“Give a man a fish and you feed him for a day. Teach a man to fish and you feed him for a lifetime…”

A while back, I talked about having a A Long-Term View of Student Ministry and focus on the critical areas of ministry that will lead to long-term life change. In ten years from now, what will the faith of our students look like because of what we (and their parents) do today? So often, it’s easy to get caught up with a short-term view that focuses on todays numbers or todays immediate challenges. Here’s the problem: When we live in the short-term, we often shortcut what students really need. Rather than helping them to become self-feeders, they learn to be spoon fed by what we give them in our ministries.

At the beginning of the new year I want to revisit some specific steps I am taking to help students become self-feeders in their faith walk. If I am honest, in the past, I have been too focused on creating an engaging message that will feed my students spiritually, and fail to realize that I am not helping them learn feed themselves. Are we helping students depend so much on our weekly message, yet they spiritually starve the rest of the week? How are we helping them to grow independently from our ministries?

1) Teach Them Self-Feeding Principles: At least once a year, (January or the start of the school year are good times for our ministry), devote a whole series to personal growth. Teach on Bible study, prayer, quiet times, giving, and serving. Feel free to add to this list, but you get the idea. We just began a series called “The Journey” that uses material from LIVE curriculum, (the series is called “Lifelong Faith” under the curriculum, we just created a different series name).

2) Show Them In Our Teaching Times: In our teaching times, we must ensure that we walk through some of the steps we took to gain understanding to a passage or topic. Students need to see that they could quite easily unpack a passage and find application from it. Too often students will not read the Bible when they think only “smart” people can do it. Walk them through the background to the passage, what it meant to the biblical audience, the theological principle, and application for us today. If you have limited knowledge in how to do this, and want to do some self-study, I recommend Grasping God’s Word by Duvall and Hays.

3) Have Them Lead it: In our small group times, instead of a master teacher telling them what the passage says or what they need to know, it’s important to give the ownership and discussion over to the students. Ask questions about a passage instead of making statements. Have key students lead the questions and have them prepare for the study / small group time beforehand. Support them as they lead and give them feedback afterward. This will take more work than if we do it ourselves, but the long-term results are worth it.

5) Give Resources To Continue Self Feeding: Whether it’s a monthly devotion or Bible study resource we give them to take home, it’s imperative we resource them to read God’s Word and pray at home. We use On Track Devotions and our students love them. They are cheap, but well done. Click here for info. 

6) Have Students Share Their Experiences: Anytime we have students share their testimony, we always ask them how they are growing in their faith and what ways they are self-feeding. It’s so important that students get to hear from their peers and what is working for them.

Well, there are some ways I am trying to help my students become self-feeders. How about you? What are you doing to help your students own their faith in greater ways? What is working for you? What tips could you share?

Phil <><

These were the hard, but truthful, words my wife spoke as she shared her frustrations of being married to an overscheduled youth pastor.

It wasn’t like I didn’t see it coming… Over many months I had blurred the lines of ministry and family. I had created an unhealthy ministry schedule in a church that was exploding with growth. My overscheduled ministry had become the enemy of healthy family time. I knew in my heart there were things I needed to change.

I had been to conferences that told me to create boundaries and to take care of my family. Even though I knew simple changes would make all the difference, I was allowing the complexity of ministry to lead the way for my family. It took a difficult reality and painful words to begin a new direction…

Here’s what I discovered: When I schedule what matters most for my family, we stay healthier and I minister from a healthier perspective. Therefore, it is imperative that I live by some simple, (yet powerful) ways of planning family and ministry. We do this by picking a regular day to make a plan. For us, it’s Monday evenings. We have dinner together and look at our upcoming schedules. During this habitual planning time we are intentional about setting aside family time.

Here’s how we schedule what matters most:

(Continue reading the rest of this article over at youthministry.com by clicking here)

Here are 5 good reasons I am excited for this conference:

1) SYMC is AUTHENTIC: I have been to this conference over the last few years and I always find the people, atmosphere, and speakers to be so real and authentic. At some conferences you can get the idea that certain people have “arrived” as youth ministry “rock stars”.  At this conference, the speakers actually sign an agreement that requires them to be “on the floor” with everyone. No green room, no hiding, no “them and us”. It’s about speakers meeting with “in the trenches” youth workers like you and me…

2) SYMC is JESUS CENTERED: You would hope that would be the case (and it is)! For me, what makes the difference for this conference are the worship times. Rick Lawrence and his team do an incredible job of helping create some wonderful times to reflect, refuel, and focus on Jesus.

