A letter from a youth pastor contained the following query: I had a 2 day training event for the youth leadership team last week. It ended up being a stay awake at the same time, but things went well, and the commitment level model (humanity, come and grow level) was adopted. Just one question: I'm still a little vague as to how a Christian rave differs from the Gospel rave? Help! Marc Hemmens, Port Elizabeth, South Africa, lapidot@iafrica.com.
The important thing to realise is that we have designed a four week strategy in order to take youth who visit our youth group right through to becoming members of the group. Central to this process is them finding salvation in Christ. You might choose to change the structure of these events, but the principle is important - we want to reach and evangelize unchurched youth. The process which we use is: make contact; develop relationships; share Christ and follow-up new-converts.
Our objectives during the four weeks include:
1. Attract Unchurched Youth
Obviously a lot of fun and big events are needed to draw the unchurched...they will not attend a Bible study. Each youth group needs to find what in their community will draw unchurched youth. Then they should decide on how they can use those events or activities in their programmes to attract unchurched youth.
Here our first week programme, the Mega Rave is used. This is an event which is purely a fun-filled, big event, such as go karting or ice skating. We will not hide that fact that we are a Christian youth group, but we will not preach at visitors during this event.
2. Get Them to Return
We found previously that youth would visit our group, but would not return if they thought that the next week's programme did not relate to them. It is most important to have a great follow up event planned, advertising it during the evening, and handing out leaflets with the details to the visitors. We advertise the big event on the leaflet, and generally not the spiritual topic, unless it is a relevant issue that we will be presenting. In most youth groups, the back door is bigger than the front door. We are working hard at closing the back door, or at least making it hard for youth to slip out and never return. Obviously, a visit to the newcomers during the week is vital as well. Even just a phone call will help to get them to return.
This leads to the second week programme, the Gospel Rave. We will advertise the fun event, and not the speaker on the advertising leaflet.
3. Present the Gospel
The Rave programming strategy is evangelistic in focus. We want to share the gospel with unchurched youth, but we do not want to do so if they will be scared off. While the gospel will not find acceptance from all youth, we want to make sure that we establish a relationship with them and then, when they have seen Christianity up-close-and-personal they will be more open to hearing the message that we deliver.
4. Reinforce the Message
The seeker-sensitive churches, like Willow Creek, are finding that people take a number of exposures to the gospel message before they will make a commitment to Christ. If this is the case, then our youth group programming strategy should include more than a once-off gospel presentation.
The third week's programme is the Christian Rave. Here a fun activity is still central, but the Christian input section is longer than at the Gospel Rave, and it will possibly include group discussion, and have a clear reference back to the gospel presentation of
the previous week.
One example of the difference between the Gospel and Christian Raves involved the following events. At a Gospel Rave a short gospel message was presented after a fun event. The next week, at the Christian Rave, the message that followed the fun event was based on the parable of the sower. The speaker spoke about the different types of soil, or conditions of the heart that lead to
different reactions when people hear the message of salvation. He challenged the youth to think back to the previous week and how they responded to the message. Another opportunity was given to youth to respond to the gospel.
5. Assimilate Them into the Group
This is the fourth week in the programming strategy. It is essential to continue the process of incorporating the newcomers into the youth group. We began using a service event at first, and found that many youth enjoyed reaching into the community. However, some youth were skipping this event because they were not at the stage where they were ready to reach out to others. We have since change the Service Rave into an Issue Rave.
The fourth week's programme is the Issue Rave. Here a relevant issue that youth deal with is explored. Again some activity is used to attract youth, but by this stage, if they have attended for three weeks, they should be willing to submit to some activities that are blatantly Christian. The Issue Rave we are doing this term involves a visit to a local clinic to hand out flowers and cards to people who are sick. This will expose youth to the reality of sickness and suffering. Then we will return to the center where a guest speaker will speak on "Where is God when it hurts?" Youth will be involved in discussion and interaction as they find out something of God's involvement in their lives. The issue is presented with an evangelistic emphasis as well.
Those who have accepted the message of salvation should be placed into a small group for follow-up, or followed-up one-on-one by one of the leaders. This takes place at the next commitment level event in the model called Follow-Up.
We have wondered if we need to spend more time developing relationships with unchurched youth before we share the gospel with them. But, we don't want people to attend the group for too long before they hear the life-changing message of salvation in Christ. Also, we realise that most people who visit our group do so because they have been brought through a relationship they have with a group member. So a level of relationship already exists, which we build on.
View details of Rave Programmes run at Windsor.
Return to Model of Youth Ministry