Last week I took a call from a youth pastor in the greater Portland area who, for lack of a better word, was very frustrated with his church’s decision to cut one of his fellow youth pastors from a full-time position to a quarter-time position.  Although frustrated this particular youth worker accepted the reason for the staff cut - economic challenges.

A second youth worker emailed me and told me that her youth budget was cut in half for her summer ministry and said that in the 14 years she as been a full-time youth worker she’s never had a more paired back summer programming schedule. A youth worker here in the greater Kansas City area emailed me to see if I knew of any good fundraisers that didn’t require a ton of time.  Not because this youth worker didn’t want to make and take the time - he just can’t take the time… he’s recently had to get a second job in order to offset the fact that his wife lost her job.

I’ve found a new hobby.  I have found absolute delight in digging up older books on youth ministry - books from the 70’s and 80’s.  Much of what I find I purchase for a couple of bucks from some obscure website and they’re usually shipped from places in the world I can only wish I might one day visit.

Most recently I came across a book by Stephen Jones called, Faith Shaping: Youth and the Experience of Faith (Judson Press, 1987).  Some of you may remember it when it came out.  Me?  Nope.  I was a freshman in high school at the time it was released.

Faith Shaping is full of little nuggets that are not only relevant for today but are required for people who work with today’s youth.  Probably the most helpful morsel of the book for me was chapter 9 on culture shaping.  In this chapter, Jones reminds his readers “We will not do justice to adolescents unless we help them consider the shape of their emerging faith in relation to their culture.” (P.89)

So, what exactly is the task of culture shaping?  I mean, I have some ideas but I’d rather hear from those of you wrestling with similar observances and experiments.  How can we move away from our tendencies to manufacture and manipulate?  What are the essential aspects of culture shaping?  Is it even possible to really allow students to shape their culture or do they need some kind of adult influence to assure that it gets done?   Are we (or more specifically, am I) crazy to think that youth workers should rely more on students to shape the emerging culture and less on our own assumptions, preferences and opinions?

When I first began in youth ministry (almost 15 years ago) “peer-to-peer” ministry was the buzzword.  The purpose of peer-to-peer ministry was to influence students in order that they might influence their friends. It wasn’t an altogether inherently bad idea.  After all, isn’t this what Jesus did with his disciples?  Didn’t Jesus find influencers and allow them to do the influencing? Actually, no, this isn’t what Jesus did.  Jesus called mere fisherman, ordinary people to follow him.  He was present with them incarnating himself for the mission of God.  Yes, certainly to influence others but not solely limited to influence.  Jesus called his disciples to shape the culture and move it toward becoming a Kingdom culture.

Most often youth workers who talked about and built “peer to peer” ministry models functioned with the idea that to influence students meant we had to create consumers who bought what we were selling and who conformed to the culture that we created.  The mistake in this concept wasn’t the motive to influence or even the call to conform to a culture (that was often mere words and abstractions).  The biggest mistake was seeing students as the tool or the agenda and not seeing them as “persons-in-culture” (P.90) who were “not only recipients of culture but also shapers of it.”  We trusted students enough to bring their friends to our Friday night outreach events but we didn’t (generally speaking, of course) trust them enough to allow them to shape the culture through their communal and personal faith — a faith that “offers the criteria against which to evaluate one’s participation in culture and the courage, when necessary, to be countercultural.” (P. 90) We called students to live counter culturally, but we didn’t trust the students we were supposedly influencing to really shape the culture so we tended to manufacture and manipulate.

I don’t really hear the phrase “peer to peer” much anymore.  I don’t think it is because we’ve stopped doing youth ministry in that fashion.  Nor do I think it is because we’ve stumbled upon another, better model either.  Honestly, I think for many it was one of those things that either “sounded cool at the time” or just never really “worked” so we’ve abandoned the language.  Most youth ministries still operate under the mindset that if I can just influence the right student(s) I can use them to share the message of Jesus with their friends.  This doesn’t shape the culture it simply and most often temporarily keeps a few of our students interested and engaged.

The trend we commonly understand as ‘youth leaving the church’ isn’t primarily about the churches tendency toward abandonment, a rise in the influence of media or the Internet or the inability to reach a post-literate generation through traditional methods.  Rather, it is primarily an issue of doubt and distrust. 

