TBC Youth Group

Finally, the snow let up enough for us to have a Youth Group meeting again. (Unfortunately, there is supposed to be more snow next Friday—hopefully not enough to have to cancel it again. We’ve been cancelling Youth Group a lot, lately.)

Due to lack of planning, it was decided to have a Games Night again. As usual, the Games Night was not planned too extensively, beforehand. For the first hour or so, the kids entertained themselves; most of the boys played basketball, in the church gym, while some kids were in the sanctuary, playing the drums and piano, and some others were playing video games, on a console provided by Urban Promise. Some of the older boys were also having an intense conversation with one of the Urban Promise leaders, with whom they’d developed a good relationship. They mentioned that when they graduated out of Urban Promise, Youth Group hadn’t really properly filled the void—which isn’t too surprising, because the boys have less in common with the current Youth Group leadership than they’d had with the Urban Promise leadership. Still, it’s a failure for the Youth Group leadership, not to have filled that void.

While this took place, David ordered pizza and wings. Since it takes so long for delivery, we decided to let the kids continue entertaining themselves, until it arrived. We could then do the devotions, while the kids ate, and then move on to play Boneyard.

Unfortunately, when the food finally arrived—but after the pizza delivery guy had already left—we realized that he had forgotten to give us all of our drinks. So David had to call them, and get them to bring the rest of our drinks. He also forgot to start the devotion, and John had to remind him. The kids had already dispersed, and David had to go and gather them back up again.

John’s devotion was on the subject of a Christian’s changed life. Although we know that a Christian’s saved behaviour can never save that person—that is a work of Grace, and nothing but Grace—the flip side is that a saved Christian will always start to exhibit Christ-like behaviour. The saved person will become more like Christ—and if that person doesn’t start to become more like Christ, it’s a sign that the person has not been saved. If you’re not more like Christ than you were before you got saved, then you need to examine yourself, and decide if you really are saved. (For example, see Matthew 7:15–23.)

The drinks arrived just as the devotion ended, which was good timing. And then we played boneyard for the rest of the night. This is usually a crowd-pleaser, but for some reason, the kids weren’t into it. (Which tends to happen, from time to time, when you’re dealing with teenagers.)

After boneyard, it was time to bring everyone home. It took a few trips, between Odele and David, but we got them all home. Some kids had to go to Mississauga, which is a bit outside of the usual Youth Group range, but David volunteered to bring them.