I am, currently, a bi-vocational youth worker. I have held this title before so I am well versed in it’s demands. For me it boils down to keeping these two elements in line, balance and boundaries. Balance Have you ever tried to balance a see-saw? You have to have the right amount of weight on…
It’s the beginning of the year and, if you’re like me, you’re looking for new books to read. These are books I have already read, wrote, or are on my reading list for 2023. I have divided this list into three sections Ministry Nuts and Bolts, Soul Care and Other Non-Fiction. Ministry Nuts and Bolts…
Three Pillars of Youth Ministry This past year, I felt like I was all over the map as far as programming, teaching and planning, then I had a talk with my pastor. I wanted to find out what his thoughts were about narrowing down the focus of the youth ministry to three pillars. These three…
Welcome to part two of my series The Five Plans Every New Youth Pastor Needs To Have. You can start at the first post here, If you like. I started youth ministry by just reading my bible, praying about it and then teaching on what God showed me. There’s nothing wrong with that, it was…
There are weeks where I struggled with pre-youth group anxiety. I was anxious with questions like would the service go well? was I prepared? was the sermon good enough? would the students like the game? These questions were all part of my need to make sure things were perfect. Why? Why did I need to…
I know getting students signed up for anything is a chore, but is there anything you can do about it? Start with why Why does this event exist? Why did it make it on to your calendar? It’s much easier to get students signed up if you know, and they know, why an event exists.…
Youth Ministry chaos is a lot of fun when it’s game time or even hangout time, but chaos is not fun when applied to organizing your youth ministry. There are two extremes in youth ministry calendars. One looks like this, This is calendar is too busy and busy is not better. Busy means you may…
I am going to guess that you have not reached point where you do not care about expectation. You do not have the clout or the cash to say, “I don’t care what you think”. Which means you’re middle management. You care about what the people above you think, what the people below you think…
I recently watched a podcast episode about the value of reviewing your goals and I thought I’d pass them along to you. Principles of Review The unexamined life is not worth living – Socrates I would put it this way, “the unexamined youth ministry isn’t worth building”. Not reviewing your goals, events or programs means…
Hustle. In means to move faster and work harder than everyone.People of faith might be the worst at hustling. I can testify to that. I thought that because I prayed and read my Bible, God was going to do all the heavy lifting and like Pedro promised in Napoleon Dynamite, “all your dreams will come…
