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On this episode of Beyond the Event, we sit down with Student Minister Flint Spencer to talk about why Sunday school can be the most overlooked and most strategic hour in youth ministry. We unpack a simple plan for junior high that builds Bible literacy, repeatable study skills, and Scripture memory that can last for decades.

building a youth ministry rhythm with Wednesday nights, D-groups, and a Bible-focused Sunday morning

treating Sunday school as mind formation, not an afterthought

using inductive Bible study to help students observe, interpret, and apply Scripture

structuring class time to fit wide maturity levels in grades 5-8

teaching Scripture memorization with practical tools and light incentives

designing for inconsistent attendance so students can jump back in

celebrating wins that connect students to the whole church

 on Instagram: you can find all of our individual program accounts in the bio

As always, be sure to subscribe wherever you listen to podcasts. It also helps us out if you rate and review us on Apple Podcasts and send this episode to a friend!

BTE 6.03 Sunday School is So Back with Flint Spencer and Lane Moss

Brad Warren 0:03
Hi, I'm Brad Warren. This is Beyond the Event, a Youth Ministry podcast presented by Christ in Youth, where we help you maintain momentum between the mountaintops. Today, we're going to be talking to Flint Spencer, who is one of the junior high student pastors at Christchurch of Ornogo about Sunday school. Super fun conversation that we're going to have. Uh, before that, let's talk to Lane Moss a little bit. How are you doing, Lane? I'm doing awesome. You're doing awesome?
Lane Moss 0:27
I'm doing awesome. Why are you doing awesome? Well, because I'm done thinking about budgets for a little while to do a podcast. Thank you.
Brad Warren 0:35
Good for you. Uh Lane, one of my favorite things about you is we were in the same van on the way to and from Staff Retreat. That's true. And it was great. I just, it really was a lot of fun. Yeah. I loved that you had the whole thing like programmed. Um like he had some questions, just like locked and loaded. Like we did Disney animated movie, Mount Rushmore. We did all the things. I'm wondering if you had one in your back pocket that didn't come up that we could talk about. Like you know, didn't come up?
Lane Moss 1:10
Yeah, that we didn't already do. We were in the van together for pushing 30 hours. So I don't know. I pretty much tapped you dry. Maybe. Like I I well, I really just I don't remember what did or didn't come up. You know what I mean?
Brad Warren 1:23
So yeah, I don't uh I don't know. I guess we did a lot of like um we're gonna name a musical prompt and everybody put a song on and we have to guess who put which song on. Yeah, which was which was a lot of fun. Yeah, yeah.
Lane Moss 1:36
So like the prompts like like a song you loved in eighth grade. Yeah. Yeah. Which was like fun to like go around the van and be like, how well do we know each other? Yeah. And also when were you in eighth grade?
Brad Warren 1:46
Yeah, yeah, totally. Right, right. It was fun. Uh anyway, it was a good time. Um, yeah, it was great. I was a little surprised about you having Mulan on your animated movie Mount Rushmore, but you know. Yeah, I'm a big something I learned.
Lane Moss 2:00
I like I like Mulan a lot, man. I like Eddie Murphy. It's kind of underrated. Right, yeah, it's
Move Journals And Student Note-Taking

Lane Moss 2:04
great.
Brad Warren 2:04
It's really great. Um, okay, move. Move is on a rocket ship to the moon right now, and we love it. And um move has been just Praise the Lord, man. It it really has been, and I don't even just mean like numbers-wise, but it's been just like a lot of fun um to be a part of over the past few years. We just got done with another summer of Move. Um in the books. In the books, baby. What's uh what's your what what what what aspect of the programming this summer like surprised you? Like, oh, that was really, really successful. And I'm not not that you didn't think it was gonna be successful, but like what's something you look back on and you're like, I'm so glad we did that. That was amazing. I'm so glad that worked as well as it did.
Lane Moss 2:54
Totally. Um I mean, there there's a lot of things. Um, you know, a lot of things that went well. It they just like, yeah, it's not that it's not that surprising that they did just because like we did things that like we had we just we we felt really confident in. And of course, yeah, surprised you was a bad way of putting it. No, no, no. But just like but I was surprised by like there, but there, but there are some things. I mean, there are um, you know, I'll I'll say I the journals, like the the Kingdom Worker journals and how much we leaned into those um, you know, for different programming things. It surprised me how it surprised me um how utilized they were and how um and how often like how few of them got like lost and left. And I I mean that was that was very surprising. Not that it didn't happen, obviously.
Brad Warren 3:38
I mean, you know, totally of course it did, but I mean I feel like the butterfly got lost more than the actual journey itself. But people did like hold on to them.
Lane Moss 3:47
Yeah, I mean I fully expected to walk through uh, you know, on night one of every week and just find like a couple hundred, you know, just like laying around and and then um and I and I expected to you know to find even more laying around throughout the week as kids kind of got tired, but but really did not. I mean, all like so few. Um the one you know, the amount that got turned into lost and found over the course week, you literally probably count on two hands, yeah, you know, from from week to week. It was it was incredible, and that's a testament to leaders too, and be you know, in in and pressing that upon their students.
Brad Warren 4:16
But but also paper is so back.
Lane Moss 4:18
Paper's so back.
Brad Warren 4:20
So is uh physical media.
Lane Moss 4:21
Were you at Dunder Mifflin?
Brad Warren 4:22
Did you hear that uh Disney Plus now has no ad-free tier? Wow. Even if you pay for Disney Plus, even if you're on their highest paid plan, there's ads.
Lane Moss 4:34
It's just cable, man.
Brad Warren 4:35
We're just doing cable.
Lane Moss 4:36
Just buy DVDs, we're just doing cable. That's what I'm saying.
Michael Hester 4:39
I guess I guess HBO's the same way. And I have those two things bundled together HBO and and uh Disney Plus are in a bundle. Yeah, now HBO and Paraguay are gonna be like the same thing. Matchmane's always showing me a trailer for something else on the platform, right?
Brad Warren 4:53
But at least it's like before what you watch, and then it doesn't interrupt it.
Michael Hester 4:56
Oh, Disney's interrupting. Oh yeah. Junk. Yeah.
Brad Warren 4:59
All ad supported.
Lane Moss 5:00
Um, but it but the so the journals though were extremely surprised. Uh what I loved is that kids took notes. I thought that was awesome. Yeah, it was cool. There's something, there's a connection between like physically writing something down and like and and it getting stored in your brain. And and so I at the uh encouragement of Nate Carnes actually, he sent kind of our director thread um that summer, just like he said, Hey, during my like director free swim, which is just kind of what we call it when you know, uh the just when a director has like a few minutes to you know to kill on stage, they he said, During my director free swim a little bit later on in the week, I've been asking people, uh I've just been kind of like asking kids like what did like if they've been taking notes and what they wrote down and and letting kids just kind of like shout it out or whatever. And so we were like, Oh yeah. So like a lot of us jumped on that train as well. And it was one of the most encouraging parts of every week, uh just to hear you know kids you know, open up their journals and yell out something that they wrote down at some point during the course of the of the week. It was awesome. I mean, just really, really encouraging. So I love that.
Brad Warren 5:58
Yeah, it was sweet. That's awesome. Yeah.
Why Con Mi Manos Worked

