Youth Ministry

I have been extremely blessed for the past few years to work with some of the best teenagers and adults in Oklahoma! Their hearts and minds are guided by the Lord Jesus and he permeates all they do. Don’t get me wrong, they aren’t perfect! Who is? But they love him and continue to grow in their faith in him. They are a beacon in our community and certainly an encouragement to me.

WEDNESDAY NIGHTS
Our teens meet together every Wednesday night in somebody’s house or in our youth room for worship, hang-out time, bible study and prayer. It seems like every Wednesday night is impactful in some way and our teens are growing right before our eyes. Too, we put it on our teens to make WNC (Wednesday Night Class) their deal and to make it successful by not only brining their friends, but by giving all they have into the class and by soaking up every ounce they can. Guess what, they have done that more than we ever expected, and we coudn’t be more proud of them for what they have done so far and for who they are becoming in Christ even in their teen years.

Our group has grown large enough that we have multiplied our large group into two more managable groups. We call our two groups: ALPHA and OMEGA. (We figure, if we need to multiply again, we have plenty of options in between!) The Alpha group consists of 7th through 9th graders, and the Omega group consists of 10th through 12th graders. Also, each group has about eight to ten adults that rotate two weeks on and two weeks off meeting with their designated group (four to five meet with each group for the first two weeks of the month; then four to five meet with each group for the second two weeks of the month), so in total we have about eighteen to twenty adults meeting with our teens monthly. This new model/structure allows more adults to be involved in our teens’ lives as we hope each teen will connect with at least one adult in a big way…in a mentoring way.

MENTORING
Some more to say about why more adults in our teen ministry…

We have realized that for too long we put too much stock in our adopted youth ministry model. For too long we expected our hired youth minister to connect with all the teens (male and female, jocks and geeks, core and fringe, etc.), run all the activities (almost be like a ”babysitter” at times), and be their spiritual mentor (as if he is a professionally trained perfect shepherd of teens!). Man, all that on a twenty-something year old fresh out of college, or at most just starting his family! That’s a lot of pressure…was a lot of pressure!

We also realized that many of our parents lost their intensely important role of the spiritual mentoring in their own families. Because of our model, parents could (without really even thinking about it) allow themselves to not only be displaced by the youth minister (truly, not that this was his fault) as their own teenager’s spiritual leader, but also could find themselves disconnected from the congregation and somewhat feeling lost and misplaced. Sure, our adopted model of youth ministy can’t be blamed fully for these family disfunctions, but it did certainly contribute.

We decided to make an intentional change in our youth ministry model: to get more adults in our teens’ lives, and to put our parents back in the spiritual mentoring driver’s seat in their own homes. We have tried to initiate a more family-based youth ministry where parents are encouraged to take an active role in all that our teens do so these parents can be the best influence they can be spiritually, physically, emotionally, and everything- else-ally possible for their own teens, and possibly in other teens’ lives as well. Have we totally reached that goal yet? Not totally, but we are getting there and trying harder all the time!

Parents, I plead with you to DEMAND TO BE THE SPIRITUAL LEADERS IN YOUR HOME! Let your church staff support you, not do it for you. No one can take your place in the lives of your own children. They need you more than anyone else in this world to help them grow in the Lord and in every other way. I know it’s not easy, I have four children myself. But we can do it with the help of the Lord and with the help of each other.

“Be strong and courageous and do not be afraid; the Lord goes with you each and everyday.”
(God to Joshua; God to you.)

LOVE AND WAR (September 2010 – August 2011)
Our theme this year is Love and War. Yeah, I know…it’s cool. We plan to work through a variety of topics concerning “love” and “war” during this school year. Here is a list to name a few:

Love in Community (To Save A Life)
Love and Purity When Dating
Courage for God
Great Warriors of the Old Testament

Here are a couple of helpful links to click on to see our shedule for this fall semester:

Please go to our youth website and learn more about the WCC Youth Group: www.WCCyouthgroup.com

I will add stuff along as we go, so check back often!

MISSION454 (September 2009 – August 2010)
Mission 454 was the great mission of our teenagers in Woodward, Oklahoma last year. We adopted this mission and it ignited fire in our spiritual bones! Our mission was easily outlined like this:

Mission 454 is what we do…

4 Major Service Projects
5 Friends to Share Christ: Understanding our own faith stories and then sharing them!
4 Spiritual Disciplines: Praying, Studying Scripture, Journal & Meditation, and Memorization

Mission 454 is also what we study…

4 Miracles of Jesus
5 Parables of Jesus
4 Great Teachings of Jesus

The following is the list of Mission 454 WNC lessons we worked through. Make as many copies as you would like and use them as much as you want in your ministry, you have my permission.

Fall 2009 Lessons

1. 4 Miracles of Jesus – Paralized Man (Mark 2)

2. 4 Miracles of Jesus – Blind Man (Mark 8 )

3. 4 Miracles of Jesus – Calms the Storm & Sea (Matthew 8 )

4. 4 Miracles of Jesus – 5,000 People Fed (Mark 6)

5. 5 Parables of Jesus – Seeds & Weeds (Matthew 13)

6. 5 Parables of Jesus – Unmerciful Servant (Matthew 18)

7. 5 Parables of Jesus – Ten Virgins (Matthew 25)

8. 5 Parables of Jesus – The Good Samaritan (Luke 10)

9. 5 Parables of Jesus – The Prodigal Son (Luke 15)

10. 4 Great Teachings of Jesus – I Am The Way (John 14)

11. 4 Great Teachings of Jesus – For God So Loved You (John 3)