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Brenda’s summer camp schedule is scheduled and her theme for the summer is “God is Love.”  While straight from 1 John 4:16 and simple, it does have a hippy-dippy feel to it that shouts the truth.  Brenda has creative plans to introduce this God of love from a rote teaching of going page by page through the New Testament to teachings of wonder.  That is quite a spectrum from rote teaching to wonder but isn’t this God of love astonishing and needs all that space to be described?   

Brenda’s summer camp schedule for 2013 is full.  However, her fall schedule is open and the “God is Love” theme can be tweaked to fit a fall schedule.  To learn more about Brenda and topics she is available to teach on for you, go to Who is Brenda 

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Welcome! We are excited to announce yet another web design change. As technology is ever changing, we have opportunity to better this site, yet again. To improve on our past website we have integrated many new features including inline article reader commenting, Twitter, Facebook and Google+ integration, and better organization of our free resources, videos, and articles.

But it is not just Wild Frontier.org that has been changed up. Our sister-site CFBYM.org also has received a much-needed update. We have completely redesigned CFBYM.org from the ground up and added many new social features including sharing, commenting and more.

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WF News: Christmas Lesson for Teens

Over at our CFBYM resource site are user-submitted ideas in several categories to help you plan with parents and your church family in mind.  For the crazy-yet-memory-filled Christmas season is an idea you may want to pass on to the parents as a way to make a family memory. You can find it and other ideas at www.cfbym.org.

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WF News: Writers for YM Shorts

We are looking for youth ministers to send in your practical ideas by video or in 150-words.We are looking specifically for shorts on these needed ideas:

  • How to communicate with teens who’s parents don’t allow them on Facebook or have text messaging.
  • How you have used the sense of sight as a teachable moment.
  • How have you used the sense of sound as a teachable moment.
  • How have you used the sense of smell as a teachable moment.
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YM Shorts Magazine Issue #4 - 1,083 Readers in First Week

The latest issue of YM Shorts Magazine is available live & free and you can read it here.

For the first week of availability, we've had 1,083 readers.  Considering this was released amidst the busy month of June, we are blown away.  Of course, we've got such great writers who gave us such great ideas.

We'd love to create a summer buzz about this new issue.  Please leave us comments on our Facebook page.  At least like us.  And forward the issue to your friends and associates.

 

 

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WF News: First Week = 1,083 Readers

The fourth issues of YM Shorts has matched all the other issues for first week readers.  And this issue was released in the busy month of June.  Thank you.

Have you read the issue yet?

Have you told your friends aboutYM Shorts yet?

We'd love to have your comments about the new issue on our Facebook page.  At least like us on FB.  Because this is a free resource, we'd love to get some summer buzz going.

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WF News: Faith Shaping

Have you read the widely-touted book, You Lost Me, by Gabe Lyons?  One quote: “The dropout problem (of teens in churches) is, at its core, a faith-development problem; to use religious language, it’s a disciple-making problem.” (p. 21)  One of our online resources is a simplified yet practical download on adolescent faith development called Faith Shaping. We hope this will be a helpful start to educate you on faith development--and we know you will enjoy identifying your own faith journey as you read this. Download

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Pair of Cleats Announcement

What is Next for Pair of Cleats?

For 20 years I've been writing Pair of Cleats.  It used to be only available by mail.  Then the internet came and Pair of Cleats was available long before the blog-craze.  During that new blog-craze we pondered changing the format and decided to continue as is. We are grateful in hindsight for that decision since Pair of Cleats has outlasted many many blogs. Pair of Cleats has been a consistent space of challenging the status quo of youth ministry to follow what God may lead "out on the Wild Frontier."

The entire 20-year collection has had a consistent theme of avoiding attractional youth ministry and involving the parents and church family which we've termed Church Family-Based Youth Ministry.  In hindsight we can see this consistent theme.  It's amazing.  But in the midst of it, we had no idea that this would be the direction.  Our thoughts came from personal frustrations and trusting God to reveal new things to better the fruit of youth ministry.  Obviously God has revealed new things.

Now nearly every youth ministry resource is talking about and providing resources for family-based youth ministry, intergenerational youth ministry, Orange, Sticky Faith (it is so great to have actual research to support what we strongly believe in!) or whatever else you've heard it called.  We are thrilled at this new look of youth ministry and believe fully in its possibilities.

Wild Frontier, simply because of its name and purpose, has always been a place for "out there" thinking.  Instead of using the Pair of Cleats space to rehash what is now common and good, we are following God further "out there" for what is next.  However at this point, we have no idea what that is.  Until then, we are placing this Pair of Cleats space in suspension.  When the new starts to be revealed to our team, we will let you know.  For all we know now, it may not even be in this Pair of Cleats space.  The unknown is a central part of any frontier living but the choices are made because of the belief that something is better "out there."  This has always been core to everything we've done and will continue to do.

