I've talked to a few people about yesterday's news and I have to admit, I was too excited to post things in order... I had meant to "set up" that news by presenting the vision that I've been talking to others about and praying about for youth ministry in this area first, and then talk about how it was coming to be, but - yeah, anyway. So here is the post that should have come first:
When I moved to Corpus Christi, I tried to hook into such a group, but couldn't find one. At a "See You At The Pole" event, I met the youth minister at a small Methodist just down the street from us. We got to talking about this group, and decided that we would just start one up. We called several youth ministers in the area and started meeting with them. One of the bigger Baptist churches in the area had already planned a Disciple Now weekend and invited us to join them for their worship and speaker. So, we had about 4 churches and probably 60 kids at Disciple Now. It was very cool.
Some of you who have followed the ministry that Robyn and I have been doing for the last decade or so may remember WAY back when we were still in Plano, the youth group at Christ Church, Plano used to do a Disciple Now event every year. This wouldn't be such a big deal really, except we did it in conjunction with several other churches in the area as well. Each church did their own small groups over the weekend, but on Saturday night, we all got together for a big rally or concert or something - all of us together - worshipping and praying. It was a very cool thing. We even had the OC Supertones one year. (it was my first Christian concert) That was the "public" aspect of a group of youth ministers who met regularly and prayed for each other and helped each other out. It was a very cool ministry.
When I moved to Corpus Christi, I tried to hook into such a group, but couldn't find one. At a "See You At The Pole" event, I met the youth minister at a small Methodist just down the street from us. We got to talking about this group, and decided that we would just start one up. We called several youth ministers in the area and started meeting with them. One of the bigger Baptist churches in the area had already planned a Disciple Now weekend and invited us to join them for their worship and speaker. So, we had about 4 churches and probably 60 kids at Disciple Now. It was very cool. |
| Tommy getting "Undignified" during worship! |
When DNow was over, we decided that it was too good to only do once a year, so we planned another event in a couple of months where our churches would get together and just do youth group - just a much larger scale. One church was in charge of food, one did worship, one preaching, and one in charge of games. We started going around to churches all over our area and inviting those churches to join us. We especially focused on churches who did not have a youth minister on staff. We wanted to give something to the community and to those churches, who had kids, but no real program, something to come to - FREE.
The event, called "Common Ground" worked very well. We ended up doing several Common Ground events. The last one we did had over 20 churches involved and over 300 kids showed up. It was fantastic!
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| Common Ground Sept. 2003 with special guests - Fusco! |
When we moved to Houston, however, we couldn't get anyone to do anything with us. No one wanted to cross denominational boundaries for anything. I had one youth pastor tell me "I'll do any event with any Episcopal Church in Houston, but I will never do any event with a Baptist Church." It was disheartening. Our youth did end up getting very involved with the diocese, our province and even the church at a national level, but we couldn't seem to get anything going with the churches right in our neighborhood.
When we first moved to Denison, I talked to a few youth ministers that liked the idea of getting together, but we never really got around to it.
Now, it is one of my priorities. I've met with two groups of pastors (one in Pottsboro and one in Sherman) and I'm going to continue to meet and pray with them, developing relationships. I've also sent out emails to every youth minister I could find online. I've gotten back 5 solid responses (out of about 30) but 5 is a great start. We've already planned a couple of events together.
My goal is for all of us to work together to reach every kid in our area. Working alone is great, and developing those close relationships with our youth is vital, but I feel like if we have to work together and get out of our little sandboxes in order to effectively reach as many youth as possible.
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