Last week SYP wrapped up a month long night of fighting against the evil purple. Well, technically the story was 6 weeks long but only because I put an introduction in January and the dénouement in March, but those weren't really integral to the story line. Anyways, I'm mapping out another story line, which I could have written an introduction for, but I wanted to talk about SYP for a bit. I want SYP to evolve into something for more than just myself. Right now I am writing this to burn off some stress. SYP gets to confront issues that I can't. Like taking on purple directly. I'm sure anyone that has worked with Youth wished purple would take a physical form so you could take it out directly. In reality you have to deal with a lot of garbage because you can't confront the problem the way SYP did. In the next story arc SYP has to deal with some grumpy deacons because of what happened at the lock-in. I'm sure that I would have something like this going on if we had a lock-in melt down like that, but the story is based on my own reality more than the natural extension of the last story. Youth has been growing and the people coming don't seem to have much church back ground. They act like you would expect and that is perfectly fine with me. I am working on teaching them but God is the only one that can change them and only when they let Him. Last Wednesday there was a group of brand new students that was run off by a well meaning grumpy old man. They were on their skate boards in the parking lot (which is a touchy issue right now) and I had to talk to them about toning it down because they were really pushing the edge of reason when they first arrived. They had calmed down quite a bit when this guy walks out and gripes them out. They had come with another group of skateboarders that have been coming for a while and when they got yelled at they tried to get the other group to leave with them. The group that had been coming stayed but the new group split. This well meaning grumpy old man ran off 6 kids that needed to hear the gospel over skate boarding. That kind of thing really makes me mad. I hope these kids come back but they may never consider it because of the way they were received. This is the place that I am in right now and so SYP will be harsh with the grumpy deacons. I will say that this is not a reflection on the deacons at my church. They are pretty awesome and have supported a lot of my anti-establishment kinda thinking and actions. After dealing with the grumpy deacons SYP will have to fight Apathy, which will also take physical form. The Youth group will swell from less than 100 to over 200 (what do you expect after that lock-in) but SYP won't be able to get the volunteers because of Apathy. This is also a huge problem I am facing. A couple months ago we were running 15-20 and now we are running 30-50 in a given week. If everyone showed up at the same time we would have about 70 students and I only have 5 reliable adults including myself right now. I need help in several areas but can't seem to get through to the people in church. I'm about to go into the highways and byways like the servants in the parable of the Master's feast. Like I said before, I really want SYP to be a fun vent for others as well. I know a lot of people that read my blog are in ministry of some kind and so share in ministry frustrations. What kinds of things would you like to see SYP battle in the future? What are you going through right now? Do you relate to some of the issues I've been facing and have ideas you think I should try or SYP should try?
Saturday, March 14, 2009
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
Posts
3 comments:
Wish I could help with the story arc, but I'm not so creative.
In real life however, have you considered talking to your pastor about blocking off a particular section of parking lot for the kids?
actually we have a part of the parking lot for them. They have a basket ball court and room to throw a football and skateboard so long as they aren't going crazy. The biggest problem with the skate boarding is that insurance doesn't cover "extreme sports." I tell them this and that they are skating at their own risk and not as part of the church, liability release, blah blah blah. The old guy in question means well but ... I guess I have a real problem with running anyone off.
My husband and I headed up our youth group for about a year while we were looking for a new youth leader. This is what we did and it worked really well, for our Sunday night activities.
We had a total of 4 couples to work with as leaders. We had the youth sign up to be part of a ministry team and paired them up with one of the couples. Then we assigned each group a Sunday to be in charge of. They planned the games or activities and devotion or message and food or snacks.It worked out well for the leaders because they did not have to be there every week, but we always had at least two couples each week. And most importantly it got the youth involved, gave them a sense of ownership to their youth program. We averaged about 35-45 on any given Sunday. Another bonus was the planning groups almost operated as a small group type group. So you really connected with the youth in your group. Connie
Post a Comment