I had something I wanted to discuss - a problem in our youth group. Gary and I have discussed this, and I thought it was something I should bring up, even though I will be the first to admit that I'm guilty of it myself.
The problem is in how we welcome guests to our youth group. This is especially important now as we begin a new semester. With all the changes going on in our youth group, it is likely (and hopeful) that we will be getting lots of visitors. But who's talking to these guests? Who's learning their names or making them feel welcome. Sure, friends who were invited find a place pretty quickly. They can just stick with the people who invited them. But what about someone who just showed up out of curiosity. Does anyway notice them?
Let's take this even further: Have we made the best effort possible to make the neighborhood kids who come on Wednesdays feel welcome? Sure, they've been coming for a while, so they're not exactly "visitors". But in all the time they have been coming, I keep wondering why. What makes them come back? 'Cause let's face it, we don't even know all of their names! I don't, at least.
I think that the problem goes beyond just knowing how to make people feel welcome. The problem is in how we relate to everyone - even each other. Our youth group is lacking something when it comes to relationships. We're scattered and divided. We lack a common bond. We fail to recognize that Christ is our common bond and that this should make all the difference in the world. If we can't even come to truly love each other, how can we ever expect to grow?
We saw a glimpse of this at church camp this summer, but it was baby steps. And we've already started to forget them. It's time to recover that.
But how? What are we doing wrong? We've tried, right? What are we not getting? I can't answer that. But I can say this - it is not something that is just going to happen. We have to make it happen. We have to seek it. And the first step in seeking the solution is recognizing the problem. So pay attention next time we're together. Pay attention to how we relate to each other. Pay attention to your thoughts as you interact with your fellow members. Do you like them more than the others? Do they annoy you? Would you rather them not be there? Is your attitude the right one?
I hope this will be an ongoing discussion. It is something we have to take seriously if we want things to change. It might even be the key to getting our youth group to that point we all know it should be at.
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Friday, August 25, 2006
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5 comments:
This is something that I've thought about a lot, especially for the last few weeks.
It's been hard for me to feel like an o.k. welcomer to visitors, I just don't naturally open to people very easily. I mean, you guys know how long it took to for me to open up to you. Though that's no excuse, and I hope that I'll be more aware of visitors. :)
Thanks for the reminder, I think this is an area that we can all work on.
I honestly haven't noticed anyone being unbearably disrespectful. There's always going to be some inappropriate behavior when you're dealing with people who aren't used to the way we do things. But I really haven't seen anything that I can't forgive.
We need to be careful about letting our personal feelings about people get in the way of building our youth group. It's easy to get this idea in our heads about what our group should be like - what kind of people should make it up - but I happen to think that our diversity is one of the best things about our group. We should embrace that, behavior problems or no behavior problems.
I'm glad to see some response to this post, but I was hoping for a little more input on the other point I was trying to make - that the real key to this is in learning how to be better friends with EACH OTHER.
It might be a little harder to think about this. After all, many of us really are good friends. Maybe we don't all recognize the problem here. But if we were all to be honest, we'd have to admit that we all have certain people we wouldn't miss too much if they were to stop coming. I'm guilty of this myself, but even if these people really ARE a pain, this is the wrong attitude.
And even with those of us who don't have probelms with each other, are we really the best friends we can be? If not, why? Maybe it's because we don't all know what being a true Christian friend is really all about. I didn't know when I was in high school. I'm just now starting to really get it - that's part of what has inspired me to make this post.
So I'm encouraging everybody to think and pray about this issue. What is involved in being a true friend, how are we failing each other in this, and how does this failure effect our ministry?
I agree about what you said in your original post, about the progress we were making at camp. Do you guys remember? It was awesome, everyone was connecting and working together. Did we forget to bring that back with us after we left? That isn't something that can only happen at camp. Honestly, if we could just pick to go back to how we related to each other the way we did then and keep going, would you want that? We can have that again, and we can go even further if we let God work in our hearts. This is a group effort, but that doesn't mean as soon as youth group is over on Sundays or Wednesdays that our effort dies down. This is a continuing thing that we have to be open for God to work within us. If we get to that place, think of all of the things that God can do through us. We can reach other people, but right now we need to reach out to each other and form our group's identity, the way that God would want us to.
A lot of prayer is needed, and I hope that all of us to keep praying for our group. :)
Thanks Melody. It's amazing how simple it can be and yet be so complicated. Do we want what we had a church camp and then some? Of course we do! If we don't, we might as well just shut down the youth group. And yet, as easy as it is to answer that question, it seems almost impossible to actually make it happen. Why is that? Because Satan doesn't want it to happen, that's why. I mean, really, think about how bad it would be for him if this DID happen. Obviously he's not gonna just sit on his hands and let that happen. So he starts whispering to us, wearing us down, making us tired and lazy so that we forget the purpose and stop trying to reach it. That's why it's vital that we all recognize the battle we're in. Recognizing that those times we feel tired and disinterested in the youth group are actually attacks from the enemy is the first step in fighting this battle successfully. And of course, like you were getting at, we're not gonna do anything without prayer. I hope this is a priority for all of us. We should all be praying that every time we're together, we are in God's will and that Satan is nowhere to be found.
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