Alongside our many events, one-offs, and schools work, we have three super-regular projects at Llandudno Youth for Christ, Recess, Redefine and Show Up & Write. Let me give you a quick update!

Recess

Recess is our weekly group in school at Ysgol John Bright. It’s is probably our longest standing project. It was running at lunch times before our director Tim took over over 12 years ago!

Every year Recess reinvents itself a little, depending on what’s happening in the school timetable and when young people are around. However, it has always been a regular place for young people to hear about Jesus for the first time.

Over the last twelve months, however, Recess went through its biggest reinvention yet! We now meet after school rather than during lunchtime, and rather than meeting in a classroom, hidden down a corridor somewhere, we meet in both the library and the main school hall. This has given us great opportunities to do larger events, as well as things like alter the seating to fit the theme and to add games like 4-square which wouldn’t fit in a small room.

In September, off the back of some assemblies we have an almost entirely new group of young people. So, every Wednesday after school between 10 and 20 of us meet to have fun and to connect with each other about big topics.

What we do at Recess is help young people explore big issues around life, the world, faith, God, community – and their relationships in these things. Our job really is to help them talk and to help them think. This creates an environment where they feel safe to consider different points of view and share their own without fear of ridicule. This also means that we can talk really honestly and clearly about our faith in Jesus.

We’ve taken this group on some trips, some have connected to deeper groups, and some of them have also joined our Saturday Café young volunteer team. These are brilliant young people, and we thank God every day that we get this opportunity to journey with them and support them at school

Redefine

Redefine is another one of our long-standing projects. We meet once a fortnight with a small group of 15-20 young people who would either call themselves a Christian or at least be open to learning more about Jesus. This is a broad discipleship group where we aim to help young people take responsibility for their own faith. We share with them not just what the Bible says but how to read it for themselves.

We have a great team of volunteers who lead small groups and games and help young people really connect with each other and with the theme for the day. I say ‘theme’ but we’ve actually been reading the book of Galatians for almost two years now. There’s so much in it to unpack, and the young people love that we’re getting really deep into the Bible and answering questions that maybe they’ve not asked anyone before.

Thinking about team, every one of them are gifted at sitting down one to one or in small groups of young people and helping them feel comfortable, safe, and secure. We are so fortunate to have these amazing volunteers at Youth for Christ.

Redefine is our first group to move into the new venue in The Garage and so far, it has been absolutely brilliant!

Show Up and Write

Show Up and Write is a project we started in lockdown as an online support group for creative writers. It now continues to meet once a fortnight online using Zoom, with a small group of young budding novelists.

Run by three published authors and headed up by Katie – poet, writer, and editor extraordinaire – it has been one of the most innovative and encouraging projects we’ve run. One of the most amazing things about Show Up and Write is it’s highly targeted, because we’re serving in a way that meets a very specific need.

Jesus is called the Word, God created the world by speaking words, and we believe that God loves creative writing. Show Up and Write is a chance to celebrate creativity and have a lot of fun with storytelling. We love it!

Want to get involved?

Do any of these projects take your fancy? We’re always looking for new volunteers to support young people where they are at. Please do get in touch: llandudndoyfc@gmail.com

 

 

Photo by John Schnobrich on Unsplash