Brad Warren 6:01
Next week we're doing a uh bonus episode with Kurt Hoffman. Oh, yeah. About Con Me Smanos. That was another big one that people are probably tired of hearing me rave about it. I love it so much.
Lane Moss 6:11
You know, I'll be I'll be honest though, that that surprised me just a little bit as well. So the the thing that surprised me not that it was like good, but just like how much people watched on. Yeah, totally crazy. Totally because it was as as far as like those kinds of films that we do, those episodes were were long compared to what we normally do. They were, you know, they were a lot of them were 10 to 12 minutes apiece, which normally we break, those are closer to you know, five to seven minutes. Five, yeah. Yeah. And so that and so they so they were significantly longer, and obviously in Spanish and sign language, and you know, and so um one I kind of did wonder how how well students were gonna like latch onto it and follow with it and you know, and everything else. And people seemed to be really stoked about it, which for good reason. I mean it's a testament to A, the story itself and what God is doing through that ministry, but B, also Kurt and the crew, their vision for it, their you know, golly, they are so gifted. And so the way that they put that together is just phenomenal. All right. We can cut this. Okay, let's cut it.
Brad Warren 7:11
There's already a bunch of things I gotta cut. We can cut this, but you said that there's one thing you have to cut. Which thing? There's one thing. Uh when no, no, no, no, no. Uh no, no, no. Okay. Um, but we can cut this if you want. As of right now, if you're hearing this, this has been unadul unadulterated. Okay. This is this is all clean right now. This is it. Um We piloted at some Move events
MoveMania Pilot And Participation

Brad Warren 7:44
an afternoon thing. Correct. Can we talk about it? Sure. Okay. Tell me what it was. Yeah, it was MoveMania. Because I actually don't even truly, I was not at any of the events where it was piloted, and I don't know anything about it. And I want to know if it went well and if you're excited about it and what what the deal was. It did go well, and I am excited about it. Oh, I love it.
Lane Moss 8:03
Yeah. Yeah. Um so no, uh so basically it it was we are what we're trying to do is figure out that as, you know, as Move continues to grow, and not just adding more events, but but honestly, but to the events themselves are growing a little bit as well. How do we continue to help that to feel small? Um and and how do we um you know continue to like provide just a valuable experience uh through throughout the entire day? And and so tournaments are in some ways becoming like increasingly difficult at times just to get, you know, I mean, anybody-the sheer number of people. Yeah, the sheer number of people, yeah. And so we don't want to just completely remove that aspect of it, but we're trying to, we're piloting, adding some other things in as well. And that's where this idea of move media came from.
Brad Warren 8:44
Specifically between lunch and dinner.
Lane Moss 8:46
Yeah, that's right. Yeah, you got it. Yeah. And so what uh so the idea was that the week was divided up into two groups according to wristband color. So, you know, yellow and green, you're this day, blue and red, you're the you're you're the following day. And during the afternoon, we had something called Move Mania, which was essentially there's a little more to it than this, a little more complicated than this, but think elementary school field day. Um, I mean, it really was just kind of that whole thing, which kids just really don't, I don't think they have now, you know. And so it was field day now? I don't think so. I don't think it's really a thing. And so, and so what what would happen is is uh the they would show up and they would be in like their small groups or in like a small group that they can, you know, they can divide themselves up however they want to, but a group of like, you know, five to 10. Um, and then they would be given, we had 20 stations. Um, they would be given a number and an arrow. So they would be given like so Brad's group would be given 13 with an up arrow. Um, and Michael's group would be given 13 with a down arrow. And what that means is the number indicates what station you start at, and then the arrow indicates which what which direction you move at the end of a five-minute timer. So we would basically set a five-minute timer and all the stations would go at once. They all the stations were led by a volunteer that had like all their rules and all the things in there. Very simple games. Um, and and so Brad and Michael Steam would compete against each other at station 13. The winner would get a token, and then at the end of five minutes, they would Brad would go up to a 14, Michael would go down to 12. Um, and so and we would go for a set amount of time, you know, hour, hour and a half or something like that. And then at the end of that, uh, whoever had the most tokens was the winner of that day. We did it, um, we did it again the following day. And so um at the end of the couple of days, we had the two winning teams from the days. They competed on stage against one another for a move mania trophy. It's like a four-foot-tall trophy, it was huge uh for like a move mania trophy. And so it was it, and and it was super fun. Um, we learned a lot uh about how we can continue to do rec and involve a lot of people and help everybody have a good time and um not many people waiting really long lines for things and uh that kind of stuff. And so, yeah, we had a great time.
Brad Warren 10:53
Was this a um I'm gonna use the word mandatory thing? Like if you had a red wristband when it was your team's move mania day, was that where you went, or was this like an elective opportunity for people who had red wristbands? Totally totally elective. Yep, totally elective. Yep, nobody So there's like other stuff going on at the same time too. Yeah, yeah.
Lane Moss 11:15
There there's still tournaments that were happening, there's still other things that were happening at that same time.
Brad Warren 11:19
So, what was participation like? Like, did you get a good thing?
Lane Moss 11:23
Yeah, it was like a few hundred per day. Yeah, that's cool.
Brad Warren 11:25
Yeah, was this a thing that they like had to sign up for that there's like limited space for, that kind of thing?
Lane Moss 11:29
Or it was not a thing that they had to sign up for this past year. And like I said, I don't know what I don't know exactly what all that's gonna I don't know what it's gonna turn into. Right. I don't know how that's evolving um at the moment, but uh but that's the yeah, that was that was the pilot. I feel fine uh talking about it because it was a total experiment. Um and so yeah, we don't know exactly how that's evolving, but uh but we did have a great time with it.
Brad Warren 11:49
So like key takeaway for a youth pastor who wasn't at one of these events would be like we're continuing to try to absolutely figure out afternoons and help your students have lots of options and a great time and feel like you've got uh high high percentage of participation among your group. Yep. Um so I'm excited to see where that I am too.
Lane Moss 12:07
Yeah, yeah, I am too. There's already a lot of other ideas in the hopper about it.
Brad Warren 12:11
I wouldn't even want to like super speculate on it right now because I know that'll change a million times. Totally. Yep. Um, I don't want to put you on the spot. No, but we're having all kinds of really fun conversations about that right now.
Lane Moss 12:21
So I'm excited about it.
Brad Warren 12:22
That's cool. Yeah, that's cool. All right. Um, let's go talk to Flint. But before we do that, let's have another iteration of Mike Duck with Mike.
AI Fears And Ministry Guardrails

