YL Capernaum Everywhere

My name is Sarah Brintnall. I’m so privileged that I have these few minutes with you to share some of how my journey with God, the creator of the entire universe, has radically changed my life. First, when I was in middle school I accepted Jesus Christ as my personal lord and savior. I was actually on a fall weekend when I made the absolute best decision of my life. I spent the rest of my 8th grade year going to weekly Young Life club where the leaders would proclaim the Word. I couldn’t wait to go to campaigners where we would dive into the scriptures and really take them apart and study the word of God. You know how exciting fall weekend can be. I was excited and started planning to go again my freshman year but I came home one day that week from school sick. I had a virus that didn’t seem too bad, but ultimately it changed my life. It started out like a typical virus… headache, fever, & the worst sore throat you can imagine, stomach aches and I just couldn’t focus. Over time I...

Every leader loves to be cared for and every staff person loves to have someone help make that happen! In Clemson, SC their Young Life teams have “team parents”. When someone or a couple commits to being a team parent they are committing to: Praying with and for the team Coming to club as often as possible to get to know kids and leaders Providing a meal for leaders before club (either in their own home or at club) Helping with the Christmas Party club for kids and leaders Serving as a mentor, when needed, for leaders In the end, they are committed to being Young Life leaders for Young Life leaders! What a beautiful picture of the body working together for the sake of everyone experiencing Jesus! Already have team parents? Tell us what they do that you love!

When I think of the scene of Christ’s birth I think of all the  “favorite things”  of many of my Capernaum friends. Elizabeth’s  Dream  💫Come True Mary’s  Choseness👯 Angels Announcements of 📣 Good News A Donkey🐴 as Transportation The  Music  🎶of Mary and Zechariah The Birth of a Baby  Winning🏆   over an Evil King A  Sparkly🌟  Star Gifts 🎄and Surprises🎉  from Fancy Magi Animals  🐎🐄🐑in a Stable  Silence  🙉and  Holiness😇  in the Night A  Baby 🍼  who is Christ the Lord!!!! Right from the beginning God takes great care including a variety of sensory details in Jesus birth story. He does not want anyone excluded from the thrill of hope, peace or joy that Jesus has come to offer!!  What a thoughtful, detailed and inclusive God! In Young Life we have a founding quote from Jim Rayburn that has been repeated in our mission for over 75 years...

  Mixer Q-tip war: Split room in half with tape down the middle. Pass out straws and Q-tips (make sure you test that the Q-tips fit before hand). You will shoot the Q-tips across the line via placing the Q-tip in the straw and blowing. Keep this going for a while and then stop the music and pick a winning side (one with the least amount of Q-tips). 12 days of Christmas: divide the room up into 12 groups (numbers in group vary based on size of club) Each group is a day of the 12 days. Give them some time to think of a motion/dance move that represents their day. Then perform the whole song! Dice Doubles: Have prepared a gift (candy from dollar store goes over great!). Wrap it in MANY layers, including tape! Sit the group in a circle. If you have more than 20, it’s best for multiples circles to play the game. Place the wrapped gift, gloves, a Santa hat and dice in the center (from playing this game with Capernaum many times, I’ve actually learned that one dice with each ...

Thank you Danielle Guy for this great club idea!   Mixers Scavenger hunt: Break the room into teams.   Each team’s hints are divided by color. For example, the blue teams hints are all on blue paper, green is all green, and yellow is all yellow. Each team’s hints are the same and hidden in the same place. Change up the order for each team so that they’re not all going to the same place at the same time. These examples are specific to my club so you’d have to adjust to fit yours: Hand piece of paper with first step: Take a selfie of your whole group with the “dessert lady” Once they take the photo, the dessert lady will hand them their first clue . Clues are on paper with a letter (will spell out Young Life at the end). First paper has a Y on back and then the next clue on other side. (these are specific to a club in Jackson, MS so feel free to change them up to work with your location) Y: Leap frog to the music station O: As a group sing the ch...

As we continue to think about helping our friends serve, it often will be individual conversations and adaptations. Danielle Guy in Jackson, MS recently walked through the process with one of her friends and has shared it with us. Peyton is 23, thus aging out of Capernaum, but he absolutely loves it! During the day Peyton works as a host/busboy at a local restaurant, and one of my adult leaders who heads up our meals thought it could be cool to have Peyton help her out with that at club. That leader and I met with Peyton and his parents to talk about it and everyone seemed to love the idea. After a lot of talking and planning, we sat down to make it official! We let Peyton know what it meant to be a helper at Capernaum as well as how and why it will look different than when he was attending. I handed his parents Young Life's mission statement that we give to all leaders and handed Peyton an adapted one that pertained to him. This was easy for him to understand and he read eac...

In his book “Prayer”, Tim Keller writes, “Prayer is faith become audible.” Spending time with our friends with disabilities, they often teach us more about prayer than we teach them. They show me there is no one way to communicate with the Father. They show me how simple it can be to engage and worship him through prayer. At Fall Camp, we had a friend who was asked to pray with the leadership team before they went on stage. “Jesus, I love you and I believe in you.” It was simple yet profound. However, not all of our friends have the confidence to pray on stage or the use of verbal communication. How do we begin to teach our friends with varying abilities how to communicate with their Father?  Laurel and Kaitlyn, both on Tennessee Capernaum staff, held a Campaigner overnight in which the focus was prayer. They led one activity in particular that worked well for the whole group: Each student got a sheet of paper. First, they wrote their name. (For some, leaders acted as the...