As for practics, your email in this account is secure as it always has been.  The archive of Pair of Cleats is available at WildFrontier.org.  There may be a new Pair of Cleats here and there from a guest author.  That is certainly a possibility and may direct us to the next "out there" thing.  Who knows?

The "what next" is exciting yet not comfortable.  We cherish your prayers and partnership along the way.

Brenda Seefeldt

Founder

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WF News: Brenda's 30 Years In Pictures

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qviOaLvjCVc

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WF News: Congrats from the World of Youth Ministry

30 years - dudette! That's impressive and inspiring Brenda! Thanks for the example of longevity and dedication to this generation, and for your voice of experience and challenge to youth workers!

same team,
Danette Matty, speaker, author and trainer as well as part of the staff of Christ’s Place in Lincoln, Nebraska

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About Wild Frontier

Wild Frontier is a mindset. It is a mindset that there is something more out there than what is normal or what is within human limitations. Only the brave dare to have this mindset. The brave dare to be vulnerable. The brave learn to recognize and expose numbing behaviors so that bravery can now be what defines our lives.  And vulnerability is the beginning of hope. 

This is the main theme of Brenda’s messages.  She is now joined with her husband, John Amodea, who adds songs to the message. They have a great back-and-forth repertoire of vulnerability that opens up the crowds to the possibility that they can also live a brave life. This is a healing message that teens and adults are responding to.

We’ve been a resource since 1990, an online resource since 1995 for youth ministry.  Brenda is in her 34th year as a youth minister with no plans to change that role in her local church.  Wild Frontier’s many publications include Pair of Cleats (1992-2001), Moms & Pops Stuff (since 2003 and continuing), a digital youth ministry magazine, YM Shorts (2010-2013) as well as several download curriculums.  Pre-internet resources were Stuff, Stuffnet, Stufffax, and Stuffed Statistical Collection. 

We have a partner-site, ChurchFamilyBasedYouthMinistry.org or CFBYM.org.  This website contains our many Wild Frontier resources for this practice of youth ministry which we believe very much in. This is a user-generated site with everyone's practical ideas available for free so more and more churches may be encouraged to practice a more church family friendly youth ministry.

Wild Frontier is also an album written by Randy Stonehill.  An album that perhaps influenced Brenda Seefeldt at a vulnerable age. 


Our Statement of Faith is:

Wild Frontier believes the Bible is inspired by the Holy Spirit and is the flawless Word of God. We believe in the trinity of God – Father, Son, and Holy Spirit – and that He is holy. We believe that Jesus Christ is God’s only Son, born of a virgin, that He made complete payment for our sin nature through His sinless life, death on the cross, and resurrection. We believe in the second coming of Christ, the resurrection of the living and the dead, and eternal life either with Christ or lost forever. We believe that those who accept the free gift of salvation through Christ are born of God’s Holy Spirit and are brothers and sisters in Christ Jesus.

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Thank You to 3,011 of You and Another 4,000

Thank you for blowing away our goals for YM Shorts.  Since our spring issue has been released 7 days ago, it has been read by 3,011 individual readers.  The readership of the first issue for the first 30 days was only 5,238 (and we were thrilled with that number!).

The numbers are now in for our first 30 days of the spring issue.  The readership so far is 7,011.  Where are you all coming from?  We are still amazed!

The summer issue will be released September 15.  Writer submissions are due August 1.  We hope you will contribute.    Please check out our Writer’s Guidelines for more details.  But even if you don’t, thank you for reading and telling others.

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Brenda's article,"Bring the Whole Family: Church-and Family Based Youth Ministry," is featured in the September/October issue of Youth Worker Journal in the "Stirring It Up" last page column of the magazine. You can order a copy or subscribe at http://www.youthworker.com/

 

 

 

 

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Brenda Seefeldt Published In youth Worker Journal

Once again Brenda has been published in Youth Worker Journal. Her latest article, “10 Reasons Parents Should Be Part Of Your Youth Ministry,” is featured in the March/April issue. You can subscribe to Youth Worker Journal Here.

 

Youth Worker Book of Hope

Authors Include Wild Frontier Founder Brenda Seefeldt

The Youth Worker Book of Hope offers you encouragement and hope in those moments of darkness by using experiences and advice from people who have been through the valley and learned from it. Youth workers from around the country have contributed personal stories of their own desire to quit, confrontations with parents, struggles with running the ministry, getting fired, and many more. In “her” chapter, “When Parents Don’t Respect You,” Brenda talks about the epiphany she had in 1999 that changed her ministry after 16 years of being Brenda-centric. Today she has a very different perspective of the connection between parents and youth ministry.

