Tag: youth ministry

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Rice Rally // 20th August 2011

RICE Rally is back again this coming Saturday. God has brought many young people to himself through this ministry over the last 10 years. I wasn’t able to make it last year, so I’m looking forward to joining in the action again this year.

Still deciding whether to take your crew along? Do it. It will be epic. Check out the website for some rad promo vids, tickets and any more info.

Blog readers – pray for this sucker! Pray that 100’s of peeps will put their trust in Jesus’ death for their sin and resurrection to new life. Pray that God would keep using youth ministry to change the world.

Click here to check out all my previous RICE blog posts.

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UNASHAMED // 19th August 2011

I’m noticing around Sydney lots of Youth Ministries getting together with others in their region. This is really cool. Some great momentum is being gained at the grass roots level that is helping to fuel discipleship and evangelism among teenagers. Here on the Northern Beaches we have a combined youth event coming up on August 19: UNASHAMED.

Historically combined events have happened on the beaches, but it’s been a few years. There are a bunch of youth pastors who get together every couple of months to hang out, encourage and pray. And last year a local leadership training event began that continued again this year. There seems to be some good momentum.

It felt like the time was right to try and do something together. We should get 250-300 young people this Friday. My hope is that the event will encourage Christian teenagers to be unashamed to follow Jesus on the Northern Beaches, and that those that aren’t already following Jesus will be challenged to consider following Him.

We’ve got Ross Ciano speaking and the band from St Paul’s Castle Hill leading the music. If you’re local – come along! If you’re not, we’d value your prayers.

Are you doing some grass roots combined youth events in your area? What works well? What lessons have you learnt? What value does it add to your own ministry?

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GOD HAS COME // Soulies Teaching Plan

The latest series at SOULIES is called GOD HAS COME. We will be studying the first 3 chapters of John’s Gospel. I thought it might be useful to share some of the strategy in how we are approaching the teaching at SOULIES this term. (Props to creationswap for art)

  • It’s from a gospel – any book of the bible would have been good! But, I’m keen to give a more evangelistic edge to our Friday night talks. The gospels are easy to do that because Jesus is speaking and when he’s not it’s about him.
  • Manageable chunks – rather than 3 chapters at a time we’re looking at approx 1/2 a chapter per week.
  • Junior and Senior Crew are doing the same series – this may not be the pattern forever, however, I’ve been trying to create an identity larger than just the junior group or senior group by themselves. Even if we’re in two locations, the same series helps us to identify with that larger youth community.
  • Soulies Small Groups are studying the same section – this helps to create continuity between Friday night and our Sunday small groups. While I value the principle of having leaders write their own studies, I’m also aware that that’s a big job! So I hope that having the series written will be a good service and model to small group leaders.
  • We are producing the ‘DAILY BIBLE JOURNAL‘ – this is a small booklet that encourages young punks to spend 5 minutes a day in the Bible. It includes: daily reading notes, sermon notes space and Bible study. It seemed to be received well on Friday and Sunday. I’m praying it will help to develop a hunger for the Word among our community.
  • There’s an Online component – I’m keen to use new media to encourage people to dig into the Bible. So each week, we will have a Sunday (no later than Monday) blog post with a video intro for the week’s readings as well as the daily reading notes and a link to an online Bible. I hope that this helps more people to participate.

See this blog post for a copy of the Daily Bible Journey.

See below for the first Bible intro, as well as our bumper vid

Continue reading “GOD HAS COME // Soulies Teaching Plan”

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Hunger for the WORD + Pray for the WORLD

SOULIES UNDERGROUND is on this Friday night. As I’ve learnt more about the persecuted church, I’ve been struck by the hunger for the Word of God of underground/secret church members. So SOULIES UNDERGROUND will be an opportunity to be BOUND WITH our brothers and sisters in the persecuted church by learn from their hunger for the Word and also spend time praying for them and for our world. We’ll be looking at Romans 8.

If you’re not part of our youth community, you’re more than welcome to join us online!

We’ve just launched www.souliesunderground.com which will include a live video stream and the opportunity to interact via twitter and facebook. Check it out for details.

Why broadcast it online? There probably aren’t many ‘real’ underground churches broadcasting their gatherings via webcam!!

