College Buddies, A Reprise

Four guys, four days, one conference.
By Shawn Duncan

Most conferences are about learning. Learning how to think more critically about our finances, jobs, marriages, etc. Learning how to overcome fears, failures, and setbacks. Learning how to be more efficient, more faithful, or more successful. At a recent conference I learned something different: Men Never Grow Up; They Just Learn How to Act Civilized Around Their Wives.

No, this was not the theme of the week or the topic of one of the sessions. When I went to the National Conference on Youth Ministries in Colorado Springs in January, I flew solo. My wife and son stayed in Atlanta. Maybe it was luck, maybe it was providence, but three of my buddies from college also arrived without their wives. The moment we greeted each other, our collective meter of maturity took a nose dive, and pretty much stayed that way for the next couple of days.

Once again we were out at Denny’s at 1 a.m., eating pie and laughing ourselves sick. Once again we were ordering pizza and watching football. Once again we were borrowing room service trays to go sledding on the beautiful snow of Colorado. (Okay, I admit, that is a new one.) But our fortuitous man-gathering was not just about regressing to our former selves. Denny’s, Papa John’s, and that snowy hill turned out to be the perfect forums for sharing life—the good, the confusing, the funny, the sad, and the indefinable. Leadership can be lonely, and what I needed most wasn’t more advice, more resources, more motivation. I needed lunch with JT. I needed time with friends to connect personally, honestly.

I have been to NCYM four times. One of the emphases of the conference each year is the Covenant Groups. When you register you are offered the opportunity to join one, start one, or just continue one from the year before. Participation is not required, but at 10 p.m. all other activities cease and all are encouraged to gather in small groups to enrich, encourage, and bless each other’s lives.

I could take half the day describing the powerful effect of the worship, the keynotes, the early morning Bible studies, the conference sessions. But what struck me most in this last conference was the realization that we all have a powerful need to not just learn, but to learn together.

Most conferences are about learning. But this one offered so much more. Four days at a conference in Colorado with my college buddies turned out to be not just fun but profound. Who would have thought?

Shawn Duncan is the Youth Minister at Northlake Church in Tucker, Georgia. He has worked with teenagers for seven years.