Youth Ministry in a Recession
Let’s be honest: a part of youth ministry culture is entertainment. It’s not necessarily good or bad; it’s just the fact that youth ministers typically love to entertain, whether that’s telling funny stories or trips to Six Flags or making stupid videos. The question is: what values do we communicate?
Here’s two things we do (and since I’m a fan of consistency, we do these every week).
1. Deconstructing the news. This is a homage to Stewart and Colbert, and I find ridiculous stories from the week (This week I brought up “Bible-guns” and the Whites-only basketball league). In the most absurd way possible, I break down the meaning of these things.
2. The Week in the Recession. In ’010, we’re taking it back to ’910 (that’s 1910) with some classic games. I love watching kids bob for spam and throw pumpkins, but those things get expensive. A little red rover, thumb wars, rock-paper-scissors, etc, that’s where it is in 2010.
About a month ago, I found all these wooden Popsicle sticks and branded them “Spam-sticks.” Basically, the joke is that spoons are too expensive, but this Spam-stick is cheap and reusable and will retain that Spam-flavor after you use it. We pass out Spam-sticks like peppermint candy.
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