COSTA RICA 2019 (TRAINING)
CORE VALUES SEMINAR
(Saturday 7-10) Part 2: "Explaining the 7 Core Values"
Nature & Purpose of the Night: We will be gathered with youth leaders and workers in the local community. They typically don't get a lot of training and so we will be partnering with them and giving them as much as we possibly can in a limited amount of time. Est. time = 2 hours.
PART 1: "What is a Youth"- 30 minutes
- Led by: Justin Wong
- Topics: Special category, New research, Needs of a youth
Part 2: "Explaining the 7 Core Values"
- 5 minutes each
- Explain: What it is (how we define it biblically & philosophically); why it's important; +/- examples
- Depth - Josh
- Community - Alexis
- Discipleship - Hayley
- Truth - Jerry
- Service - Jonathan
- Missions - Allison
- Prayer - Natalie
BREAK
- 10 minutes
Part 3: "Round table"
- 10 min each
- There will be 4 groups that will be engaged in interactive dialogue about one particular part of youth ministry
- Programming - Robert
- Bible Teaching - Aaron
- Games - Kendall/Nicole
- Discipleship - Jessica/Sarah
Part 4: "Q&A"
- 20 minutes
- Led by Justin
- ***cut if we don't have time
CONTEXT
So we've been invited by the church leaders in the area that Luis has been in contact with to come into their buildings and help train their pastors and youth workers. Why this is so important is because these churches rarely, if ever, have a chance to receive training. And one of the things Luis and I have talked about is having some of what has worked for us to translate over there. Of course we ultimately didn't "do" anything to make it succeed because as our last core value - prayer, we understand that it was all Jesus that caused it all to happen. But through trial and faithfulness and just the grace of resources that God has given us as leaders, we have been able to put things in place and think through things enough to build a good youth ministry. We want to take what we have learned (both good and bad) and share it with our fellow brothers and sisters...especially in the context of youth ministry. Your role is to share some of our core values with them.
REMEMBER: that our core values came from scripture and we believe that EVERY single christian is accountable to all of them all the time. We do not believe you can pick and choose which core value you want to do or not do. If you follow Jesus, and want to live as he has told us to live, you get the 7 core values. It's fairly obvious if you read the bible...but again, a lot of Christians don't want to or they don't understand these core values. But imagine if a youth group could actually live out these 7 core values as best as they can individually and as a group??? what kind of group would they be? how purposeful do you think it'll be? That's the hope we want to share with the leaders in Costa Rica.
CORE VALUES (SHORT LIST)
THE SHORT LIST: I'll give yall a bit of what each core value is from the original intention when i came up with it when i put the youth group together. Even though you're teaching one of the core values, you better know all of them in order to make sense of yours. These are short descriptions right now. Youl'll need to supplement by understanding it more. I've attached the manual that has it.
- Depth: This is the fire, the desire, the always churning, unsatisfied part of our souls that WANTS to grow more and more like Christ. This core value moves us way way past "mere salvation" and into obedience, even though it's hard, and we are determined to chase Jesus at ALL cost. This is what we see in Psalms from David when he says, "One thing I ask is that I would dwell in the house of the Lord forever." Because he has tasted and seen that the Lord is good and everything in the world seems weak and bland compared to Jesus.
- Community: We believe that once you are saved you aren't just saved from sin and death, but you're also saved to something. One of that something is a body of redeemed believers that are very much like us. They were broken, they were chasing empty things, they were like us hopeless and needed salvation. We admit that community isn't easy by any means nor is it ideal...but it reveals the gospel because we have one foundation one lord and one savior that binds us all together. We need each other and we serve, cry, and forgive each other in this body. This goes way beyond just buddy buddies. This is multigenerations, different socio-economic statuses, but we have Jesus in common. This is the church.
- Discipleship: this is the piece where we realize that because we are in community we are not doing this christian thing solo. There are others around us and while we may be stumbling forward in pursuing Jesus, we need those further in their faith to mentor us and for us to look and disciple those around us so that they may mature in their faith. This is beyond just having a big/little buddy...this is showing them the goodness of Jesus. This is the long, hard, task of coaching someone in the doctrine, spiritual disciplines, correcting them, encouraging them, loving them in the good and bad, and sometimes wanting more for themselves than they want.
- Truth: the reason why this is a core value is because we believe that there is a truth. An objective truth that is beyond human opinion and it comes from a God that is truth and a god who has revealed ultimate truth in Jesus and later on written down for us in his Holy Bible. Truth is our core value because we admit that we don't know everything and because we trust that God is good and what he says is really for our good even if it is hard to hear and accept at times. So our youth group will preach and teach and live out what Scripture says unapologetically. We don't skip things we don't like or things that culture finds offensive. We believe that all truth is God's and it leads us to the greatest life.
- Service: We have this as a core value because we believe that God has given us our time, energy, talents, and resources not to end on us but so that we can push that back onto this world...ultimately to reveal how good God is. So we now see that money is a good thing but we don't make an idol of it so we can actually give it back. We see that each of us have different personalities and we use that not so we can gain the world or their approval, but we use it to glorify God with it in some many different ways. We do this as individuals and as a youth group.
- Missions: We believe as Christians, once you have the good news of Jesus, it is our job and privilege to share and tell everyone about that good news. So while we do trips as a large group to share God's goodness, we believe that every single christian is currently ON missions right now! So whether at school, at the store, online, etc. they are representing Jesus, his mission, his love somehow.
- Prayer: We have this as a core value because we believe that no matter how awesome we are as a youth group or what we do, if Jesus doesn't move hearts and the Holy Spirit doesn't change lives...then it is ultimately worthless. We do not believe that we can do anything in our own power. We are always reliant on someone bigger than us and we dare not to think we're awesome. In addition, we believe this core value goes beyond just a simple thing of reciting words. Prayer to us is a lifestyle. So for example, we believe that cbc youth ought to understand sabbath, confession, thanksgiving, repentance, meditation.