I wrote a post about generational youth ministry for my friends over at Generation to Generation Youth Ministry’s website.

Here’s a clip. You can go there for the rest:

- Watch for potential: You can’t mentor every student. Look for the ones who are open to being molded, eager to serve, and are, on some level, dedicated to God. These students aren’t perfect, necessarily skilled or even popular. They are, however, full of potential, and almost select themselves – they’re not difficult to spot because they’re already exhibiting these characteristics

- Let students behind the scenes: Let them in on the decisions that need to be made, what you’re trying to accomplish, and how it will benefit the cause of Christ. Get their input and talk through options. This will teach students critical thinking while allowing them to take ownership in ministry

- Plant seeds of service: ”When you’re a small group Bible study leader…”, “When you’re a college student facing temptation and standing firm on your faith…”, “When you’re a parent and your teenager does that…” I speak seeds of service into my students’ lives frequently. I want them to see themselves as serving Christ in every area of their lives. Some of them, like Kevin, Kyle and Eric, will even translate that into serving students.

27 years ago when I was, a couple of weeks before my 14th birthday, I started making these time capsules. I was always intrigued with the passage of time. Several times I would gaze at the time capsule in the small town where I grew up. I thought it would be cool to save some memories from my childhood and “send them ahead to the future” (Back To The Future was big around that time).

Tonight (2 years late), I opened my first 2 time capsules. It was kind of cool.

I convey this idea to my students because I want them to do the same. While they are in a place of being spiritually fed right now, I want them to bottle some of that up for later in life. During this spiritually fertile time in their lives, I want them to send some memories of God’s goodness in their lives ahead to a time hen they may not feel so close to God.

When my students graduate high school, their spiritual formation will require a lot more effort on their part. Distractions and other pursuits, possibly even tragedy, can take their focus off of the goodness of God and their dedication to him. Time capsules from better times can be a path back to being restored to God and finding healing in their lives.

I love our students. They’re incredibly helpful around the church, passionate about the causes of Christ, eager to sign up to go on mission trips, etc. With some of them, however, there’s a huge disconnect with the work of the church and their interactions at home. I’m not surprised anymore, but I am at a loss for how to help these students take their church attitudes into their home lives.

In the eyes of students, there are a variety of reasons for the disconnect:

• Life at home is unfair
• Parents are unpleasable
• You hurt most those you love
• There’s too much history. Everybody knows my faults so I can’t hide. I might as well be what they expect.

While I have counseled a couple of families on this topic, I’m still figuring out how to bridge the gap of how the students shine at church and rust at home. Here are a few strategies I’m testing:

• Colliding worlds. I’m interacting with parents more so they feel comfortable coming to me for help. This helps me get to know the student behind the mask and deal with the real issues there
• Listen, but don’t feed. Students need to vent. I get that. However, I try hard to leave it at that. The basic truth is students love their parents, they just drive each other crazy. Students need a safe place to scream about what’s happening at home. I’m careful not to encourage their feelings, but I’ll let them get it off their chest.
• Connect the dots. This is a huge eye opener for students that has to become an art form for youth workers. It’s not easy to do well without pushing a student away. In the last point, I wrote to listen, but don’t feed. Connecting the dots happens after students have cooled down and you’re in a different conversation with them. Something they say will shed light on why a parent reacts a certain way or has a rule or doesn’t trust. At that moment, I’ll engage the student in a conversation about how that nugget of discovery impacts their life at home. It’s fun to see the lights go on when I offer a different way to communicate that same message in a healthier way.

While I’ve been doing this stuff for years, I’m being more intentional specifically about relationships in the home in this season of ministry. I’ve still got some learning to do. I’m sure there will be more posts about this in the future.

I’d love to know what you think. Please comment on this post if you have some ideas.

Thanks!

Dennis

For a couple of years I’ve been thinking about how to interact with the issue of homosexuality in youth culture from the world of youth ministry. While I haven’t made much progress researching how ministries approach the topic, I have known of a couple of students in our ministry struggling with this in their lives.

I believe if our ministries will address the topic,

• Students will feel less shame about talking about it
• The stereotypical image of the church will become more loving
• The love of Christ will replace rebellion, bitterness, disillusionment, and feelings of rejection against the church

I came across this blog post today at the Fuller Youth Institute blog. It doesn’t offer much, either. However, it does give some data that shows the need for youth workers to address gender-identity. I put a clip below from the article, click here to read the rest.

The Marin Foundation discovered that 86% of gays and lesbians were raised in the church—meaning they are right in front of us. Age 13 is the average age for feeling same-sex attraction—again, they are right in front of us.

Last night a FaceTime call came in on my iPhone. It was from Donny, a student who has been my righthand man at The Landing (a program I lead for students at Saddleback Church). I’d been thinking about him all day because he had left to start school at Biola University yesterday.

He called in to spend a few minutes telling me about his day. His face was free of the stress he had leading up to the big day. We’ve had several conversations about tough college-related decisions. These last few weeks have been very tough on him and his family.

It felt great that he thought to call to let me know how he was and to tell me about his new experiences. I love when one of my students shares both the trials and joys of life. One without the other keeps youth ministry off balance.

Most of all, he was calling to say thanks and I love you. That’s the part that really made my youth-ministry day!

Last weekend I was in a pretty serious conversation with another leader. This conversation ended abruptly and prematurely by an interrupting student who wouldn’t quit saying my name until I turned from the conversation and gave him my undivided attention.

His interruption was to ask if I would notarize a form for him this week. I said he could come by my office. That 10-second mid-sentence interruption ended an important conversation.