We (youth workers) have not believed in and trusted the Holy Spirit’s ministry and movements enough among youth to allow youth to be the shapers of their culture.  Instead, we’ve tried to shape the culture ourselves.  This tragic mistake has led several decades of youth toward finding ways outside of the church to practice their faith and shape their culture.  This is why students are graduating and not coming back.  (Note: I just read the galley copy of Andy Root’s upcoming book called, Unfiltered Relationships.  Look for this book from YS/Zondervan this fall.  Andy covers the topics above — especially that of “influencing students” — in great detail.)

I was a youth pastor for 13 years.  Today, I am active in youth ministry as a volunteer at The Church of the Resurrection near my home in Kansas City but most of my contribution to youth ministry these days is through training, writing, speaking and consulting.

Recently, I was sharing some thoughts regarding the future of youth ministry with a   group of local lead and executive pastors.  I was asked, “If you were to go back and do youth ministry again, as you once did, how would what you know now change how you would lead a youth ministry?”  I had a few items off the top of my head (some are listed below) but I pointed them all to this post for a more robust list of things I might do differently.  So, if I were to go back and lead a youth ministry again I would…

• Act theologically before methodologically
• Be more of a spiritual director than a program director
• Hire a parent to be a part of our youth staff
• Spend more time investing in interns/co-pastors
• Experiment with more learner-centered education models
• Ask less of my volunteers and yet equip them more
• Communicate change to the church leaders, staff and parents more
• Create more opportunities for students to “learn up” instead of me “teaching down”
• Celebrate the successes in the lives of students with greater regularity and intensity
• Worry less about the retreat themes and spend more time with the students on the retreats.
• Take students on way more spiritual retreats
• Work hard to be more collaborative with the youth workers in my city
• Take more time off to be with my wife and kids
• Be more intentional with a confirmation process
• Find time to laugh and play more
• Be more grace-filled with students who were goofing off and causing trouble
• Try to learn more from the staff instead of thinking I have all the answers
• Take the criticism of others more seriously and less defensively
• Meet with my spiritual director more often
• Take personal retreats more often
• Be way more missional and a lot less attractional in my approach or model
• Try and get more pulpit time to advocate for the students in the church and community
• Pray more and develop a team of people to pray with
• Provide inspiring training for the parent of the students
• Call the students to greater levels of holiness
• Spend a lot more time creating opportunities for students to practice justice
• Allow the more artistic students opportunities to express themselves and their love for God.
• Teach much more conversationally
• Try to enter into the joy, pain, loss, doubt, hurt, etc. of the students and their families

If I spend some more time thinking I am sure I could come up with a list of a whole lot more things I would do differently.  If you are a youth pastor/worker, what are some things you have learned to do differently from when you began until now?  If you are a former youth pastor/worker, what are some things that you would do differently?

Here is my latest post over at Jesus Creed.

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Since I began posting here several months ago I have received a dozen or so requests for me to post on “family-based youth ministry.”   For those of you who have been requesting this, I think you might be disappointed with this post.  Honestly, I have no idea what to say about family based youth ministry.  I mean, I know how some are defining it and I think I like the idea of it, generally speaking, but I have no idea what it means to be a family-based youth ministry.

Can somebody help me out with this?

I’ve read some portions of books and articles, sat in some seminars here and there and I’ve been in a ton of conversations about the importance of family-based youth ministry.  However, I still haven’t really witnessed a youth ministry who is truly shaping a family-based youth ministry where the “God-designed structures of the nuclear family and the extended family of the church are helping young people grow toward mature Christian adulthood.”   I’m not sure I could even begin to explain it in a coherent way

Do I think the family has a role in the spiritual formation of their children?  Of course I do.  Do I think that the local faith community has a responsibility to create environments for the spiritual formation of others children?  Of course I do.  Do I think that youth ministries and families need to be in harmony and working together to support one another in our roles and responsibilities?  Of course I do.  Do I know how to structure a youth ministry in such a way that does this effectively?  Of course I don’t.  Does anybody?

Can someone help me better understand what it looks like for a youth ministry to be family-based?  For those of you who are in the process of shaping family-based youth ministries, what does it look like?  I mean, what kinds of things are you doing that are different than the “conventional” youth ministry models?

