Plans for the Summer

Last night we kicked off a brand new series, "Don't Waste Your Summer." The night was electric. We always do high energy an-thematic praise songs and at least two secular cover songs but the band's set with "Don't Stop Believing" and Atari's version of "Boys of Summer" was A-MAZING! Below is our advertising video for facebook and our website.

"Remember your last summer? You were bored to tears, felt alone, and when school started you may have said, "What happened to my summer?" You only get so many days off so don't waste them. All series long we're going to kick the summer off and help you make the most of it."

In addition to the new series roll out we conveyed to our kids our plans for this summer. I want to bullet them below and share them with you. 

• Our regular Tuesday night high school small groups (the Gathering) will dismiss for summer. In it's place every third Tuesday we will be hosting an event called T-Minus. The premise with this event is that 48 hours before a scheduled T-Minus a map, items to bring, and challenge to meet will be posted on the site and facebook. Students will have less than 48 hours to be ready, prepared, and present at the event. What happens and what they will do will be a complete mystery to them.
• We will continue to meet on Wednesday night for our seeker program continuing to bring great music, fun, and energy but instead of staying on campus we are going to promote an event called On the Spot. On the Spot will take place every third week and with this event students will bring $4.00 (to pay for the bus ride.) When they show up we will bus them to an offsite location where program will unfold. The location will be specific to the talk. It could be a lake where we talk about "the great catch of fish." A cemetery where we talk about  "Lazarus." A high school stadium where we talk about "a great cloud of witnesses." You get the picture.
• Summer Camp. Gateway has never had a summer camp. We are hosting it a beautiful Camp Buckner and bringing the band Courrier. Along with great sessions and activities we are also going to have themed late nights that will be insane.
• Last night we also conveyed to the kids that in June we will kick off a series called, "It's Up to You." We asked them before they left to write down questions or topics that they are dying to talk about or know how God stands on it. The top four so far; suicide, weed, suffering, and sex. With this series they have buy in and I'm excited to promote it and come at the kids with it. 
• On the back side of student ministry we are taking the time to galvanize our leadership community moving toward an environemnt where every leader is in Biblical community through a triad or running partner relationship. We are also going to go through "The Be With Factor" as a catalyst to moving toward a mentoring movement in our high school and middle school program.