Michael Hester 12:38
AKA Pycorn Brad and Lane. Do you guys think? No. Rarely. Rarely. As little as possible that AI will cause the apocalypse.
Lane Moss 12:55
We're gonna say our answer on the count of three. Okay? One, two, three. Yes.
Michael Hester 13:01
No. Ooh, wow, some display. We all we all knew exactly where that one's headed.
Lane Moss 13:07
I would have I would have I would have bet a mortgage.
Brad Warren 13:14
Which is due today. Oh shoot. Oh yeah. No, it's like Lane is the most optimistic person in the world. He's like, how could this go wrong? And I'm like, how can it go right?
Lane Moss 13:26
Uh to be to be clear, um, I'm not a I'm I'm no AI stand. Like, I'm not, you know what I mean? I'm I'm not by any stretch. Um I think it's got some I think it's got some helpful uses, um, but I also think it's got um a lot of really dangerous ones and and especially well, I we don't need to go into all that. You get it. But but no, I think that it is the latest in a long line of things that humans have thought would cause the apocalypse.
Michael Hester 13:50
Yeah. Um I I've been listening to uh I've been listening to a podcast um that is like interesting enough, um, called Suspicious Minds. This is not necessarily an endorsement. Um if you uh if you want to, you can listen to it. Uh they're currently on their second season. It it is about AI. Wow, what time is that? It's 417, it's time to pray for Joplin. Oh. Okay. We can cut that. Sorry.
Brad Warren 14:17
Um uh and you know To the uninitiated, 417 is the area for Joplin, and it is 417 and I was praying for Joplin.
Michael Hester 14:27
Really took me by surprise. Um the the the first season is is it focuses all about AI psychosis and and some of the crazy experiences that that people have had with some earlier iterations of um AI chatbots and LLRs. It was a pretty interesting uh uh series to listen to. The current season is about the question of AI and the apocalypse. Um I was reminded about this because we earlier we were recording um uh a a different upcoming episode of this podcast uh where we talked a little bit about AI. It's turning into a common theme for this season, Brad has asked. I think.
Brad Warren 15:02
I'm a little obsessed, not in a fearful way. Yeah. I just really am curious how everybody's gonna be able to do that. I think there's a lot of really nice ethics of it, and it matters so much in ministry. It does. Like and for the integrity of the way that people operate as pastors. Yeah. I would love to know how we're defining apocalypse.
Michael Hester 15:22
So the I don't actually think that it's gonna cause the apocalypse. So, so I one of the interesting things in that, in that podcast um is is they even are kind of like wrestling with the idea of like what does that actually mean? Right. Like people throw the word around. They actually talk about the thing that you know most of us who have at least been around ministry and probably have been to Bible college, um, we're probably all taught that apocalypse actually just means revelation. And that's you know what the name for the book of Revelation comes from. Um and it doesn't mean end of the world, it's just that you know there are a lot of like religious historical reasons to link the word apocalypse to you know the quote unquote end of the world. Yep. Um interesting stuff. I lost my train of thought, but um you were yeah, you were talking about how like this like latest iteration is about like the apocalypse. Yeah, so I think you know it's it's kind of it's kind of a funny uh it's kind of a funny conversation to me because for me, listening to that that conversation as a as a Christian, I'm like, no, of course it's not. Sure, right to you know but it's interesting listening to different people with different worldviews. But really the the whole conversation really comes about because a lot of tech executives that have their own AI that their company might be working on um earlier this year have been making a lot of noise about. Yeah, I think AI is gonna bring about the end of the world or the end of humanity. Or which is uh just a funny thing.
Lane Moss 16:53
Like trying to throw the e-break, kind of, but not really, because also like you know what I mean.
Michael Hester 16:57
Except early on they didn't until a couple weeks ago when you know someone from Anthropic was like, hey, I'm whoa, whoa, whoa. This is really dangerous. Um it's all just been like a really interesting development. I think one of the things that people have not talked about a whole lot, um, uh, because I think I think you know there is a an aspect of fear-mongering that can kind of you know come up with this for sure. But I think one of the things that people have not really talked about a whole lot is that they do mention on this podcast, um, but they don't go the second step that I was thinking about um the other day. Uh a lot of the people that have been making noise about AI potentially causing the apocalypse um are people who have monetary stake in AI. Yeah. Um and not not to be like there's some cognitive dissonance going on, but more about like it's all it's almost like all press is good press, kind of kind of a deal. Like by making by making noise, they are kind of uh they're kind of driving more attention and more traffic to their product. Interesting. Um by bringing up a fear angle. The the thing that that that wasn't said that I had been thinking about was anytime you have people that are predicting the end of the world, money moves. Um like it's it's you know, someone, you know, there are there are people out there who are like who are like the world's gonna end. I can take the things off of your plate that you don't need because you can't take them with you. Um they're like those kinds of those kinds of conversations, people who like sell all their possessions because they're so convinced. I remember that being a a big conversation point in 2012. So AI is so so like so it's like a cult. Oh yeah.
Lane Moss 18:33
It's like it's like a doomsday cult. Kind of like at the end of the day, like it's like becoming you know what I mean.
Brad Warren 18:39
It's like uh oh yeah, like Claude the cult leader. Yeah. Um, I have two things to say. Yeah. One is there's a podcast called This American Life. Hi, I'm Hourglass. You're listening to This American Life, Chicago Public Radio.
Lane Moss 18:53
Do you remember do you remember what it felt like the first time?
Brad Warren 18:56
That wasn't the point.
Lane Moss 18:57
Yeah, yeah, I know. But but do you remember what it was like the first time you saw what he looked like? I don't know if I've ever seen what he looked like. I wonder, I wonder if there's like a common thing with people who see who listen to Iraglass for a long time and then see what he looks like. And then it kind of checks out. No? Oh no. Right. No. That's what I that's kind that's what I thought. Yeah. And I was just like, oh.
Brad Warren 19:23
Anyway, there's an episode that came out on August 30th of this year called I Know What You Need, Act Two. You know, This American Life is an axe, I don't know if you're like, I do, yeah, I I have an idea. Act two, they put two Claude chatbots in conversation with each other, and it is wild. It like it blew my mind. Because you start and you're like, these things are so stupid, and we're getting all worked up over nothing. And then by the end, you're like, what is happening? I need a bunker. Um, but also, yeah, um, I do think that AI is headed for a little bit of a reckoning. Like, I think that there is a time coming where we are going to throw the e-break because like our current infrastructure can't support where it is heading. Nobody wants AI data centers in their community. Literally, not a single person in this planet wants an AI data center in their community. Not to paint with too broad of a brush. Not not to paint with too broad of a brush. But I mean, like, it's one of the most universally agreed upon things in the history of our country. Yeah. Is that just like nobody wants it? Data centers and plot gamers. No civilian. No civilian wants it. Yeah. Right. And it's like, so we've got that coming. They are starting to legislate a bunch of stuff. And I do just think that like the AI world we live in now is not the AI world we're going to live in a year from now, in terms of like discourse, not even necessarily in terms of technology. Like, I just think we're in the middle of like people realizing how powerful it is and potentially how dangerous it is, and trying to take steps to like put some guardrails in place, you know. And I'm interested to see where all of that heads. Yep. And also, I've said this before on this podcast, and I'll say it again. Your church should have an AI policy of some kind that is written out and just ready to go, you know? Yeah, totally. That's all I got. Claude will write you up on real easy. Yeah, just go to Claude, say, Hey, I work for a church, make me an AI policy, and don't even read it. Just print it off, hang it on the wall. Yeah. That's that on that. I don't actually think it's going to cause the apocalypse. Um, I do think that Jesus is really good and powerful, and that we're gonna be fine.
Lane Moss 21:47
Do you guys think that um that that S that we all drew um, you know, back in like the 90s, like the three lines, then the three lines, then you connect the top, then you can't, you know. Do you all think that that's the logo for the corporate? That's running the simulation. Oh, yeah. It's written in our code. Yeah. It's written in our code. There's a reason why it's actually a DNA heel. There's a reason everyone around the world knew how to draw that before the internet existed. Like why was that everywhere?
Michael Hester 22:13
Like how did we know how to do that?
Lane Moss 22:22
Yeah, it is. Well, that's what a meme is, right? Like a meme is like literally like a like an oral tradition, like a tradition passed down without like cause or whatever.
Brad Warren 22:30
We're going to start getting hate mail for how much I bring up AI.
Michael Hester 22:33
Aaron Ross Powell No, I sorry. I'm calling you out for it and I'm doing it out of love. I'm sorry for doing that.
Brad Warren 22:38
No, it's okay. All right, let's go talk to Flint. All right, here
Flint Spencer On Sunday School

