Mentoring Youth: Affinity - God Cares for Youth

Summary

Sometimes the summer months can be lonely for youth. Things slow down. Since they are not at school, contact with other youth is reduced. There is a lot of time to think. And when you spend more time alone, it's also common to think that you are alone in your struggles. Use this activity as an icebreaker or simply to create an awareness that regardless of what youth are going through, there are others who gone through it before us and others that will go through it later. And even if it seems there is no one who can understand, Jesus does.

ResourcesNone

Preparation
None

What to do

1. Get everyone to pair up with someone else in the room.
2. Ask them to decide who will be person A and who will be person B.
3. As always, person B goes first. Person B asks the following questions in order, giving a chance for person A to respond after each question.
4. After person A has given his/her responses, the pair switches between who asks and who answers.
5. After some time to go back and forth between person A and B, you may wish to mix up the pairs with others in the room and repeat the process.

Questions

• Tell me something I don’t know about you.
• Tell me something you like about me.
• Tell me something we might have in common.

Take It to the Next Level

We often feel we are alone in our struggles and that no one understands us or there’s no one who can relate to us or understand what we’re going through.

We don’t often realize there are people all around us that have the same life situations as us – people who share so many things in common with us. We were never created to function alone. That’s why God gave us a community.

In fact, to prove we were never alone and that there was someone out there who was familiar with our struggles, Jesus Christ, our King left His throne room and became man. He walked the same land and lived the same life. He was God with us – Emmanuel.

Looking at the Scripture

"For we do not have a high priest who cannot sympathize with our weaknesses, but One who has been tempted in all things as we are, yet without sin. Therefore let us draw near with confidence to the throne of grace, so that we may receive mercy and find grace to help in time of need." (Hebrews 4:15-16 NASB)

1. Jesus knows how you think and feel

• "But Jesus did not commit Himself to them, because He knew all men, and had no need that anyone should testify of man, for He knew what was in man" (John 2:24, 25).
• And they prayed and said, “You, O Lord, who know the hearts of all, show which of these two You have chosen” (Acts 1:24).

2. Jesus knows you inside and out (Psalm 139:1-12, Psalm 103:14)

O LORD, You have searched me and known me.
You know my sitting down and my rising up;
You understand my thought afar off.
You comprehend my path and my lying down,
And are acquainted with all my ways.
For there is not a word on my tongue,
But behold, O LORD, You know it altogether. (Psalm 139:1-4)

3. Jesus knows your suffering (Isaiah 53:3-7)

4. Jesus will be with you and take care of you in all things (Psalm 91, 1 Peter 5:7)

Applying it to Life

• How does it make you feel knowing that God fully understands everything you think, feel, and are going through?
• Often God uses Christians as his hands, his voice, and his messengers to show his love and care to others.
• Who has God placed around you to show that there are others out there who care about them?
• Is there someone in your life you need to get to know more, to relate to, that you need to be his messenger of love and concern to?
• If we don’t take that first step to reach out, how else will they know that there is a God who isn’t so far away an out of touch with what they’re going through?
• What can you do this week to be a messenger of God's love, and care for others?

 For More Mentoring Ideas, Visit Us On Christian Mentoring