More than ever, our culture offers enticing activities on Sunday mornings. Young peoples' lives are so heavily scheduled with school, sports, and enrichment activities like piano and art lessons that it is tempting for parents to use Sunday morning as a day to let the children and youth sleep in. “Family together time” is important, and there is so little of it.

I think those of us who feel called to a ministry of Christian/Spiritual formation need to take the competition seriously. I concentrate my efforts on two fronts: Today I suggest some ways to entice young people to give youth group a try. The next entry will be about persuading parents to bring their youth to church.

Persuading youth to give church a try:

● Send a graphically snappy post card or letter to each young person in mid August. Make it  a bit mysterious, hinting at enticing things happening

    in your youth group in September. See Church Marketing Sucks for ideas and critiques of brochures and fliers.

● Send young people, by internet or snail-mail, a survey form asking about their preferences.

● If it is in  your budget, send the young people a small package a couple of weeks before Sunday school/youth groups begin to meet in the fall.  Tell them to bring the item to church to discover how it will be used in your group. It almost doesn’t matter what you send. Receiving and opening a package that arrived by mail is a rare pleasure for us all.

   Possible items to send youth by mail:

● a smooth stone or glass bead that will be used in a meditation exercise

● a CD of a song that you will play and discuss in your group

● a compass that might signify your groups search for something (ex: “Finding Peace.”)

● a map of your city or town on which you can later indicate a field trip/s your group  will take

● a dragon’s eye lens to show that your group will learn new ways of looking at the world

Other ways to create excitement about your youth group:

● Have a picnic or pool party the last week in August to kick off the new year. Build in some ice breaker activities to help the youth begin to “bond” with each other.

● Put extra effort into making the first couple of meetings especially fun or interesting. Scavenger hunts are a hit. So are field trips of any kind.