October 14, 2021
Last night at youth group we spent the evening tacking the first 6 verses of Jonah chapter 1. We read that Jonah, as a prophet, hears the voice of the Lord and is told to arise and go to Nineveh who has done evil in His sight. This is how many of the other minor prophetic books start – and yet, there’s a twist in the book of Jonah. Instead of doing what God commands, Jonah rises and goes the opposite way. The text repeats three times that Jonah goes down to Tarshish, down to the boat, and down into the belly of the boat. It’s clear that the author wants to emphasize Jonah’s complete distain for God’s call on him.
We talked about how God speaks to us through His Word, and how we can often be just like Jonah. Although Jonah is portrayed as being silly for turning away from God in this story, it’s a reflection for us on how silly we are to turn away from God’s commands. In fact, often times, we tune out His voice completely by turning to distractions, etc. In small groups, we tried to get really practical, discussing how we hear from the Lord, and called to obey God, even when we are struggling to trust that His way is the best way.
It was a good night in the Scriptures together. I am looking forward to next week when we’ll tackle the second half of chapter 1.
High School Hang Details for this Week
We are going to do something a little bit different for High School Hang this week. Instead of staying at the church the whole evening, we’re going to take the group to the Sauvie Island Pumpkin Patch to do the Corn Maze at Night (we’ll probably do a youth leader scavenger hunt). 🙂 The cost will be $8 for admission to the Corn Maze. We will meet at the church at 6:30pm, and plan to leave in the church van at 7:00pm. We will be back at the church by 10pm.
Pumpkin Patch
We are going to the pumpkin patch THIS Sunday. This is open to both our Middle School and High School students. 🙂 If your student would like to attend, please have them gather out by the bell of the church on Sunday at 12:45pm. We will carpool to Bizi Farms together. The cost is $15 for admission, which buys the students a pumpkin, a hot drink, pumpkin launching privileges, and admission into the corn maze. We will arrive back to the church close to 4:00pm.
With you and for you in Christ,
Ryan Aufenkamp
Categories: Youth - Jonah, Youth Night Updates