SwitchOver was an event that we held this weekend for our preteens. It was an absolute blast!! I have been dreaming of an event like this for some time now and we finally were able to pull it off.
Here is the summary of the event. Continue Reading…
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Preteen Ministry Sleepover – The SwitchOver
Guest Post by Nick Diliberto: Leading Preteens to Pray – Part 2
pic from calvarycobb
Here is another great post from Nick. Nick Diliberto is the creator of PreteenMinistry.net, which provides creative curriculum and resources for preteen ministry. He is the preteen columnist for Children’s Ministry Magazine and Children’s/Family Pastor at Seven San Diego Church.
If you missed part 1 of Leading Preteens to Pray, then be sure to read it. In today’s faced paced world, how can you lead preteens to pray?
Here are two more things to emphasize:
Third, prayer is the activity that changes the outcome of events.
Preteens face tough issues: broken homes, bullies, stress at school, an overloaded schedule and more. They need to know that God has the power to change all those things! His power is released when they pray. God always answers prayers. Continue Reading…
FLYTE: Preteen Curriculum Review
FLYTE a curriculum from Lifeway designed specifically for preteens showed up at my door a few months ago. I was pumped. I got a sample to review and I was pleasantly surprised.
First of all. The look and feel and sound of this stuff is amazing. I think they really nailed the age group. Here is an example of FLYTE’s video work:
Preteen Parent Panel
We hosted a Parent Panel for our tweens on Sunday. It was a great close to our series called “How to Annoy your Family”, which we adapted from Simply Youth Ministry’s series.
It was such a cool thing for the parents to see Switch and participate in the discussions.
I decided to do a parent panel for a few reasons:
Guest Post: Leading Preteens to Pray pt. 1 by Nick Diliberto
I’m pumped to be bringing some guest posts from Nick! Nick Diliberto is the creator of PreteenMinistry.net, which provides creative curriculum and resources for preteen ministry. He is the preteen columnist for Children’s Ministry Magazine and Children’s/Family Pastor at Seven San Diego Church. He’s such an awesome voice in preteen ministry and I can’t wait for you to read what he’s prepared for this guest post…. check it out:
LEADING PRETEENS TO PRAY: PART 1
Preteens are bombarded with activities that compete for their time. Online games, Wii, homework, baseball, friends and a list of about hundred other things compete for their attention. MY ten year old has a tough time just sitting in the car without having something to engage with. My iPhone (I let him play games on it sometimes) and his iPad are his two favorites. The average preteen would agree that prayer is important, but most likely doesn’t fit much of it in their daily routine. Especially when so many other things are screaming for their attention attention.
So, how do you lead preteens to pray in today’s fast paced world? Here are a few things to emphasize:
First, prayer is something you get to do, not have to do.
Preteens often think prayer is a religious activity that isn’t very fun or interesting. Praying is often viewed like a chore: taking out the garbage or doing the dishes. It isn’t fun or exciting, but necessary. Emphasize that prayer can be one of the most exciting activities of their lives! After all, they can experience God do amazing things in and through them when praying. Paint the picture that prayer can be even more exciting than playing online games or hanging out with friends.
Second, prayer deepens your relationship with God.
We all crave a deep personal relationship with God. It’s what we’re searching for deep down. Preteens feel this need as well. They are old enough to recognize and make choices to take step towards God. They, like the rest of us, try to fill it will other things like: popularity, looking good, getting stuff, etc. But these things are empty and never truly fill the need. But when their prayer life is strong, their friendship with God deepens. Preteens are in transition from childhood to adolescence. They’re not kids anymore nor are they teenagers. They’re preteens. Preteens want to own their faith in Jesus independently of their parents. Helping them to see that prayer deepens their friendship with God is one way to help them own their faith in Jesus.
Next week we’ll take a look at two more things to emphasize when you’re leading preteens to pray. Be sure to come back for more.
The Plateau
pic from Panoramas
When it comes to ministry, this picture is a scary one. It’s a picture of a plateau. A beautiful piece of God’s creation, but not really what you want if you are the leader of any ministry or business entity. Because this image represents lack of growth.
It might only be for a season, but this is something that in no way is something that I look forward to experiencing. In fact it scares me. But it’s also something that you must learn to embrace for a season.
Monday Morning Recap
Started a New Series this week in Switch.
Series from Simply Youth Ministry. Graphic done in house
Week 1. Understanding the Why of Family
Meat (Teaching):
We Explained the Purpose of Families and specifically the role of kids in the family
Sides (Extras):
Two main illustrations.