Brad Warren 22:44
we go. We are here with Flint Spencer, who is a student pastor at Christchurch of Ornogo, where Michael and I attend.
Flint Spencer 22:54
Thanks for the applause. We appreciate that.
Brad Warren 22:56
Lane does not attend. It's true. Yeah. What's it like to be the only person sitting at this table that doesn't attend the same church? Great. Do you feel threatened? Negative. Okay. That's good. I'm just telling you that maybe you should. Just think about that for a second while I talk to people. I don't think it probably says more about you than it is.
Flint Spencer 23:20
Brad, you should not threaten people with the mass of people you get from your church.
Brad Warren 23:25
Yeah, that's true. That's true. Um anyway, Flint. Uh you do uh here's I'm gonna say this. This is the 75th episode of the podcast.
Flint Spencer 23:34
Are you serious? Yeah.
Brad Warren 23:35
And I rigged it because I wanted to have my best friend on the 75th episode. Thanks for having me. So glad to be here. Yeah. I'm most. Yeah. So many of my good friends. Wow, this is actually a treat. This is great. This is wonderful.
Flint Spencer 23:49
Are we actually podcasting or is nothing being recorded and you just want to hang out with all of us? Yeah.
Brad Warren 23:54
This is a Truman show situation. We're just pretending. Nope, we're not pretending. This is real. Everyone had to listen to all of that. Thank you for hanging in, Flint. Glad you're here. Um, we are jumping in a series, not jumping in, this is the third episode of a series, where we want to hear from youth pastors what youth pastors want to talk about. Okay. Um aka, you can read into that. Brad was too lazy to determine a topic for the podcast. And you would be partially right. Um, but anyway, you're a really one of the things I admire about you is that you're just a really, really smart, thoughtful guy. And I know that you put a lot of thought into this. Um, so I'm excited to hear what it is, Flint, that we are gonna be talking about today.
Flint Spencer 24:48
Uh yeah, I wanted to talk about what we do for Sunday school. Um uh, I don't know if you mentioned this, fifth through eighth grade youth pastors. Five-eight, that's true. Five-eight, yeah. Fi fifth grade through eighth grade. So just uh, I don't know, preteen adolescents, 10 to 14, 9 to 15, depending on the case. What an age group, man. What a crew. I love it. Uh one of my favorite things, I try to get a picture of it uh because the semester just started, and I was standing on the side of the room where the fifth graders are, and there's a fifth grader who, like during worship, had his little teddy bear stuffy in his hand and was just kind of waving it around. And behind him, like in perfect line with me, was like a 300-pound eighth-grade boy who's just like hulky, just like this massive. He's got frosted tips and he can beat us all up. And it's like, yeah, this is yeah, this is what these four years will do to you. Incredible.
Brad Warren 25:35
It's incredible. It's kind of wild. Um but we're talking about Sunday school, which is funny because I feel like maybe maybe you can relate to me on this, or maybe I had a different experience. But I feel like when I was in like college, um, so you know, 10, 15 years ago, whatever it was, that like Sunday school almost became like a bad word. Like churches wanted to not have Sunday school. Like it, it be it went into like the rebrand machine. You know what I mean? Where it was like, we don't it's school gross. Yeah. Um but I actually really love that I go to a church that's like, no, we have Sunday school, we do it for junior high, we do it for high school. It's great. College Heights is the same way. Um what do you like? So tell me what you value.
Flint Spencer 26:23
Cause how about I I'd tell you just like our youth ministry programs that we do, and then like what the emphasis of Sunday school is, and then by all means you're in charge. Okay. All right. I could feel kind of passive aggressive, but uh just to like to give context, because I think it's important. So we have basically like three things we do on top of events and trips. Uh we have Wednesday nights, which are a very classic youth group night. We have worship, we have a stage game, we have a sermon, and we have small groups. Um and that is Wednesday night, and we think of that as like a front door to the ministry. Anyone can come to church, um, you know, have friends, meet an adult who cares about them, and just kind of like walk into the community of Jesus, right? Uh, and then we have we call them discipleship groups or D groups, and those are groups that meet in families' homes, their grade and gender groups. And like when when I talk to someone in you know fifth, sixth grade, when they're starting leading one of those, it's like my goal is for you to get invited to college graduation. I want you uh in their life for a long time, and that's kind of where we'd like try to teach like along obedience in the same direction. Right? And shout out. Love it, love it. Always. Uh and those obviously are are grounded in scripture, but it's also very relational and mentorship based. And then Sunday morning is like we just want kids to know the Bible, we want kids to know what's in the Bible, we want kids to know to know how to read the Bible. And we we kind of like worked on all of this a few years ago, and there were a few things that we were like, okay, if if a kid is gonna walk in um to Sunday morning, what do we want after four years of this? What do we want for them? Um and uh a big thing that I that that kind of just like drives ministry for me is I always tell people like I want um our kids to become 30-year-olds who still love Jesus, obviously older as well. But I don't care as much if they're just like really well-behaved eighth graders. Um I I want them to like learn who Jesus is. I want them to learn how to read the Bible for themselves so they can foster a relationship with him. And uh yeah, I want them to just be able to open the Bible and read true things about who God is and what his plan is for them. And so that is uh yeah, out of that, then we we came up with a couple things um for how we do it. And the program itself looks Oh, hold on. Okay, hold on, slow down.
Brad Warren 28:40
I got I got some questions. All right, what are the questions? This the the we we got an hour, you know. Let's let's dig in. Oh, we have an hour. We got time, baby. Um, I want to know. So, like you have a co-leader of 5.8 Ministry, Emily Mitchell. Wonderful woman. She is great. We love Emily.
Flint Spencer 28:58
The goat of 5.8 Ministry, probably. I'll go 5.8 goat.
Brad Warren 29:03
The goat that rapper of 5.8. Um so like a while ago, you told me that you guys have kind of like um just the way you you've chosen to like do your division of labor, is like Emily is going to kind of run point on what happens on Wednesday nights. Flint is going to run point on what happens on Sunday mornings during Sunday school. Why is that the thing you were drawn to? Like, why is that the thing that you specifically like have a deep passion for and care
Loving God With Your Mind

