a Shared Life

Previously, I blogged about Liquid: Live at Five, a curriculum that really connected with the young adults that I serve. Overall, Liquid is great curriculum–well written and practical. While I found Live at Five great for young adults, the second one that I tried, Liquid: Fork in the Road is a good curriculum, but not for young adults. The video and questions seem better suited for an older crowd, such as adults with kids in their late teens. I’d still recommend the curriculum; but I would recommend it for an older age group–not young adults. Tomorrow we’ll begin Liquid: Mirror Image. From the video and participant guide, I expect that it will really connect with the young adults.

I just got back from coffee with a few friends (20-somethings) to talk about plans for the young adults on Sunday nights. Although several of us currently go to the evening service at our church, we’re looking at doing a small group(s) in order to connect with more young adults.

We have a few small groups for our young adult ministry that meet regularly, but we could definitely use more. One thing I am certain of, especially after The Interview Project, is the need for small groups in young adult ministry. The churches we interviewed may do groups differently, but ALL of them do small groups. To effectively reach and teach young adults, groups are essential. To get some young adults connected in small groups, I’ve been asking young adults who don’t normally go weekly:

• Why don’t you go to night church? Do you like the current way (Worship, Brief Sermon and Small Groups) we do it?
• Our values in the young adult ministry are Connect, Grow, Serve and Share–what do you do to live these values on a regular basis?
• Would you go to a small group if we offered more groups?
• If you were to go to a small group for one or more of these, when would you be most likely to go? Nights? Mornings? During the day?

Most people enjoy the current format of our evening worship experience, but don’t come because they are busy, busy, busy–which is no surprise considering that Americans are VERY busy (TOO BUSY!). And in this case, a lot of them take classes, work long hours, etc. Almost everyone seems open to, and even excited about, small groups. I’m excited about some of the new ones forming now! The big question is whether everyone will actually come when the new groups start.

Essential Church?: One of my biggest passions/concerns is connecting with young adults (18-20-somethings) so they can experience God, connect with others, grow in their faith and serve others–that’s what the Interview Project has been all about. Since I love to read, I read every book and article I find that looks interesting or addresses the problems associated with working with young adults. Normally I’m not one to recommend a book before I read it, but I just stumbled upon Essential Church? and trust Thom Rainer as a researcher and author. (He  wrote Surprising Insights from the Unchurched, Breakout Churches, The Unchurched Next Door–along with the forewords to some important books like Simple Church and In Real Time).

I’m sure it’s going to be a great read and am looking forward to getting it in the mail! If you can’t wait, you can download a free copy here.

Product Description
Why do so many young adults (18 to 22) leave the church, and what will it take to bring them back? This important question is examined and duly answered in Essential Church? with his son, research expert Sam Rainer.

The book is based on a study of one-thousand so-called “church dropouts” who were interviewed about why they left. Their answers are quite surprising, having less to do with “losing their religion” and more about the desire for a community that isn’t made stale by simply maintaining the status quo.

In turn, the Rainers offer churches four concrete solutions toward making their worship community an essential part these young people’s lives again:

Simplify - develop a clear structure and process for making disciples.
Deepen - provide strong biblical teaching and preaching.
Expect - let members know the need for commitment to the congregation.
Multiply - emphasize evangelism, outward focus, and starting new churches.

About the Authors
Thom S. Rainer is president and CEO of LifeWay Christian Resources, one of the largest Christian resource companies worldwide, and the best-selling coauthor of Simple Church. Rainer and his wife, Nellie Jo, have three grown sons and live in Nashville, Tennessee.

Sam S. Rainer is a senior pastor, writer, and the president and CEO of Rainer Research. He also blogs and writes a column for Outreach magazine and lives with his wife, Erin, in Floyds Knobs, Indiana.

Wild Goose Chase: Reclaim the Adventure of Pursuing God

Nobody sets out to live a life full of regrets—never fulfilling their God-given dreams. Although a life following Jesus begins with excitement, it often becomes routine for many believers. Mark Batterson identifies the “cages” that keep people from living fully and experiencing the unpredictable adventure for which they are destined. Throughout the book, he encourages believers to pursue their God-given dreams, passions and goals—while giving practical advice to finding and discerning God’s will within those dreams and goals.

