Take Time to Talk
Tonight, we're doing something different.
Instead of a pre-planned game and a carefully constructed youth lesson, we're going to kick back, eat some pizza and just talk. No agenda. No prepared topic we're attempting to land on. Just adults, teens, food and conversation.
Every once in a while in youth ministry, it's great to just pause on the talks and the lesson plans and let students drive the discussion. Tonight is about putting students in the driver's seat and steering the conversation.
I have no idea where it will go. I don't know what topics we'll cover. I don't have a clue as to the theological points we'll wander upon. It's exciting.
Every once in a while I do this with my youth group. I call it "Brown-Table Discussions" because I don't have any round tables and all the tables we do have are brown. It's a way for us to talk about our faith and our lives and how those two things connect. It's a free-form discussion driven by students.
In many ways, it's similar to what the early church did in Acts.
"Every day they continued to meet together in the temple courts. They broke bread in their homes and ate together with glad and sincere hearts, praising God and enjoying the favor of all the people. And the Lord added to their number daily those who were being saved." - Acts 2:46-47 (NIV)
The early believers in Acts shared meals and conversations. Those conversations inevitably dealt with their new faith in Christ. By talking and sharing, they grew in their relationships with one another, as did their faith.
As believers, we need to have many more of these types of conversations. We need to converse with other believers about our lives and our faith. Too often, we try to sanitize our conversations with other believers. We try to make ourselves look smarter or better or less of a sinner. We need more spontaneous nights where no topic is off-limit and as a group, we encounter Christ through our questions and discussion.
Tonight, in youth, we'll attempt that very experiment. Maybe you should too.
Instead of a pre-planned game and a carefully constructed youth lesson, we're going to kick back, eat some pizza and just talk. No agenda. No prepared topic we're attempting to land on. Just adults, teens, food and conversation.
Every once in a while in youth ministry, it's great to just pause on the talks and the lesson plans and let students drive the discussion. Tonight is about putting students in the driver's seat and steering the conversation.
I have no idea where it will go. I don't know what topics we'll cover. I don't have a clue as to the theological points we'll wander upon. It's exciting.
Every once in a while I do this with my youth group. I call it "Brown-Table Discussions" because I don't have any round tables and all the tables we do have are brown. It's a way for us to talk about our faith and our lives and how those two things connect. It's a free-form discussion driven by students.
In many ways, it's similar to what the early church did in Acts.
"Every day they continued to meet together in the temple courts. They broke bread in their homes and ate together with glad and sincere hearts, praising God and enjoying the favor of all the people. And the Lord added to their number daily those who were being saved." - Acts 2:46-47 (NIV)
The early believers in Acts shared meals and conversations. Those conversations inevitably dealt with their new faith in Christ. By talking and sharing, they grew in their relationships with one another, as did their faith.
As believers, we need to have many more of these types of conversations. We need to converse with other believers about our lives and our faith. Too often, we try to sanitize our conversations with other believers. We try to make ourselves look smarter or better or less of a sinner. We need more spontaneous nights where no topic is off-limit and as a group, we encounter Christ through our questions and discussion.
Tonight, in youth, we'll attempt that very experiment. Maybe you should too.
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