Brad Warren 29:33
about?
Lane Moss 29:33
Yeah, because it is oftentimes kind of considered like the afterthought 100%. You know what I mean? Like there's a lot of thought that goes into like a big Wednesday night program, and then it's just like, well, Sunday school, like, well, like, you know. Well, but I know you and I I know that you weren't relegated to that, but that you wanted to do that.
Flint Spencer 29:49
Yeah, definitely. Yeah, yeah. I think that I just personally hold a lot of value in the idea of education and the idea of like formation of the mind, which I think happens through learning in different ways. Uh and I Yeah, I I just think that it's just really fun to take this portion of the ministry that is not glamorous. Like, I don't know, we we we don't even turn on the stage lights on Sunday mornings, right? We're just up there, we have a marker board sometimes. It's very boring. Um we're we're teaching. But I do yeah, I just I I love the idea of trying to like help kids like turn their mind. Like I'm a very like learning driven, education-driven person in general. Um and I think a lot of times students need more of that. Like if you talk to a lot of people when they're in high school, or we have a lot of Bible college kids who come and volunteer for us and go to Christchurch and and are hosts in our ministry. And I feel like every Bible college freshman, the thing that they say when they start taking a hermeneutics class is like, why didn't anyone ever teach me this before? Like, I didn't know that I could read the Bible like this. Like, I this is awesome. Why didn't my church and a lot of times most churches are actually trying really hard to teach us things? Sure. Um But I will say um we're not always really great at it. And also that like there's not a ton of us, especially like with fifth through eighth grade, there's just not a lot of like great stuff. It's pre-made and and pre-packaged. And so I like the challenge of it, and I also just love trying to get kids to um engage um their minds.
Lane Moss 31:30
Yeah, well, what does it look like to love the Lord with all your mind? Right. I mean, like that's like a it's it's kind of like an underconsidered aspect of the Shema or of the, you know what I mean, of the greatest command. You know, it's a is to love the Lord with all your mind. So what's it look like? And not only what does it look like for us, but what does it look like for fifth, sixth, seventh, eighth grade? Yeah. You know what I mean? Or you know, graders to do that, to do that as well. I mean, that's a you know, it's a it's a big deal.
Brad Warren 31:54
Like most people most people on a Wednesday night, like, I feel like the boxes that we're trying to check are, and they're important boxes. I'm not are relational. It's like how you mentioned this, like how do I get this student in touch with like an adult who cares about them and is going to be invested in them relationally and just like kind of a more uh spiritual like midweek reset button. Like, how do I just retrain my gaze in the right direction and aren't always like focused on learning, on challenging the mind? And so it is a really interesting like change in perspective and change in tactic to get students to try to like engage that part of themselves. But you were getting ready to just jump into this. But I want to ask the question this way since you brought up this kid with his teddy bear and and the 300-pound kid with frosted tips who can start in the NFL if he wanted to right now, like in that how do you those brains are different? Absolutely. Yeah. So like you have a big challenge on your hands as somebody who's like programming all of this, and how do you guys like approach that idea, you know?
Flint Spencer 33:04
Yeah, that
Inductive Bible Study With Kids

Flint Spencer 33:05
is that is an interesting thing. A lot of the way that we do, so class is like we have a teaching part of the class and then we have a memorization part of the class, which we can get into in a little bit. But with the teaching, a lot of what we're doing is um very much like question and answer and trying to get kids to go to the text themselves. Like that's that's my goal is to move things like off the pages of their Bible, onto the pages of their notes, in into their mind. And so there's a sense in which it's like actually we're just at whatever level they are engaging at the text. That's kind of how we teach because it is like what we're doing right now is we're just doing inductive Bible studies every week that are led by me from the front or led by a teacher from the front. And so it's like, okay, let's open the Bibles, let's observe this text. And we ask a lot of questions. And I totally know what you mean by inductive Bible study, but can you tell Michael? Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. So it's just like a three-step Bible study that is like, let's look at the text, let's observe it, um, let's interpret it, let's apply it. I'm counting on my fingers. I know that this is a podcast, probably shouldn't.
Lane Moss 34:05
No, I was just gonna make I was I in my mind, I was making the joke as the three steps. I was like, in duct tape. Like are the three steps, which is a which is a dumb joke to make, but that's what I was I wasn't making fun of you for counting. N is for knowing. Yeah.
Flint Spencer 34:23
Well, we are cooking now. Life of the mind, baby. Let's go. Um, no, but it's like we are just doing Bibles, like it is not a lecture-based thing. It's like we're asking a lot of questions. We're getting them to ask questions. And that's what it's like when I prep for this, it's like you just read about the text, read the background, um, try to understand like everything that a student will need to understand this at a base level. Uh, and then it's like, okay, let's read this, read it yourself, underline questions or underline words you don't know, uh, write questions, come up with some stuff so that you'll be able to reach the point. Like we do a lot of narrative, and it's like, I want you to be able to tell this story to the person next to you. Like, I just want your mind to be able to grasp it a little bit, um, or you know, draw a picture of it, or act it out, whatever that is. So we're just trying to get them to grasp the story at step one, and then step two, like we move from observing the text to interpreting the text. So uh we have right now we're we're in the book of Matthew, and we have like a thesis statement of the book of Matthew, of like uh either the the Matthew is the story of Jesus, um, you know, how he saves, what he taught, uh oh my goodness forgetting it right now. Like who who Jesus is, what he taught, and what life is like in his kingdom. So then it's like, okay, let's put those three things up there. You guys look at this passage that we've read, let's read it again and just say, okay, what's this tell us about who Jesus is, or who God is, what's this tell us about what it means to live in his kingdom, what's this tell us about what it means that he saves us or how he saves us. And um then from there, obviously we go to application and we talk about just like, okay, take the interpretation you put and try to put it on your own life in in a small way this week. And um teaching in that way honestly takes a lot of the um like stress and difficulty out of trying to connect with a 10-year-old and a 14-year-old. Uh, because when the fifth and sixth graders are in the room, it's very much like, okay, I'm as a teacher mostly just responding to the questions that they have, to the statements that they're making, right? To to what's going on with them. And then when the seventh and eighth graders are in there, they're gonna have a whole different set of observations or questions about the text or whatever that is. And so um so it's kind of a twofold thing where it's like we're dividing the group up in half by age.
Brad Warren 36:41
So I do have like a younger subset and an older subset, but at the same time, like the content is a little bit universal. I could sit in there and get something out of it in the same way that a third grader could, you know, and so you're just kind of like trying to put those guardrails up, I guess. So what is the like format? Because I think a lot of times when we think of Sunday school, it's like a little bit lecture-based. And you know, I I I'm not hearing you say that you're standing up in front of it, like standing in front of a room full of people and just giving them information about the Bible.
Scripture Memory As Formation

