Last night's lesson was about sacrifice. I used Luke 1:26-38 for my lesson.
We look at Christmas as a time of gift giving and joy because of the birth of Christ, but shouldn't we instead by focused on the sacrifices made by Mary, Joseph, and God? When the angel Gabriel gave Mary the message she was going to have Jesus it caused a lot of uncertainty in her future. She was a virgin and engaged to Joseph. If she turned up pregnant before the wedding she would certainly have a lot of things to explain.
While our society doesn't seem to have much of a problem with unwed teen mothers today, 2000 years ago things were definitely different. According to the law she would have been guilty of committing adultery (Deut. 22:23-24) Of course the townspeople would not believe that she had not slept with another man.
Joseph could have broken the engagement (he knew he wasn't the father. In fact, this is what he planned after he found out Mary was pregnant Matthew 1:19. If it hadn't been for an angel's intervention Joseph would have done just that Matthew 1:20-21. Mary's future would have been in real jeopardy.
Knowing that all this could happen, Mary had to make the decision to carry Jesus. She made a real sacrifice that could have cost her a secure future and possibly her life. Joseph had to make the sacrifice of his reputation being called into question since Mary was pregnant before the marriage and he was expected to raise a child that was not his. God had to make the biggest sacrifice by sending Jesus to Earth for the purpose of becoming a sacrifice to sin.
Maybe we should spend less time this year thinking about gifts and more about sacrifices we should be making.
Thursday, December 9, 2010
Wednesday, December 1, 2010
Community Building With Youth
Interestingly enough this post comes from discussions I have been having about my other job, teaching. I have been very interested in the idea of community building for my students at school with the emphasis being on creating a learning community that encompasses students in far away places (like California or Indonesia). Here is a link to the post I wrote about it if you are interested in reading it.
My post started a great discussion. Jerrid Kruse has made some comments that make me really think about community building in my own classroom and it has bled over into my thinking about community in my youth group.
Tonight I made a realization that while I do not (usually) do any direct lecture in my media (aka computer) class, lecture is the way I present the material to my youth. This made me think about Jerrid and our past conversations. Basically I began to really examine how and why I use lecture at church but not at school and the answer seems to be at odds with the expected results.
I lecture to my youth group because I have 10-15 minutes to get across a Biblical truth (at least that is what I believe I am doing.) The youth then spend at least 15 minutes with their small group discussing the lesson and how they can apply the principle in their lives. The community building really takes place in the small group because of the shared experience of the lecture.
So, what is it I am trying to explain? The way the youth class is set up is for the purpose of getting students to share with each other what the message is and how it can be applied. They work together, not separated at desk or on a computer. They are building their community which is what I want to have happen in my classroom. Time to take what I am doing at church and apply it to my class, don't you think?
My post started a great discussion. Jerrid Kruse has made some comments that make me really think about community building in my own classroom and it has bled over into my thinking about community in my youth group.
Tonight I made a realization that while I do not (usually) do any direct lecture in my media (aka computer) class, lecture is the way I present the material to my youth. This made me think about Jerrid and our past conversations. Basically I began to really examine how and why I use lecture at church but not at school and the answer seems to be at odds with the expected results.
I lecture to my youth group because I have 10-15 minutes to get across a Biblical truth (at least that is what I believe I am doing.) The youth then spend at least 15 minutes with their small group discussing the lesson and how they can apply the principle in their lives. The community building really takes place in the small group because of the shared experience of the lecture.
So, what is it I am trying to explain? The way the youth class is set up is for the purpose of getting students to share with each other what the message is and how it can be applied. They work together, not separated at desk or on a computer. They are building their community which is what I want to have happen in my classroom. Time to take what I am doing at church and apply it to my class, don't you think?
Let Me Get You Caught Up
It is a real struggle to balance family, work (I am a teacher), and church responsibilities. It seems like I am playing catch up to often and don't do any of the three real justice. One thing I am grateful for is the growth of the youth group. Creating a a lesson (as if I create it, I just have to listen and trust) is imperative when we have 30-40 youth on a Wednesday night with a good 3/4 of them not attending a church the rest of the week.
