You may be coping unsuccessfully with personal stress if you:

1. Don’t take vacations or don’t enjoy them when you do take them.
2. Don’t have a sense of humor.
3. Don’t recognize when you are getting fatigued.
4. Believe that being busy means being productive.
5. View change as a threat instead of a challenge.
6. Feel that you are not in control of events.
7. Do not engage in any regular exercise.
8. Excessively seek out diversions to take your mind off your work.
9. Worry excessively about problems.
10. Do not have interests outside your ministry.

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In order for recreation to most effectively minister and encourage the highest number of youth it should de-emphasize athletic ability, individual performance, and “winning at all costs”. There are six factors to avoid in planning recreation for youth:

1. Make sure no one is left out;
2. Beware of negative reinforcement;
3. Beware of mismatching youth;
4. Beware of creating psychological stress;
5. Beware of setting youth up for failure; and
6. Beware of over-organization.

In light if these, youth recreation must

1. Emphasize group effort,
2. Encourage total participation,
3. Provide fun for all,
4. Present as many “everyone wins” situations as possible,
5. Mix planned activities with free time keeps youth from being bored and allows them some freedom to do their own thing.
6. Competition should emphasize the team and not the individual.

Initiative and cooperative games, which emphasize group problem solving make the problem the opponent instead of another person or team. The conquering of these problems as a team effort

1. Builds unity and a sense of group identity,
2. Promotes communication,
3. Encourages cooperation, and
4. Develops trust among team members.

There are several considerations in choosing activity for youth:

1. safety
2. age of the group
3. sex
4. ability of group members
5. size of the group
6. personality of the group
7. the intended purpose of the activity

Edward Hayes (“Recreational Activities” Youth Education in the Church. Moody Bible Institute, Chicago: 1978. pp 308-323) says youth leaders must account for the basic characteristics of recreation:

1. 1. activity
   2. variety of form
   3. use of unobligated time
   4. voluntary participation
   5. flexibility
   6. purposeful behavior
   7. promotion of socially accepted and thoroughly Christian behavior.

Other considerations:

1. A recreational activity must include as many safety precautions as possible.
2. The age of the group is a factor because different ages of youth will enjoy different games. Also, at younger age groups some youth may lack physical coordination and skill for highly competitive sports.
3. Even though girls can engage in most of the same activities with boys, some activities are best not used with coed groups, especially those that involve highly physical interaction. Also, girls do not necessarily enjoy male dominated sports such as football.
4. The size of the group is important. It is difficult to have a volleyball game with two people. Other games and recreational activities may be inappropriate for large groups.
5. The personality of the group, its likes and dislikes is another important factor. The best game is one that works for your specific group of youth.

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Recreation is an incredible tool for youth ministry. While games may not be overtly spiritual, they are a very powerful teaching tool to condense many of the realities of life down into a short period of time. The way we respond in games often reflects how we deal with the realities of life. They reveal our attitudes, our strengths, our weaknesses, the ways we communicate and relate to other people, our ability to lead, the way we deal with challenges, rules, and difficulties. They show our approach to solving problems and maybe most importantly they show our REACTIONS to a variety of circumstances. When the pressure is on, what comes out, actions, words, mindsets, and believes often reveals the most about us.

As youth and youth workers work and play together, they learn to help one another, share possessions, overcome fears, draw closer to God, open up, and even risk sharing about themselves with the group. Hassles do occur but they serve as catalysts for growth and sharing and force individuals to move beyond superficial relationships. Regular sports and games often present many of life’s problems in capsule form. The factors of stress, competition, rules to be followed, success and failure, and cooperation in a team effort are common to sports, games, daily life and Christian living both inside the church and outside it.

As such, recreation should not be focused on the event., the program, the game. Instead it should be focused on the people and creating opportunities for them to grow spiritually and relationally. Relationships are of vital importance to God and should be an integral part of youth ministry. Its about people, not programs. When the programs become the focus they too easily become gimmicks to get people to come to the youth group.

Edward L. Hayes (“Recreational Activities” Youth Education in the Church. Moody Bible Institute, Chicago: 1978. pp 308-323) warns against using recreation as a “hidden persuader.” He says that when this occurs “recreation is cheapened, and the gospel is viewed as related to and dependent on gimmicks.”

