Talk About Clyde: Christian youth group thriving in community
Clyde Community Youth Group (CCYG), a Christian group for teens, is thriving.
“Gatherings are held at 7 p.m. Sunday nights at St. Paul Lutheran Church. High school students meet one week and middle schoolers the next," said Jen Rawson, youth leader. "Snacks are served to middle school students and a full meal for the high school group because many are coming straight from practices and rehearsals. We don’t want that to be a reason they can’t come.
“We just got done with back-to-back retreat weekends where we took 20 students to our high school retreat at Kalahari Water Park in Sandusky and 30 students to our middle school retreat at Beulah Beach,” Rawson said.
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Group began so kids could grow their faith together
CCYG unofficially began In 2015 when Amy Hilliker, a Lutheran and McPherson Middle School guidance counselor, and Jeanette Greenslade, a Methodist church member and teacher at Green Springs Elementary, wanted a Christian youth group for their kids.
“I wanted my kids, nieces and nephews in smaller churches to meet other youth to grow their faith with. Faith builds within relationships with other Christians, regardless of your denomination,” Greenslade said.
Unfortunately, neither of their home churches had enough teens so they got their kids, cousins and friends together for activities that would basically be a Christian youth group. At first it was just them. As attendance grew it was decided to name it Clyde Community Youth Group since teens came from different churches.
Rawson was hired in 2016 as youth director by St. Paul Lutheran Church. The church wanted to change the trend it was seeing of kids being confirmed and never coming back to church.
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Rawson was encouraged to use some of her time partnering with Hillaker and Greenslade. She was impressed with what they had started with two churches working together. At their first meeting they had only 16 teens, grade six through 12, and four volunteers. That was already stronger than many small-town church youth groups, Rawson said.
'High energy atmosphere that opens doors'
September 2021 kicked off the school year with 65 students and a full team of 29 volunteers. Most of their students are from Clyde, but several are from Fremont, Bellevue, Tiffin and Vickery. About half are connected to a home church, one of 18 different churches from different denominations. The other half do not yet claim a home church.
“Our goal is to create a high energy atmosphere that opens doors to spiritual conversations,” Rawson said. “This year we are doing scavenger hunts, Nerf and laser wars, paint dodgeball, human foosball and battleship, life size Angry Birds, apple picking and lots more.”
The calendar of events is at ccyg.weebly.com.
Their theme is “God allows U-turns. You’re never too far and it’s never too late to come back to God.”
Every week someone is brought in from the community to share their U-turn story of how and why they came back to God.
“Our biggest struggle is helping kids and parents view the ministry as more than another club. We are not the place you drop your kid to get some morals,” Rawson said. “We want to help students bring God into their everyday lives. For those who have a church home, we want to be an extension of that rather than a bonus to it. For those without a church home, we want to be the bridge to finding one. We don’t want to be a club that kids do for a season; we want to be a ministry.”
Hillaker compares her favorite parable to CCYG.
“Jesus tells the parable of the lost sheep to show that the Kingdom of God is accessible to all, even those who were sinners or strayed from God's path,” she said.
CCYG is grateful to St. Paul Lutheran Church which fully funds them. “They see the vision of investing in our youth regardless of what church they go to,” Rawson stated. “St. Paul has even created a contemporary service (10:30 a.m. Sundays) so our families who do not have a church home can have a place they feel comfortable with and can connect with God.”
The group also received behind-the-scenes help from Clyde’s First United Methodist Church and Green Springs UMC. The Clyde Ministerial Association has been encouraging and interested in adopting the ministry as its own youth ministry.
CCYG plans Valentine Dinner
People can support CCYG at its annual Valentine Dinner fundraiser 11:30 a.m.-1:30 p.m. Feb 13 at St. Paul Lutheran Church, 147 W. Forest St. Students will serve a rigatoni dinner. Proceeds go directly to the cost of students attending retreats.
Jeanette Liebold Ricker writes about Clyde and Green Springs. Contact her at 419-547-8177 or by email at jeanette.ricker@gmail.com.
This article originally appeared on Fremont News-Messenger: Talk About Clyde: Youth gather to enjoy growing faith together
