Letter to bcsm Parents

By this time you have no doubt heard that starting at the beginning of the year, things at BCC will look a little different. If you have not, let me give you a simple rundown of the impending changes. If you have already heard, just skip the next two paragraphs.

About 6 months back the Elders and Staff entered into an intense discussion about where we as a church body go from here. We felt like we built a good foundation for the future of ministry here in this place, but the question was, “What do we build on the foundation?”

The answer is, really, we become more of who we wanted to be all along. Our mission is to love our community and invite them into a life-changing relationship with Jesus. While we feel like we have really strengthened the people inside of our church, we did not think we were really bringing people in from the outside effectively. So the Elders put every program and ministry under the microscope to figure out how we can do that better. As a result, they decided the Sunday morning service needed to change a bit and asked me to head up the song service piece.

I am sure you all have your own questions and concerns as to what this might mean for the youth ministry. Let me assure you, we are not letting the teenagers fall through the cracks. In fact, quite the opposite is happening.

We feel like our church will be most successful if we can create a worship service that appeals to teenagers and adults alike. So as I lead worship over the next year we will be changing our song service to more closely reflect the ways in which teenagers like to worship. In order to make sure we are hitting the mark, we need the teenagers in the service and giving us feedback. So Sunday mornings we will have all jr. highers and high schoolers meet up front in the sanctuary. They will worship and take communion with the whole church. Then the Jr. Highers will be dismissed into the bcsm classroom where they will receive an age appropriate lesson based off of the sermon that Nathan will be preaching. The high schoolers will be asked to stay in the service for the duration.

I know that in the past we have had some parents say that teenagers just don’t like the service so it is hard to get them to go to church in the morning or even into the service. While I understand that sentiment, I wonder if the same argument would be made for keeping a teenager from getting their education. I don’t hear parents saying, “My kid doesn’t like math so I don’t make him/her do it.” In the grand scheme of things, the stuff we discuss in church is far more important than arithmetic.

So if your teens don’t like it, ask them why. Have a conversation. Lead them by saying something like, “I understand your concerns. Let’s go find a time when we can talk to Eric or Nathan or the leadership of the church and ask why we do things this particular way. They may not change the way they do things, but if you just complain to me nothing can or will be done about it and you will still have to go to church.” This shows them the high value you place on being a part of a local congregation, how vital it is to your life-changing relationship with Jesus, and how important you think it is to have open lines of communication. That is the only way we can grow together as a church.

Also bcsm is working hard to ensure there are plenty of opportunities for your student to engage outside of Sunday morning. We will have our small groups up and running, the New Years Party, the Winter Games 2018 in January, Ignite for the High Schoolers, Believe for the Jr. Highers and a bunch of other things happening.

I know this is a lot to process. If you have any concerns or questions about this new system, please let me know. I would love to talk with you about all this stuff.  

Eric