So, I thought that rather than trying to reveal my ignorance on the issue, I’d rather sit back and learn from those of you who are doing it.  Here are some questions that I would love some thoughts on (and so would the group of people who’ve requested this theme).

•    Is there a need for a youth pastor/worker in a family-based model?
•    What does discipleship/formation look like in a family-based model?
•    How do you go about this in cooperation with the other staff or workers in your church (for example, the children’s ministry)
•    How does the ‘youngish’ in age youth pastor/worker even lead parents of teenagers toward such a model? (Of course, I am assuming that there is a need for a youth pastor/worker in such a model.)
•    Does it work?  Do you have any ’success’ stories to share?  What defines success?
•    Where might I go to get some really good help on better understanding what family-based youth ministry is?
•    How do the youth in your faith community feel about family-based youth ministry?

Again, I’d really love to be informed on this topic.  I long for youth ministries to be more proactive in working with the family in process of spiritual formation of youth for the mission of God and I think there are many others like me out there.  Help!  Where do we go with this?

I don’t think I am an alarmist.  The word ‘departing’ in the title of this post may appear that I am but to me, the word ‘vanishing’ was to excessive.  Another word that came to mind was ‘deserting’ and that just didn’t seem fair.

At any rate, today I got news via a friend’s email that a mutual friend of ours was departing youth ministry to plant a church in NYC.  Normally I wouldn’t think twice about the news as change in our lives is inevitable and youth ministers are departing their roles as spiritual guides to emerging adults everyday.  However, this bit of news came in a long line of reports and personal conversations with youth workers who are leaving their vocation.

I’m curious… does anyone else see a greater number of youth ministers than what feels ordinary leaving their role in exchange for something other that youth work?  To me, it sure feels like there are more youth ministers leaving than what is usual.  Perhaps this phenomenon is only occurring in the view through my little window of youth ministry.

NOTE: I realize that there has always been a fair amount of transition among youth workers.  However, most of that transition has been from one church or ministry to another not a transition away from youth work altogether.

I have some thoughts as to why we might be seeing more youth ministers leaving their roles of serving youth and their families.  I’m hoping you can help me fill out this list.

Here are a few of my thoughts:

1.    Theology- it appears to me that today’s youth minister has a very different theological framework for approaching ministry than their supervising ministers and church boards.  This results in youth ministers looking to other ministry opportunities and other environments in which to express their divergent theological convictions.

2.    Methodology – I have found that in the conversations I am having with departing youth workers one of the main issues contributing to the exit strategies has to do with churches operating with an attractional model of ministry when many youth ministers are resonating more with a missional model.  After a while it just becomes like two ships passing in the night and this leads to transition.

3.    Leadership – I have also found that many youth workers feel as though they are ready for greater leadership challenges and influence and their supervising ministers are either not in agreement or completely unwilling to step aside to give the youth worker a greater amount of influence.  I’m not saying the youth workers are ready for more or not, but one thing that is sure is that youth workers think they deserve more and unquestionably want more.

4.    Expectations – There are a growing number of expectations being placed on the youth worker by others (church leadership, parents, students, peers, etc.) and this causes a working environment that is inescapably overwhelming.  I’m not quite sure exactly what is causing the growing expectations but I have a hunch it has to do with the absolute disorientation most people feel as it relates to the most effective ways to make disciples of today’s youth.

5.    Calling – Sometimes God calls people to new vocations.  I get that.  I believe a fair number of the departing youth workers I have talked with are really being led to do something else.

6.    Schedule – Youth workers work their butt off and often without a healthy balance.  Some youth workers are just tired and the grass on the other side looks a whole lot more green, and often it can be.

Are sensing a growing number of youth workers departing for things other than youth? What are your thoughts on why that might be the case?  Do you have any solutions to offer us?

I’ve been thinking a bunch lately about how we help our students best understand the Church and its work in the mission of God.  I have received several recent emails in which youth workers have expressed a deep concern for their students understanding of the church.

Can the students in your youth ministry describe the nature of the Church?  Do your students recognize the role of the Church in the mission of God?  Are your students able to identify with the biblical metaphors of the Church?  All of these questions are born out of the concerns that I have heard youth workers repeatedly expressing. As we are all aware there has been a great deal of dialogue surrounding the data concluding that students are ‘leaving the church’ upon the completion of high school with no plans to return.  I’ve heard many reasons as to the cause of this great challenge we face ranging from the increased level of apathy of students (which I don’t think is in anyway the primary reason) to the abandonment of today’s youth by both culture and the Church to a myriad of other suggested causes that are in some way connected to the inability and desire for local churches to embrace change and new practices.

