I am the gate

Last night at youth group we had great conversations. We have a tradition each week of beginning our evening (after some gathering snacks and some sort of weird ice breaker) of sharing our joys and concerns. As we receive these prayer requests from students and leaders with raised hands, we share a moment of community. Sometimes it's kids who want to tell the group about making it to state, or receiving the lead role in the play, or that their grnadmother died... and last night's moment of community was a great moment, with lots of sharing, it began the evening great!

After our Joys and Concerns I explained the game of Secret Agent, which is a great mingling game. The basic premise is to walk around shaking hands with people while secretly one person, the secret agent, secretly scratches/taps the inside wrist of the person that they meet, thus killing them. Once a person is tapped, they need to shake at least two hands before collapsing to the floor in death.  Part of what makes this game great is that kids are talking with each other and the leader of the group can direct those conversations. To make the game a little better of a mixer, I told the kids that they were to keep shaking hands while they each asked the directed question and and both answered it. The game progresses as people share conversation (what was the last movie you've seen, what's your favorite vacation, where would you like to go before you die...) until someone would like to risk accusing someone of being the secret agent. An accuser raises their hand, the game is paused, and the accuser gets to accuse someone. If they're right the game is over, if they're wrong, the accuser is out.

For our group - once was perfect. We had used playing cards to determine who was the killer (the only one with a face) but when we attempted a second time playing the game a handful of kids cheated and killed each other. oh well.

Following our game we headed back into the youth room and dove into some scripture. I projected the Bible verses and we read them out loud as we talked about John 10:1-18. This year we've been reading through John and this was the next logical passage, but to make it especially relevant and interesting we referenced the news story last week about the LCMS pastor who apologized for participating in the Sandy Hook Vigil. The two phrases that stood out to our group which incited good discussion were: I am the gate, Whoever enters by me will be saved... and I have other sheep that do not belong to this fold. I must bring them also. What great conversation those two passages held, especially given the Lutheran pastor apology.