How would we describe what we hope a young person grows into during their time in our Parish? That list can be very long, probably all good things, or it can be too short and exclude faith and focus only on moral behavior. We’ve been using the “Characteristics of Mature Christian Youth” from the study […]
I’m sure you’ve had the experience of the awkward silence in your small group or Sunday school class. You throw out a question, and all the kids sit there and stare back at you. You, the leader, are panicking inside. All sorts of things are running through your head about your lesson or your question […]
The following quote would characterize my own facebook experience as well Still, 56 percent of girls told researchers that social networks help them feel closer and more connected to friends, and 30 percent think they’ve improved their friendships The same article also said… A study of 1,000 girls ages 14-17, conducted by the Girl Scouts, […]
Before a great round of the appointment game, our Parents of Teens class watched a sample of the videos that are part of our 7th and 8th grade Sunday School Curriculum. Here’s the video, and a second video that talks a little bit about the curriculum. Our 7th and 8th grade class has been full […]
This post is mostly for those adults that work directly with our young people in ministry settings, but there are some obvious parenting applications. The test balloon is something kids float out there to see your reaction. Example: I once had a kid who always (almost weekly) cussed in our group, out loud, in front […]
This is a slightly edited version of an article that will be in this month’s Archangel This year our high school kids no longer have a “youth group night.” You may have read about our shift to a small group ministry. All youth ministry lends itself to the talk of curriculum, and curriculum has a […]
A few years ago I used to play a game to entertain myself during the workday where I would send out a group text to kids while they were in school and see who would be the first to respond. Usually it took as long as a half hour to get a response, some kids […]
The mission of Unpackthis.com is changing, well not so much the mission but the audience. When we started, this was the blog of a couple of youth directors that wanted to play around with this blog thing. We eventually got bored with talking to no-one but ourselves. The technology was fun, but this is the […]
I’ve recently been working on increasing the visibility of our ministry at Bethlehem. One suggestion was to post more pictures of our young people around the church. This seemed like an obvious step for us, but I wanted the pictures to really stand out. The great news is that we literally have tens of thousands […]
My wife and I are in the process of buying a car. We’re taking our time, which is a nice situation to be in. Today, after a few phone exchanges, I stopped by the car dealer to see what they could do for a trade in. I knew I was asking for it, but I […]
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