Finding True North #15: Youth Sunday @ NUMC // Lyceum @ LCUMC

Yesterday, I took communion three times. Maybe that's gluttony, but in my mind it made up for the fact that I'm pretty sure the last time I had Eucharist was May 10, during field ed orientation.

My second Sunday in Indianapolis involved three worship services—two at NUMC and my first at LCUMC. I got to be in the congregation for the two NUMC services because it was Youth Sunday.

Youth Sunday was excellent. I was curious to see how it would go because I've seen some pretty awful Youth Sundays in my time. But the NUMC youth did a great job. They used the theme "Stranger or neighbor?", from a Lenten retreat they did recently, to frame the service, and explored what it means to recognize one another as neighbors. The youth group here is diverse (in many ways) and missionally driven. Two graduating (or recently graduated) seniors told their faith stories, each of which was compelling, though both were different from the other and demonstrated the breadth and depth of the experience of a youth at this church. The service was convicting. The youth even took the opportunity to publish a letter in the bulletin expressing a call to the church to support full inclusion for the GLBT community, using the youth group's mission statement to frame it: "North United Methodist Church Youth Ministry seeks to learn, serve, and celebrate God's awesome love with EVERYONE!" This was not a normal Sunday service with youth plugged in at random; through liturgy, Scripture and music, the youth got to tell their stories of faith, even participating in the Great Thanksgiving. It was great to be there.

Then, yesterday evening, I participated in my first service at Lockerbie Central UMC. This week, they started what they're calling "Lyceum," changing the format of Sunday evenings to include 25-30 minutes of worship and then a time of presentation/discussing with various speakers coming in over the course of the summer. Last night, the speaker was...me. Well, Brenda and me. Anyway, first was worship, and I ended up bringing my guitar and playing along with Kari, a member who is cool in general but also plays piano, so, bonus points. We did a song I hadn't heard before called "Here Is Love" (that's the normal AKA lame version, but I found it in Welsh too!!). It's pretty, and it worked well with Kari on piano and me on guitar. We also did two Taizé chants, and in between were prayers, Scripture and a brief reflection on the Word. Then we moved into communion, and I (sort of) assisted. It was awesome! I mean, I just broke the bread and lifted the cup when Brenda got to that part, but I'd never participated in that beyond leading musical responses to the Great Thanksgiving or serving communion. So that was neat.

After worship, we migrated downstairs to the cafe. Brenda and I gave a brief presentation about "Approaching the Bible in the 21st Century." Because I'm me, I had put dibs on talking about the Old Testament, so I had composed a list of things I think are important to keep in mind when thinking about the Old Testament. You can look at that here if you care/are looking for ideas on ways to start a basic conversation about the Bible/want to judge me. :) We opened the space up for conversation, which was pretty interesting, though there were several people I wished had spoken up. We'll keep working on the format to encourage discussion while keeping things on track, but I thought it went well.

I'm excited to continue to help out at LCUMC and to get to know the congregation better. That will be a place where Brenda and I will get to sort of try things out, and hopefully I'll get to do more music there as well.

Also, I have an in/out button at NUMC, and it makes me feel really cool.