Visionating a new name

An old saying, poorly remembered says, "if you have no target to aim for then that's exactly what you'll hit, nothing."

Last night, along with some of the senior high teens from church, we spent some time vision-ating.

Over five pizzas, three different coloured post-it notes and 90 minutes, we looked back on 2010 and looked forward to this year.

We began by asking answering the question "if you could describe what we did on a Friday night in one word, what would it be?"

Then we answered the same question, but the one word was about what we would want this year to be known for. The one thing about the youth activities that make what we do uniquely us.

Ideally, this would give us the direction that we want to head in 2011.

Finally, we started to plot the course for a new name for you youth group. This was, by far, the most fun.

The lessons?

1 - The name should reflect something about the group and the purpose for the meeting.

2 - The name should be pronounceable in public. For example you don't go with the name YouthRUSH or Friday Night Live (FNL). You need to imagine yourself saying "come with me to my youth group called..."

3 - The name needs to be clear. If your name is some little-used Hebrew word that makes no sense to outsiders, then it creates one more obstacle that needs to be overcome. Explainable trumps obscure.

4 - Your name needs to be more than cool. If not, then every youth ministry would be called Megatron.