One of the privileges of ministering amongst young people is helping them understand what the local church is and how God intends it to function, for his glory, in his world. The apostle Paul compares the local church…
Two battles are common for youth pastors in large churches: 1) The battle to be remembered in a sea of ministry initiatives, mission trips and campaigns and 2) the battle to have a relationship with your Sr. pastor….
I just returned from having a small group with four really sharp senior girls, and a story one of them shared made me wonder: Are we listening for what questions our kids are really asking, or do we…
I was recently counseling a new student in my office and after we closed out our time together, as he was looking around my office, he said, “Why do you have so many books?” After explaining to him…
When I sit down and talk with Youth Pastors, staff, and volunteers I hear a lot of the same thing—that their students want more. This is incredibly exciting. In the late 1990’s the face of youth ministry was this…
It is very common these days to see Student Ministers or other staff members want to be lead pastors. It has been my experience that, as youth guys get around each other, they talk a lot about the…
In my eight years as a small group leader to students (and their leaders), I’ve learned much about what to do and what not to do. About what works, and what doesn’t. So what makes small groups successful?…
Retreats. Chaos. Logistics. Long nights. Long drives. Injuries. Fond memories. That is the sequence of words that follow in my mind when I think of youth retreats. When I think of what was most memorable in my time…
Every week, I receive another postcard for a new youth ministry conference pledging to have the magic bullet for today’s youth. Nearly all of these ministries and conferences have much value; I wish I could go to a…
