Youth Ministry: If I were to do it again…
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?
May 29th, 2009 - 08:16
Chris,
As a guy who is just finishing up year 1 in youth ministry, here’s what I think about this post:
I started off with the right thinking. A year ago I sat down and dreamed up what was important for our ministry and came up with a list very similar to the one you’ve pumped out here. I was ahead of the curve.
Over the past year, I’ve noticed the tendency to move away – little by little – from doing things the way I was convinced things ought to be done.
Too many people expect the exact opposite type of ministry from me. They want loud, over-hyped, large crowd programs and they see any sort of bent towards “spiritual direction” as lazy or unproductive.
I’m about to pull my hair out! How bizarre is it that the church where we serve is often the culture we’re fighting against, instead of the place we know we’ll find support for our ministry?
Adam
May 29th, 2009 - 10:29
Chris -
I love that you have finally put this list down in a way that we can all interact with it in one format.
I think that this list has been a list that has been developing over the 4-5 years we both have been out of the “paid” youth pastor world. I have enjoyed the many car conversations we have had about this list.
I would add:
- Think less about the end product and more about the teaching and learning in the current
- Thiink more about the individual rather than the whole group which made me create a great system
- Pursuit of deeper relationships with one another as a group
- Teaching more about the Holy Spirit and actually letting the Holy Spirit work in the lives of our group both leaders and students
- Contribute way more to the benefit of the whole church rather than building my special student silo.
Thanks pal for a reminder of what the main things are in student ministry.
Matt
May 30th, 2009 - 09:54
I love the list. One could really develop each of these points more substantially and offer some really valuable resources for youth workers and the churches they serve. Maybe Barefoot should do that.
The missional/attractional one is one that I most resonate with, and yet the one that I think is probably the hardest to realize. Becoming missional is such a difficult task, and it seems to me that without a wholesale shift in all facets of the church, becoming missional is near impossible. You’re talking about an overhaul of virtually everything in that kind of change — the way we preach, evangelize, think through our budgets, educate our congregations, gather, fellowship, etc. — so that its almost like a new birth (hence Guder’s continuing conversion of the church). Rock the status quo too much… well, you know what happens.
Maybe I’m just overly pessimistic, but I’ve seen many youth pastors set out to introduce this kind of change, humbly, and find themselves disheartened quickly. That’s why, I think this list, while apropos for youth ministries, very much applies to the church in general, especially this bullet.
May 31st, 2009 - 10:06
Chris, really liked this post! Shot it to a bunch of my buddies who are in student ministry and even gave it a little love on by blog. Hope you don’t mind!
thanks for the thoughts.
Peace
Erik
June 5th, 2009 - 22:10
Chris,
Thanks for posting your thoughts. I’ve been in youth ministry for almost 8 years, but ran into a brick wall about six months ago. As I’ve reflected and tried to learn from the mistakes, the self-sufficiency and pride, I’ve come to realize how much I wish I would have done differently. Your list both gives voice to a lot of those thoughts that I just didn’t know how to verbalize. Thanks for the post and your continual thinking!