Online Archives

Young Adult Retreat

You are having a young adult action team retreat from January 19-21 at West River in Churchton. What is a young adult action team?

The Discipline mandates that every annual conference have some form of a conference level young adult ministry. We will be organizing this effort in the Baltimore-Washington Conference that weekend.This team will be responsible for programming young adult ministry and equipping the young adult community of the BWC to be disciples in the world.

Why are you having this retreat during ROCK weekend?
Well, when we contacted our retreat centers we asked for the available dates and this was one of the three dates we were able to get. Ideally, this is not the best weekend in that ROCK is such a big and important part of our conference's ministry. We just grabbed the dates we could get. Remember this is a planning/organ-izing retreat just to get the ball rolling.

Who are considered young adults?
Young adults are basically people in their 20s and 30s. Good core groups usually consist of 24 to 35-year-olds.

Who are you looking for to attend this retreat?
We are looking for young adult leaders that feel called by God to impact the young adult community in the church and in the community. We are looking for young adults to initiate the new Protestant reformation.

What do you mean by the new Protestant Reformation?
We want to raise a community of young adults who are committed to their Lord and helping their congregations become Acts 2 congregations. We want to raise a young adult community that will lead the denomination into the future. We want reformation, not cancellation, of what we know the United Methodist church to be. We want to reform communities, worship and congregational life by challenging those things that we have traditionally held to be necessary to be the body of Christ. We want to challenge the church to rethink and refresh what it means to be disciples in the neighborhood and beyond.

What's in store for the future of young adult ministry?
We really want to engage young adults first and foremost in their local communities. This is where the action is. To help this, we are looking at linking congregations that have similar challenges and opportunities. We also look to do a large mission project with as many young adults as we can find and develop local young adult spots for social gathering and worship. So, we have much to do!

For more information, contact the Rev. Kevin Smalls at