Flint Spencer 37:16
So how does this actually like I do lecture some. Uh, you know, I do plenty of yapping for sure, as my students would tell you. But um, so we we do that is half of the class. So the fifth and sixth graders are in one group, seventh and eighth graders are in one. And while the um seventh and eighth graders are in class where we're doing a Bible study together and kind of leading them through that, then the fifth and sixth graders are in memory work time. And we are an old school church, we do memory work. Um that's good. And that honestly came a lot out of it. One of the questions that we asked ourselves was um, like, okay, if if we're really trying to form like eventual 30-year-olds who love Jesus, and they could remember anything from Sunday school class, what do I want them to remember? Like, do I want them to remember my cool alliteration about John 15? No, I would much rather them just remember John 15. Uh, and so um, like Dallas Willard talks about like mim like contemplating, like formation happens when we contemplate large chunks of scripture. And so we're just trying to give kids scripture about who God is um and and what he's done and their role in the story that they can memorize and that they can contemplate. And we talk a lot about why we do that, but yeah, so so for half the class, we're just we're memorizing it.
Lane Moss 38:36
I mean, I did memorizing such a I mean, one of the most critical aspects, I think, of spiritual formation. Absolutely. And also one of the most somehow undervalued. Super undervalues. How does the young man keep his way pure by hiding God's word in his heart? You know what I mean?
Brad Warren 38:52
Like it's just like that was the nature of how people interacted with scripture forever. The majority of the history of the Christian faith. It's like we were mostly illiterate for a long time. A Bible that you could take home with you, like what you had was what you had stowed away, right? And like now all of a sudden we have all these things available to us. So it's like, well, why would I, you know?
Flint Spencer 39:15
It's like, how do we how do we live someone if we do not have scripture? Yes. How do we meditate day and night if you know it's right wake up in the middle and love it?
Brad Warren 39:24
How do we yield our fruit in season if we don't, I don't know, admit so, but but no, that that is half of it.
Flint Spencer 39:31
We just we have a lot of uh different tools that we introduce kids to. So we have um like just very practically the way that we do this. And not all the kids use it. Some kids just like to look at the text written, but uh we have like a little um slip binders, like you would put, I don't know, for for school that are plastic, and then we have expo markers, um, and then we have a bunch of like I have a paper that is every other word is a blank, and uh, we have a sheet that is, you know, every all the words are turned into emojis so that the way they can follow along and try to write it as they're reminded of it. We have pages where it's just the first letter of every um word in the in the passage, just like all the things that you know when you go to Bible college or whatever and you have to do memory work, you figure out like, oh, there's like methods and tactics that are really, really helpful that make this a lot easier for me. And so we give kids all those tools, and then it's very like self-uh guided as well. It's not like you know, and and this is all when we do that, we split them off. So it's just the fifth grade boys, just the fifth grade girls in in their own room with each other. It's very self-directed, so it's like we we just started started memorizing Psalm 139, and it's like there's uh a couple kids who already have the whole thing memorized, you know, most people don't. And that is another thing that I think is frustrating for students in a classroom setting, is they're like, hey, yeah, I am not um like intellectually at the same place as these other people. Like I, you know, it's just like kids get bored in school if they already know what it is that they're talking about. And so this is an opportunity for students to not feel like they are just having to stay with what it is that we're teaching. It's like, okay, like you're really excited to be here, you're really excited about this. Um the first time we did this, I think we were memorizing um Ephesians, I don't know, I don't remember what chapter it was, but one student came back three weeks later and he was like, uh, I think that I memorized all of it. And then he stood there and he just recited all of Ephesians, like the entire book to me. And it's like that is so cool.
Brad Warren 41:30
It's really but then you have kids that it's like sincerely a win if they can do one verse while they're the other, you know, or whatever. Yeah, it's amazing.
Flint Spencer 41:40
So it's awesome. It it really lets students who might get bored have like a really constructive use of of time independently. But so cool. Love it.
Brad Warren 41:50
And like sh it it it does though shorten the amount of time that you have for the like more instructive um portion of it. So how do you cause really I I don't know exactly how it breaks down, I should. Um, but like how much time do you actually have with them in each space?
Flint Spencer 42:12
Yeah, it's about 25 minutes.
Brad Warren 42:13
So it's like, okay, I got I got 25 minutes, um, and we're gonna go through this inductive Bible study about whatever Matthew, whatever it is that we're talking about today. What does that time actually look like in that room?
Flint Spencer 42:26
Is that just you standing up there talking to them and Yeah, we do a lot of um uh like I said, it's a lot of question and answer, but it is we will come together, um, we'll start and we'll read it and we'll make observations and then it'll be like, okay, you know, for the next two minutes, talk with the person next to you about the questions you have about this text. Right. Or a lot of times just because trying to let kids whose brains are not, you know, ADHD like mine catch up. It's like, okay, write on your paper, then there's sixty seconds of of silence silence, make six observations about this or whatever. And it's like, okay, talk with the person next to you about your observations, any questions that you had, this, that, the other. And then we just work through that. And it is like directed by me, like I am standing in front of everyone teaching. But you're breaking it up. Yeah, and we normally have slides, and it is very much like I talk, they do groups, and then they they respond, and I respond to that. So, you know, socratic, I think is what they call that a little bit. And I think that is that that would be the method.
Brad Warren 43:27
I think socratic method. Just a little bit based. It is socratic. Just a little cratic.
Lane Moss 43:34
I hate that.
Brad Warren 43:36
Socratic method, though.
Lane Moss 43:37
Supercratic. Good band name? Socratic, the Socratic method. The Socratic method. It's like, yeah. What kind of band is that? Flint spinster and the Socratic method. It's like sharpen the magnetic mirror. It's that yeah, it's that flavor for sure. Do you bear a few?
Flint Spencer 43:56
It's like one of those. Did you guys ever listen to the band called Fletcher? Speaking of Sunday school inspired by the biggest. Yeah, they were all right. I don't hardly remember their music, but I just remember what is that word? Oh, third grade Sunday school. We had a flannel graph. And now someone's named their band after that. That's awesome. It's amazing. Kind of a random.
Brad Warren 44:15
A few practical questions for you.
Attendance Reality And Curriculum Choices

