Looking for material that you can use with your youth group tonight? We’ve got you covered!
Forever One Curriculum
“The stories in the Bible are not standalone accounts of people, places, and events though; the Bible is one cohesive grand narrative of the Triune God who created all things, loves all things despite brokenness and sin, came down in flesh to redeem all things, and is weaving a master plan to bring all things back to himself. All stories of all people, places, and events in the Bible are part of this grand narrative. At first read, biblical narratives may seem to tell the story of a prophet, or a country, or a miracle but really Bible stories are only a little bit about these things. They are mostly about God.”
The Other Six Curriculum
“The Gospel is not about you, but you can play a part. Let me share a word with you—egocentric. Egocentrism is the belief that you are the center of all you do, feel and experience. You believe you are right, you know best and life is all about you. That’s being egocentric. Most of us grow up that way – it’s not our fault. As young children, we learn quickly that we need to take care of ourselves. We need to learn, adapt, grow and experience life from our own perspective. Nobody will do everything for us.
The problem (as you can likely see already) is when we remain egocentric as we get older. Perhaps it is still not our fault, as most advertising is also about you. You watch the TV shows you want and you pick the website you want to go to – perhaps it is even YouTube. You create your own social media accounts , and you post pictures and status updates about you. You hope that friends like it so you can grow in popularity. Even some church groups tend to emphasize you, saying you need to be in relationship with Jesus, you need to be saved, you need to follow Jesus, etc. Here’s the surprise: When you crack open the Bible, it’s not about you.”
Beatitudes Retreat Curriculum
A six session curriculum for youth group retreats.
“The beatitudes outlines the big picture of qualities and actions that should characterize the way believers live into the story of God. Our English translations of the Bible say that people who live into the beatitudes will be blessed. A better word here might be happy, not in the sense of the feeling of happiness but in the sense of deep fulfillment in having lived transformed lives because of our relationship with God. This does result in blessing, the greatest blessing we can know, but not necessarily the kind of material or physical blessing we might usually think of when we picture what it looks like to be blessed.”