Coronavirus: A youth ministry liveblog

"The Lord is close to the brokenhearted; he rescues those whose spirits are crushed." (Psalm 34:18 NLT)

Tonight we’re praying for young people who are living closer to uncertainty, risk and suffering during the lockdown. Some are experiencing a ‘double lockdown’ by living in households or families where they are at greater risk of being hurt, abused or neglected by those they are having to self-isolate with. Some young people will be witnessing increased violence between people in their households.
Some young people will be staying with neighbours or other relatives as one or both parents are key workers and have been deployed to areas of very high risk.

Some young people have friends or family members who have tested positive for covid19. Some young people have already been bereaved. Others will lose loved ones to the virus as the weeks go by.

Ever-present God, thank you that you draw close to those in great need. We ask you to draw close to young people who are facing grief, suffering and uncertainty in their isolation. Keep them under the shadow of your mercy and hold them in their anxiety and fears. May people around them have the skill and wisdom to respond to their needs.
May those in need of protection reach out for help and find the support they need, quickly.
May those who are grieving know your comfort and love.
May those who are anxious for families they are in isolation with or are separate from, know peace in the midst of their fears.
Amen.

We've been posting a lot on this liveblog and we don't want you to miss out, so we thought we’d give you a mid-week round-up of some our highlights you might have missed over the last seven days:

• Together Apart session three and session four came out this week! These comprehensive session plans are part of a short series enabling you to explore life and faith with young people, designed specifically for the context of online youth work.
• There have been several great podcasts released in the last week but in particular, we recommend checking out Dr Kate Middleton’s insights into the mental health of young people during isolation. There are tips and practical advice applicable to both young people and youth leaders alike. On a similar theme, another great article to check out is Young Minds blog post 'Young people's self-care tips for self-isolation’ which features practical advice from young people themselves!
• Writer and broadcaster Andy Robertson shared some excellent content on the ‘Spirituality of Games’. He challenged us to reevaluate the way we view video games and how these games are more than just entertainment to young people – they are a new way to tell stories, to engage with the world and make sense of life.
• Our friends at Open Doors Youth have created some incredible resources for young people and youth leaders for this time of isolation – learning lessons from the persecuted church. These resources are available in several different media forms and explore themes of uncertainty, isolation, lack and fear.
• The ultimate ‘Lockdown Listicle’ appeared on the liveblog just in time for the start of the Easter ‘holidays’! This list brings together 99 fun, thoughtful and creative ideas young people can try out over the next couple of weeks.

These are just a few highlights from a week of all-around incredible content. We want to thank you so much for your support and if there’s something you’d love to see or even something you want to contribute in coming weeks please get in touch!

Starting digital evangelism for the first time? Need tips for how to use social media to reach young people? We recommend this blog post by our friend Ben Cutting, digital evangelist at Youth for Christ. We love this quote about digital evangelism for the long haul:

"In that sense, digital evangelism is like dieting. You can shortcut the proper process and get some instant results but long term, it requires time and consistency to be more than a flash in the pan. I want to encourage you that when all this is over and the youth group can meet up again, please continue what you have started online."

"Friends come and friends go, but a true friend sticks by you like family." (Proverbs 18:24 MSG)

Tonight we’re praying for young people’s friendships. During the teenage years, friendships take on a powerful new dimension in helping young people gather a deep sense of belonging and confidence. On the flip side, it’s also the time when young people are most vulnerable to feelings of rejection and loneliness if they don’t find close, supportive friends, or if they are caught up in peer groups that assert a negative influence on them.

Let’s pray that when the regular routines that provide social connection, stability and purpose are removed, young people in our churches and communities will find existing friendships growing stronger, make new positive friendships and find brilliant ways to support each other.

Father, friendships are a brilliant gift from you.
We thank you that young people are often the best at demonstrating the kind of loyalty, sense of adventure and compassion in their friendships that delight your heart. Tonight we pray that you will bless the young people in our churches and communities with even greater skills to develop positive friendships that will build their confidence and increase their hope in this difficult time.

May they find opportunities to be honest and vulnerable with each other, in a way that’s safe.

May they be courageous in reaching out to peers who may feel lonely or are struggling at this time.

For young people who may have felt socially isolated and lonely before covid19, may this break from the regular routine give them new ways to express themselves and find good, lasting friendships.

For young people who may be feeling trapped or overwhelmed in their peer groups, uncertain who their friends are or suffering bullying online, may they have the strength to reach out to peers and adults who can support and love them.

For young people whose struggles to accept themselves and feel that they fit in is exaggerated by social media, may they find safe and meaningful ways to connect with peers online.

May the young people who know you, find the confidence to take the risk of sharing you with their friends.
Amen.

"Now that we know what we have—Jesus, this great High Priest with ready access to God—let’s not let it slip through our fingers. We don’t have a priest who is out of touch with our reality. He’s been through weakness and testing, experienced it all—all but the sin. So let’s walk right up to him and get what he is so ready to give. Take the mercy, accept the help." (Hebrews 4:14-16 MSG)

Tonight we’re praying for young people in our churches and communities to experience the goodness and mercy of God. Whether we are able or not to stay in contact with the young people we’re called to serve, we can rest in the confidence that God is more than able to make his presence known to each and every young person right now. Social isolation is no barrier to the Holy Spirit. If you can, bring young people before God by name. Ask God to pour out his blessing and comfort on the young people who are living in your community.