Brad Warren 44:17
What is like what what what type of involvement are you getting from students for like a Sunday morning Sunday school setting as you would compare to like a Wednesday night?
Flint Spencer 44:29
Like is this we get 10% of the attendance that we do on a Wednesday night on a Sunday morning or like is a previous yeah I don't I don't you know It's pretty even um it it's roughly about the same number, but it it is a different crowd. Uh one thing also when we were looking at just trying to change this and thinking about why we were doing the things that we were doing is uh we realized like um pulled all the reports and looked at just like how often kids were coming. And so you know you pull out all the people who only come once a semester. And like our average Sunday will be anywhere from like I I don't know, I don't I don't want to preach or count, and I have these numbers and I should have just pulled them up. But it's like between 120 and 160, probably is like a Sunday morning right now. Um but those kids are coming to an average of one Sunday a month. Like our average student only comes once a month. Uh and and Wednesdays are honestly almost the same number, but they're actually more consistent, which is weird. So it's like if it instead of showing up to 25% of the events in a month, uh show up to like 35% or whatever. Um and so yeah, it's it's from the same like big pool of kids on Wednesdays for the most part, it's a lot of overlap. Um, but it it is an interesting thing because it is a very inconsistent group. Obviously, you've got like 20 kids who are there every week, who are there all the time, but the the average student is only going to come to class once a month, which also was really I mean, very eye-opening. Is we were trying to like plan curriculum and think about because you know, every week you get up there and you're like, okay, so last week we talked about this, so this week we're gonna talk about this. And it's like when you do that, when I was doing that, I'm only talking to one in four students at that point. Like everyone else is like, I don't know, I wasn't here, so I guess the rest of this doesn't really matter. Which is a a big part of like why we have shaped the curriculum and shaped the program to be what it is, because you can come once every four weeks, twice every four weeks, and it's like that we we're just doing John 15 for this semester. So you can if you memorize one verse of it last time, you can hop right back in and and you can continue on that. And if we're just doing a Bible study, like what part of what we're gonna do is we start that as like, okay, here's the context for this. You didn't need to be here last week to get to get this. We're just gonna talk about it um to the level that you can you can understand what it is. So um it is a lot of the same kids who are there on Wednesdays, but it's a slightly different crowd and it is weirdly less consistent, which kind of surprised me when it's like it's cool that you get the same like just overall like turnout numbers, you know what I mean?
Brad Warren 47:06
Because like I don't know, it's it's fun to me to think about the fact that like the the thing that is designed to be uh more attractional is like that you are seeing as much participation in something that is like not made with that in mind. You know what I mean? I don't know, it's just kind of an encouraging thing.
Flint Spencer 47:27
Yeah, it is. I will say it is uh Wednesday nights are are more fun to think about uh numbers because there's always more fifth graders come like every the fifth grade class is when they go to sixth grade and then seventh grade and eighth grade it like dwindles. There's like less of them on Sunday mornings, but on Wednesday nights it's like our biggest group will be our eighth graders and then our seventh graders and then our sixth graders and then our fifth graders, uh which is which is cool. Um but yeah, uh a part of that on Sunday mornings also is like kids start serving in different areas of the church, which is awesome. We love that. We want that.
Brad Warren 48:00
Or they're and you do only like the Sunday school is only offered for one out of our three. Yeah, it's only doing the 915.
Flint Spencer 48:06
And I I tell families, I tell students anytime we talk about this, is like I want like this is not church. We are not doing church for your for your 13-year-old. Like they should go to church with you, they should worship with you, they should take communion with you. That uh our pastor, Mark Christian sermons are great, and a 13-year-old a 10-year-old can listen to them and like understand that and and apply that to his life. And so um yeah, we don't we only do it once on a Sunday morning because we want to incentivize students to go to church with their family. And so yeah.
Brad Warren 48:41
How does that like compare to I'm gonna ask you about college heights a little bit? Um ask me. Um so I I wonder what changes when it's like the the format is so different, where it's like you guys have kind of a Sunday school hour all to itself. You know what I mean? Yeah, yeah, yeah. So, and you're not the youth pastor there. I'm I'm kind of asking you an unfair question, but like I wonder if that leads to a higher level of consistency. Like our kids not going on certain Sundays because it's like, well, the family can only make it work to be at church for two hours this this time, but you know, but if there is that kind of dedicated time, if it allows for a little bit more consistency.
Lane Moss 49:25
I think I would say that it allows for a like significantly more consistency, right? Because like that's why I mean, like anybody that's there is there very much on purpose. And is there probably there because they're committed to being a part of something during that hour, like like almost all the time. It probably doesn't lead to as high volume. Yeah, because you don't get because you don't get again the people that are just there because like I'm I'm here because this is the service that my parents want to go to. And even though like I know like you know, CCO's heart is that the kids do go to service with with their parents, and I totally agree with that. But you know, you're always gonna get that, you know. Yeah, right. You're always gonna get the family that you're well aware. Yeah, yeah.
Flint Spencer 50:03
I did one time there was there was a class where I was like, hey, I just want to reiterate this. I've said it a lot. And I was like, hey, we like you guys should go to class. And the next week there were zero eighth grade girls in class because they all don't went to church or whether it's a good thing. It was a funny conversation. I was like, And then it all trickled back and that they mostly do go to church, but it it was funny.
Lane Moss 50:24
So I was like, oh, I guess I think that yeah, you probably have like a like you could probably like a trade-off. I think there's yeah, I'm sure there is. I'm sure there is. I don't know that because I don't have those numbers obviously in front of me or anything like that.
Brad Warren 50:36
But I'm as someone who doesn't go to CTO, what is interesting to you about all of this? Like what are what are your thoughts? What are your what are your questions for Flynn?
Lane Moss 50:44
Um if do do this for me real quick. Because I what I think is that people might be like listening to this podcast because my guess is that something about the Sunday school you know will be in the title of this podcast somehow or something. Thumbnail. And they'll be yeah, super cool thumbnail. Yeah, yeah. Um then uh but what I so do this for me real quick. And walk through those movements real quick of a typical Sunday school kind of hour again, real quick. Give me like two sentences per movement. And just say like from this time to this time, it's this, this time to this time, it's this, this time to this time to this. You know, just again, give give everybody like a okay, hang on just a second. I got there was a lot of information just now. So give me like give me the playbook real quick.
Flint Spencer 51:19
Yeah. So um 9:15, students come in, 920, which uh 915 is when the second service is. When the second service starts. Yeah.
Brad Warren 51:28
So parents are going to church at that time.
Flint Spencer 51:31
Their kids are dropped off. Uh we're hanging out, uh, and then we split into fifth and sixth are in one group, seventh and eighth in in the other group. Seventh and eighth graders go to class where we do Bible studies, where they open their Bible, everyone opens the Bible, everyone take takes notes, we study scripture, they come to true conclusions about what the Bible says. And from there, after 25 minutes, they switch, they go to memory work time, but they break up into smaller groups uh where their their leaders uh help direct them in learning and memorizing scripture. Um thirty-nine, we do a chapter at a time. Yeah. So you're only ever working on one thing. All the students are working on the same thing. Uh we do that for 25 minutes and then we dismiss. Love it. What the and you do a chapter at a time. Yes. So every it's like a trimester, kind of. So like over the summer we did we did uh John 15. Yep. Um yeah, right now we're doing Psalm 139. Uh we did Romans eight a few semesters ago, and that one was that one was tough. That one's tough. We went from we went from Romans eight to uh John 15. No, we went from Romans eight to first Corinthians 13, and we went from like 30 kids memorized this chapter to 95 kids memorize this chapter. And it's like, yeah, we really can reset the baseline of it.
Brad Warren 52:51
I love that. Yeah, you mentioned a couple, but like like you mentioned a guy a guy that memorized all of Ephesians or whatever. Like what what are some things that have surprised you?
Flint Spencer 53:00
You know, like uh I'm surprised, one, how much kids actually really enjoy memorizing scripture. A lot of kids they don't memorize stuff.
Lane Moss 53:09
We think that is. Do you and do you and do you incentivize it?
Flint Spencer 53:12
We do incentivize it. We have like a Pete's party at the end of the year. Okay, they can win little squishies at the end of the semester. Um, but I mean it's not hugely incentive. Yeah, totalize. No, no, yeah. Uh we we track it. We don't do like you know, memory wars or anything where it's like you're you're versing the other grades. Uh but it is incentivized. Uh I did I think it was one one, I was like, I will buzz my head if we get 100 kids to memorize this one. We didn't, so it was great. Um but everybody wins. Yeah, yeah. It was really nice, actually. My wife was like, you said you made what promise? Yeah.
Brad Warren 53:46
But um talk about preacher counting.
Lane Moss 53:49
Only 99 kids hit the exact thing. No, I love it because here's what here's what I think is awesome is because I'm here I am, I'm 42, right? Um and and at Boulevard Christian Church in Muskogee, Oklahoma. Let's go, you know, back in you know, the early 90s when I've in that when I'm in like elementary school, uh, you know, and Mary Joe Kimbrough was like our like children's church leader, you know. Shout out Mary Joe Kimbrough. Shout out Mary Joe Kimbrough, man. And so and we did and like in once a semester, we did Super Sundays, which was a day when like we could, we could like we could show that we had memorized the scripture that we had worked on and that and we could, you know, and we could do these things, and we got like king-sized candy bars and like and like things like that. But what and and what I love is that is that dude, it's it's it is just so good and so consistent over time. Yeah. Like it is just one of those things that is just that is just true. Like this is a true, tried and true method of discipleship and of, you know what I mean? And like I'm not trying to like over-program discipleship, but of just of of like getting God's word in the hearts and minds of young people.
Flint Spencer 54:57
Absolutely.
Lane Moss 54:57
You know, and getting them excited about those kinds of things.
Flint Spencer 54:59
And I just like, you know, so there's nothing to take the place of that.
Lane Moss 55:02
Like there's nothing else that you can do that actually beats putting the words of scripture into your brain. Yep, yep. That's exactly right. Love it. All right. Joe Kimbrough and the Socratic Methods. I was thinking like her name rocks. Yeah, dude. Honestly, though. Yeah, that's a good name. Yep. And her husband Bob.
Flint Spencer 55:19
Bob Kimbrough. Uh we did uh we have a couple times we have um like gotten to film students who memorize whole script whole whole passage and then like shown that in quote unquote big church. Heck yeah. Uh, and that was awesome. The first time we did that, I think it was maybe maybe John 15, and like I was just weeping because there's there's so many people who have no idea. It's really big church. They're like, I don't know what they do over there, they're probably just playing games the whole time. And it's just such a great moment of like adults are like, oh my goodness, like our students are memorizing chapters of scripture. Like I should do that. And also, you know, parents are so proud of their kids because we we get to show them off, and those that those are really cool moments. Because then it also like helps students feel like they are a part of the life of the church, and also like what they are doing is something that is I I worthy of like elevating in some way, even for the adults in the church to to see and to aspire to. So I totally agree.
Brad Warren 56:15
That's awesome. All right, well, so that was one thing you were like, this is a thing that surprised me. Tell me some like wins from the other side, from the like classroom side. What are some things that you've seen or noticed that have been like exciting or encouraging or funny or whatever to you?
What’s Working And What’s Next

