Why Are We Here?

Kicking off a new Sunday School class with that title this Sunday.  I’m excited about it for a few reasons:

• It’s on a topic that I’ve loved exploring and learning about for myself: the 5 Purposes.  No, I’ve never read Purpose Driven Life, or Purpose Driven Chruch for that matter, but Purpose Driven Youth Ministry is a constant resource for me, and it’s driven me to explore the idea of 5 Biblical Purposes further.  I can’t say I agree with everything that’s been said about them (mostly becuse I haven’t read all of it…) but I do feel like they give a great framework for addressing how a Christ-centered life and minisitry should be lived out.
• It’s dripping with vision, which always gets me excited.  I’m pumped to have a chance to challenge our students to think hard about why our youth ministry exists, and hopeful that it will change the way that they think about it.  As a part of the class, I want to give the students a chance to think critically about the ministry and talk about how we could be living out the purposes better.  Can’t wait to see what they come up with!
• It’s been well thought-out and planned.  I took the time to write out what my goals for the class are, and what I want each class to look like.  Since it’s heavy on discussion, there isn’t a lot of prep that I need to do each week, but I’ve put a lot of time into thinking about what I want this class to look like.  I want to be totally dependant on God and his Spirit to do the real work of heart change and understanding each week, but I also beleive that I can be a better part of that work by being well-prepared, and I think I am!

The class runs for the whole month of August, and leads us back into the school year with (hopefully!) a new excitement for our ministry.  I’m also hoping it will assist me with one of my other goals for this month: launching a (small and simple) student leadership component of our ministry.  More on that later…

Drenching Youth Ministry In Truth

Just had this blog post passed along to me - it’s titled “5 Foundations of a Truth-drenched Youth Ministry”.  Abraham Piper shares his notes from a talk by Kempton Turner at the Children Desiring God conference.  This point really stuck out to me:

2. Have a truth-drenched marriage and family life.

1 Timothy 3:4-5

He must manage his own household well, with all dignity keeping his children submissive, for if someone does not know how to manage his own household, how will he care for God’s church?

We shouldn’t see if someone is fit for the ministry by how they do in seemingly less important ministries. Rather, we should see what kind of husband and father he is. If he leads his family well, then maybe he’s fit for the ministry.

Paul assumes that a church leader first leads his family. A truth-drenched youth ministry will get the overflow of the youth minister’s leadership of his wife and kids.

I feel like I’m so often tempted to shortchange my family for the sake of youth ministry – Paul paints a much different picture of what a ministry life should look like!

Scavenger Hunt Recap

Sorry for the lack of updates.  I’ve found the month of April to be the busiest time for me, ministry-wise…even more than the start of the school year!  And, most of my spare time in March was taken up with planning Operation: Colonial Chaos, which went down on March 27th.

I’m pleased (and relieved!) to say that it was a big success.  Friends were invited, fun was had, and students walked away talking about what a great time they’d had a a church activity, which is a big goal of any outreach event.  We also had a lot of volunteer involvement: 15 adults helped out in one way or another, which is huge for us!  Many of those adults are not regular volunteers for us, but I’m hoping that their experience might lead them to being involved more in the future.

Part of what I want to be able to do with this blog is share ideas and resources with other youth ministers – we all need all the help we can get, am I right?  So, with that in mind, I’m planning on making many of the resources we used for this event available here so that you can pull off something similar with your group if you want.  I’ll try to get everything together in the next week or so – I’ve probably got nearly one hundred different pages of notes, lists, props, scripts, and all sorts of other things, so I’ll take a little time to pare it down to the bare necessities.  Hopefully that will help me out if I try to do this again next year, which is a real possibility!

I’ll also try to be posting more regularly now that things are slowing down a bit – check back soon!

Are You a Missionary?

In and not of.  Those four words can often create quite a bit of controversy in ministry-circles.  What does it look like for me to be in this world, but not of it?  And, as a youth minister, how does the “in not of” relationship affect my understanding of youth culture?

I’ve recently started listening to The Source for Youth Ministry Podcast, and the latest episode had some insightful thoughts on the topic.  Guest-host Walt Mueller (president of The Center for Parent Youth Understanding), speaking on the “Seven Sins of Engaging Youth Culture” had this to say:

We need to see ourselves as cross cultural missionaries. So, a BIG SIN is when youth workers fail to see themselves as cross cultural missionaries. We don’t just have to know the Word, we have to know the world, changing kids and their changing world. So, youth workers have to be about the business of knowing what those kids are swimming in everyday.

Walt continued the missionary analogy as he reminded listeners that it’s not unusual for missionaries preparing for a trip to spend months studying up on the culture they’ll be immersed in – the good and the bad!  Contrast that approach with many Christians in America who see large parts of our culture (especially youth culture!) as something to hide from, not try to understand.

While I’ve always been much more in favor of engaging and trying to transform our culture rather than run from it, Walt’s message convicted me that I could be doing a much better job of trying to understand what my “kids are swimming in everyday.”  Fortunately, he also gave some good suggestions on doing that, starting with asking lots of questions about what’s hot and what’s not with students today.  I tried it out last night with the guys in my small group, and quickly discovered that I was WAY behind the curve on music!  I didn’t recognize either of the songs or even artists they mentioned as the top couple of tunes right now!