I’m not an expert on the issue of what is so often thought of as the most daunting challenge facing the church today — that being the mass exit of emerging adults.  For all I know there may be dozens of causes that have led to this challenge.  So I don’t proclaim my absolute conclusions.  I do, however, have a hunch.  My hunch is that many of our students, as a result of not knowing the Bible’s story, haven’t been guided toward an understanding of the work of the church in the mission of God and therefore have no framework for or devotion to the church and its nature and work.

What is your hunch as to the cause of such a challenge?  Maybe you have more than a hunch; you have a conclusion?  If so, what have you concluded and what might the church do differently to cultivate a passion for the church among emerging adults?

Perhaps a great starting point for our students is to help them see the Church as a people who are about conversion, community and conformity.

> By conversion I mean that the Church is to be a people concerned about evangelism, hospitality, generosity, liberation and formation.

> By community I mean that the Church is to be a people concerned about providing a sense of belonging, responsibility, inspiration, sharing, diversity and inclusivity.

> By conformity I mean that the Church is to be a people concerned about their desire to form spiritually.  That is, a community that is consistently seeking to arrange its personal and communal lives around the mission of God, the person and work of Jesus, submission to the gifts and roles of the Holy Spirit in order t become a people full of grace and dedicated to the healing of all people through salvation and justice.

What else might we consider as part of the framework to help students best understand the nature and work of the Church?  As far as you are concerned, do you feel like the Church is doing a good job helping emerging adults understand the Church?  How might the Church improve in its efforts?

[I’ve been posting once a week over at Scot McKnight’s blog.  You can read the post and join the conversation over there and read my previous posts HERE.  Below is this weeks installment…]

Sometimes I wonder how I ever even made it as a youth minister through my emerging adulthood years (think: Dr. Jeffrey Arnett and his book, Emerging Adulthood: The Winding Road From Late Teens Through The Twenties).  The first position I held as a “solo” youth minister I was only 22 years old.  Those years were largely a time that I would characterize my life’s experiences as experimental and transitory and my inner life as self-absorbed, unbalanced and stuck.

Disclaimer:  I am not generalizing about a stage of life here; I am telling you who I was and at times, still am.

I took a call today from a youth minister in the Midwest who sounded a whole lot like I did when I was his age (25) and in my first few years of youth ministry; energetic, idealistic, optimistic, self-assured, and fearless.  The conversation was frightening in the sense that it took me back to mistakes I had made over a decade ago, words I had spoken in absolute certainty that I wish I could take back and statements I made to myself like, “I can handle this” or “I don’t need any help”.

The difference between the youth minister I spoke to today and me at his age is this; he knows enough to long for and look for a mentor, I thought I could do it all on my own.  The problem this minister is having is that he can’t find one–maybe he isn’t looking that hard or looking in the wrong places.  I don’t think that is the issue however, as today’s conversation was one of a dozen or so I have had over the last year.

I certainly don’t have anything against a 25 year old being a youth minister and being called on to guide the spiritual formation of a dozen or sometimes ten dozen teenagers.  Much of my life is spent training and equipping 25-year olds.  What I do have a problem with, however, is what I perceive as the outright neglect of older more mature men and women to mentor the emerging adults.

Am I the only one who sees a huge gap between the expectations we place on the lives of emerging adults to lead our youth ministry’s and the mentoring those ministers are getting?  Is it that youth ministers don’t want to be mentored?  Is it that others (church boards, pastors, etc.) won’t take seriously the role of mentoring?

I had and currently have wonderful mentors in my life.  I must say that the mentors who have taken their role with me seriously have undoubtedly changed and continue to change the way that I live, pray, work, play, etc.  I continue to wonder if much of what concerns us about youth ministry today isn’t at the very least reduced by commitments to mentoring.  What would youth ministry be like if the churches who hired emerging adults to lead their youth ministry’s were as passionate about mentoring the minister as they were about the minister mentoring the students?

