We have all had a wonderful time this past summer hanging out and having fun at youth group. Now as school gets going it is time to take it to a new level. Not that the fun is going to stop, just change a little bit.

This fall we are going to be focusing on outreach. Basically taking the tools we learned at the Blaze conference and expanding on them. The youth groups leaders aren’t the ones who make the group grow. That is your job. When you live the life and carry the message Christ calls us all to do, you are the light in someone’s life. As your friends and classmates see it in you, they will want to learn more.

We have several activities planned in the coming months. A schedule of events is listed below. These are open to all. If they involve being away from the church, an Activity Participation slip and event permission slip are needed from you in order to attend. If you want to invite a friend to one of them, make sure you get them the forms to fill out. Event permission slips will be available at least 2 weeks before the event date.

Our youth group meeting time will be changing to 4:30 pm to 6:00 pm on Sunday starting October 3rd. Some meeting times are different and are noted on the calendar of events. You will see that the first Sunday of each month has Youth Service listed.

The Youth Service will be run like our normal Sunday morning service. Please remember that this is not the service to come to instead of Sunday morning, it is in addition to that service. We will have music, stewardship and communion as well as a short message. We will then meet downstairs and have a snack and discuss what we learned from the message. These services hopefully will be a time to introduce your friends to Christ and to our group. Adults are welcome to attend this service and to be involved with our discussion time. This would be a wonderful time to get to know the youth of our church and community better.

The other youth leaders and I are looking forward to an exciting year with all of our youth. Please feel free to contact me at any time if you have questions about anything we are doing. I can be reached at the church at 541.566.3422 Monday through Friday or on my cell at 541.377.0364. In His name, John ps. No NATHAN story done yet. If you want to read the next chapter when I am done, let me know and I will get it to you.

For good information on helping your kids learn what chores and how to help them do chores go to the following website:

http://www.focusonthefamily.com/parenting/parenting_challenges/motivating_kids_to_clean_up/age_appropriate_chores.aspx