Talks in Transit

Last year I started posting this series for students and parents of Transit (the middle school ministry of dV8 the student ministry of Far Hills Community Church - how about that for a parenthesis full!). I was doing pretty good until finals at UD and the Christmas season hit at the end of the year. It was pretty much straight down hill from there. I stopped about halfway through our series on Galatians. If I can find my notes for chapters 4-6 of that series I'll post them. Until then you'll have to talk with some of the awesome kids and leaders of Transit to see how it finished up.

I am going to revive the series for me and you. I'm going to cut the posts in half to get to the core of the outline in the various forms they come in as well as give the big ideas of each talk and core text that we use.

So we kicked off the year with a series called: My Anthem

Week 1
Seek and Stand

Text: Psalm 1

Intro:
New Year's resolutions

Transition:
New Year's resolutions in the grand scheme of things are declarations to self, others and the world that this is what is changing in the new year. It's an anthem communicating this is how I will live.

Body:
Definition of Anthem

What are the anthems for significant groups that represent middle school students?

Observations from Psalm 1:1-6 that might guide us as we sing/live our anthem in 2009
1. Choose your relationships wisely.
2. Delight in all things godly b/c of 1) growth b/c if we don't 2) delight in the rest of the stuff won't last.
3. Keep everything in perspective.

Big Idea: May our lives declare that we seek after and stand firm in the way of God

Week 2
My Loser Anthem

Text:
Matthew 16:24-27

Intro:
Review what is an anthem and looked at what some pop culture people might have as their anthem for 2009

Body:
Read aloud Matthew 16:24-27

We looked at the three things that make up the loser anthem according to Jesus and how/why it is important for living them out in our lives. The three key components of this anthem are:
1. Deny self
2. Take up your cross
3. Follow me

We unpacked this in large group where I facilitated basically four questions to the group about each of those three things:
1. What did Jesus mean?
2. Why did he say it?
3. What does it look like in the real world?
4. How could we apply that to our own lives?

Big Idea: This "loser" anthem demonstrates how we can follow Jesus in his way of life.

Week 3:
I can't find my notes but revolved around MLK and was titles something like My Dream/My Anthem. I'm such a loser and not in the above way! sorry.

Next up: The I Heart U Revolution - Series about love.