AGE GROUP 11-19 year olds.
Evangelism as discernment: listen!
Game
Play the game ‘two truths and a lie’. Each person says two things that are true about themselves and one thing that is false. People have to try and guess which one is false. Talk about the importance of truly hearing what someone else is saying and what might be behind what they are saying. When we go about our lives in school, we can listen out for what God, through his Holy Spirit, is doing in our school.
Idea
Ask for a volunteer who wouldn’t mind being blindfolded. Send them out of the room and move the furniture around. Bring them back in and ask another person in the group to be their guide. Get the guide to stand next to the person without touching them and issue them with instructions for how to move around the room without hitting anything. After three minutes stop the exercise and ask the blindfolded person what it was like being given instructions.
Compare the work of the Holy Spirit to the person issuing instructions in that exercise. When we stay close to God we are more likely to hear what he is saying and where he is guiding us. That may be about challenging an injustice, reaching out to a lonely student or not laughing along with a degrading comment about someone.
Question
Ask the group: when was the last time they heard God tell them something? If they have never heard God, ask them if they would like to. Talk about what that might look and sound like.
Evangelism as dialogue: two-way conversation!
Say
We tend to think that mission is something that happens when we go to a different country or run a special week in school. Actually, mission is what is happening every day as you go about your life in school and live out your Christian faith in your classes and with your friends. A crucial part of mission is dialogue, and as we read the Bible it is obvious that Jesus lived this way, as did Paul, as we see in Acts 17. Ask someone to read Acts 17:22-23, or if you have time look at the whole chapter.
Questions
• What is happening in this story?
• How might this relate to what you might see happening in your friend’s lives?
• How did Jesus communicate with people when he was living on Earth?
Talk about parables and how Jesus would often leave people with a question. Suggest that this is a good model for how we can have conversations with those around us about our faith. The most important thing is not going away from a conversation knowing that we were right, but that the other person feels heard, valued and prompted to go away reflecting on what we have said or asked them. When we tell people they are wrong that is an instant barrier and we quite likely will not have another chance to chat to them about what is really important to us. Do not be fearful about leaving questions unanswered; quite often people will come back to find out more if they were left feeling intrigued.
Encourage the group to read parables Jesus told in their own time and to look for any patterns they can learn from them. You might also want to do this together in later sessions.
Evangelism as demonstration: act like it matters!
Demonstrating the gospel is probably the evangelism that most people will hear the loudest. More than our words it is actions that people remember the most, so how you live your life day-by-day in school really does matter.
Game: taste test
Take ten different samples of different tastes or foods, e.g. cold rice pudding, custard, mayonnaise, chicken soup, soy sauce, brown sauce and number these one to ten in different bowls without the group seeing what is in each bowl. Ask for two contestants. The first one starts and with their eyes shut they select a number and taste the item and have a guess at what it is. If they get it right they get a point. Take it in turns until you have done all ten and the person with the most points wins. If it is a draw, have a final taste to hand and have them taste it at the same time; the one to correctly guess first wins.
Idea
Jesus used the senses of taste and sight to illustrate the effect his followers should have on the world. Read Matthew 5:13-16, explain the context for this and quote the Sermon on the Mount.
Question
• Why do you think Jesus compared Christians to ‘salt and light’?
• How is it possible to become ‘unsalty’? Can you think of ways we sometimes hide our light?
• If we are living as ‘salt and light’, what impact should we be having in our school as 1) salt and 2) light?
• What things could we do to have more impact on our school as 1) salt and 2) light?
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