Father, every young person is known and loved by you. Tonight we pray that the young people in this community who you have called me to serve will reach out for you and will find you. Bless them in their homes. Bless them online. Bless them out on the streets. Bless them as they sleep. Bless them as they adjust to this new way of living. Above all, may they see and understand how wonderfully they are made and how powerfully they are loved by you. Amen.

A new network of churches which are looking to help their communities during the Covid-19 epidemic is growing rapidly. YourNeighbour.org - an initiative of the Good Faith Partnership - is seeking to ‘help churches to be good neighbours’ by equipping leaders, connecting churches with people in need, and by working with the government. It’s free and quick to join, and by doing so you’ll get access to a range of online resources, including some from Youthscape.

During Holy Week, Christians around the world will be remembering the sacrifice of Jesus that makes it possible for us all to draw close to God. It’s good to be reminded that we can have this intimacy with the Father through the Son. And now more than ever, it’s good to pray for young people in our churches and communities to know this intimacy with the Father too. So every day this week we’re inviting youth workers and those who care about young people to join us in praying for them. Each day at 6pm we will share a prayer and a few pointers for how we can be praying for young people at this time.

We would love you to join us.

Our friends at Open Doors Youth have created resources for young people and youth leaders for this time of isolation, learning lessons from the persecuted church. You can subscribe here to receive weekly emails, videos, podcasts and reflections around these themes: uncertainty, isolation, lack and fear.

At the best of times, we turn to video games to keep children busy or provide some light entertainment and bonding. Now, with much more time inside it’s easy simply to ramp up that same approach.

However, video games can offer much more than that for young people. Like any media, they are a new way to tell stories, to engage with the world, to make sense of life. But as well as that, they can also offer a powerful space in which to find calm, hope, peace and even a bit of control when the world around us feels far from that.

The challenge is finding the games that offer these things at the right time. Writer and broadcaster Andy Robertson (who was one of the contributors at last November’s National Youth Ministry Weekend) has put together The Family Video Game Database as a resource to help you do just this. It’s a huge collection of information about video games arranged into lists.

Along with the usual lists about playing together on the couch, or online, there are some more interesting ones that point to games with a deeper side. For example:

• Find Calm
• Hope Through Play
• Laugh and Relax

One of the lists in the database has been put together by the LTN (Love Thy Nerd) Christian gaming community to highlight games that challenge us to love our neighbour. Other interesting highlights include a list of games that offer tough ethical decisions, games that invite you to inhabit another world or walk in someone else’s shoes.

If you’ve never played games yourself before, the site encourages you to try out the games picked out specifically as your first video game.

The full set of lists in the database are here and you can search for any game by platform, genre, theme, PEGI rating, here.

Interested in further reading? You can also find Andy's book: "Exploring Spirituality in Video Games" here and news about an upcoming book here.

We want to reach young people where they are - and right now, young people are at home more than ever before. If you want some ideas for how to support parents/families as they do this, or if you're a youth leader juggling youth work and homeschooling, Kitchen Table has a great list of "faith at home" resources here and some helpful advice here.

Mike Pilavachi and Andy Croft, two of the key leaders from Soul Survivor Watford (and the long-running Soul Survivor festival which ended last Summer), are producing daily Biblical reflection and encouragement videos for teenagers. The first two are already online on the Soul Survivor YouTube channel here, and further episodes will appear each day. You can also find them on Spotify.

You could share these with young people as a regular bit of good quality input during the current period of social isolation, either by sharing the video each day or pointing groups to the channel.

The Youthscape team have been working hard to create new tools and resources to support youth leaders in response to the recent period of massive and rapid cultural change. Here’s a brand new one, hot off the press. ‘Together Apart’ is a short series of curriculum resources enabling you to explore life and faith with young people, and is designed specifically for use in the context of an online youth work session. And it’s absolutely FREE!

Each session includes a short programme around a theme, along with copious notes on everything that a youth leader might need to consider when running the session online. We’re not claiming that this is a revolutionary new youth work model - but we hope that it will prove really useful in the immediate context in which we find ourselves.

The first two sessions, written by Youthscape’s Hannah Bradley, can be downloaded below. Session one looks at the subject of trusting in God, and the second resource explores how Jesus changes lives. Another four sessions will follow in the next couple of weeks. We hope to bring you more innovative resources very soon - but for now, we hope these are useful, and as always we welcome your feedback!

If you’re looking for resources to send to young people, you might want to point approximately half of them to a new video/audio podcast from Youthscape’s Martin Saunders. Based on his recent book The Man You’re Made to Be, this eponymous new series is an attempt to make the book’s content accessible to a wider range of young men, including those who struggle with reading. New episodes are released each Friday on Spotify and Apple podcasts, and a video version is available on YouTube. The first instalment is now available below.

Want to get your youth group praying in creative ways? Or just struggling to find the words/inspiration for your own prayer life at this time? Our friends at 24/7 Prayer have written up prayer guides for the Coronavirus and you can sign up for virtual prayer rooms. Prayer Spaces in Schools have also released some guidance for family-friendly prayers.