We will discuss the role of mentorship in transitioning new members, as well as those who grew up in the church, from being consumers to soul winners for Christ.

Michigan Camp Meeting 2018: As a Witness, Matthew 24:14

<p>We will discuss the role of mentorship in transitioning new members, as well as those who grew up in the church, from being consumers to soul winners for Christ.</p>

<p>Free sharing permitted under the Creative Commons <a rel="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/3.0/us/">BY-NC-ND 3.0 (US)</a> license.</p>

Michigan Conference of Seventh-day Adventists

Fieldwork

Chad Bernard

Meet Generation Z

Dear Lord, we thank You so much for the opportunity to talk about young people and ministry.

Lord, I just pray that You would bless our time together.

It might mean their son, their brother, their sister.

I just want to start off with a little bit of an introduction.

About 8 years ago now, I was called to move out to California.

The majority of my experience is in education.

My education, as far as training, is in education.

Last June, I started a new phase of my life, I guess is the best way to say it.

I'm now 1 of the directors for the youth department for the Michigan Conference.

I have the supreme pleasure of working with Craig Harris and Ken Mitchiff is our as our director and I let me tell you what there's so many reasons why I love this state and I love this conference but 1 of them was this essentially the leadership came and said you know we really think that God is blessing our camp, and we really think that God is blessing club ministries or the Pathfinders and Adventurers, But boy, our young people, once they go through those experiences, they're leaving.

And they're looking, they're having this conversation with me and I'm like, yeah, that's a great question.

We're interested in starting a new approach or a program or something.

We're asking the Holy Spirit to give us some ideas on how to reach our young people.

And we'd like to actually see if you'd be willing to join the team to develop that.

I get to go to any church that will have me, seriously, any church, and talk to them about a process that I'm basically gonna share with you this week.

Today we're gonna just identify the youth of today.

The generation Z is the term given to young people that were born roughly from 1998 to 2010-ish.

So I'm going to kind of share that a little bit with today, but I hope it to be super interactive.

I want to take you through a process of what I believe God has shown me, principles that I see him use in scripture, principles I find in Spirit of Prophecy, on how to change the way we do youth ministry.

I don't want to make absolute statements, but I recognize a problem that I have.

Sometimes I'll use words like always and never.

I hear youth ministers or people that are developed, and essentially it looks like this.

By God's grace, we offered free pizza in a movie and 60 kids showed up.

And so what is it that you want to listen to?

The other side is an approach I've seen is young people, all they do is self, they're selfish, all they do is care about themselves, and they're just horrible, and forget it, don't even waste your time with youth ministry.

Matter of fact, we don't even care because they're going to go to a boarding school soon and we'll never see them again.

We'll raise them in the community, they'll hit, you know, depending on your grade, they'll hit ninth grade or they'll hit eleventh grade and then somewhere, somebody will minister to these people.

And then when they don't come back, we can just blame those institutions.

Those teachers at the boarding schools did it.

I saw what they did at the latest gathering and then they don't come back.

I actually believe that youth ministry can be done differently.

So we started this new initiative called Fieldwork.

I'll explain it as we progress through the week.

But just today, I'm just going to talk basically about Generation Z, field questions.

I probably won't know a lot of the answers, but I'll take them anyway.

But we're going to be on this journey together.

So, another book I want to share, this was a very good book called Meet Generation Z.

I love the guy's name, that helped me out.

Some of you might ask is this gentleman, Is he an Adventist or not?

The reality is that in the field of youth ministry, the Adventist church, this is not a negative, this is stating the fact, we don't really write a whole lot about this.

So, when talking about something current and sociological trends, you typically need, if you're wanting to study this, you either need to go to scholarly articles, which are fascinating, but they use big words.

And then you read books too, those are good too.

But born between 1998, 2010, they don't remember, or many of them were not alive during 9-11.

This year's graduating class would have been born what?

What was your big thing that happened in American history that you like this was our generation's defining moment?

The challenger, that's really interesting you say that.

Civil rights movement, yeah, his brother, exactly.

How many of you felt like the moon landing was a big deal?

And you know what's interesting is, we sometimes carry an emotion that we expect everyone else should.

Like where you might hold Vietnam with reverence, if you talk to a Gen Zer about it, they would think of Vietnam, no offense, like maybe you feel about World War I.

The Method

Dear Lord, we thank You so much for the opportunity to come together.

And Lord, we just want to win souls for Your kingdom.

We are excited about spending eternity with You.

And that love that You filled our hearts with compels us to tell others.

And specifically, Lord, we have a burden for young people.

So Lord, bless us today as our prayer in Jesus' name, Amen.

Okay, so, I want to share some ideas with you that I think are super duper powerful, but I want you to understand it in context.

Sometimes we can get really excited about a concept that we almost make it an idol.

Like this is the way and look there's only 1 way and it's Jesus.

And if Jesus is behind the concept it'll be super successful.