My wife and I divide up the duties. Basically that means I come up with the theme for the month and the "whole group" lesson. She takes care of the paperwork, games, announcements and things like that. I appreciate my role because it is very focused and I feel like I can concentrate on it.
The month after school started to see a much larger turn-out for youth than normal. Last year a big night would be 20, it wasn't long before we started having 30 this year and we needed to change how we were doing things.
The first thing we did was meet with the youth committee. My wife Dianna had a great idea where we would involve adult "helpers" with the youth and we would have a main lesson (done by me) and then break out sessions so students could explore the message in a smaller, more manageable group.
Because of the disparate people that have been attending the Wednesday night group I felt (God made it pretty plain to me :) that I needed to focus the group on community so that became our first month's theme. I used the book of Nehemiah and the story of the remnant returning to Jerusalem from captivity in Babylon to emphasize the building of a community.
Last month I chose the theme of commitment and used the story of Nebuchadnezzar as well as the story of Hananiah, Mishael, and Azariah (better known as Shadrach, Mesach, and Abednego) to emphasize how we need to commit to God. Nebuchadnezzar saw several miracles but finally had to be driven insane before he accepted God as his God. The story of the fiery furnace was an excellent example of the power of commitment by the three Jewish men.
This month the theme is sacrifice. I started tonight's lesson using an article sent to me by a friend. The article, written by an atheist, lambasts followers of all religions for blaming God for the bad and waiting for God to bring the good. I used this as a seque to talk to the students about how God has not let us down, but we have let him down.
If you notice, we are to love God and through that love our neighbors. Because we do not love Him as we should, the neighbors don't get the love they should either. My emphasis was we need to sacrifice more of ourselves to loving God and our neighbors.
My plan (God willing) is to continue the theme of sacrifice over the next few weeks and talk to the kids specifically about the sacrifice Mary, Joseph, and Jesus made just to get to the Christmas story. As I told them, we look at Christmas as a celebration of the Christ's birth, but we need to really examine the reason behind the birth.
My wife and I divide up the duties. Basically that means I come up with the theme for the month and the "whole group" lesson. She takes care of the paperwork, games, announcements and things like that. I appreciate my role because it is very focused and I feel like I can concentrate on it.
The month after school started to see a much larger turn-out for youth than normal. Last year a big night would be 20, it wasn't long before we started having 30 this year and we needed to change how we were doing things.
The first thing we did was meet with the youth committee. My wife Dianna had a great idea where we would involve adult "helpers" with the youth and we would have a main lesson (done by me) and then break out sessions so students could explore the message in a smaller, more manageable group.
Because of the disparate people that have been attending the Wednesday night group I felt (God made it pretty plain to me :) that I needed to focus the group on community so that became our first month's theme. I used the book of Nehemiah and the story of the remnant returning to Jerusalem from captivity in Babylon to emphasize the building of a community.
Last month I chose the theme of commitment and used the story of Nebuchadnezzar as well as the story of Hananiah, Mishael, and Azariah (better known as Shadrach, Mesach, and Abednego) to emphasize how we need to commit to God. Nebuchadnezzar saw several miracles but finally had to be driven insane before he accepted God as his God. The story of the fiery furnace was an excellent example of the power of commitment by the three Jewish men.
This month the theme is sacrifice. I started tonight's lesson using an article sent to me by a friend. The article, written by an atheist, lambasts followers of all religions for blaming God for the bad and waiting for God to bring the good. I used this as a seque to talk to the students about how God has not let us down, but we have let him down.
Matthew 22:36-40 (New International Version, ©2010)
36 “Teacher, which is the greatest commandment in the Law?” 37 Jesus replied: “‘Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind.’[a] 38 This is the first and greatest commandment. 39 And the second is like it: ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’[b] 40 All the Law and the Prophets hang on these two commandments.”
If you notice, we are to love God and through that love our neighbors. Because we do not love Him as we should, the neighbors don't get the love they should either. My emphasis was we need to sacrifice more of ourselves to loving God and our neighbors.
My plan (God willing) is to continue the theme of sacrifice over the next few weeks and talk to the kids specifically about the sacrifice Mary, Joseph, and Jesus made just to get to the Christmas story. As I told them, we look at Christmas as a celebration of the Christ's birth, but we need to really examine the reason behind the birth.
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