Summer Experiment

So today we started something new.  Today we launched the Contagious Youth Growth and Leadership  experiment.  This summer we offered the students an opportunity for an online experience in a "class" type setting.  The goal is to help some students grow and hopefully glean some leaders out of this experience. 

The students will write a beginning paper, sort of a spiritual evaluation with where they are at now.  Then at the end of the summer they will write another evaluation paper and share where and how they grew in their faith.

Each week they will read a chapter in Doug Field's book, Refuel.  We will then answer some discussion questions during the week online.  We were looking for a cheap/free way to do this and so we formed a secret Facebook group where we can post discussion questions and have some interaction together.

We are looking forward to the summer and how this experiment will go.  Hopefully this is something that will grow each year.  At the end of the summer the students will get a certificate that is suitable for framing.

Modeling

Today I celebrate 23 years of marriage with my wife!  She is my biggest supporter and encourager and an example of a godly woman.  I'm soooooo glad I met her at college many years ago.  I stalked her and wooed her with my charms and manly ways (not to mention muscular build).  My plan at college was to find the most beautiful girl and take her on a date.  It worked!  We've been dating ever since.

As youth leaders we must protect our marriages and model to students what a healthy marriage looks like since probably half don't get to see this at home.

Youth Ministers:

• Take time together with your spouse. 
• Vacation (or in this economy "staycation) at least once a year.
• Balance your time at home.

Churches:

• Allow your youth pastor to be flexible with his time.  If he was out all night at ball games don't freak out if he's not at the office at 9AM.  
• Understand that if your youth minister's family and marriage isn't healthy then there is no way your youth minister can minister to your students.
• COMP TIME!  If your youth group is at camp for a week this means your youth pastor put in about 95 hours or more of work.  He has also taken a week away from his family.  Let him take some time off the next week, and not vacation time.
• In 20 years of youth ministry a youth pastor will be gone from home about 52 weeks time.  Be understanding of family time.  
• If it's not an emergency don't call on his day(s) off or in the evening, especially at supper time.
• Paid vacations and medical benefits.  Help remove the financial stress.

No Longer Shall it be Called . . .

No longer shall it be called "Youth Room".  Now it is "The Loft".  Student picked, students approved.
This is what is going on the wall really big.

Parent Resource

This looks like a good book to read for parents of teens.  I'll be ordering one to help with students now and to prepare myself for my kids hitting their teen years.

You can order a copy here at Homeword

Support

In talking with other youth ministers it is obvious that in churches with youth ministries there are some parents and some students who take their youth ministry for granted.  I would venture a guess and say we have this happening at our church also.  I talk with parents and church leaders from other churches that do not have youth ministries and hear them share how they wish they had something for their students.

What if your church’s youth ministry ceased?  What if your church decided to focus elsewhere in ministry and your parents and students were left with no youth ministry?  What would your response be?  Would you even notice?  Chances are if you are reading this you would be one of the ones who would notice.

Supporting your church’s youth ministry is vital to the future of your church’s youth ministry.  Support comes in many shapes and forms.  

Support look like this:

• Making sure your son or daughter is active and faithful in attendance to youth group and youth events.
• Understanding that youth group is church.
• Volunteering to help minister when help is needed, pitching in.
  
• Placing a priority on youth worship gatherings.
  
• Faithfully giving back to God in tithes and offerings.
  
• Inviting your friends and coworkers to bring their teens to youth.
  
• Recognizing the youth ministers who volunteer hours every week investing into your son or daughter.
• Spend time with your teen discipling them and discussing what they are learning at youth group and helping them apply what they are learning in life.
• Set the example for your teen to follow by living out your faith.

Are you supporting your church’s youth ministry?

Where Have You Been All My Life?

Stumbles across this site a couple of days ago.  Where have you been all my life?!
Great game ideas and better yet they are very inexpensive if not FREE!  Everyone loves some free stuffs.  Check it out!  Your students will thank you.

Folders

Hi my name is Andy and I have ADD.

One of the reasons why I am in love with the iMac that is sitting on my desk is because it is connected to an external drive on my desk.  If you were to open the external drive you would see rows and rows of blue file folders.  Each folder has a name.  Some of those folders have folders within them. 

I'm working on getting camp stuff together for parents and campers and meetings and all that goes into preparing for summer camp.  The beauty of the folder is I go to the "Camp Contagious 11" folder and I slide the files I want onto my desktop.  On my desktop I have a "Camp Contagious 12" folder.  After I edit the files to fit Camp Contagious 12 I slide them into the folder.  Boom!  What could take hours to recreate each year is done in a matter of minutes.  When camp is done and gone I will slide that file on to my external drive (yes it's backed up elsewhere).  Then I will be ready for Camp Contagious 13.