If you're behind it or I'm behind it, not so much.

And a lot of the quotes I'm going to be sharing with you today are off of 1 page.

The book, Ministry of Healing, is so awesome, But there's this 1 page, it's my favorite page, page 143 specifically.

She says this, the world needs today what it needed 1, 900 years ago, a revelation of Christ.

Now, revelation, when you think of that word, you typically think of a book of the Bible, but if you break it down to its core word, its reveal, what do you think it means to reveal?

She's saying if Christ was revealed, that's what would be needed.

Have you ever heard that Scripture where Jesus said, if I am lifted up, I'll draw them into Me.

Now, he's not trying to be arrogant or any of that.

He's just suggesting that if people really saw me for who I really was and understood my ways, they would love it.

Now, we know this to be true if you read the narrative or the Gospels of Jesus' life, whenever He shows up, what happened?

Ellen White says in Desire of Ages that the reason why he didn't go inside, because there was no building that could hold the crowd.

Not only that, they would stand all day to listen to him.

Think of whoever you think your favorite speaker is.

Could you listen to them for 7 hours straight standing up in the heat of the day?

And so then when we ask, Why are people leaving the church?

There's a logical connection that maybe we need to do a better job of revealing Jesus.

She says, Christ's method alone will give true success in reaching the people.

The Savior does something really interesting.

He mingled with men as 1 who desired their good.

He showed his sympathy for them, ministered to their needs, and won their confidence.

Then he bade them, follow me." There's a process.

Heslop, that a this, this, this equals this, and then do this.

My question in your groups is this, how do you mingle?

Go ahead and take 60 seconds, and I want you to tell the rest of your group your moves.

How do you mingle with people you don't know?

Like have you ever, and I feel like there's a lot of dating crossover, like maybe remember when you were a teenager, did you ever see somebody go, I like to meet that person?

OK, so go ahead and discuss what you use, what worked for you to mingle.

For those of you that are just coming in, I'm just picking on you, but I think like pick a spot where there's other people so you can mingle if you're by yourself that could be awkward So if you're too heavy in 1 group move over to another table But because we're going to be talking in groups all morning.

You have the opportunity, you can share what you think, you can share what you heard, or you could share what you think someone else should have said.

So anyway, whatever, you just share with us how do you mingle, and if you happen to hear me repeat what you said, it's only because someone told me yesterday, you need to repeat what people say if they're not on a mic so that for the recording.

So I'm not being weird, maybe I am but like man he just said what I said you know, So you know why, okay.

Okay, you ask people, yes, you're a master mingler.

Yeah, so you ask them questions about themselves.

If you consider yourself an introvert, do you say, I do not mingle?

What I don't want to try and suggest this morning is, hey, I'm an extrovert, you all should be extroverted.

Matter of fact, I want to hear more, if possible, from introverted people to let me know either A, how you do this, or B, why you feel so uncomfortable doing it.

So you look for people who look more quieter than you.

Follow Me

Dear Lord, I thank you for our time together again.

Lord, I just, I want so badly for our young people to just have the experience that you've always wanted them to have.

I want us old people to have this experience that you've always wanted us to have.

You raised the church to be your agency to save men.

Help us function more efficiently with greater fruit Like you've always intended it to be is my prayer in Jesus name.

Amen let me let me tell you why I So passionate about young people.

Sunday, Sunday I'm walking along and I run into a young man and his age doesn't matter and who he was doesn't matter, but what does matter was he was baked, That's the term I use.

So I greeted him And he was he just was out of it and he was trying to act like He was trying to act like he was okay but he wasn't And my soul just was hurting You know what I'm saying now we don't live anywhere near each other.

Like here's my philosophy, and you could you can tell me after class how wrong I am and I would gladly like to learn.

But I don't, I feel like in order for me to address that, I actually need to be closer to him than I actually am.

Because part of you wants to go, dude, I totally know your bait.

Then the other side of me wants to go, dude, go to your trailer.

They're like, you can't say that, you're the pastor.

I feel like I'm just neutralized, But I'm hurting because I know that he's hurting.

And not only that, I know his family, and I know his situation.

The last thing I'm going to do is tell his father, because I know what he'll do.

And so I'm like, well, I'll see him when he sobers up.

And then I'll go, hey, man, please tell me I'm wrong, but I'm concerned about you.

Do you use social media, private message?

But you know what I would do if we were in relationship and we were in this type of program?

I mean, you know what, what kind of options do you have?

Like while he's high, hey, tomorrow remember we're going to go, oh yeah.

Then tomorrow while we're working together, man, hey, how was your day?

Okay, yeah you seemed a little sick Like because I just want you to know that I love you no matter what.

And we can have a conversation and that conversation can stay right here if you want to talk as we're doing whatever we need to be doing.

And maybe 1 day he would feel safe enough to go, man, I was, and explain.