Talked about Developmental Delays and the roles parents play in the development of children at even a young age.
Also played a bit of charades with 3 different contestants having the same instructions. A fun way to get some “less than ok with sitting still” kids to get up make us laugh. Then we talked about how just like you don’t get to choose instructions with Charades you don’t get to choose your parents, but it’s all about what you make of it.
You can’t control your parents, but you can control your attitude.
Dessert (Extras):
Played BandAid face. Fun game to play students versus adults. Also had a fun intro video.
Save money as a Youth Pastor
Gotta Do whatcha Gotta Do
So last weekend, my Jeep’s driver side window wouldn’t roll up. It’s been a few weeks of crazy stuff happening in our lives and our cars haven’t helped. We’ve had plenty of car trouble in the past. We know that it’s only a season, but sometimes these problems just seem to pile up. Not to mention, you are a youth pastor. It’s not like you are in this thing for the money. So I thought I would give you some insight into some things that I use pretty regularly to help with some problems with cars and appliances in your home to save you a few bucks.
I used some of these to fix my power window that wouldn’t roll up as well. Saved me about $200-$300 by DIY instead of taking it to a shop.
Check out these resources: Continue Reading…
Why – When Tweens ask questions
Last night at our Switch C-Groups I let my 6th grade boys know that we would be talking about some questions that they had over the next few weeks. These questions are about faith, the Bible, God, and Jesus. So it will be a good opportunity to ask and see if we can figure some things out together.
Tweens are beginning to be at the point where they want to see if there faith is real and also they want to begin to make their own decisions. With all that is going on in the adolescent brain, it’s a wonder they don’t just burst into these questions all the time. Providing an environment where our preteen students can feel safe asking questions about faith is essential.
But I was still surprised by the interest of the boys when I let them know we would be questioning some things. They were so pumped and interested. In fact one of our students was ready to go from the onset of me saying that questions were welcome. His question:
How can we trust the Bible is real and not some children’s book from long ago?
I love the authenticity that this question brings to light. This particular student has been asking questions for the last 2 years. He wants to know, but also has asked some people that have a different worldview than ours. It’s important to embrace the fact that this student wants to know that his faith can be trusted and that he can test it. So we talked about that for a little while last night and then we talked about Baptism.
But why open it up? Aren’t you going to receive a ton of stuff that these preteens have probably never heard before?
When it comes to tweens and questions, try to remember a few things:
- Questions produce a stronger faith. There should be no reason that faith can’t be questioned. And a quote that I pulled from Faith and Doubt by John Ortberg is this: Faith which does not doubt is dead faith.—Miguel de Unamuno
- Widen the Circle - We want to add to the number of influencers in our students’ lives. Who is helping you answer your preteen’s questions? (Small Group Leader, Teacher, Other parent, etc.)
- Validate their questions. If we don’t someone will.
- Model a challenging faith. A faith modeled is better than a faith known. Model trumps knowledge. Show your kids how faith is real.
- Pray for your preteen to pursue Christ rather than just knowledge. I believe that knowledge can lead to some faith reformation, but not always. Pray for your student’s heart and their pursuit of God.
So when your tween asks questions about faith, try not to jump off a bridge. It’s part of what’s happening in their brain development and body development. Also get up to speed on some of their questions and try to answer some of them together by looking for truth. There are a ton of great resources out there at your disposal.
What types of questions are your preteens asking?
Monday Morning Recap
image from stufficanuse.com
This week in Switch was our 3rd week in our 4 week series called “Open Skies”. This week we focused on teaching our tweens that Prayer leads to action.
Meat (the teaching):
Constant and Consistent prayer life leads to God changing our hearts and minds (Rom. 12:2). This will build pressure to act on those things that we pray about.
Sides (Key Illustrations):
We talked about how popcorn works using this video:
We used this video to illustrate how our prayer life builds pressure much like the moisture in popcorn and the “pop” results in action. We must continue to press into God with time in prayer. Our job is to make ourselves available for God to change our hearts and move us to action.
Dessert (extras):
Played the Impossible Shot again. A student almost made it this week. It’s always a blast.
We also had a student that prayed it would quit raining. After his small group prayed the rain stopped. It was funny to hear him say “It actually stopped raining, how amazing is that!!” Other students were upset that it stopped raining and I had a good time letting them know that they should have prayed about that.
Next up:
Trying to decide between unanswered prayer and Pray like Jesus. Should be fun.
