My parents were watching TV in the living room when they heard banging from the back of the house. My dad went around the corner to check on the noise and found April, a girl from our church group whom my parents hadn’t met before, halfway through the doggy door, reaching up to unlock the latch. She heard him stop and jerked her water gun toward him before realizing it wasn’t my younger brother.

“Oh. Hi. Is Tyler here?”

Our church group plays big games, and the students love it. My wife, Camille, her sister Candace, and I have been leading the college ministry at Irving Bible Church for about six years, and some of these games have grown wonderfully out of our control. We often borrow from existing material, work with a tight budget, and endure a lot of planning; but they have been so much fun. The following describes some of our best. I want to share how we pulled these off and what we learned.

Assassins
Essentially, we just encouraged students to shoot each other with water guns, but this became much more intense than we had planned. We advertised two weeks before the event and required students to sign up in order to participate. A week before the launch, I wrote a mysterious email to all the participants, asking them to give me some basic information. One late night at the church, I brought everyone into our normal meeting room and explained all the rules. They began the contest with one target inside of an envelope stamped confidential. It included a mug shot of a student and a hint for finding him.

Sean, now an IT specialist, used his technology prowess and a ridiculous zeal for the game to earn the win. He managed to sneak a tracking device onto another student’s car and follow him around town using a blip on his phone’s map feature. He was similarly over the top with a lot of his kills. Sean won…by a lot.
For the most part, the students made this great by themselves, but we did a few things to help. For starters, the cloak-and-dagger feel of the emails and the weeks of secret buildup got everyone excited about this mysterious activity. No one knew what would happen until everyone came to the launch meeting, and I sent obscure “man down” texts when I heard news of a successful soaking. At the closing ceremony, we handed out awards and shared great stories. Sean won “Most Ridiculous Kill” for the tracking device. We learned to let the theme be big and add to the intrigue. Playing out a scenario and having no Pause button added to the excitement.

Lifesize ‘Clue’
This game was much easier to set up. Using Word, I created square cards by drawing text boxes, and we printed on cardstock. We wrote the names of the first nine participants on the cards. More people could play, but the nine were the only potential suspects. We labeled the possible locations using the rooms in our house.
The best part was the murder weapons. I asked a few students to tell me the stupidest cause of death they could imagine. Some potential weapons included a bus driven by the Incredible Hulk, a boring lecture and our dog’s gas.

This is a fun concept, but it has the potential to drag on too long. To avoid the loss of interest, we created teams. This helped the game a ton. It was not only the usual game experience, but partners got to scheme together, which cut the time in half between turns. Also, don’t do this using your entire church space. If one team is forever in the gym and another in the office area, no one will hear each other’s accusations and the game really never will end. Working on a table top doesn’t exactly translate to real life. When you do a big game, walk through the logistics before you unleash it.

Human Foosball
A few summers ago, our entire group offered bimonthly babysitting for the families in our church with young kids. Every time we did this, we tried to offer some new things for the kids to do. We had plenty of balls, hula hoops and floor mats hidden behind collapsible partitions on wheels; we used all of them exhaustively. After a month, someone looked at those movable walls and thought of human foosball. Easily rolling the walls into place, we constructed an 8-foot high arena that could only be entered through the goal openings on each end. We put painters tape on the floor, making squares where players would be stuck in place. Then we threw a big red ball in the middle.

The kids loved it. We filled the empty spots with a rotation of our college students and made sure to pass to the kids often. Later that evening, after the last parents dragged their kids away, I walked back to the arena to tell everyone they were free to go. All of our college students were feverishly kicking the ball and screaming for the open pass. They hadn’t noticed all the children were gone.

Use what’s around you. Try to imagine how the church’s durable furniture and resources can be repurposed for big games, and don’t shoot down a crazy idea before you think it through completely. In fact, keep some crazy-idea people around. Also, look for opportunities to stretch your group and yourself. Service might become your conduit for inventing big games.

Conclusion
We also have done murder mystery dinners, a battle of the sexes challenge, human “Pac-Man” and “Cranium,” Capture the Flag, and recreated “The Price Is Right” and “Family Feud.” These games succeeded because they shared similar principles. Let the students help. When they can add to the humor (“Clue”) or come up with the idea (Foosball), it will be more meaningful for them. Each game allowed for teamwork, which gets students fired up when they can scheme and celebrate together. I also mentioned precise planning. I used to be a camp counselor and the games director for a children’s ministry, so I have had a lot of practice conceptualizing these things. Whenever I do this, after getting the basic concept, I imagine myself participating. I roll the dice in my head, move to the first spot and then ask, “What happens now?” I write that step down and go to the next thing. It sounds simple, but it really works for me. Most important, as leaders, we went into each game more excited than the students. This is infectious when it is genuine. Do these things the next time you have a fun event for your students. They will love you for it.

Matt Holland has studied English at the University of Texas, Dallas, and theology at Dallas Theological Seminary. He also has written for Relevant.com, FaithVillage.com and Chatter magazine.