I think I’ll be hitting up Walt’s website pretty often…

Scavenger Hunt

I’m the in the process of planning a pretty major outreach event that I’m really excited about.  For the last two years, we’ve done a photo scavenger hunt around town, and it’s always been a good time.  This year, rather than just repeat the same thing (I thought it’d be tough to think of new tasks!) I wanted to do something bigger…

My plan is to create a game where teams are driven across town by staff (adults) and collect information and clues to piece together a plot, and then have to take action to stop the bad guys from succeeding in their evil scheme.  I’ve paricipated in games similar to this before, and they were always a lot of fun – though pretty complicated.

In order to pull it off, I’m reaching outside my usual volunteer team.  I’m a part of a home group with quite a few 20- and 30-somethings that I emailed for help, and a bunch of them are up for it.  Tonight I met with a few of them over dinner to brainstorm some details, and it made me even more excited for what we might be able to pull off.  I’m also excited to be able to expose some other folks in our church to our youth ministry, and to have our students exposed to some of the other adults in the church…maybe I’ll even get a few more volunteers out of it!

My goal is to get the students pumped about it, enough that they’ll reach out to their friends to be a part of it, too.  Any friends that they bring will automatically be on their team.  I’m going to work on a promo video in the next couple of weeks to pique interest, and I’m trying to talk it up around my regulars.  The tricky part is to tell them enough to give them an idea about how awesome it’s going to be, without giving way too much.

Ever done anything like this in your youth ministry?

Wise Wants

I recently started reading Get Outta My Face!: How to Reach Angry, Unmotivated Teens with Biblical Counsel by Rick Horne.  I wouldn’t describe any of the teens in my group and regularly angry or unmotivated, but those emotions still come up pretty frequently, so I thought this book would be helpful.

Anyway, the chapter I read today was on wise wants, which Horne describes as the “underlying set of wants within every young person that is part of their human nature as a creature made in the image of God.”  Solomon understood the idea of these wants well – Proverbs is full of descriptions of correct behavior that will lead to a favorable outcome.  He assumes his readers (young men!) would want to live the kind of life he describes as being produced by correct behavior.  Jesus also understands this, and frequently asks the question “What do you want?” in an effort to uncover those underlying wants.

Horne’s point is that, in order to really connect with a hurting teen, we need to connect their wise wants.  He summarizes the chapter like this:

Our deep desire is to see our teens change because of love for Christ.  However, the counsel that leads a disinterested or angry teen toward godly motives and choices usually cannot begin at a deep, heart level.  In time, the connections we have with our teens may let us talk about these things.  But often our conversation cannot start there.  If you begin your conversation by reviewing their wise wants, that will probably do more than just get their attention.  It will likely give both of you the ability to talk respectfully to one another and actually be heard.

While he’s talking specifically about angry, disinterested teens, I think this point holds true for interactions with every teen.  If we want to see real heart change motivated by the Gospel, we need to start at the surface level and work deeper over time.  We need to earn the right to be heard through caring for them and coming to understand their needs and wants.

I need to be better about meeting and understanding students where they are before I begin throwing holy hand grenades of Spiritual Truth at them!

Prayer Struggles

One of the struggles I bump into most often in my youth ministry is encouraging teens to engage in prayer times that go beyond the typical “Please help me do well on my test”-style prayer and share times.  Obviously God wants us to bring all areas of our life before Him, but I think prayers for school work, sports games, and other routine areas of life are often a symptom of not recognizing where we really need Jesus in our life, or being afraid to open up about that need in front of others.  I don’t have any real answers, but here are a few of my thoughts:

• Teens really need to see a healthy prayer life modeled in the adults their closest to, and parents and youth leaders top that list.  Am I being forthcoming enough about my own need for Jesus, and are my prayer requests reflecting that need?
• There’s often a disconnect between prayer time and lesson time.  I need to be better about naturally bridging the application section of a lesson into a prayer time, and encouraging the students to pray about what they just learned.
• I’m convinced that everyone has always got something going on in their life that should be brought to God in prayer, and shared with friends who can support you and hold you accountable if needed.
• I’m also convinced that bringing whatever that is out into the open doesn’t come naturally to anyone – we all need to be pushed into being vulnerable, and need to feel comfortable in the context where we’re asked to share (small groups, mostly).  Small groups need to be a safe place for students to be vulnerable, and that’s hard to accomplish.  Especially for guys – we are too good at picking out each other’s weaknesses and exploiting them for humor or our own benefit!
• Because we’ve all got something we ought to be praying about, I don’t like to let students take a “pass” when it’s their turn to share (assuming they’re not new to the group!).  Because of that…
• I’m always walking the fine line between strongly encouraging students to dig deep in their requests and making them feel like they must have some sort of insightful, thoughtful prayer request each week.  I try to challenge students who seem to be copping out of putting thought into their requests, but don’t want to pressure someone too much.
• Developing a community of students who really feel comfortable sharing about the tough stuff in their lives with me and their peers will take time.  It’s a marathon, not a sprint.  I constantly have to remind myself of this when I have a frustrating small group prayer time.  I also need to be praying for God to work through His Spirit to accomplish this work in my ministry – I can’t change hearts!

That last tought is probably the most important one to keep in mind – at least for me.  I’m far too aware of what prayer time in our small groups should be, and not aware enough that the work of the Holy Spirit doesn’t always go as fast as I’d like it to.

How’s the prayer time in your youth ministry?

My Youth Ministry

There are a lot of websites on the internet that provide helpful advice, resources, and reflections on youth ministry.  Most are written by men and women who have been involved with ministering to teenagers for some time, and their advice is derived from both their successes and their failures.

This is a blog about my successes and failures in youth ministry.