A Multi-generational Church
One of the things that I love most about pastoring an established church is the fact that we are truly multi-generational. I love looking out into the congregation each Sunday morning and seeing the wide mix of ages and people in different stages of life. Our diverse mix of age groups is one the core strengths of Fee Fee Baptist. However, it does lead to the question of how do we create a comprehensive plan for spiritual formation that will be effective for each generation in our church?
We are attempting to tackle that through a couple of different avenues. First, specifically for the start of this year, we are having all our Bible Study classes walk through the same material based around the markers of our church’s mission. We wanted to create a “common conversation” throughout the many generations of our church. Whether you are in our children’s ministry or in a senior adult Bible study class, you will be studying the same thing and be able to talk about it with one another. We are strategically not just trying to drill down deeper into the marks of what it means to “build and pursue,” but also looking for ways to create dialogue and connections between different generations.
Besides the importance of having common conversations between our different generations here at Fee Fee, we are also going to have targeted, specialized events for spiritual formation for specific generations.
Here are a just a few things we have coming up over the next few months:
This month, we are having a Parents’ Boot Camp on February 16 to help disciple and equip our parents to lead tech-wise families to protect their kids from various online dangers.
The weekend of March 6-8, our youth will be having their Disciple Now event. This event is focused on spiritual formation and we will be challenging our students to wholeheartedly pursue Christ and live boldly for Him.
On April 19, Dr. Richard Ross, the founder of the True Love Waits movement, will present to us a “Family Connection Sunday.” He is going to be preaching on multi-generational discipleship and will lead a special training time for parents and grandparents.
In May, we will have Dr. Claude Cone, the former Executive Director of the Baptist Convention of New Mexico, head up our Legacy Weekend for Senior Adults. We will have a Senior Adult banquet that weekend, and Dr. Cone will be preaching and leading our senior adults in how to use the wisdom and experience that God has granted them to make an impact in our church.
In June, we will be hosting our annual Vacation Bible School, which focuses on spiritual formation for our kids.
Please join me in praying for our church, that we will have effective discipleship and spiritual formation throughout each and every age group here. Pray that God will use our targeted discipleship events to equip all of us to love God more and serve Him well.
In Him,
Pastor Zach