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Weekly Resources, Ideas and Articles from The Source for Youth Ministry Tuesday, April 29, 2008
Fun Ideas Youth Groups Can Do for Graduating Seniors and 8th Graders As the end of the school year approaches, many of us are looking for some fresh ideas of how we can do something special for our graduates. As our seniors leave the group or our 8th graders move on, let's make it memorable! You know our team here at THE SOURCE loves to regularly provide you with free youth ministry ideas. That's why last year we asked our EZINE subscribers for their best graduation ideas in the form of a little contest. We're posting many of the individual elements we liked, the top five ideas, and a few honorable mentions below. Even though you might not use these exact ideas, I think they'll get your gears turning. INDIVIDUAL ELEMENTS WE LIKED It was amazing to see all the fun and creative ideas that came in. Many had similar elements. Some of the basic ideas for ceremonies included the following components:
Out of all the ideas, a select few stood out to our team at THE SOURCE. The following five are our top picks: #1- Senior Night... and Then Some Submitted by Leo Barnes, Christ Community Church, Zion, IL JONATHAN'S NOTE: Although we had many people submit ideas about "graduation ceremonies" of some sort, Leo had some very distinctive elements that we loved (for example, bringing the college kids in for a unique portion of the ceremony and the freshman kidnapping). Thanks for the great ideas Leo! Every year we do the following for our graduating seniors and 8th graders: In Church: On the Sunday before graduation we bring all of our graduating seniors to the front and I give a short (2-3 minute) talk, followed by a name by name recognition of each senior. As they leave the stage they always receive a book from our pastoral staff, this year it will be Lee Strobel's "The Case for Christ." In Youth Group: That same evening we bill our youth group event as Senior Night. We project a slide show of pictures of the seniors from as many years back during their youth group time as we can. Inevitably, the non-seniors appear in the shots as well and it becomes a great time of looking back and reminiscing. Then, in place of a message from me that evening, we have the seniors all sit at the front of the room and let everyone else share their favorite memories of the seniors. We get a mix of "most embarrassing" stories and genuine encouragement from underclassmen about how some of the seniors have shaped their walk with Christ. We then give every senior a chance to share a piece of advice with the underclassmen. We as staff are always amazed by some of the things we hear/find out that night. Then we take the underclassmen out of the room for an activity and bring in current college students who graduated from our youth group and have them talk with the seniors about the challenges of being a Christian in various college environments. We get more positive feedback from this night than any other night of the year. Freshman Kidnapping: One of the final tasks of our seniors is to assist with our annual Freshman Kidnapping. With permission from parents, our high school students show up at the homes of our graduating 8th graders at about 7:00 AM on a Saturday morning and pull them out of bed "as is," with some obvious provisions for modesty of course. They then take them out to a local restaurant where our staff are waiting and the church treats them to breakfast. Students talk about their kidnapping experiences for years to come. Once the kidnapping has occurred, the 8th graders are then an official part of the high school youth group.
 Yesterday Jonathan's Blog provided a great discussion piece that we can use to springboard conversation with kids this week (including small group questions and a scripture). Check it out. Seeing Much More of Miley Miley is regretting her decision big time. But haven't we all regretted decisions at one time or another? That's why this is a great opportunity to discuss decision-making with our kids. (Note: I've included discussion questions with a scripture passage below) Here's the skinny: Last week I was surprised by an email from a blog subscriber telling me that Miley had just taken some shots of herself in her underwear and one shot of herself pulling her shirt down exposing her green bra. I didn't post anything because there was some debate as to whether it was truly Miley or not. No statement was issued. Well... this morning a new set of photos have emerged... and it's no secret. Associated Press spells it out:
Miley Cyrus is taking issue with a photo of herself that's going around, and it's not another amateur,
truth-or-dare Internet snapshot - it's the handiwork of Annie Leibovitz.
