THE RUNDOWN

Welcome to a NEW month of youth ministry. In this edition of The Rundown, I wanted to cover:

1. A Quiz!
2. Direction for October
3. Some prayer requests

Kevin DeYoung, Pastor at University Reformed Church gives out this little quiz (in addition to other essays and such) for those who desire to become pastors and elders at the church. He also opens this 12-week course to all teachers and leaders in the church and at the end, they take this test. I share this with you to see how we would do and to challenge us to become more and more biblically literate for the sake of our own ability to know God in order to worship him more but also to educate the students in this portion of biblical discipleship.

Here are the first 10 questions (if you'd like the rest, i've attached the link). Good luck!

A. Who did the following? 1. Wrote the book of Acts? 2. Appeared with Jesus on the Mount of Transfiguration? 3. Directed the rebuilding of the wall of Jerusalem? 4. Killed a thousand Philistines with a donkey’s jawbone? 5. Led the Israelites into the promised land? 6. Was exiled to the island of Patmos where he wrote Revelation? 7. Was going to curse Israel, but had to bless them? 8. Became the first King of the 10 tribes that broke away? 9. Rescued David from her foolish husband Nabal? 10. Was rebuked by Paul for refusing to eat with Gentiles?

LINK: https://www.thegospelcoalition.org/blogs/kevin-deyoung/100-bible-knowledge-questions/

As we launch into this month we're going to continue to press forward with learning more about who God is and what He says. Sunday's youth praise covered the topics on the bible and for the most part, it revealed to us that many of our students have yet to know the basics or simply forgotten. Now, there's no way to teach everything there is to know about God and Christianity within a month but at least we can start. And we have been doing this all along but this month, i'd like to focus a bit more on the discipleship of the mind that relates to our spiritual faith.

So here are some ideas:

For MS:

• Study section of Scripture this month in depth
• Memorize 3 verses
• Answer some basic theological questions such as "How do I know the Bible is true? So what if Jesus claims to be God?"
  
  

For HS:

• Study a book of the Bible this month (or continue to do so) in depth
• Memorize 3 verses
• Write up a positional paper on a topic regarding Christianity (i.e. what is baptism? who is the Holy Spirit? What is Hebrews 6 talking about?)

1. For our students, leaders, and parents to love the Lord with their MIND. That we don't work out all the other core values and leave TRUTH behind. Pray that our people would love God with their MIND so that as they learn about Jesus and topics surrounding Jesus they get to worship him more and experience a deeper understanding of life as they draw near. Pray that we see the Words of Scripture has life-giving and sweet and delicious.

2. Pray also that we are not puffed up but knowledge alone. That as we sharpen our theological mind, we become more and more humble by what we learn. That we come to a place of knowing the grandness of God and our smallness yet his love and nearness to us that it brings us to a place of peace and comfort. Pray that as we learn more about God we are able to share that knowledge with other believers in the form of discipleship and encouragement. But also as we understand more of who God is, we are able to share this good news with those who have yet heard of the Gospel or those who despise it.

3. Pray for the church that they would teach well and study hard. That the leaders and the preachers would love the word of God for their own lives and not just for the sake of teaching.

4. Pray for the youth who haven't shown up recently. Pray that God meets them where they are at in life right now and that God would use the body of CBC youth to meet their needs as well.

BOOKS ALL CHRISTIANS SHOULD READ:

1. Bondage of the Will by Martin Luther
2. Desiring God by John Piper
3. Confessions by St. Augustine
4. Explicit Gospel by Matt Chandler
5. We Cannot Be Silent by Albert Mohler
6. Making Sense of God by Tim Keller

PODCAST FOR THE CHRISTIAN MIND:

1. The Briefing by Albert Mohler
2. Doctrine & Devotion
3. White Horse Inn
4. Ask Pastor John
5. Knowing Faith by Village Church
6. Breakaway Ministries
7. Austin Stone Podcast
8. Youth Culture Matters
9. Youth Ministry Hacks
10. Culture Matters by Village Church

As we continue to mature in our faith as a youth group, our understanding and purpose of Winter Retreat has morphed as well. Winter Retreat has be established to be a time in the year (well...the end of the "Fall" semester) to finish off the theme of Community. Well not finish finish community because...well, the gospel creates community and it should always be creating community. Anyways, Winter Retreat for us is now more of an internal event for our students and leaders to come together for a few days and "retreat."

So the emphasis will be more of community and relationship building and "less" on hardcore studying and less camp-feel. There are still elements of bible study and I think we are still talking about groups but that's contingent on the student/leader ratio. All in all, we want to design winter retreat for our youth ministry - all the youth and the leaders to build off of the Fall and build towards the Spring.

You interested in going? I hope so cuz it's awesome! So you get dibs on coming. Reminder: spaces are limited!

***Secret registration link (for adults only): https://forms.gle/Uu1WyqmKktYW6wpT6