3) SYMC is IN DEPTH: SYMC has been intentional about creating environments where youth workers can have greater discussion, greater access to the speakers, and greater focus on specific areas of ministry. This is perhaps best displayed in the tracks and half-tracks they offer. The tracks are two day / 8 hour workshops focused on one area of ministry. While that might seem too much for some people, I prefer this over a smorgasbord of workshops that give me a great deal of information and ideas, yet leave me walking away with very little concrete application… With that said, they also many great stand alone workshops to choose from that have a discussional atmosphere and invite questions that truly apply to our contexts. It’s more of a conversation than a presentation… This, I believe, creates greater depth…

4) SYMC is ABOUT RELATIONSHIPS: From the hundreds of sack chairs all over the place to the seminars being set up with tables for discussion, the whole conference points towards connection and relationships. Again, the speakers are available to talk to and every youth worker can be a part of a “connect group” that focuses in on their stage of ministry, or a particular area they wish to work through. From the previous few years at this conference, I have many good friends in ministry who know me well and connect with me continuously throughout the year. It’s about ongoing relationships…

5) SYMC is INNOVATIVE: The people behind this conference are not content to continue with the norm of what has gone before. The conference in many ways stands for the shift that we are all seeing in youth ministry. As SYMC has developed over the years it has led the shifts and patterns of youth ministry and has led the way in tackling the newest and best ways to reach the next generation of students…

Finally, the conference is sold-out… Enough said!

Phil <><

As some of you know we have a 3 year old (Emma) and a 5 month old (Addie). Unfortunately, as many parents experience, we have had a baby who has had colic and is still waking every few hours, (we never had this with our first… I think the Lord knew what we could handle with our first kid)… In recent months we have tried to sleep and make family and ministry work as best as possible and try to keep our schedules simple and free from ‘extra stuff’ (Blogging is extra stuff for me).

In many ways, student ministry is a huge blessing when it comes being creative with scheduling. I am thankful that I can ‘buy’ time in my schedule and ‘pay back’ time later in the day or week. I am thankful to be able to do this and know that I am still able to give ministry a good account. Most of all, I am thankful that I can still make family and ministry a priority in this sleep deprived season… blogging gets a back seat

One of the things I have been encouraged by (and would like to encourage you with) is this: Sometimes, I hear youth pastors complaining about their schedules and wishing they would be different. But the question I will often ask is, “what job can you do where you get have this kind of flexibility to adjust your schedule when life throws a curve ball at you”? Sure there are a few occupations that allow this, but would you enjoy it? As long as you and I are giving God and our churches / organizations a good account with our time, it is a real blessing to be able to “flex” the schedule when we need to…

I hope to blog some in the next few weeks with a few ideas and thoughts I have… Hope you are having a great week and getting a chance to pause too…

hey. i’m working through some modifications for next fall, and one of the things I’m looking at a lot is publicity & communication with parents and students. I looked at your blog on stuff for parents, but was curious how you publicize stuff to your students. handouts? mailings? facebook? emails? a little of everything? just curious? 

I am sure that there are some much more innovative ways out there, but the following are what work for our ministry right now mainly because they are simple, sustainable and effective. We employ all these ways to promo for events and series kick offs. One way cannot work on it’s own. I find that many ‘hits’ work to get the message out there: 

1) Series Kick Off Postcards (2 weeks before): For our Fall Kick-Off series (and our January kick off), we send out some pretty awesome 5 x 7 postcards to every student on our mailing list, (we are very intentional in getting all their info). The postcards have been designed in one of two ways: First, I have a friend who is a graphic designer and he currently designs our stuff for free, (awesome I know). Second, some of the curriculum’s out there (like SYM and XP3) offer postcards and graphics you can customize yourself. However, I prefer to make it our own. This postcard, ‘Mission Impossible’ started out life as ‘Impossible for God’ from Simply Youth Ministry.

