Getting What You Need

“And he will give you all you need from day to day if you live for him and make the Kingdom of God your primary concern.” Mt 6:33 (NLT) My pastor called all of the men of our church together for an early-morning meeting today. He shared a lot of vision for where we’re going [...]

Knowing What To Own When Communicating With Parents

I’m bringing in 5 new students into my small group in the Fall. We’ve been spending a lot of time together this summer getting to know each other. One of the issues that’s come up is the city curfew which is 11:00 for drivers who have had their driver license for less than a year. [...]

Trophy Case: Youth Pastor Gets Twitter Encouragement

This has nothing to do with me, but it made me feel good to see it. A guy I follow on Twitter sent a message to encourage his youth pastor from his teenage years. I love stuff like this! I thought I’d pass it along because I know other youth workers will be encouraged by [...]

10 Signs a Leader is “Losing It”, by Perry Noble

Perry Noble wrote this excellent blog post. Some of the points won’t apply directly to volunteers, but the principles behind them will. Here’s a clip. Head there for the rest. I’ve been reading through the OT lately and have been challenged by the downward leadership spiral that Saul went on…here are TEN signs from his [...]

Hunting for Leaders

We have a big problem in our high school ministry. More students than our leaders can handle want to be in small groups. While I love the desire or our students, it kills me to know that there is such a great need going unmet. I’m going to do my best to do something about [...]

Learning to Last

Tonight one of the small group leaders called to share his concerns about not going deep enough in his teaching. He’s been a little self-conscious since two of his guys gave that as their reason for leaving his group for a group at another church. This is understandably difficult on the self-esteem and confidence level. [...]

I’m Glad This Happened To Somebody Else

Thanks Kurt Johnston for posting this on your blog so I could share it on VolunteerYouthMinistry.com. I’m so incredibly glad this video serves as a warning to me instead of a “what-was-I-thinking” regret. I filed this on my blog under “How to last in ministry.” The concept is you last in ministry by learning from [...]

Interviewing For a Youth Ministry Position

If you’re interviewing for a youth ministry position, Tim Schmoyer has created a list of red flags to watch for and what they mean. Be sure to check it out to save yourself from getting into an unhealthy church environment. I’ve pasted a few of them below, click here to read the rest. 2. We [...]

Getting a Running Start as a New Volunteer Youth Worker

a. Determine to last through the awkwardness Even secure people who are stable in every way can feel self-conscious when they begin working with students. Stepping into youth culture to care for students is about as natural a feeling for adult leaders as the feeling a student gets when his doting parent friends him on [...]

Talking Shop about Youth Ministry

Last night I met up with a youth ministry Twitter friend (Jonathan Telles – blog, Twitter) for dinner. We had never met in person, but we’ve been following each other on Twitter. We talked about a lot of stuff; vacation locations, ministry ideas, how-to’s for ministry, etc. It was 3 hours of getting filled up [...]