Worship With Teenagers

This book addresses the vital role of public Christian worship in adolescent spiritual formation and shows how important youth ministry and worship ministry are to each other. Despite numerous research projects, books, articles, and resources that have been published about teenagers and about worship in recent years, the relationship between the two has been addressed only peripherally if not altogether overlooked. Drawing on his extensive experience in worship ministry and youth ministry, Eric Mathis offers insights into the worship practices of teenagers, corrects common misperceptions about worship, and critically examines four prominent worship models in current practice. Mathis invites youth pastors, worship leaders, ministerial students, and congregations to elevate the voices of young people in the worshiping community and enhance worship for all ages. The book includes a foreword by Kenda Creasy Dean.

Using scripture passages from Acts to Revelation, these creative worship experiences invite young people to focus on their relationship with God.

Between 40 and 50 per cent of Adventist youth leave the church in their 20s. Why? How can we keep them? How can we win them back? This book is the culmination of a magnificent obsession. For more than ten years Roger Dudley traced the lives of 1500 teenagers as they grew up and, often, grew disillusioned. Refusing to let them leave in peace, Dudley bombarded them with questionnaires. Many of them answered. This is their story. Dudley puts faces on the statistics by focusing in on individual case studies. He cites the heart-wrenching testimony of desperately lonely people surrounded by uncaring members. They want to belong, to be needed, to be heard, to be loved. They made some mistakes. We share their pain and their dreams, and feel the dissonant cadences of their troubled hearts. Some who never left explain what kept them in the church. Many who left want to return. "Without God, life is hell," wrote one. If you want to know what the youth of your church are not telling you, read this book. It includes the responses of a group of kids who were asked to design the ideal church, and an appendix explaining the causes of "adolescent heresy," the conflict spawned by the teenage struggle for autonomy.

Worship 4 Today is a three-part course specially designed to train and equip all who lead worship in the local church - those with prior experience or none, musicians and the non-musical, ordained or lay, those who lead the prayers, operate the technology, employ the creative arts, or participate in any way. Developed and tested in the Diocese of Sheffield over the last five years, it is now recognised as a national training resource and its publication is fully supported by the Liturgical Commission of the Church of England. This course: Nurtures a foundation of personal worship Provides a rich biblical and historical background Builds understanding of different worship Develops new expertise and skills Explores authentic worship for a mission-shaped church Part 3 focuses on practical worship skills, worship in the New Testament, the challenge of all-age worship and worship in a mission context.

This text looks at the background to alternative worship, charts its recent progress and studies its challenges for church youth work.

My name is Jaquelle, and I'm a teenager. I like football movies, sushi, and dark chocolate. But the biggest, most crucial, most significant thing about me is that my life's task is to follow Jesus. He is the One who changed my life. That's what this book is about. It's for teenagers eager to reject the status quo and low standards our culture sets for us. It's for those of us who don't want to spend the adolescent years slacking off, but rather standing out and digging deep into what Jesus says about following him. This book will help you see how the truth about God changes everything—our relationships, our time, our sin, our habits, and more—freeing us to live joyful, obedient, and Christ-exalting lives, even while we're young.

In [ital] Becoming a Multicultural Church[ital], Bowers reflects upon and shows how churches can benefit from the experience of First Congregational Church of Randolph, Massachusetts [em dash] the church she pastors [em dash] once a historically "traditional" one social grouping church, but now a "multicultural" church and one of the numerically largest churches in Randolph. She offers practical strategies and explores the processes involved, in a conversational style that will make it an easy read for pastors.