The picture doesn't show any nudity, but it shows the shirtless Miley covering her front with a blanket and
showing her bare back to the camera. Even though this picture isn't pornographic, it disturbed Disney and Miley
enough that they both issued statements. And most people agree that Miley had been duped so Vanity Fair
can just sell magazines."I took part in a photo shoot that was supposed to be 'artistic' and now, seeing the photographs and reading the story, I feel so embarrassed," Cyrus said Sunday in a statement through her publicist. "I never intended for any of this to happen and I apologize to my fans who I care so deeply about." The photos, appearing in the upcoming issue of Vanity Fair, were taken by Leibovitz, a renowned celebrity photographer whose edgy, silver-toned portraits have included subjects such as Angelina Jolie, Scarlett Johansson and a naked, pregnant Demi Moore. Obviously this makes me sad. Miley is one of the few superstars that I've felt pretty good about my kids watching and listening to. She seems to have a faith (I've blogged on that before), although I've never heard her talk too specifically about it (Remember people, just because she said "I want to thank my Lord and Savior Jesus Christ" at the recent awards, that doesn't mean anything. Don't ask me to list the people who have said those exact words receiving awards). But, as I've mentioned in a previous blog about Miley, her parents are once again proving to demonstrate questionable judgment. THOUGHT FOR DISCUSSION WITH OUR KIDS: So what can we as youth workers and parents do about this? I think that this issue like many issues is a jumpstarter to dialogues with our kids about decision making. I'd use this statement from Cyrus in the Associated Press article:
"I think it's really artsy," she told the magazine at the time. "It wasn't in a skanky way. Annie took, like, a
beautiful shot, and I thought that was really cool. That's what she wanted me to do, and you can't say no to Annie."
CNN
expands on this:
And you can't say no to Annie. She's so cute. She gets this puppy dog look and you're like, 'O.K.'"
then this...
"I took part in a photo shoot that was supposed to be 'artistic' and now, seeing the photographs and reading
the story, I feel so embarrassed," Cyrus said Sunday in a statement through her publicist. "I never intended
for any of this to happen and I apologize to my fans who I care so deeply about."
Then I'd ask our kids:
Jonathan McKee is president of The Source for Youth Ministry and author of numerous youth ministry books like
"Do They Run When They See You Coming?" and
"Getting Students to Show Up." Jonathan studies youth
culture and trends, speaking and
training across the country and providing free online
resources, training, & ideas for youth workers at
www.TheSource4YM.com
In this episode Jonathan & Furby get together for a fun but informational time discussing understanding our
youth culture and the media, dealing with problem kids, talking with kids about sex and relationships... and
then they answer some questions from you in the field.
THE SOURCE4YM PODCAST, EPISODE #14 JONATHAN: Sin #3. This sin is when you immerse yourself in today's culture-when you absolutely submerge yourself. I always tell people, "I think you should understand it... dabble to understand, but don't immerse yourself in it." ...I mean, I teach this to my kids: this stuff affects us! Guess what? It affects us as adults too. And if we immerse ourselves in this stuff, and we're like, "Yeah! I just gotta stay current with youth culture. That's why I watch MTV for two hours a day! Hey wait! ‘Tila Tequila' is on! I can't miss that!" FURBY: Ha ha. "I just gotta know my kids." JONATHAN: Yeah! I just gotta know my kids... But the fact is, there's a lot of us that... use it as an excuse, to allow some of this stuff into our life. FURBY: Totally. JONATHAN: I'm just saying, that's a sin. We cannot allow this stuff into our lives... I'll just be honest. In a society where addiction to pornography is a reality, and stuff like that, I don't go on MySpace unless my wife is in the room. And my wife and I work in the same office, we got chairs across from each other, and I'm like, "Hey, Lori! I'm gonna get on MySpace." Because you know why? You know that you can't browse MySpace for 3 minutes without seein' a girl in a thong... We need to be careful and guard ourselves if we're gonna do some research on some of this stuff, fine. We can do the research, but don't immerse ourselves in this stuff. We just mentioned A Lil Bit Podcast example of Josiah in Second Chronicles. Josiah, when he heard the truth of the Word, he not only tore his clothes, but he went around and he started just emptying stuff out of the Temple. And some of us as youth workers need to kinda clear out our CD cases in our cars and stuff like that.... FURBY: The thing is, we need to become, we need to be students of the culture and we want to know the students but we don't want to become the consumers of this culture. JONATHAN: Yeah. Supporting it-that's even a different thing. FURBY: Yeah, I mean it's just... we have to go in with a guarded heart. I mean Proverbs says, "Our heart is the wellspring of our life." And if we don't guard our heart, if we don't take very cautious actions when we are listening to the lyrics or looking at the whatevers on the Internet. We just have to be so careful that we don't become what we are trying to keep our kids from... Episode Highlights:
NOTE: Jump on Jonathan's Blog page and scroll to the April 14th entry to add your comments or ideas about books,
resources or curriculum you have used to talk with kids about sex and relationships -as discussed in the HELP ME
section of this podcast.
Delivered free via e-mail to subscribers each week. We encourage you to distribute this newsletter freely and ask only that you not change its contents. HAVE YOU MISSED PAST "EZINE" ARTICLES? CLICK HERE FOR JONATHAN'S "EZINE" ARCHIVES And for more FREE resources and ideas ... go to THE SOURCE www.TheSource4YM.com Copyright ©2008 The Source for Youth Ministry All rights reserved. |
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