On Sunday, March 30th, Planet Impact headed into Queens for a day of leadership training called The Core which is put on by Youth Specialties. The adult leaders have attended this training annually for several years, but this was the first year that Youth Specialties extended an invitation for student leaders to attend as well. So, we took a group of 40 – 25 student leaders and 15 adult leaders – for a day of challenge and growth.
The theme for this year was Generation Change, and the presenter was Brock Morgan from Salem, Oregon. He began by reminding us that change starts from the inside out. Transformation is messy because we are messy, and it usually takes a lot of time. God is a God of process, and we must embrace the unfolding of his work in our lives. Since those gathered were leaders who are hoping to affect change, he kept going back to the truth that we don’t change anyone – we can’t. Only God can change us!
After discussing the personal change that we must embrace, we then turned our attention to transforming our youth ministries. We were challenged to think about how authentic our community really is. This is why our small groups are so vital to getting our students to open up on a deeper level. Our small groups are a time when students can share about their lives, and develop healthy friendships. As C.S. Lewis said, “Friendship is born at that moment when one person says to another: ‘What! You too? Thought I was the only one.’”
Finally, we were confronted with the truth that we have been and are being changed to bring change. We were presented with the question: What should transformed people do with their change? Our transformation should be recognizable, and we began to ask some tough questions about how personal transformation translates into community and world transformation.
My favorite part of the day was actually the ride home because all of the students were sound asleep in the back of the shuttle and I was able to drive home in such serenity. No, actually it was my favorite time because for the entire ride home we had an engaging discussion about the things we had learned during the seminar and how we can bring our learnings home and affect change at SGT. I told the students that if what we learned isn’t put into action, then our time and money were wasted. A lively and creative discussion ensued, and the conversation will be ongoing. Our passion is to move students from going to church to being the Church.
1 comment:
Awesome! This is so great to hear. It was cool seeing all of your team and students there - very encouraging. Keep it up and I hope to see you at convention.
-Brock
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