One of the hardest things in youth ministry is encouraging students to bring their friends. Case in point, Typically on a Wednesday night we want to provide an atmosphere where students can bring friends but some had shared that with the small group breakouts it is hard to bring a friend who might be uncomfortable with sitting in discussion groups. They asked if we could do some things that would be set apart as a night where people brought friends. I really liked this idea!
So, last night we intentionally hosted a Crave Luau in order to provide an environment where students to bring their friends and have easy next steps for them to enter into the Crave Senior High Ministry community. Specifically, we shared a trailer to our next series "Gospel Journey Maui" A few students understood what we were doing and brought new friends, the majority did not. I talked to a lot of our regular students and asked them, "So, who did you bring?" Most of them said that they brought the person who comes with them every week (I guess they thought that was funny). One said that he didn't know about the Luau. The ironic thing is this same kid won a text message contest a few weeks ago where he had to text this back to us in reverse:
11hcramyadsendewnouaulevarcehtotsdneirfruoyfollagnirb
How did he not know we had a Luau and that this was a night for him to bring his friends to?!
We tried to remove obstacles, pricetags etc. to help students make the sell but for some reason it wasn't compelling enough to our regulars for them to invite their friends. I try to put myself in these students shoes and I can empathize that their is a lot of risk in asking a friend to something like this. Most students didn't know how serious we were about THROWING a Luau until they arrived and reacted, "Wow, you guys were serious!" I can't look at this problem without seeing some glaring holes in how we do things. We are currently looking at revamping our student leadership (ways that we involve students as the leaders instead of doing everything with adults). Perhaps if we gave the preparation for this Luau to students, they might've caught the need to invite other friends.
All this to say, after attending today's "Rock the River" launch lunch today, I hope that our ministry can sell the vision for students to take advantage of the opportunity to see thousands experience a changed life through the Good News by not just attending this event themselves but by investing in and inviting their pre-Christian friends. This will be my prayer for the next several weeks!
Comments