One of the workshops I’ve taught for a couple of years is Connecting the Generations. We discuss the uniqueness of each generation existing today and then find solutions to connect women across those generational lines. One of the leaders, DeAnna Fields, women’s ministry pastor at Beltway Park Baptist Church, attended this workshop at our YOU Lead event in Lubbock, Texas. She recently sent me an email about the impact this has had on their women.
A couple of months after our YOU Lead, their women hosted “Let’s Get Together: Connecting the Generations.” They wanted to get more young adult women involved in ministry, and this was a great springboard to do just that. They asked 25 young women to join in the planning process and about 15 of them said yes! Most of them were used as models for the “generations style show” portion of the evening you will see described below.
To promote the event, they sent women from their vision team to various young adult life groups and their college ministry to personally invite women to attend. It paid off as they had a great response from all ages the night of the event.
Here are some of the elements of the evening:
Generations Slide Show
All ages of women sent in pictures of themselves growing up, prom, weddings, etc. They were in date order and the pictures scrolled as women entered the worship center. Worship music that matched the generation of the pictures played in the background.
Ice Breaker
Women were instructed to find and meet a woman from a different generation than theirs (this was easy to do with color-coded name tags for various generations). They had time to ask and answer four questions that were listed on the screen.
Generations Video
Next a video was shown of Deanna’s family (her mom, Deanna, and her three daughters ages 19-25) discussing various topics and how things had changed over the years. They talked about homes without plumbing, her mother being born at home and delivered by her older sisters, having no phones in houses to cell phones today, and dating and weddings. Pictures were included in the video.
Generations Style Show
A lighted runway went down the center aisle in the worship center, and the models took the runway. They discussed four generations, what was popular at that time, and modeled at least five outfits from each. They also played music in the background that matched the time, and had women from that generation stand up so they could be identified.
Generations Panel
Six older godly women (in their 50s to 70s) who had experienced much in life (divorce, infertility, adoption, loss of a child, loss of a spouse, chronic illness, loss of job, etc.) answered questions that came from the women’s registrations.
Challenge
Deanna then challenged the older women to be mentors and develop relationships with the younger women (overcome fear, etc.). She challenged the younger women to get involved and seek out older women to be a part of their lives.
Blessings and Prayers
The attendees were then asked to return to the friend they met during the ice breaker and bless and pray over each other, exchange contact information, and start communicating. Many older women left that night with a new, younger friend. It was fun to watch the younger women who wouldn’t leave until they had a phone number in hand and knew they could call someone in the future for conversation or guidance!
The night was a great success, and this church is still seeing the “fruit” from this event.
These are some great ideas to help you consider something that could be done in your ministry with women to make generational connections, just as we are mandated in Titus 2:3-5.
What ideas would add to these?
Chris Adams is senior lead women’s ministry specialist at Lifeway Christian Resources in Nashville, Tenn. Learn more about Chris here.