When I was not walking with the Lord, what kept me close were people that knew that I was walking way outside of the will of God, who still love me, who actually talked to me as if I was 1 of them.

They always use inclusive language like, man, whether it was like a Christian success story, they would say things like, man, isn't God blessing us?

Or if they talked about something that was theological, and of course, we know this, And not as an exclusive thing, but like, yeah, you and I, we have this opportunity.

And you know what was going on every time they said that to me, the Holy Spirit was convicting.

You know, it could be a whole lot better.

This morning as I was praying, I came under this conviction, I actually posted it just because I just, God by your grace help me to love everybody and by your grace help me to have enmity or help me to hate everything that hurts me and you.

I want to hate what I absolutely love that hurts me.

Like help, it's easy to say help me to hate machine guns because they would hurt me.

But it's harder to say, and then you can just insert, Have you ever done this?

Have you ever went, I've done this, I'm gonna get off the confessional, I'm sorry, I'm on a side track.

Have you ever got done, you've sat before a meal and you said, and I've literally said this, Lord, I know you can't bless this, but I'm gonna thank you for it anyway.

I can't have a blessing, but I can give thanks.

You know, like this is not gonna help my waste.

Okay, but help me to hate anything that hurts me or others.

Christ's method alone will give true success in reaching the people.

The Savior mingled with men as 1 who desired their good.

Then he bade them, follow me." Now, for those of you that are new here today, thank you so much for coming.

What we've done is we've set up tables, so we encourage you to sit with others if you feel comfortable doing so.

So yeah, that's what you like to do, because we're gonna have some discussion and activities.

What we've focused on so far is we've talked about what mingling looks like, right?

And we talked also about what happens when we match our strengths with what our needs in the community, right?

But just a quick review, and to process this quote a little bit, mingling plus desiring their good plus showing their sympathy plus ministering to the needs equals confidence.

I talked to you about this young gentleman this morning that I saw that was just just so out of it.

I need to build confidence with him so that I can have this conversation, right?

Do you have people in your life that they have so much confidence in you or vice versa that they could tell you anything and you might be offended but you wouldn't leave the relationship?

Right, like for me, the obvious for me is my wife, right?

And she can tell me stuff that no 1 else can.

You should never wear that shirt, or why are you whatever?

She could tell me what color the shirt really was.

A Reason to Stay

Dear Lord, thank you for the opportunity to once again talk about field work, and this is essentially a way to reach people.

We want to follow your methods because everything that you did is amazing, perfect, and full of love.

So, just a quick review, the 4 components of this process, we've talked about engage, right?

Of the need to actually engage people outside of our circle, maybe of friends, circle of faith.

We talked about how many, most times we have people who, the only people they know are Christians, but we have this command to go actually out and meet people who don't know Jesus and to tell them about Him.

So we've got to figure out ways to engage the community.

We've sat and we've processed our strengths.

We've processed what the needs of our community are, and we're looking for matches, right?

Those of you that have been here for all of the lectures or whatever, you've established a table, you've established a little mini church, and you've got your ideas.

If you're new here today, we're so glad you're here.

Feel free to join any table, join a church.

You can act like you're from the community.

Then the second piece was equipping, right?

Learning how to equip on multiple levels.

And then also equip people that we ask that are friends in the community or acquaintances that we know, equipping them to do this ministry that we are doing.

And then the third piece we talked about yesterday was encompass.

We want to surround these people with love and encouragement.

And just kind of show them what Christianity is like from our perspective.

Now, remember this is a question we ended on yesterday and want to process today.

We have people that are coming from the community.

Remember on Day 1 I told you about that girl I talked to.

She had no idea where certain parts of the Bible were located.

And just super open to learning more about God.

And we have these meetings that we're meeting.

We're meeting because there's a point to the meeting, because we've got to align things up to strengthen this approach to our community.

And now, and we've said this, if we just stop there with social reform or social assistance, if we just stop there, that doesn't necessarily mean that God's in it.

Atheists can do these types of things, right?

They act like Jesus and not even know it.

But now we actually want to be intentional and talk to them about spiritual things.

So in your groups this morning, we're going to spend some time and talk about this.

And then after we process this question, I'm going to close our time together with giving you some help.

Like, these are some things you might want to look out for if you're looking to implement this.

So here's the question how do you intentionally speak to them about spiritual things what does that look like And as I read the question just now, I realized it's a weak question.

Because I don't want the question to just, you know, how do you talk about it?

Like for instance, you have lunch together at Subway and then you go, praise the Lord for the veggie sandwich.

How do, when you meet, How, well, when you come together, how can you transition those things into spiritual things?

Or maybe you create other opportunities that have a more intentional spiritual theme.

So what I'd like you to do right now is in your groups, discuss what that looks like, and come up with some ideas that you can share with the rest of the group.

Series

Fieldwork

A Reason to Stay

Transcript

Description

Parent Series

Parent Conference

Sponsor

Recorded

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