My life was not always like this.  I used to just click on "documents" and it would be rowed and rows of documents that were totally unorganized and if I didn't know the exact file name to search hours of my life would go down the toilet and thusly hinder my ability to work on anything new.

Moral of the story:  If you are like I used to be and just saving files without any sort of folder or filing system you need to make a life change TODAY!

Action Step 1 - Set aside a day and organize that boat load of messy files on your PC today.  If you use a Mac it just creates more quality time for you and your computer.

"What's Up?"

It’s sad to see a student who was once excited about their faith drift away and soon fizzle.  In youth ministry we see this all the time.  For youth ministers it can be very frustrating.  Sort of like a coach who can see the incredible potential in  a player but the player is not interested or committed to the team.

Some students don’t have Christian parents so at home there exists no support or encouragement for them to grow in their faith.  Their parents view church/youth group as a good thing but not necessary in their teen’s life.  The “head scratcher” is the parent(s) who wants their teen involved in youth group but the parent isn’t involved in church.  I’m glad they send their teen but maybe I should become bold enough to ask and find out the rationale behind their thinking so I can better understand where they are coming from.

What is even more mind boggling for those of us who serve in youth ministry is the church parents and the Christian parents who don’t encourage their son or daughter to grow in their faith.  The ones who cruise along in some sort of auto pilot while their teen’s life and faith walk is looks too much like a roller coaster.

Recently I have watched a few students who at one point had a passion for their relationship with Jesus Christ.  They would come every week to youth group and also to church on Sunday morning.  They were interested in discussing spiritual things and the Bible.  You could see that they genuinely enjoyed pursuing Christ.  If I were their parents I would have been their biggest cheerleader on the sideline of their life yelling, “Go!  You can do it!  Keep going!”  I would have been thrilled and would have done everything within my power and with the help of the Holy Spirit to keep them plugged into a community of believers.

To dwell on it, quite frankly, causes a couple of reactions within me:

My flesh wants to give the parents a “smack down”

Depressed because there is no parental involvement or encouragement (I’m guessing school teachers go through the same feelings at times) 

So what do we do as youth ministers when we see this happening?

• Encourage  
the student as much as we can

• Pray 
for the student and the student’s parents

• (this may be where getting older comes into play) Be bold enough to ask the church/Christian parents, “What’s up? and Don’t give me excuses or “smoke screens”.  (of course season this with caring and grace)

• Realize 
that we can only do so much as youth ministers.  Students have to own their faith and take responsibility and parents are accountable to God. (that takes some of the pressure off doesn’t it?)

• Pray
some more

Parents, what can you do? 

• Cheer.  
 Be your son or daughter’s biggest cheerleader.

• Talk.  
Strike up conversations about God and the Bible.  When your son or daughter is passionate about their faith they will want to discuss it with you and not look at you like you are some sort of freaky creature from some old episode of the original Star Trek.

• Commit.  
Commit to keeping your family plugged into a local body of believers.  Commit to bringing your teen to their youth group.  Commit to put eternal matters above earthly stuff.  An indicator that life is upside down in your home is when your teen never misses a practice or game but rarely makes it to church or youth group. Commit to living out Deuteronomy 6.

• Grow.  
Make sure you are setting the example with a growing faith.

• Pray.  
Pray with and for your son or daughter.

• Tell.  
Tell your teen how proud you are of their passion to grow in their faith.

Someone has to do it

Well my youth ministry friends I have to say this, "Someone has to do it."  This is my home:
Best Family Beach Vacation

Facebook Church?

If at one point youth held the more vibrant spirits of faith within the church, that may no longer be the case. As youth attendance at church drops, some blame new inventions like Facebook, which have dampened young people's sense of community.

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Reasons

Reasons for your son or daughter to go to church summer camp:

1. Removal.  All the outside influences and distractions of life are removed.  No game boys, no texting, no media.  
2. Saturation.  Everything in their schedule that was removed is now replaced with God, Bible study, prayer, worship.  
3. Growth.  Because of the “removal” and “saturation” your son or daughter’s opportunity to grow spiritually is greatly increased.
4. Decisions.  Life changing and life affecting decisions are made at camp because of the Removal, Saturation and Growth.
5. Unity.  Just as we adults need that connection and encouragement that being a part of a local body of believers brings us the same applies to students.  Youth groups grow, youth groups gain momentum, youth groups become unified in purpose as a result of spending a week living out life and their faith together.  Friendships and relationships with other teen believers is VITAL to a teen's spiritual life in middle and high school.
6. Fun.  I’ve been going to camp now with students for 20 years.  It’s getting harder on the old man to keep up the pace at camp.  BUT I can, with confidence, say that camp is fun.  The students have a blast together!

So why wouldn’t you send your teen to camp this summer?