Flint Spencer 56:35
Yeah, um, I'll say it is just really cool that that I think students use the things that we do in class. Uh and and a part of the reason that we moved to this is because students came to me and they're like, I really like it when we just practice Bible studies because I know that I'm supposed to do a Bible study and sometimes I just like read some verses of my Bible and I don't really know what else like I like I think that there's supposed to be more to it than that. I don't really know. And um yeah, I love I love obviously like teaching specific things from scripture, but I I think it's really uh awesome to give kids tools that they use, uh, and then to to hear from them or to even hear from parents that like hey my my kid was doing a Bible study and then they said that they're learning this in class, and that's just always really encouraging stuff. Um because yeah, uh there is a sense in which like the specific things that we talk about in class every week, like they will not stay in their head. Yeah, some things will, um, but a lot of things won't. But if we can, like I said, like I wanted to help we do the same thing every Sunday during class right now, because like I'm actually just trying to teach the form of it. The tool. The ideal is that any student will be able to open their Bible, read God's word, and come to true conclusions about what it says that they can apply to their life. And so it is fun to to see them kind of like pick up that tool, even if we're not being super explicit about that of every week, of like, hey, when you open your Bible, you should do these three things. Yeah. Um it's like, hey, we're opening our Bibles, we're doing these three things. And then they are starting to catch that um and do that in their own.
Brad Warren 58:19
That's cool. Do you guys follow any kind of like scope and sequence when it comes to the teaching stuff, or is it more programmed like, oh, we did a gospel last semester, so we're gonna do an epistle or we're gonna do an old testament thing, or we're we're pretty we're we're kind of uh just free range at the moment, just doing whatever.
Flint Spencer 58:40
Uh you sound exasperated about that. Well, we're we're working on it. Yeah, okay. And I don't know, scope and sequence, obviously, it is it would be awesome to be able to sit down and write out like this is what we're doing for for four years. And we're work like we have a big project right now where we're we're working on that, where it's like, okay, what are the like learning objectives that we want to see students hit if they're here for four years? What are the things that they should know? Um, what that they should have, you know, what what what like how should they understand the Bible? What parts of the Bible should they know really well? Uh, how can we teach them like the story of the Bible in a way that they can, you know, place whatever it is that they are reading? Um and so it's like we're we're kind of working backwards through all those things right now and trying to get to a a curriculum that will be like four years long in scope and sequence. But um yeah, at the moment it's just kind of a question of like what what are kids like one, are there is there anything that they're asking about right now, anything that that they want to hear? Also, like what have we done lately, what have we not done lately?
Brad Warren 59:43
Like you're doing Matthew right now, you're not gonna jump into John next. It's like, you know, let's probably so there is some intentionality and there's just like different um genres of books of the Bible and that kind of thing. But yeah. Huh. Interesting. All right. Um, Flint, this has been great. I am gonna give Lane one more chance. If you have any, I don't want to like cut off the episode if you're holding on to something, but also if we're done, we're done. You know, you got anything else?
Lane Moss 1:00:07
Yeah, no, I don't think so, dude. I just want to commend you, man, because I think it's awesome. I think like I I love what you're doing. And like, listen, like I would tell I would tell any youth pastor or any pastor or any parent or anything, like you want a guarantee of something that because what you said is true. What is going like things are going to like not everything is going to stick in a kid's head. You know what I mean? Like everything that we say, as much time as much prep, as much, but you want a guarantee of something that's not gonna come back void? Like here it is. You know what I mean? Like I got the, yeah, you know, and so that's the so no, dude, I love it, man.
Brad Warren 1:00:37
Yeah. Yeah. I think it's sweet. Two like timeless things, like store scripture away in your heart and have a tool that you can pull out of your tool belt that's gonna help you study the Bible in a responsible way. Is like, man, if a kid walks away with those two things, like what else could you want for them?
Lane Moss 1:00:51
Yeah, I like that the goal of the of the five to eight ministry over there at CCO is just to create an odd Bible college freshmen. Like I'm looking for freshmen to walk in their whole freshman year and go, I know. It's just like, yeah, I know. We've we I like this in sixth grade. You all worked? Yeah, we're been doing it.
Brad Warren 1:01:15
It's amazing. Well, Flat, I love ya. Love you too, Brad. Thanks for being here, man.
Tyler Davison 1:01:21
Hey, I'm Tyler. I've been on staff at CIY for four years, and I work on the programming team, overseeing our speakers for Move and Mix. CIY exists to call youth to Christ and into lives of Kingdomwork through the church. Today's episode of Beyond the Event was produced by Brad Warren, Michael Hester, and Lauren Bryan. If you'd like to reach us, you can email us at podcast atci.com or reach out on the CIY Community Facebook group. Thanks so much for listening, and we'll see you next time.


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Beyond the Event

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