The Youth Worker Book of Hope is available at www.youthspecialties.com and bookstores everywhere.

 

Celebrating 20 Years of Ministry, and 15 Years Online

In honor of our twenty years of ministry and fifteen years online we decided to take a look at the Wild Frontier Wayback Machine. Take peak at what we’ve looked like over the years.

 

 

 

YWJ Quote

A quote from Brenda Seefeldt was a part of the February 9, 2010, Youthworker eJournal.  She was the YWJ Quote of the Week.  The actual quote is:

“We spend too much time on issues and not enough on teaching life lessons, providing enough mentoring and following up.”
–Brenda Seefeldt   This was taken from a previously published article entitled, “They’re Not Grown Up Yet: Leaving Adult Decisions for Adulthood”.

 

WF Founder Brenda Seefeldt Featured in Group Magazine

Brenda’s article entitled “Growing a Youth Ministry That Looks a Lot Like Your Church” is one of five featured articles in the September/October issue of Group Magazine. Friend and contributor to Wild Frontier, Danette Matty, wrote an article that piggybacks to Brenda’s article.

 

 

 

 

 

WF Green Redemption Stories

In the Pair of Cleats “Creation Care is Youth Ministry, ” we encourage you to include Creation Care redemption stories on your website as a way to support Creation Care, which is of high concern for this generation of teens. The following two stories are so innovative and powerful that we encourage you to post them (with proper referencing):

Story #1: Rock festivals have long been a gathering for excessive amounts of garbage. The Roskilde Festival of Denmark has changed their format to “Less Trash ‑ More Music.” Attendees were encouraged to cut back on the amount of trash they generated. Attendees were also given their own bags to fill with trash and were given a reward of beer or chocolate milk for every bad. There was also a competition for who could collect the most garbage. The winner collected 1,048 bags of garbage and won backstage passes to Neil Young’s performance.

At the 2007 festival, trash clean up took more than 500 people and several weeks to clean up the trash at a price tag of over a million Euros. (Trendcentral, August 6, 2008)

Story#2: Mark the Litter Guy is an unemployed homeless man in Toronto who was uninterested in panhandling. Instead he gets trash bags and has dedicated himself to cleaning the city’s streets day in and day out. Torontians respect him for choosing a non‑intrusive way to make money (he does not ask for money but accepts donations) and celebrate him for beautifying their streets. He sometimes receives so much more than panhandlers in the area that he will give them some change. (Trendcentral, August 6, 2008)

Secret Lives of Teenagers in Group Magazine

Group surveys youth workers every few months to help know what articles are needed in the magazine.  The top vote-getter by far was youth ministry mistakes.  So Brenda was one of three active youth pastors asked to talk about her mistakes for this issue’s cover story for the July/August 2007 issue. – Group Magazine

 

 

New Book Featuring Brenda Seefeldt of Wild Frontier

Lasting Student Ministry is a new E-Book written by Scott Aughtmon, in which 14 top student ministry leaders reveal what they’d do if they had to start all over again. Brenda was one of the student ministry leaders interviewed. She joins 13 others who are authors, conference speakers, founders of ministries, and youth pastors/student pastors of large groups around the country. The unique format provides lots of practical insight from various youth ministry doers who’s answers don’t always agree with Brenda’s. Click here to read more about Lasting Student Ministry and purchase your copy through our webpage to show your Wild Frontier support. Click here to read more about Lasting Student Ministry

About Wild Frontier

Wild Frontier is a mindset. It is a mindset that there is something more out there than what is normal or what is within human limitations. Only the brave dare to have this mindset. The brave dare to be vulnerable. The brave learn to recognize and expose numbing behaviors so that bravery can now be what defines our lives.  And vulnerability is the beginning of hope. 

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Who is Brenda?

Brenda is a brave one. She stutters yet is a national speaker. She loves teaching so much she’s been a substitute teacher for over 20 years. She’s brave enough to enter any classroom at a middle school. She also simply loves teaching groups, whether they are teens or adults. You could say she was created for this, stuttering and all. She has been in youth ministry for 34 years and has no plans to “grow up” and be a real pastor. She bravely loves teenagers, especially that middle school age. She has served in her church, New Covenant Fellowship of Manassas, Virginia, since 1990 and they will probably bury her there.

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Wild Frontier Videos

Wild Frontier Resources

The most popular resource from Wild Frontier is Moms & Pops Stuff.  This is a monthly newsletter of ideas for parent to pass on their faith to their children.  To see the newest issue, click HERE.  To become a free subscriber, click HERE.  

More Resources HERE

YM Shorts Magazine