Katoomba's premier Christian convention for teenagers is using its Saturday night slot as an opportunity to promote the importance of prayer.
KYCK (formerly Kyckstart), which has been attended by over 4000 teenagers and youth leaders across the last two weekends, has run a 40 minute prayer session following the Saturday evening evangelistic talk.
KYCK chairman, L-T Hopper says the night aims to provide a more "edifying' time for Christian teenagers.
"It flows from the broader approach to KYCK and youth ministry in which we are trying to make every session of the weekend edifying for teenagers," he says.
"I have an expectation that young Christians pray, want to pray and can grow in understanding in their prayer life " so why not help them do that?"
The Saturday night post-talk session has changed from previous years which have included events from sumo wrestling to Christian short film screenings to youth group interviews.
Mr Hopper believes previous Saturday night events have verged on overshadowing the purpose of KYCK.
"Rather than have a stand-out, professional Saturday night session that everyone looks forward to as though it's the best thing out of the whole weekend, where it's just fun and has no edification " this is a movement away from that," he says.
"[The prayer session] shows we can have a great time together for the whole weekend while doing things that are really edifying."
Teenagers split into pairs within their youth groups, then joined up with two pairs from other youth groups and a youth leader.
Using prayer points on the big screen, the teenagers prayed prayers of praise to God and prayed for mission work and for other youth groups.
"By praying in mixed groups kids also got to know young people from other youth groups and continued to get to know each other during supper afterwards," Mr Hopper says.
St Paul's, Kogarah youth leader, David Ould says the prayer night was the best way to model prayer to the non-Christian people who were present.
"Some of our guys are "pre-pre-Christian' so I could not think of a less threatening way that the prayer time could have been done for them," he says.
St George North youth leader, the Rev David Mears says the prayer time was an effective way for the teenagers to bond.
" I think some of the kids were a bit taken aback at first in meeting new people like this, but in the group I was in the young people related well and there was a good feel," he says.
However other youth leaders are questioning the new development.
A youth group leader who has attended the last five KYCK conventions and asked to remain anonymous says he didn't find the prayer time appropriate for his youth group members.
"Given that half our youth group at KYCK are non-Christian, this event succeeded in making them feel completely uncomfortable with a bunch of strangers," he says.
"I think about three or four years ago, the Kyckstart organisers had the right idea. But I feel the past two years have seen them struggling to come up with anything appropriate."
For those who miss the previous forms of Saturday night events, Mr Hopper believes youth groups can make those opportunities for themselves.
"I expect those fun, extracurricular activities will still happen over the weekend within individual youth groups as they do things like bushwalks in the mountains and the youth group games," he says.
"Meanwhile, KYCK will pour its resources into things that are particularly edifying."
