Our team here at Group/Simply Youth Ministry spent two years developing an approach to a youth ministry staple—the sermon series—that creates a growth-rich environment for students. We discovered a lot along the way. For example, almost everyone in youth ministry uses sermon/talk series at their main weekly gathering, but very few are truly happy with the end results.
All of us pour our heart, mind, and soul into sermon prep, but it’s really hard to gauge our permanent impact. So we tapped our four decades of expertise to create an innovative, highly engaging resource we call LIVE: Message Series. Each series offers powerhouse messages that have a secret weapon: active and interactive elements that lead to true transformation. And all the series come in a package that includes optional ideas and a mountain of graphic assets to help you publicize and present.
Along our development journey, we surveyed youth workers for their favorite topic targets. So here they are! These titles are the result of partnering with youth workers just like you to develop a comprehensive list. Build your own series based on these topics, or just click on this link to check out the series we’ve already completed.
- Base Camp: The Basics of the Faith
- The True You: Finding Your Identity in Christ
- The Parables: Unlocking the Mystery Stories of Jesus
- Many Parts, One Body: You’re Gifted for a Purpose
- The Unit: Building Community & Unity
- Choose Wisely: Navigating Your Life With Jesus
- The Church: Belonging to Something Big
- Dive: The Freedom of Commitment
- Prove It: How Doubt Can Fuel Belief
- Do-Over: The Gift of Grace
- Gold Stars: The Truth About Self-Esteem
- Family Matters: Surviving & Thriving at Home
- Friends Forever: Finding a Place to Belong
Got a great sermon series title to share? See a big gaping hole in our list? Offer your ideas in the comments section.
No more, but Talk to Me answers a need I have for a title for prayer ‘sections’ on handouts (for Junior Highers who struggle with prayer) – tx
7 deadly sins of a youth group
Fightin Words – handling conflict, controlling the tongue
Scary Jesus – a series around halloween covering the side of Jesus we dont always see or want to think about
Hey Dave,
Scary Jesus sounds cool, do you have audio, video, sermon notes you could share?
Have a great day!
The Thruth Series- Looking at the book Evidence That Demands a Verdict and apologetics
Take Me To Your Leader
OMG! -Our Mighty God!
*Truth not thruth,lol
kinks- what stops God from flowing through you
“Where Should I Go to College?” – a series on seeking God’s Will and trusting Him through all of life’s BIG and small questions.
YoU aSkEd It: our current series answring questions they turned in!
“Lost” Is Over, Now What?
A series on “Habits”. This series would coincide with the last episode of the ABC show lost.
Here are a couple we are doing this fall:
Jukebox: we will take a Top 40 hit’s lyrics and compare with scripture
That’s What He Said: A look at the red letters of Jesus
Leftovers: Giving God our time, talents, and treasures
Thanks for the ideas.
I just did a series called, “Cinderella and Coldplay are Killing your Love Life: Love in Real Life”.
A practical approach to love and dating. It was really well received. Email me if you’re interested in it! josh@restoringhope.com
I also did a series called, “Why We Do What We Do”. Exploring the “taboos” of the church, and why we say “abstain”.
We’re doing two series this school term… ‘Profile of a life-giver’ and ‘My faith, my responsibility.’
I don’t want to dampen the creativity but is this working backwards? Coming up with a cool name for a series and then figuring out what it should be on? Why not start with Scripture then get the fancy name? Maybe I’m just wierd or totally out of touch with what students really want.
Jeff … dude, EVERYTHING revolves around Scripture. Just fun naming the series you teach from Scripture. JG
great ideas…i’m interested in the GodTwitter one. what’s the subject matter? verses with 140 characters? is there a way to find those?
JG- I know that and I know that’s where you come from but I know too many leaders who look for a cool theme or build an entire series on an illustration and then attach some verses. I’m not one of those grumpy frumpy anti-everything kinds of guys, I just feel like one reason youth leaders are not seen as “real pastors” is because their speaking/preaching/teaching is weak. Often we are seen as needing a fancy title or catchy name or crazxy media to make up for that weakness. There was a Collide article which talked about this type of thing where John Piper mentioned he wasn’t so big on media illustrations mostly because he felt they were used to cover up weak teaching.
So we’re on the same page I think. And my students loved the PDYM Student Leadership Conference.
We just did an identity in Christ series called “RPG: Real Personal God” it was fun to use elements of role-playing games and rocket propelled grenades (we’re situated next to a marine base, so many of our students were more familiar with that than the roleplaying games) to illustrate who God is, who we are in response, and what it looks like when that relationship with our real God is restored.
We just finished a series on the armor of God called six round knockout. We made our stage into a boxing ring with a punching bag hanging from the ceiling. We used the rocky videos to be our openers. We even made a count
down to go along with the theme using eye of the tiger music. Here is a link to that countdown feel free to use it. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uWpPU3NYjO0
thank you so much for the ideas.I’m a sophomore in high school in Arkansas. Last Wednesday at youth i proposed the idea that each week a different student do a small lesson. next week is my week and you just gave some amazing ideas. thank you
Thanks for the ideas. We just did GAME PLAN. What’s your game plan? Everyone wore team shirts. I taught in a referee jersey. What’s God’s game plan for your life? What happens when you aren’t firm in the game plan (hypocrisy, lukewarm). What’s Satan’s game plan for you?
In response to the previous thought that the title should come after reading scripture. I do agree but it’s possible to get a title like CALL OF DUTY, since its already used in homes everywhere, and pray into it, and that message unfold. THAT title alone gets my attention and will that of every teen who sees, or hears it advertised, because they are familiar with it. I’m loving these ideas.
Is there are particular series that focuses on the empowerment of the Holy Spirit in a believers life? I looked at the “Choose Wisely” four part series and two of the lessons are based on Acts, but it seems like a pretty broad focus on making wise decisions. Does it really drill down to our need for Christ and the empowerment we have through the Spirit over every area of our life?
Thank you for ideas