2) Facebook Group /Event Invite (10 days before): Probably the most effective current way to invite students to events and kick offs. We promo our facebook group quite a bit, but we also have many of our students who forward the invite to their friends. 

3) Text Messages (1 week and then again 1 day before): We have many of our students (and parents) signed up for this. I currently used Simply Youth Ministry’s text service (which is basically txtsignal.com). I love using this and I find that many students will text me back with questions, so it become quite interactive… 

4) Emails (10 days before): Again, we are very intentional about getting emails and contact info. Although email is an ‘old mode’ of communication for students, I find that a number of them still use email quite a bit. They might not check it regularly, so get the info out well in advance. 

5) Blog and Video Announcements (updated two weeks before): Rather than having a traditional website for our student ministry, we have a wordpress blog that we can update and change quickly and easily. It also allows us to upload video announcements which create much more interest than usual. I use my flip camera for quick updates, and I have a great leader who is awesome and creating good ‘trailers’

That’s what we do. Like I said… simple, sustainable and effective. If you have some good ideas, I would love to hear them. Feel free to leave a comment. 

Phil <><

Why is that so difficult for some of us?  Let’s be honest, if you are like me,  it’s very easy to come up with reasons for not making use of volunteers in this way…

First, it’s easy to conclude that their volunteer status equals poor messages… Not true. 

Second, it could mean that we have to plan far in advance… Not easy for some of us!

Third, after we have met with the leader and walked them through the message,  we could have written it ourselves in less time… This is true, but would it be more effective? 

All seem like compelling reasons?  However, here’s why it is imperative to to invest, equip, and empower our volunteers to give messages: 

1) They are Different: As hard as this is to admit, students in our ministries will tune us out week after week. No matter how dynamic we are,  kids will naturally tune us out.  I have a British accent and my youth ministry friends say I could talk about anything and it would be interesting… I wish!  I tell them, yes, the new kids love it… (if they can understand me at first), but give them a few months and it’s old!  Our leaders are a different face, have a different style, and different ways of thinking through things… Your students have different learning styles and different ways to think through things too… We cannot cover the whole ‘bandwidth’ of students personalities and learning styles on our own. 

2) Planning Pays Off Volunteers will present poorly if we give them short notice… When we plan ahead in a series, we can give leaders 4-6 weeks to think and work on a message.  Leaders perform better when they have time to pray and think through their message. If we are not planning this far ahead, we are not helping our leaders succeed. 

3) Investment  Pays Off. Recently two leaders gave messages for me and I have invested hours of time into both of them. They both have good communication skills and a strong faith and these most recent messages were the best I have seen them give. We would all agree that their first messages were shaky and not as concise as they could be, (do you remember your first message?) Investment pays off as we take time to encourage, tweak and improve their skills. 

4) Get the Night off and Lead: When a leader gives the message for me and I am able to take the night off from speaking, I am able to lead better. I can step back and assess the program from a different vantage point and see tweaks we need to make that I would not normally see.  Finally, I can invest more relational time with leaders and students. It’s great for students and leaders to see us laughing and being a part of the group in a different way…

Is it time to step aside and let leaders speak? 

Phil <><

So, how do you and I allow people at our churches to have a better perspective of our ministry and ultimately each of us as individuals? How do we ‘allow’ people to be more gracious with us, more than they were with the previous youth worker? It helps to be building a youth ministry fan base (See previous post, ‘How to Build a Youth Ministry Fan Base’)

First, I want to be clear that our goal should not to focus on trying to manipulate or become everyone ‘fake best friend’. What I am talking about is realizing that there are some healthy things we can do to supplement what we are trying to implement. Implementing our ideas without the supplement of ‘fan base building’ will become a detriment. 

Here’s some further ideas: 

1) Serve People in your Church. An effective way to build bridges and promote your wonderful students in your ministry is to be intentional about planning some service type events that bless people in your church. We try to do ‘Serve Team’ projects once a month which are aimed at blessing our community by showing God’s love in practical ways. At the same time, we try to find a few people in our church we can help or visit during that event. You will be surprized at how much the youth ministry will be promoted positively by those people inside and outside your church. Example: Before Christmas, we took our middle school kids Christmas carolling. We were inentional about going to some families at our church who needed the ‘blessing’ of middle school kids singing to them. I heard a lot of favorable comments from a number of people. 