Here are 3 reasons:

  1. I first read about running an event like this in David Platt’s book Radical. And then Secret Church was simulcast to over 50,000 people around the world in April this year. Our aims are smaller scale, but I like the idea and that leads to point 2…
  2. The technology is fairly straightforward. Livestream is free. LIVE THEME is relatively cheap and easy to customise. And it’s brilliant! (Affiliate link)
  3. If a few more people can be encouraged from God’s Word (in Romans 8 ) and spend some time praying for the persecuted church, then why not?! I’m keen to keep leveraging new technology for good things. I think this is a good thing.
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National Youth Ministry Convention 2011

NYMC is back for 2011. It’s a youth ministry conference held every two years in Australia. Here are my blog posts from the 2007 event (I couldn’t make it in 2009). It has speakers and participants from a spectrum of different youth ministries and theological camps. I think it’s a valuable conference and would encourage you to come along and join in the conversation! Register by June 30 for the early bird spesh.

I’ll be running an elective and a professional development seminar. Details below…
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Sharing Your Faith in a Dangerous Place

I’m so encouraged by the work of Thirteen Three. They’re the youth arm of Voice of the Martyrs Australia. (You can see some of my previous posts related to 13:3 under the ‘persecution’ tag). Brad Konemann is doing an amazing job at encouraging youth ministries to stand with and be encouraged by our persecuted brothers and sisters around the world. I’m personally looking forward to working closely with Brad on some upcoming projects. More info coming soon.

In the meantime, I want to encourage any youth ministers within an achievable distance of Western Sydney or Sutherland Shire to take your group along to Thirteen Three’s two upcoming June events. I’m guessing you’re finalising your term 2 program now – so make sure you leave some room for this event!! I believe that under God it will have a profound impact on your youth community.

Here’s some deets:

Thirteen Three is bringing out Pastor Victor, an international youth speaker and frontline evangelist with a dangerous, covert ministry to Muslims in Malaysia!

Are you nervous about sharing your faith?

This event is for you! Thirteen Three is helping to equip Australian youth to share their faith in their local communities. Learn from ordinary Christians who speak up for Jesus even if it means being beaten or going to jail and be BOUND WITH THEM as an everyday part of following Jesus.

Save these dates now!

Western Sydney
7PM Friday 17 June 2011
MBM Rooty Hill
20 Westminster Street
Rooty Hill NSW

The Shire
7PM Friday 24 June 2011
Menai Anglican Church
Broughton Place
Barden Ridge NSW

You don’t want to miss this unique opportunity to meet a persecuted Christian firsthand and to be challenged to live out Hebrews 13:3!

Check out the website for more details and some resources to help you promote the event.

Also, see below the jump for highlights vid from last year’s event:

Continue reading “Sharing Your Faith in a Dangerous Place”

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Youth Ministry Papers: Small Groups Part 1

I’m planning on producing a youth ministry training paper most Wednesday’s throughout the year. These papers will be discussed at our Soulies weekly leaders meeting. Anyone is welcome to interact in the comments. Click here to access archive.

The Aim of Soulies Small Groups

Soulies comes in 3 handy sized packages: Large (Soulies United yr 7-12); Medium (Soulies Junior Crew yr 7-9 + Soulies Senior Crew yr10-12); and Small (Soulies Small Groups). How do we roll at Soulies? Whether we’re small, medium or large, we want to be a community who: Love Jesus; Love Jesus’ People; Love Jesus’ World. Small Groups are an amazing opportunity for young punks to grow in their 3 loves. The medium and large gatherings are great, but so much can be done in smaller intimate groups! Our small groups are: an opportunity to grow in our worship and discipleship of Jesus; a great chance to actively serve and love fellow brothers and sisters; and encourage each other to love Jesus’ world through evangelism and social justice.

Our Small Groups Aren’t “Bible Studies”

…but we do study the Bible! While spending time studying the Bible is at the heart of what we do together, it’s not all that we do. God’s Word is “useful for teaching, rebuking, correcting and training in righteousness, so that the man of God may be thoroughly equipped for every good work” (2 Tim 3:16-17 NIV) – so we want to let God’s Spirit do His work as we study the Bible. But we also want to make sure that our small group time is not just an academic exercise. So there are 3 others things we want to be doing regularly: SHARING, SUPPLICATING, SOCIALISING.

Continue reading “Youth Ministry Papers: Small Groups Part 1”