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KPC YOUTH MINISTRY PARENTS’ LINK
May 2006 |
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OUR MISSON is to TOUCH the lives of unbelievers, to RECEIVE them into God’s family, to TEACH them Jesus’ ways, to help them SERVE one another, so as to GLORIFY God together, forever!
Contacts
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Dear Parents, In this newsletter, I would like
to touch on these few issues: (1) Perspectives. Why
must youths spend time in church? (2) Events Forecast. The highlights
for May and beyond. (3) Leadership Training Camp (4th–7th June). Can I
count on you to encourage your youth
to attend? (4) YM Update. Find out how your youth
will benefit from being mentored and mentoring someone younger. Finally,
please pray for KPC Youth Ministry that it’ll move beyond serving our own
children to reaching out to all youths in Singapore. Yours truly, Ps Kuo Yung Click here for earlier
newsletters |
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WHY MUST YOUTHS SPEND TIME IN CHURCH ?
Some youth leaders were puzzled when I advised
them to initially treat all youths in our ministry as seekers, not believers.
“Aren’t they Christians? They’ve grown up in Christian families, they should
be grounded in their faith!” their inner voices spoke up. Don’t get me wrong. I think most of our youths
are believers. But let me illustrate why it’s wise to “treat them like
seekers”. Recently, on my advice, the youth ministry
runs a 3-session seekers course for all our youths. And our Bible Study
leaders received a huge surprise. There were so many long-time KPC youths
with questions about the dependability of their faith! (E.g. Is the Bible
trustworthy? Is Christianity relevant today? Can I believe there is a God?
Did Jesus really die and resurrect? Etc.) Our leaders started rethinking their
assumptions. x
x x x x x
x x x x x
x x x x x
x x x x x
x x x x x
x Adolescence is a stage for growth and
transformation. At this stage, our youth’s spirituality will be developing in
tandem with all their other faculties (intellectual, emotional, social,
physical). Hence, they will have 101 questions about
their faith – and most of the time, they kept quiet about them. If we do a
good job in leading them on and following up on them, they become
well-grounded Christians. Otherwise, they risk becoming spiritually stunted. As in any other areas of development, there is
no short cut to spiritual development. Youths need to spend a significant amount of
time in church with Christian adults and peers to iron out all these issues
that concerns their faith. And in many occasions, such “ironing out sessions”
happen informally and spontaneously – it could be during Bible Study, over
lunch, during music practice, halfway through a game…
Click here for more perspectives |
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EVENTS FORECAST
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Date/Time |
Event |
Remarks |
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7 May (Sun) 9am – 10:20am |
Mass Teaching |
Topic: Can I Trust the Bible? |
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21 May (Sun) 9am – 10:20am |
Special Teaching Program |
How to share the Gospel
like a pro ? |
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27 May (Sat) 7.30pm – 9:30pm |
Movie Night |
Movie: Remember the Titans |
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3 June (Sat) 2pm – 5:30pm |
Synod Games Day |
Board games @ Orchard Road
PC |
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4 – 7 Jun (Sun – Wed) |
Youth Leadership Training Camp * |
See below write-up for details |
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10 June (Sat) 2pm – 5:30pm |
Synod Games Day |
Soccer and Captain’s Ball
Tournament @ Covenant PC |
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LEADERSHIP TRAINING CAMP (4th – 7th June, Sun – Wed)
If you desire your youth a
vivacious spiritual life, this is a MUST GO for him! Through this camp, he’ll be
challenged (a) to take his parents’ God as his own God, and (b) to take God’s
will as his own will. All 15 year-olds and above will be invited. Advise your
youth to drop every other commitment and sign up for this camp! Your youth
and you shall not regret it… Parent Volunteers Needed! We need
parents who can help us prepare meals throughout the course of the camp. If
you can help, please drop me a call or an email. Thank you! |
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MENTORING – A WAY OF LIFE We all need mentors - People who
have trotted the path before us and can show us the way (and prevent us from
making needless mistakes). In Youth Ministry, we aim to assign everyone a spiritual mentor. This mentor need not be a spiritual giant. But just a person who has walked a longer distance in following the Lord Jesus, and is willing to share his/her experience with someone younger. This is how it works. The senior pastor mentors the youth pastor. The youth pastor mentors a group of adult volunteers (called adult mentors). These adult mentors in turn mentor the youth group leaders. And the youth group leaders mentor the youths in their group.
Mentorship is both a relationship as well as an activity. The mentor and mentee commits to know each other better and to share their lives with each other. They also spend time together praying, sharing and learning from the Word. As iron sharpens iron, these intentional relationships that is centred on Christ result in the strengthening of individual’s faith and on the whole, a spiritually robust church! |
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