Much like his preaching, Batterson has a knack for writing in a thoughtful, clear, entertaining style. He authors a narrative filled with real life examples of people chasing the Wild Goose, living Continue reading »

Mike proudly showed me his favicon on Friday, so I immediately went and added one to our church’s website. (Before this, I hadn’t really given it much thought.) And, of course, I had to add one here too, but there were a few steps that weren’t as easy as they first seemed. but, as you’ll see, it’s not that hard. Continue reading »

Sunday School at Dunkin’ Donuts the last couple of weeks has been fun–and a nice break for the summer. Along with the funny things that happen–like spilling iced coffee everywhere-the times of talking have felt more genuine. In a classroom setting, it’s a struggle to make meaningful eye-contact with everyone. There is a certain intimacy around small tables while sipping iced coffee and eating donuts and breakfast sandwiches that is not easily duplicated in a classroom. We also run into other people while Continue reading »

Finding good, well-written, easy to follow, creative curriculum is always a challenge. When involved in youth ministry, there were many options, but I rarely found material I really liked. I often bought material and spent as much time modifying it as it would take to write my own!

Good resources for young adults were scarce when I first began working with this age group. As churches in America begin to address the obvious disconnect with younger generations, finding material for young adults has become easier; but Continue reading »

We’ve been doing a young adults (18-35) Sunday School class almost since we started the young adults ministry here. But, we’ve been wanting to try something new for a while, so we’re taking it off campus–to Dunkin’ Donuts. Tomorrow morning will be the first trial of this, so we’ll know more in the morning. I’m excited.

Things I’m wondering…

How much will the change in location change the nature of what we we talk about?

How will the social dynamics change outside of “class”?

Will new people feel more or less comfortable coming?

Will it help young adults be consciously aware of how “church” integrates with their “real” lives?

Will I have to buy everyone breakfast tomorrow?

UPDATE: So far the experiment of having class off-site has been fun. People are much more talkative outside of a “classroom” setting–and it feels more “real” in some way. We also run into other people we know while off-site–but not many young adults. We haven’t had any new people so far, so I’ll have to update everyone on that later. The downside is that time constraints are defintely tighter and I am spending a lot more $ at Dunkin’ Donuts than I am used to spending…

As I’ve mentioned before, I love technology, but I’m not a programmer, but I can get by with some help from friends, good problem solving skills and Google. So, I love when I find technology that makes my life simpler, but doesn’t take me hours to set up.

My desk is normally covered in papers and post it notes. I try to carry my pda with me at all times, because I often need to write down appointments, tasks or notes. Inevitably, I find myself without paper, pen or pda. I used to leave myself voicemail or text myself, until I found Jott. In order to Jott

1. Set up a profile on Jott.com
2. Call their number, when the prompt asks, “who do you want to Jott?”, reply “myself”
3. Leave yourself a voicemail and hang up

Jott then transcribes your voicemail and emails it to you. If the transcription isn’t right or deosn’t make sense, simply click on it to listen to the audio. You can also Jott other people who you define in your address book and many other services–including Twitter, Wordpress, Amazon, etc. When it beta, everything was free. Now, for a fee, other services such as Google Calendar, Vitalist, Remember the Milk, etc. can also be used. For a complete list of applications/links, check out Jott’s getting started link.

Jott Express is a nice addition to Jott. It allows users to sync and organize their Jott’s offline. Since I jott a lot, it makes it easy to maintain multiple Jott “to do” lists.

Jott for iPhone allows iPhone users to use their iPhone like a voice recorder and access their Jott’s, which are synced with Jott while online. Of course, I don’t have an oPhone and have to settle for iPhone envy…

Frontline is one of my favorite places to go. There’s something contagious about stepping into a ministry that has literally thousands of young adults coming every Sunday night. The energy is tangible, the music is awesome and the preaching is deep, Biblical and relevant. To make things even better, they do a great job of connecting young adults into a community to help them grow and sending them out to missions within a couple of years of being there. If you do young adult ministry or are a young adult living near Washington DC, you’ve got to check these guys out. And, you can check them out online through their virtual campus if you can’t make it in person.

RECAP: We’re traveling around to churches recommended to us who connect with young adults (18-20something/30ish), checking out what they’re doing, interviewing the about their preaching (for a paper) and other things that God’s doing where they are. Continue reading »