Maybe I am trying to tackle an issue that really isn’t all that noticeable to anyone but me, that is possible.  I’d love to hear from all of you on this, however, I’d especially love to hear from some of you who are youth ministers and would be classified as an emerging adult (late teens through the twenties).  What do you think?  Do you think a mentor might help you be a better youth minister?  Do you already have a mentor?  If so, is it working?  Why or Why not?  Are you looking for a mentor and can’t find one?

My predecessor at Barefoot left a pile of book proposals on my desk and today I picked up a small stack of them during a slower moment in the day and began to skim them.
At first glance at, two things surprised me about the proposals.  First, the proposals were eerily similar in their content.  All of them (probably 6 or so) were about helping students more fully understand the story of God.  Of course each of the proposals were different in their approach to help students in that way, but they were all far too analogous.  Second, each hopeful author listed as the top reason as the primary need for his or her product on the market as this; students don’t know the stories of the Bible.

Is this true in your ministry context - are students ignorant when it comes to the stories in the Bible?  Are we in need of more curriculum, etc. that helps students more fully understand the story of God?  What is the cause of this reality (actual of perceived)?

Over the last few years I’ve deeply engaged in a learning model most commonly referred to as applied or experiential learning.  The applied learning model (think: David Kolb) has been around quite a while and it has taken on a variety of different forms.  Probably one of the most simplistic ways to describe applied learning is “hands-on” or “practicable” learning.  Of course, applied learning is about so much more than just hands-on experiences but at its core it is about creating moments for students to link theory and practice or thinking and doing.

I mention applied learning because I think that so much of the reason behind a statement like, ‘…students don’t know the stories of the Bible” has less to do about the students and more to do with the way youth workers attempt to educate them.  Perhaps it is better said, “Youth workers are not helping students to learn the stories of the Bible.”

In what ways are you helping students to know the stories of the Bible?  Is it the way you are choosing to educate or are the students in your ministry just not getting it?  Or are you content with how the students in your ministry are leaning into and living out the story of God?

Among other characteristics, applied learning is about:

• Ongoing assessment of the subject matter and the environment in which the matter is passed on
• Beginning with the learners in mind, rather than the educators
• Facilitating opportunities for guided reflection that leads to the ongoing ability to link ideas with practices
• Facilitating dialogical opportunities that lead to shared or communal learning
• A holistic approach that integrates the subject matter with the daily life of students
• Embracing of a variety of methods that encourage and value different types of learning styles

I’m really curious to know… Do you value applied learning?  Are you implementing applied learning methods in your youth ministry?  If so, which methods and if not, why not?  Do you think that there is any connection between students not knowing the stories of the Bible and the way we educate them? Or is it as simple as just not teaching them the most helpful subject matter?

I spent this past weekend in San Antonio, TX with some new friends at St. Luke’s Episcopal Church and a few other churches within the Diocese of West Texas.  I led several conversations for a couple dozens students around mission, community and identity formation - some of the very things we’ve recently been discussing on this blog.

Each of the conversations were punctuated with experiential learning environments consisting of such activities as sharing food and conversation with the homeless, collecting food for a local help pantry, participating in the Eucharist, intentional conversations in which to discuss the experiences, numerous forms of art expressions and so on.

I’ve come away from the experience feeling very inspired and encouraged.  Possibly the most inspiring element to the weekend was the relational composition I noticed between the various groups of students.
I’ve spoken to and trained many students at various gatherings throughout North America over the last decade or so and never have I more clearly witnessed a sense of true community and cooperative learning than while at St. Luke’s.

The mutual trust and respect, acceptance, care, gentle honesty, admiration for one another and the overall sense of missional cooperation that the students shared shone brilliantly through a long day of serving others all the while practicing the discipline of fasting.  This, along with a creatively designed schedule and a terrific bunch of committed students and volunteers, led to a day of sudden wonder!  [BTW- For those of you who have been recently astonished by what you have seen God do in the lives of the students within your group, I’d love to hear your story!]

This recent experience has led me to think deeply again about how I attempt to equip youth workers to create environments for transformational youth ministry.  Realizing that we can’t explore all of the elements of a transformative environment on a blog post I limit myself today to helping us think through three primary elements of the transformative environments we shape for our students.

