When I was a senior in high school, my youth minister, Tracy, hired me as an intern. What a great experience! I got to work on event planning, help with leading worship, I even got to do the announcements at my church on Sunday mornings sometimes. Many people who wind up in vocational ministry get their start in something like an internship in their local church. Whether formal or informal, internships are a great way to give young people some hands-on, practical experience in ministry. It is through these kinds of experiences that young people are able to discover giftings and potential callings into ministry work.
We can see a similar kind of experience at work in Paul’s and Timothy’s relationship. Paul met Timothy when he was young. And he served side-by-side with Paul in ministry (Phil 2:22). Paul and Timothy worked together, and once Timothy went out to do ministry on his own, Paul still wrote letters to him to encourage him in his work in the ministry. When we create leadership opportunities like internships, we bring in gospel partners for our own ministry work who will later launch out into the world, better equipped to do ministry in the future.
Here are some practical things to think about when starting an internship program in your youth group:
Why?
You have to start with “why?” before you get to “who?” The purpose of your internship program will determine how you structure your ministry and whom you will hire.
You may feel you need someone to help set up the pizza and run errands. Even so, I encourage you to make the purpose of your internship program to equip young people for ministry, helping them consider a possible call to vocational ministry. This will require a greater level of intentionality in your planning and in your meeting time with your interns, but I think it will benefit them, as well as your students.
Perhaps the best way to think about purpose is to ask this question: “Who is this program meant to benefit?” The answer: the interns. At the end of a good internship program, the intern should have gotten some good, well-rounded, hands-on ministry experience. This, combined with some good discipleship conversations, will contribute to a good program.
Who?
The next question is who are your candidates? Are they current high school students? Recent graduates? College aged? Some of this will determine the level of maturity and how wide your recruitment pool will be. Regardless of potential interns’ ages, you should consider the qualifications of an appropriate intern for your program.
Maturity
If you are asking for more than setting up tables, then you are going to want to have at least a moderate level of maturity. An intern will be viewed as an example to other students, and you want to make sure interns are already displaying some level of maturity and leadership among their peers. If you are only pulling interns from your student ministry, you will already have a feel for who good candidates would be. If you are pulling from other places, a good application, reference, and interview process will be helpful to you. Make sure to conduct background checks and follow your church’s child safety policy in your recruiting process.
Interest
The people who will most benefit from an internship will be students who are at least somewhat interested in vocational ministry. So let those students take priority in your internship program. When you are interviewing students, ask them whether they are interested in ministry work.
What?
Once you have your interns, you need to know what they will be doing. There are a ton of questions to ask yourself about this. How many hours a week are you asking them to work? Your ministry requires at least some competency in several areas. Try to make your internship program fit as many of those as possible.
Spiritual Formation
An internship is a discipleship opportunity. Read a book together. My interns have read Jerry Bridges’ The Pursuit of Holiness over the course of the summer. Make caring for their soul a part of your meetings with them. Ask them questions about their walk with the Lord, discuss your reading. Make sure they make prayer and Scripture reading a priority. The work of ministry requires us to do these things—so help them to see that, and model doing it together!
Administrative
Youth ministry necessarily includes event planning, leading games, giving announcements, thinking through schedules. Administration is probably my least favorite thing about my job, but it’s a big part of it. So give interns some experience. Let them plan an event, or an element of it. Brainstorm ideas for your summer camp, or your game night. Help them see the planning process that goes into what you do. One of the biggest things my interns see is the amount of work that goes into our Disciple Now Weekend. Those who were once students in our ministry come away kind of shocked at how much work goes into a weekend they just got to experience as a student.
Teaching
Teaching is a huge part of youth ministry. At least once, give your interns the opportunity to teach a lesson in a Sunday School class. Hold their hands through every part of the process. Help the intern prepare, brainstorm ideas, and think through hard questions. And then have them record the lesson and go back and watch themselves. Give them kind and encouraging feedback, and pointers for the future.
Ministry
Let interns be assistant small group leaders for younger students. Encourage them to pray for their students and get to know them. Talk to them about how their students are doing. They will find this rewarding, and they will have gained valuable experience.
Practical
And finally, let them set up tables, put out the pizza, lead the game, clean up. This stuff has to be done. I put it at the bottom of the list because I think ministry experience should take priority. But youth pastors clean up stuff! So they need to see that too!
Offering young people the opportunity to serve as interns in your ministry context provides them with valuable opportunities to learn and grow in their relationships with Christ. It also offers a time to examine a future vocational calling. By God’s grace, your interns can also make significant deposits into your current students as well, providing a picture of what it looks like to walk with Jesus into young adulthood. As you facilitate a relationship like Paul did with Timothy, God willing, your interns will be doing the same for younger students as well.
For more practical coaching in gospel-centered youth ministry, consider applying for Rooted’s youth ministry mentorship program.
