Recent posts
GUEST POST: On Being Called into Youth Ministry, part 1
When Matt and Steven approached me about writing for their blog, I instantly knew what I wanted to write about. I wanted to write to those men and women who feel that God is calling them into youth ministry. I wanted to write about what God taught me as I was exploring my calling into ministry, in hopes that it might help you navigate through this crazy and exciting time of your life.
If you are anything like I was, you are feeling skeptical about what you think God is calling you to do, thinking that you aren’t shaped for youth ministry. As I was figuring out what God had in mind for my life, I spoke to about a dozen youth pastors and came up with a list of adjectives that I thought made up a great youth pastor. This list was:
- Servant
- Self-less
- Outgoing
- Influential
- Confident
When I compared myself to that list, I found that my greatest weaknesses were what needed to be my greatest strengths as a youth pastor. Right as I was about to turn my back on youth ministry, I began to re-read Exodus and I was blown away by what the Lord was teaching me through it!
Exodus is easily one of my favorite books of the Bible for many reasons, but what I like most about it is that it is a “coming-of-age” story of a man being called to ministry. In chapter 3 of Exodus, Moses is called to return to Egypt and free the Israelites from the Pharaoh. The conversation that follows is so interesting to me because I feel like this is how many of us feel as we are being called into ministry.
Colton Harker (that’s him on the left) is with the High School Ministry team at Saddleback Church and a good friend of Steven and Matt. He has a huge heart for students and has a unique gift for working with teens. He is also famous in this video.
Looking for a ministry job?
If you’re looking for a job in ministry, there’s a new tool on the web to find one. Our good friend and fellow youth worker Ben Farr is the founder of MinistryHunt.com, a resource for churches to post jobs and potential employees to post resumés.
The best part–everything is completely FREE!
If you’re a church looking to fill a ministry position, it would be great to have more postings on the site. If you’re a youth worker, worship leader, involved in children’s ministry, etc., post your resumé for churches to seek you out. Don’t forget to tell your friends about the site!
Small Groups / Big Miracles
My high school small group meeting had a twist to it tonight. The students are now leading the group. I said I was going to start turning their group over to them and tonight I did it. I was proud of myself, I resisted all the urges to jump in and take over the lesson, or to speak up when a question was asked. I simply sat back and waited for them to answer themselves, and it happened. I was so stinking proud of my guys tonight.
I sat there thinking about where we were as a group last summer and where these guys are now and it made me realize this is just another example of what an awesome God we have. I’ve been blessed to watch these guys grow stronger and stronger in their walk with God and to trust Him more everyday for their problems. Our prayer requests tonight we’re not just the usual, “I need prayer for a test in my English class”, but things like “I pray that we can all get to know God on a personal level” and “that my quiet times help me grow each day.”
I also watched them pray for each other, and minister to each other. A couple of the guys are going through a tough time right now, and the others jumped right in to comfort them. After our group I received text messages from two of them saying basically the same thing, “Wow what happened tonight, group was awesome” and “Matt! God showed up big time tonight!”
It’s so cool to see the transformation in these guys, I know God will use this group for some amazing things. After our group met this week I walked away confident that I’ve done the job God placed on me with these guys.
Question: Have you set your students up to continue growing in their walk with God? Looking back, could you have done something different? We’d love to hear your comments!
The power of affirmation
Especially for a junior high or high school student, affirmation is vitally important. They live in a world where their every move is criticized, they’re constantly in fear of being judged and negativity reigns. Without pushing back against the negative, students may feel that they aren’t good enough or they don’t live up to people’s standards.
In student ministry, we should be making sure that our students are affirmed way more than they’re criticized. Encouragement is key, and it’s something we can do in little ways all over the place. A simple “That was a great thought!” or “You’re great at that!” goes a long way toward building a student up.
One way we’re being really intentional about affirming our students is taking a whole small group meeting time and doing affirmations. It will be our last “official” time together, so what better way to end the last two years. The week before, we’ll tell all the guys to be thinking about 2 things to affirm each guy in the group. The last week, we’ll just go around in a circle spending time building each other up and reflecting on how everyone has grown in the last 2 years. It’s a small thing that can have a great impact toward encouraging and building up students.
Question: What do you do to make sure your students are affirmed? Let us know here.
Summer plans for staying connected
Matt: Some student small groups take the summer off. We do that at Saddleback Church but I want to continue to keep my group connected during the summer. Last summer, even though not every student was able to be there each week, I still had a weekly meeting. I simply told 
my students to be there when they could. I tried to keep the subject matter light and not do multi-week lessons. I didn’t want a student to miss a week and feel like when he returned he wouldn’t know what we were talking about so each week was a different lesson. Summer can be filled with distractions for students and for some they probably need their small group as much if not more during the summer as they do during the school year.
This year is a little different. I have high school seniors who will be moving on next year so we plan to meet over the summer but with the intent of them forming their own young adult small group. I’ve begun to decrease my involvement with the lesson and with the meeting each week so that they can become more reliant on each other for their group. My current group has some natural leaders and I want them to step up during this time. We’ve also planned some fun outings over the summer, a time to just get together and hang out with each other. I want to keep the unity they have formed with each others and not let it slow down over the summer. I also want them to realize the importance of a small group not just during their junior and senior high school years but for life. I want them to have a group of Christian brothers who will always be there for each other.
Steven: Staying connected this summer is going to be more important than ever for my small group boys. They are moving into a new season of ministry, from junior high to high school. This means they will be making a transition, and there is plenty of opportunity for some of the guys to drop off and not make the jump. To avoid this, we’re doing everything we can to make sure they stay connected with each other so they have a seamless transition.
- We’re ending our “official” small group meeting time (which normally parallels the school year) with one of the guys’ favorite events–a sleepover in our student building. This will be the 4th time we’ve done it with this group, but we have a few extra things planned to cap off the year.
- We’ll be meeting through the summer on our normal meeting day. Some of the guys have already started asking if we’ll be continuing after school ends, and we don’t see any reason to end it! If they want to keep meeting, we’re game. We’ll do this up until the guys leave for high school camp.
- Because some of the guys in our group weren’t able to make it to the sleepover, we wanted to make sure they got to celebrate their time with us too. We’re taking a 24-hour trip to one of our local parks, which is something we’ve never done with them before. It’s close enough that we don’t have to drive far, but far enough away to feel like a total getaway.
This is just an example of some of the stuff we’ll be doing to keep our students connected. In this vital time, we want to give them as good a chance as possible so they start their time off right in high school.
Question: What are you doing to keep your students connected to each other over the summer? Let us know here.
