Blessings to you all on this beautiful summer afternoon!
I wanted to touch base with all of you (parents and youth) about upcoming Youth events and fall schedules.
We’ve spent a good deal of time the past month trying to plan for the fall and (hopefully) have some cool things in store for all of our youth (if the idea of fun, fellowship, and education doesn’t excite you, keep in mind that assisting and participating in many of these events can be used to help fulfill community service hours for school/scouts/etc…)!
Service Assistants
If you are interested in assisting with our Worship services, please let me know! We are in need of lay readers, communion assistants, acolytes, ushers, greeters, Assisting Ministers, and more!
Sunday School
In addition to the calendar of events, I want to remind everyone of our normal Sunday School schedule.
The High School youth meet in the Conference Room Sunday mornings from 9:45 – 10:35. On most Sundays, my wife Laura will open Youth Sunday School with some sort of activity that is purely about fellowship. Once I arrive, after opening the prek-6th grade Sunday School, we will move into the lesson. We will have a mixture of lessons that include videos, hands-on activities, modern-day parables, and Bible study.
Our Confirmation-age youth will get more information about the Sunday School component of Confirmation as classes begin for the year.
Rally Sunday
As part of Rally Sunday, there will be a an-all Congregation picnic beginning shortly after the ONE SERVICE on Sunday, Sept.11th. As part of the picnic, there will be games and activities for kids and adults. I am hoping that some of our youth will be willing and able to help us out with leading activities for the younger kids in our Morning Star family. We will have bubble play areas, face painting, and some silly relay games.
If you are able/willing to help out as part of the picnic, please let me know ASAP. We also have need to for help setting up tables and chairs for the picnic on Saturday, Sept. 10th at 1:00 PM! If we have enough hands, we should be able to be set up and back home by 2:30!
Experience Worship
You may have seen the mention in the Light about the new, Youth-oriented worship program beginning on Rally Sunday (Sept. 11). Experience Worship is an opportunity for youth from high school age on up (including adults who feel young at heart) to come and experience God in a different setting. This will be a non-traditional, non-Pastor led worship time. There will be multi-sensory opportunities to connect with God along with a mix of music, responsive readings, and a short, topical message that will (hopefully) connect with what is going in our young people’s lives. Even though we will not always have Communion at these worship events, there will always be a breaking of bread together, as there will be a light meal served after each service.
Experience Worship will begin on Rally Sunday, at 4:30 PM in the Chapel. Future dates are included in the calendar below.
National Youth Gathering
A long-range note for our youth who will be entering High School in the fall of 2012 or students who will Seniors this upcoming school year. Next year, the NE SYNOD/LYON (Lutheran Youth of Nebraska) are NOT sponsoring a summer Mission trip. This is because the ELCA is holding the National Youth Gathering in New Orleans next July (18-22, 2012). This is a MASSIVE event! They are expecting 39,000 youth from across the country to attend. It’s a four-day mix of worship, fellowship, bible study, and service. It promises to be an amazing, life-changing experience! Just imagine- 39,000 youth filling the Super Dome for Worship everyday; going out into the New Orleans community to do service and to share God’s Love through our own actions and hard work; meeting with small groups every night to learn, share, and discuss how God works in our lives. It’s pretty incredible. It’s also very expensive! The final cost, per person, is not known yet, but it will be over $1000.00 each! For comparison, this past summer’s trip was $400.00 per person, of which only $100.00 was paid directly by each student who attended. The rest was paid through fundraising efforts and the generosity of the Congregation. My goal is to work with the Congregation and the families of all of our youth to help find ways, through fundraising, gifts, and grants, to make this as affordable as we possibly can so as many of our youth who want to attend are able to attend.
If you have fundraising ideas or have a large pile of money buried in your backyard with no idea what to spend it on, please let me know! I will be meeting with some parents soon as we begin looking at various options for fundraising and I’d love your ideas.
