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…
One of my favorite things to plan in youth ministry is the youth Christmas Party. It’s a highlight of the year as well as a tremendous community builder. Here’s my ultimate checklist for planing a successful Christmas Party for teenagers. When should I schedule the youth Christmas Party? The earlier the better. My sweet spot…
Failure is never fun but without it you’ll never learn or grow, but how do you keep your failures from drowning you in negativity and self-loathing? Fear of failure is even worse because it may mean you’ll never try or never step outside your comfort zone. You may not want to hear this but Youth…
It breaks my heart that so many young youth pastors who enter youth ministry are not being discipled by their pastors, deacons or mature men or women of the church. Sadly, lead pastors hire youth pastors with an expectation that they have it all together without committing to further developing them spiritually. Are you one…
There are so many National Day of This and Something Something Day of that and it’s time youth ministries started benefitting from it. These are the best days, I think, youth ministries can take advantage of if your youth meetings fall on a Wednesday, like mine but you can always look at the day before…
Welcome to part four of my series on The 5 Plans Every New Youth Pastor Needs. You can read about the first plan I think is important here. Every new youth pastor needs a meeting plan. When I first started planning youth meetings I was pretty gung-ho about evangelism and every meeting I had was…
Welcome to part three of my series 5 Resources Every New Youth Pastor Needs. If you’re new here, welcome! Be sure to subscribe to my newsletter to get updates on new articles, videos and resources. New youth pastor’s needs discipleship plan I knew the word discipleship, but I was so new to youth ministry, I…
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…
When I was a younger youth pastor, I believed sports was the enemy of youth ministry. Sports took athletic students away from my youth meetings, outreaches, retreats, etc. Didn’t those coaches know I needed the numbers!? It’s easy to blame our youth ministry’s sagging momentum and low numbers on sports. Judgement usually followed, “If these…