The three elements for this conversation are time, space and matter.  Perhaps you have heard others express what they mean by these three environmental elements, as they are certainly not uncommon.  However, for training and equipping purposes, I choose to define these three elements as follows:

Time - not just minutes and hours (chronos time that is quantitative) but an undetermined period of time or an intentional pacing that cultivates a non-anxious, peace-filled, calm and reflective environment in which something unpredictable can occur (karios time that is qualitative).

Space - not a buffer zone but a sacred, ascetically intriguing and astonishing physical and or mental ‘room’ in which to contemplate and consider the wonder, beauty and creativity of God’s narrative and mission.

Matter - not solely the theme or the name/purpose of an event but the cooperating substance or content that evokes the imagination, imparts for a recreated life and inspires toward transformation.

Creating environments of transformation is some of what we are called to do as youth ministers and educators.  Along with the work of the Holy Spirit and the enduring activity of God, we seek to establish an influential set of conditions that provide a framework in which to help our students more deeply experience God.

What other factors besides time, space and matter are important for a healthy, effective and transformative environment?  How might you define the elements of time, space and matter differently than how I have defined them?  What are the ’set of conditions’ in your particular ministry context that provide for an experiential framework purposed for spiritual discovery and growth?

It wasn’t until I was nearly half a dozen years into vocational youth ministry that I began to discover that I couldn’t will a sense of community.  As hard as I worked to create an environment of invitation, generosity, hope, love, hospitality, honesty, shared learning, etc., I discovered that community isn’t developed out of a specific strategy or a series of methods regardless of how diligent I was in trying.  I grew to learn that authentic community was born out of a collective spirit of unity that is largely born out of sensitivity to and a commitment toward a spirituality driven by numerous virtues, none more important than simplicity and purity.  Obviously there are many more virtues that help our students experience what it means to be a true community.

Has anyone else ever tried to just will community?  What other virtues might lead to a sense of community?  What do our students need from us as their examples and guides to bring about a sense of genuine community?  And by genuine community I don’t merely mean fellowship, I mean a community of people who, together (inclusive of fellowship), act as the body of Christ, the physical presence of Jesus living out the mission of God.

It might be said that a collective spirit of unity can be created when a community of students and adults, seeking to live by virtues such as simplicity and purity, find an interior peace with God, self, others and the world.  This interior peace works to prohibit partiality from raising its ugly head thus keeping favoritism, prejudices, selfishness, etc. from eroding a sense of wholeness within our youth ministries.   I contend that true interior peace can only come through a student’s trusting relationship with Jesus.  It is through this relationship with Jesus that students in our ministries learn to live and love in the way of Jesus; extending an exterior peace meant to be shared with the others and in doing so participate in God’s mission to restore the world to its intended wholeness. [Note: All the more important to give our attention to the evangelism of emerging generations.  See last weeks post on Youth Ministry and Evangelism HERE].

In what ways does being a healthy community help our evangelism efforts to students?  Is my contention correct?  Does true peace only come from the freedom found in a relationship with Jesus?

Living the virtue of simplicity regulates the intentions of the soul.  Living the virtue of purity regulates the intentions of the heart.  Thomas A’ Kempis tell us in his enduring work, The Imitation of Christ that. “Simplicity looks to find God and purity finds God and savors Him.”  In other words, the beauty of simplicity keeps us grounded; it provides the means for us to evaluate our purpose and goals in life helping us to keep our focus and priorities on the mission of God.  At the same time, the virtue of purity allows us to draw increasingly closer to God as we live in the interior peace we have found with God through Jesus.  As we allow simplicity and purity to regulate our lives, we can’t help but think of others.

Helping our students develop practices such as doing the will of another rather than our own, sharing all of our material goods with others, seeking the lowliest places in the community as opposed to the most recognized places and the constant praying of God’s will be done on earth as it is in heaven all help to move our communities toward the good and pleasant whiff of unity (think: Psalm 133) that ultimately shapes a community.

Personally, I have found that when my interior life is peace-filled, my exterior life is filled with experiences of extending the invitation of a life with Jesus to all those I come into contact with - stranger, family, friend and so on.  I’d love to figure out the best ways in which to help our students find ways to belong to a genuine community and work to extend that sense of community to all that they come into contact with. So what kinds of practical things are you doing to help your student’s understand and experience community?  In what ways can we better help our students experience community now and into the future?  In what ways do our churches play a part in the development of healthy community within our youth ministries?