I?m in no way a youth ministry ?guru? or veteran by any means. I?ve only been in full-time Youth Ministry for 5 years, but there is one piece of advice I?d like to offer for Youth Workers all over the world. STICK IT OUT! In my short time up here in Anchorage AK I?ve seen youth workers from come and go followed quickly by the mass exodus students that they were over! It breaks my heart to see a student connect with a guy or gal and get involved in church then within a couple of months the Youth Leaders up and leaves. The students often feel cheated out of a relationship and get a bad taste in their mouth about ?church?.
In my 5 years I?ve wanted to leave my job multiple times but after much thought and consideration I would find that my reasoning for wanting to leave was selfish. Going into my fifth season at this church I feel like I am just now hitting my stride with building relationships with the students and parents of our Church.
Now I understand that there are reasons to leave a church but all I?m asking is that you examine your reasoning before leaving your students in the dust. Often we just need to stick it out and work through our own issues!
Darryl Nelson is the Jr High Youth Pastor at Anchorage Baptist Temple in Anchorage, AK. He blogs and Twitters, like any good youth pastor should. Check him out!
- After spending the better part of 3 days with middle school youth workers at SYMC, I am (once again) convinced that many of the sharpest minds in youth ministry are found in middle school ministry!
- At a conference like SYMC (or YS or any other large gathering of youth workers) you meet lots and lots of people. It’s always such a great reminder to me that God uses an amazingly vast array of people to pour into students. I’m so thankful that the stereotypical youth worker (young, cool, plays guitar, surfs, rides skateboards, has a tattoo….) is no longer the “norm”.
- We are starting a 3-week series this weekend called “STUFF”. We are using household stuff as object lessons to teach a biblical truth. It’s a series we have done once before with great success. This week’s lesson: Take Out The Trash!
- Quite a few people tracked me down at the conference to ask me about regional campuses (basically church plants that are still part of the mother ship). Questions about how we structure etc. My simple answer: “Treat them like a franchise with freedom” They are a franchise in that there are certainly some things that they have to do in line with the main campus because they are the same church. But there shouldn’t be an overly large amount of control…they need freedom to tweak the ministry to their context.
- Dear Denver Broncos, Please get rid of Brandon Marshall.
- Dear senate and house leadership, Please either sign [...]
We are always trying to think up new games to use in our ministry. NBC has done a great thing for youth pastors! The new game show Minute to Win It (premiering this Sunday March 14, 2010) has between 60 and 70 doable games that can be used as youth ministry crowd breakers.
Check out the site Minute to Win It and look at the ?Game Vault.? There are videos to show you how to play each game and written directions that you can copy and paste in a document, and a list of items required. This is a gold mine of game ideas! Here’s an example of one of their videos:
Just posted a new article on CollegeLeader called, “God and Majors.” It’s some very interesting findings about how religious students compare with non-religious students at college. Thought you might be interested…
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