2) Look out for your Pastor. As youthworkers it is imperative that we ‘lead up’ by always having the back of our lead pastor and other ministry staff. When we are team players who cover our team and supports them, we will see the same support extended to us. Note: I have seen and been apart of teams where everyone is for themselves. It’s tempting to fall into the mold too… In these cases you will build trust with insecure team members and you might just change the environment. Whether or not we do see fruit from this… We must do it since it is the best and right thing to do.

3) Do jobs Outside of your Job Description from time to time. Again, so many larger churches, (and smaller ones too) can easily live in silos where we only care for our own area. I am learning that building a fan base, (as well as good friends in ministry), happens when I agree to do jobs or tasks that are outside of job description from time to time. Things like, helping out the kids ministry with a message, or helping to update the website for your church, or preaching once in a while to give your pastor a week off (I currently preach every 6-8 weeks). Or even things like ‘talking up’ other ministries and helping them recruit volunteers. Note: Be careful not to become the doormat who gets asked to do EVERYTHING, but, make sure you don’t live in a silo either!

Finally, and most importantly, be a God pleaser above all else…

Building a youth ministry fan base is important, but it can go very wrong if we do not start with pleasing God first. We might become people pleasers who stretch ourselves too far by being the doormat of church ministry. Make sure that you are sensible with your time and bridge building. 

Any other ideas for building a youth ministry fan base?

The Big Question: How can I recruit and develop great leaders? 

Of course,it should be a given that it’s about God’s power and providence. There are also many answers to this one question, but I believe and have seen that there is one crucial element and answer that will make the difference between great leaders and average or bad leaders…. Are you ready for it? 

It begins with who you are!

It stands to reason that it’s not a good idea to buy hair products from someone with no hair. It stands to reason that you should not go to a dentist whose has teeth like Austin Powers. It should stand to reason that your leaders and partners in ministry will not partner with you if you are not the real deal. Or, if they do work with, they are likely never to live up to their full potential if you are not living up to it yourself… Here’s how it works: 

If I want my leaders to do the little but hugely important things like phone the kids, or send a postcard in the mail, or take a student out for coffee… it’s important that I take time to call or write… If  I want my leaders to be growing in their faith and always have something to encourage and share with kids, it will depend on how I am doing  in my faithwalk. If I want my leaders to stay cool in high pressure situations, over time it will depend on how I do the same. If I want my leaders to become good listeners for the students, it will depend on how I do the same for them. Bottom line: I can’t expect my leaders to do what I am not doing… My words and training mean little if I am leading by example.  

I meet a lot of frustrated leaders who need volunteers or have volunteers and are frustrated with them. We have to remember that we are all works in progress, and no one changes over night, but over time, our leaders will lead in the way it is modeled for them. It’s painful to admit, but if we can take an honest look at ourselves and allow God to change us, we will have a greater impact when we do the very things that we would like our leaders to do. More people will volunteer and their effectiveness will be greater… so will yours, (and mine). 

You see it’s the idea that leaders will learn leadership better when it is modelled for them. It’s the whole idea that Paul speaks of in 1 Thessalonians chapter 1: 

You know how we lived among you for your sake. You became imitators of us and of the Lord; in spite of severe suffering, you welcomed the message with the joy given by the Holy Spirit. And so you became a model to all the believers in Macedonia and Achaia. The Lord’s message rang out from you not only in Macedonia and Achaia—your faith in God has become known everywhere.

It’s the whole idea that our leaders, our partners in ministry and our student leaders will become (over time and not instantly), what is modelled for them. 

So, what kind of imitators are your leaders becoming? Today, take a look at some areas of your leadership and consider what small and important things you can do to model great leadership. What are some of the things you can care well for your leaders so that they care well for the kids you see every week. What phone calls do you need to make? Who needs a note in the mail? What truth does God want to impress on your heart that you can inspire your leaders with?

What is God saying to you today about who He wants you to become? How will that impact your leaders? How will impact God’s Kingdom?

Phil <><