Breakfast Club: 9-7-08

This past Sunday was the first Sunday of Breakfast Club, my new Sunday morning program here at MSPC.  In my summer parent newsletter I wrote that the idea of Breakfast Club was this:

“Sunday morning.  Starting Sunday, September 7th will be a new program from students grades 6-12 called Breakfast Club, which will start promptly at 9am and conclude by 9:55am, in time for “Big Church.”  Breakfast Club may best be described as a “discipleship experience.”  We will eat, but we will also do something intentional to further our walk with Jesus.  This might look like a prayer walk to the cross and back, discussing something in the news and the way God fits into it, it might involve talking about a Bible passage or singing.  It will always be creative, Christ centered, and Scripture-infused.  You won’t want to miss this chance to grow in new ways.”

Basically I wanted something for the youth (middle school and high school) on Sunday mornings since adult Sunday school was starting the same time and weekend.  However, I wanted to make sure that I didn’t make the same mistake many other youth groups seem to make: having a Sunday morning program that looks to similar to “Big Church.”  After all, what teenager would really want to sit in church with the grown-ups for singing and a sermon if they have already sat in a program with singing and a sermon that was directed towards their own needs?  I realize that for larger youth groups there is not really much else they can do, as they just don’t have the flexibility needed to really engage students creatively, but for us…there was just no way I would be able to convince our students that it was important to participate in multi-generational corporate worship if they had already sang and hear a talk.

 

Anyway, this is what I did this past Sunday:

I started off with this quote: “Mission is what the Bible is all about; we could as meaningfully talk of the missional basis of the Bible as we could talk of the biblical basis of mission.” -Christopher J.H. Wright inThe Mission of God.

Next, I had the students imagine the following: “Imagine that God has told you to travel to Prague–to move your whole life there and to become a missionary.  So you pack up your life and fly to Prague.  What would you do once you get there?  Where would you go?  Who would you try to meet?  You don’t know the city or the language of any people at all.”  I had them brainstorm on a handout that I gave them.  Perhaps later this week I will share some of the stuff that they came up with.

Then I told them that God has called us all to be missionaries, no matter where we are.  So I had them take their ideas regarding Prague and apply them to their schools, soccer teams, families, etc.  If they had said that they would get involved with a church in Prague for support, I challenged them to dig into community here.  If they said that in Prague they would find places of need and help out, I challenged them to do that in their schools and neighborhoods.  If they said they would practice hospitality over there, I challenged them to do it here.  Basically, I wanted them to think of their lives as a mission field, applying the same notions they have regarding overseas missions to their lives here in San Diego.

Lastly, we talked about Acts 1:8.  We talked about how important it is not to forget about Jerusalem in our haste to “the ends of the earth.”  Then I challenged them to come back next week with an example of an instance during their week when they were a missionary.  We prayed, and headed to “Big Church.”

~ by Mike Seawright on September 8, 2008.