In addition to nurturing relationships, recreation has emotional and psychological benefits to youth as well as the obvious physical benefits to their health. Recreation can help alleviate stress among youth. Highly charged recreational activities, which allow the youth to “cut loose,” may help get the attention of youth off their worries and onto God and spiritual truths. Poor Self-esteem or self-image is one of the most widespread issues facing teens today. Recreation can help alleviate problems of self-image by providing an opportunity for youth to express hidden abilities and talents.

Many games can also be structured to become metaphors for life and spiritual truth. Wet and wild games involving water can be used to springboard into lessons on the “Living Water.” In fact the concept of a race is explicitly mentioned several times in the Bible to illustrate spiritual truths. Games in which youth are blindfolded become metaphors on spiritual blindness. The possibilities are as numerous as the games people play.

Recreation can be used in a variety of ways and for a variety of purposes:

• • Recreational activities can be an effective means to loosen up the group.
  • Recreation can help break up cliques and draw shy people into the group.
  • Recreational activities may help prevent discipline problems that usually are a result from boredom, misdirected energy, or unused creativity.
  • Recreation may be combined with fund-raising such as walk-a-thons, jog-a-thons, and even work-a-thons. Recreation may take the form of ministry to others as service projects and workdays.
  • High adventure outings are some of the most unusual but also most rewarding activities for youth and therefore merit special attention. They can be used to improved self-esteem, encourage cooperation, build trust, enhance communication, provide opportunity for introspection, provide a change of scenery, provide challenging activities, and enhance problem solving, spiritual awareness, and outdoor skills. High adventure outings create special group dynamics, have elements of stress and (controlled) danger, a “roughing it” atmosphere and long term effects on those who attend. The relationships built on such outings never fail to provide opportunities for ministry.

For more information on how you can use games and recreation in youth ministry check out some of these resources:

• Mattingly, Don and Scott Werner. The Centrifuge Experience: Meeting Youth Needs. Convention Press, Nashville: 1987.
• Rice, Wayne and Mike Yaconelli. Play It. Zondervan Publishing House, Grand Rapids: 1986.

Better yet, visit a local Christian book store and someone will be sure to point you to shelves of books with creative ideas and games you can use in your youth ministry!

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Youth programs that are ‘too spiritual’ for recreation (games and fun group activities) probably will not achieve their spiritual goals because they will be leaving out a primary tool for achieving them. All people are involved in some form of recreation to an extent, but especially youth. Four factors make recreation an important tool in youth ministry:

1. Youth are activity-oriented;
2. Youth are motivated by involvement;
3. Youth desire to have fun;
4. Youth need positive social interaction and need practice interacting socially in a controlled environment.

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Recreation frequently provides important relational and communication bridges to youth. These bridges make possible the church’s ministries of evangelism and discipleship. Recreation can be used as:

1. a channel of service and support,
2. a catalyst for outreach,
3. a vehicle for ministry and mission action, and
4. a tool for teaching

Most young people’s lives are changed by gospel truth as that truth is interpreted in relationships. It has been said people may come to an event because of the program, but they continue to come back because of the relationships.

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Fear
One of the number one fears that people have is the fear of public speaking. While prayer is communication with God, if there are other people listening and it is a corporate prayer meeting, people are similarly afraid of prayer. This fear can be somewhat alleviated if we provide training for those that will lead prayer, and avoid putting people on the spot to pray without prior notice and training. Stress that prayer is communication with God. It is talking to God. Also stress that in private, you can pray to God in whatever way most comfortable for you, but in corporate prayer it is best to do it in such a way that you benefit those listening in on your prayers with God.

Communication Issues
Prayer is communication, and like every other form of communication it only develops with training and experience. Many people have not developed the skill of communicating verbally with God so they may tend to repeat prayers and phrases they have heard — simply stringing together prayers they often hear. The best way to overcome this is to provide specific guidance for prayer items.

Unrealistic Expectations 
Many people think that they will be considered less spiritual if their prayers are not on the level of the pastor or other church leaders. We need to stress in training that God is more concerned with our heart than how polished our prayer sounds.

Violation of confidences
Sometimes it can become a fine line between honestly praying for someone in need and turning the prayer request into little more than gossip sessions or finger pointing sessions. We need to pray for so and so because he did such and such…. Keep confidences and private prayer requests private. Make sure that even in prayer that everything we say is edifying to those who are listening. (Ephesians 4:29)

Planning issues
Many prayer meetings lack variety and become boring and routine. Vary the format and introduce a variety of concepts, styles, and vary the focus to add a little life to meetings that have become stale.

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