Directors Update - January

Heres the word on the latest happenings at YFC HQ.

Hope Is Here!
2008 sees the launch of Hope Revolution, the youth movement which is part of the Hope initiative. At YFC we're trying to co-ordinate the whole thing, and have put together a core team of youth workers from:

St Barnabas
St Andrews Street Baptist
Cambridge Community Church
Urban Saints
St Matthews Church

There are two main 'prongs' to the Hope Revolution Programme:

Hope Revolution Schools Challenge
In every secindary school we're encouraging the Christians to work together, through the vehicle of their CU group to do something to bring Hope to their school. This could be anything in the form of a Random Act of Kindness such as 'appreciate your caretaker day', wash the staff cars during lunch break, clear out the store cupboard etc. In the process they'll take an assembly to tell the school what they're doing, and make a video while they're doing it.

Schools Challenge projects are planned to take place in April 08 with a Launch event on March 14th and a report back event on May 9th, which will be hosted by FLAME the termly youth event run in partnership with c3.

Hope Revolution Summer
Following on from Go East, this summers mission week will be bigger than ever. We're joining forces with Summer Blast, the establish week of community action in Kings Hedges run by City Life church, with the aim that together there will be three localised areas of activitiy, with us heading up programmes in Cherry Hinton and Barnwell.

There is the potential for us to join forces to meet for training, and for worship, giving everyone a sense of being part of something big. Local churches in each area will help to shape the kind of activities we undertake, but we're hoping to lay on a youth cafe, some community action projects and some evening events to show the incredible, contagious love of God in word and deed!

The summer mission will run from July 27th til August 4th. And Steve Lown has designed a funky flyer which is currently at the printers!

Schools Latest
Chris Lewney made his first visit to Netherhall School CU, supporting the teacher there who runs the group, re-establishing the link made by Tom last year. He'll be going along regularly which means that between them, our yfcone volunteers support 3 CU's every week.

We're also developing a link with New Generation who are an international agency, based in Scandinavia, providing support for and raising the profile of student CU groups in secondary schools. We're going spend an afternoon in their UK base next month, and then they'll be sending their concert team to Cambridge for a day in March, doing a lunchtime performance in school and an evening event in a local church.... watch this space for details!

A Knights Ball
General Opinion was that the 2007 Ball was our best yet. A particular hit with our guests was The Medieval Tournament Arena where a jousting arena sat alongside archery, and traditional cards and dice games amused the watching peasants!

Other venues included The Tavern with themed cocktails and acoustic live music, The Great hall with DJ, bouncy castle and chocolate fountain, and The Dungeon with spooky noises, buffet meal and big screen video games.

Thankfully we paid all the bills and had a few pennies to spare - 99 tickets were sold and many decided to get into the medieval vibe with costumes galore. We even pulled off 10 minutes of English Country Dancing in the dance floor with everyone joining in.

The event was planned and delivered with the help of Dan Dowman, youth worker at St A's, and served to show the dedication and creativity of the YFC team, with Becca, Chris, Steve and Hannah handling their own venues.

Carols At The Abbey
Stuart and Jim hosted the annual Cambridge Utd Carol Service at Monday 17th December on another chilly night! This year the star guests were the school choir from Abbey Meadows Primary school - when the Salvation Army Band joined in with 'It was on a starry night' -totally unrehearsed - it was a real goosebumps moment!

Around 250 people came through the turnstiles and made a good noise, and we also welcomed the Black Thunders from Q103, who sent some a live report back to the studio. A retiring collection of £180 was given to their Q103 kids charity.

Graham Daniels spoke briefly with his typical wit and wisdom which made the event another fantastic gospel event with a real feel of community. Roll on next year!

SOURCE on Saturday
The youth workers breakfast event is now 3 months into its new run at St Philips Church. Each session includes plenty of time to chat over bagels or pastries, giving local volunteers the chance to meet each other and share concerns. We give a 15 minute intro to the topic of the day and give everyone a chance to discuss and pray in groups, applying it to their own situation. The morning wraps up with a chance to share events and news, with the added bonus of a freebie to take away.

At the January sourse we were able to give out taster packs from YFC's new resource The CRUX. The CRUX, like Rock Solid and Mettle is a continuously updated programe of session outlines, this one intended for use in schools. Churches and YFC centres are being encouraged to engage with the governments new initiative to develop extended schools. That means more after school clubs, creative and stimulating activities being offer after hours, which means more involvement from the voluntary sector - and that includes us. Please pray that we can make the most of this opportunity in Cambridge.

CUFC Tours
We continue to offer our unique tour package three times a year, which is a fun and evangelistic opportunity for church youth groups. I'm delighted to say that we're fully booked for 2008 - although we could squeeze a small group in to the January tour.

This year we're expecting visits from Lode Chapel, Bury St Edmunds, WCCYM churches (West Cambridge villages) and Great Wilbraham. Thanks to Stuart for making this possible!

Shareholders Thanks!
We were really encouraged by the attendance and enthusiasm at our Annual Dinner and AGM back on December 1st. It felt like the first time we've really been able to see just who and how many are getting behind the mission. Sometimes you need to stop and look at what God has done, and by preparing to present the vision and work on the night even we were impressed!

Please keep on gossiping about YFC to everyone you know. Don't forget that the next event, on Saturday April 19th, is coming up fast!

Royston Link
Through the Source Network event we met a lovely couple from Royston who run a small youth group in their house. They were after some support is putting on a Carol service for the community, so I went along on December 9th (the same weekend we were moving house) and managed to rope in another guitarist from S Barnabas.

It was a very impressive effort as all the users of their local community centre took part, singing, dancing and reading. The young people they worked with performed some songs with a more contemporary edge - it was encouraging to see such a genuine long term relational work with young people from no church background. We'll be visiting again this term to spend a friday night with the group.

This is just one example of how the links and roots of YFC grow gradually through time and opportunity, under the grace of God. Keep praying!