JourneyOnline
To celebrate Queensland Youth Week, Steve Molkentin writes about BreadFishToo, an online community of faith specifically for young people within the Uniting Church in Australia, Queensland Synod.
BreadFishToo has been running for a little over a year and we’re journeying together to learn more about Jesus and how to live out our faith as consistently online as we do in real life.
The BreadFishToo community is connected in many ways – camps like Easter Madness, Country Madness and Refuel, along with a number of Presbytery events and other gatherings. There’s also the music videos we’ve produced for Christmas 2017 and Easter 2018 that have been important to share our skills and talents with the wider church.
Teens and young adults can join the BreadFishToo Facebook group, or follow us on Instagram, Twitter, Vero (BreadFishToo) or Snapchat (BreadFish2oo). There’s lots of different ways to engage because we recognise not everyone is on the same social media networks. We also feed lots into the different networks every week to encourage members of the community to develop as disciples of Jesus. It’s really important to us that we together have the chance to learn how to be more like Jesus every day.
There’s lots that congregations can do to engage with the young people that attend their services. Give them opportunities to lead worship or share the sermon, involve them in intentional mentoring programs, connect them with missional opportunities, support them to come to Synod Youth events (like Easter Madness).
Congregations can also look to the needs of the young people in their local area and think about ways they support them and serve them. Sacrificial support of our children, youth and young adults provides many opportunities to develop a positive relationship that will then bring with the chance to share the gospel.
The BreadFishToo community gathers regularly as a part of the young adult Renovators youth leadership program, and also as a part of NextGenArise (both across the year). There’s opportunities to gather at specific Presbytery events and even as a part of their local congregation. The best way to find out what’s going on is to connect with BreadFishToo on one or more of our social media accounts and keep an eye out for ways to engage.
Steve Molkentin is the Mission Officer (Generation Next) for the Uniting Church in Australia, Queensland Synod.
