From sometime in 2017 through the end of 2020, I had the tremendous opportunity to be the student minister at my local church. I was on staff, but in an unpaid, lay capacity, which meant I attended as many church staff meetings as possible alongside working my job at a Christian publishing ministry.
I loved leading student ministry, and I wish I would have had the Rooted Essentials resource when I was in that position. As one who loved to prepare to teach and disciple students, but had little time to do so, a resource like this could have been a real blessing.
So what does the Rooted Essentials experience look like? Let me break it down for you.
Built Around Three Connections
Like the core Rooted Experience, Rooted Essentials takes students through three primary connections we should make in life:
- Connecting with God,
- Connecting with the church,
- Connecting with our purpose.
The whole Rooted Essentials arc is designed to help students know God, see the value of the local church, and find their purpose. This matters for adults, of course, but imagine how important it is for a teenager to think through these vital connections.
Teens are in the middle of trying to discover who God has made them to be for the first time in their life. Rooted Essentials is designed to help them see the core connections that form their identity.
The Rhythm of a Week: Group Time Plus Personal Devotionals
Rooted Essentials is made up of two core components in a given week: the Experience Together group session and three short devotionals for students to complete during the week between their group sessions. The Experience Together group section is made up of the following:
- Experience Together—an opening activity
- Read Together—a teaching time
- Discuss Together—a time for guided conversation
- Reflect Together—a time for individuals to respond
The three personal devotions to be done throughout the week provide students with the opportunity to read a passage, briefly respond, and decide how that passage may affect how they live.
The design of Rooted Essentials is meant to promote group discipleship and individual times of devotion and personal growth for students, showing them that growing to know and be like Christ happens both in community and in solitude.
The 7 Rhythms of Discipleships Students Learn
This likely comes as no surprise, but the 7 Rhythms of Discipleship that students learn about and practice in Rooted Essentials are the same 7 Rhythms of Discipleship that are core to the Rooted Experience. The 7 Rhythms of Discipleship are:
- Daily Devotion
- Prayer
- Repentance
- Sacrificial Generosity
- Serve the Community
- Share Your Story
- Worship
Youth ministry leader: these are durable, foundational Christian disciplines (or habits) you want teenagers to build as they walk through some of their most tumultuous and formative years. Rooted Essentials gives students concrete reps with each one of these rhythms of discipleship rather than just giving them the opportunity to hear you teach about them.
The Six-Week Journey
Rooted Essentials starts with topics that revolve around community and identity—two topics that are constantly at the top of students’ minds as they think, “Who am I, and how do I fit in?” Then Essentials moves into topics around freedom and mission, pointing students to a sense of purpose, ending with students owning and sharing their own stories.
Embedded experiences make these topics tangible and real for students, just like in the core Rooted Experience. The Prayer Experience (Week 2) and the Serve Experience (Week 5) help students actually practice these rhythms amid learning about them. And Rooted Essentials, like the Rooted experience, ends with a celebration of life change in your group that is especially meaningful.
A Safe Place to Come as You Are
The Rooted Covenant that students sign as the group begins helps ensure confidentiality within the group, and it allows student ministry leaders to promote a “come as you are” kind of posture, making clear that students shouldn’t feel the need to feel like they have it all together to be a part of a Rooted Essentials group. This is the same idea as the Rooted Covenant in the Rooted Experience, just tailored to fit students and their unique environments a bit more specifically.
Students need to know that they can be open and honest in a group like this if we have any hope of them experiencing the kind of transformation that is possible in Christian community dedicated to helping each other meet and become more like Jesus.
Student Ministry Needs a Discipleship Culture, Too
Long gone are the days when student ministry was all about pizza and lock-ins—and honestly, good riddance. Students experience deep struggles, carry heavy burdens, and ask hard questions, and where better for them to bring those than to a group of fellow students who have gathered with a leader dedicated to helping them connect with God, the church, and their purpose?
Imagine what it would be like if your students practiced some of the 7 Rhythms of Discipleship—praying, worshiping, and serving their community regularly. What kind of change could happen in the schools in your area? How might your students actually end up serving as role models in their homes?
If you want to learn more about Rooted Essentials and how it can serve the students in your student ministry, download the sample at the Rooted Network website and get it in your hands.