Between then and the time he called today, I got to thinking about how to address this. He’s a good kid, but just short on manners and the ability to pick up on social cues. I decided he would get his paper notarized when he apologized to the other leader for killing our conversation. He owes me an apology, too, but I didn’t want to make this about me.

As frustrating as this is, I see it as an important ministry opportunity that could be easily missed. Self-absorbed students need our help to bring discipline into their lives. Seasoned youth workers use these missteps as a chance to teach skills and helps them realize the error of their ways. I definitely fumbled this ball when I was just starting out in youth ministry. If I hated this kid, I wouldn’t have corrected him. However, I want the best for him so I point out where he’s socially inept and give him the opportunity to gain some humility and develop some manners.

About 5 minutes ago I got an email from Josh Griffin, the other youth worker, saying he got the apology text message from the student. Youth ministry accomplished.

I’ve got this new kid in my small group. He’s a nice guy, but I really haven’t had a chance to get to know him more than just on a surface level. Tonight I got a chance to find out a little bit about him in a behind-the-scenes kind of way. I like this kind of stuff because the non-verbals will tell you much more honestly what students will tend to sugarcoat.

This guy is hooked on a card game that he’s been playing with the other guys in the group. In the past, I’ve kind of watched from a distance. I’ve been a little irked that he has his own set of rules so I’ve tended to stay out of it.

Tonight I joined in. Part of my motivation was to see if this student tends to be the bossy leader or the I need-you-to-like-me leader. Either way, I can tell he’s got leadership inside him, I just couldn’t tell which kind.

To test this, I made passing comments about how the rules of the game were different. Anytime somebody said something that went in opposition to the new rules, I made a comment about how I didn’t like the rules or how the rules were different. I wasn’t being obnoxious. These were just passing comments to see how he would react.

At one point he said very politely and sheepishly, “If you guys want to play by the other rules, we can do it. These are my cards, but I don’t care which rules we play by.” That’s all I needed to hear. That’s an attitude I can work with.

He has a desire to be liked which may or may not be bad. The positive side to that is he is able to have humility. I was happy he didn’t get frustrated or complain. The bossy leader can be good, too. However, I would much rather develop a student who has a humble attitude into a leader than to break down a bossy leader so I can instill some leadership principles into him.

Here’s where I’m going with this: When we look for ways to push students a little to find out who they are on the inside, we’ll get much more accurate answers through their responses than asking them directly or by some of the lengthy personality tests. Neither of those are bad. However, as the old saying goes, “The proof is in the pudding” – what they may want us to believe is either confirmed or betrayed by how they respond when prodded a little. Skilled/seasoned leaders get this already by the nature of years of experience. Newbies will do well to practice this a little and begin developing this early.

This year I recruited a co-leader to help lead my expanding small group. As we wade deeper into the waters of leading together, there are some considerations I’m thinking people need to think through as they find the right person to share responsibilities with. So far, we’ve had a great experience together. These are just some things that we’ve addressed as we dream about how leading together can look:

• What (if any) is the break-in period before the new co-leader begins to teach
• Does the co-leader teach or focus on other responsibilities
• What values need to be communicated?
  • How much say the students have in what happens
  • Discipline procedures
  • Boundaries
  • Commitment to preparation and attendance
  • Regular debrief times
• What responsibilities will he take off my plate?
  • Can he do them well?
  • Is he dependable?
  • Does he need direction?

Having a co-leader can be an amazing blessing, or a painful thorn in the side of a leader who will accept any warm body that comes along. I’ve been fortunate, so far. I honestly didn’t consider these questions before I brought Josh in. However, we’ve talked regularly and have complemented each other’s skill set nicely. I’m excited about being able to take a young aspiring leader under my wing while also having help leading my group.

Since I’m teaching small group on two nights this year, I’m looking for a co-leader to help me on the other night. I’ll for sure take these questions into consideration as I look for the person to help on Wednesdays. I love the new challenge of not only teaching students, but developing leaders. I believe all veteran youth workers do their ministries a huge favor by finding and developing leaders to serve alongside them. Eventually both of these leaders will have their own small groups. It’s an honor to help them get started.

• Jerry Klumas taught me how to tie a tie. His wife, Helen, had me working alongside her every week doing projects for the church
• Pastor Darrel Hall allowed me to preach at the church when I was 14 (my apologies to those poor people, but I also thank them for letting me get some practice). Pastor Hall also got me my first minister’s license later that year
• Mr. Baines, my Language Arts teacher in 7th grade, took my natural talent for writing and transformed it into a passionate life goal by encouraging me to pursue it
• Mark and Micki Kassinger volunteered to lead our youth group of 5 students even though we were pretty flakey. They were the ones who helped me begin to have self esteem in a pretty turbulent time in life
• Dan Pantano, my youth pastor when I moved to California in 1985, made me his right-hand man. He taught me a lot about youth ministry. Before I started going to his church, I didn’t even know there was such a thing as a youth pastor
• The late Dana Walling, a college professor of mine, was quoted by a friend of to have said behind my back that, “In a few years Dennis is going to be a strong youth pastor.” He likely knew those words would make their way back to me.

All of these memories of encouragement and vision casting into my life led me to be the youthworker I am today.

A caring adult filling in for my dad, teaching me how to tie a tie among a myriad of other things, youth leaders, pastors, professors – all heroes in my life. They serve as beacons in my past shining a light to help me to stay on course for my future.

These were all ordinary people like you and me. Many of them have never met each other, but they all make up the examples for who I want to be and the type of person I want to become as a Christ-follower. Thanks to how they allowed Christ to use them, I now serve others with the same desire to make a lasting impact.

Here are some principles from them that I use in ministry today:

• Ditch the chaperone mode and invest relationally in students
• Show up fully prepared to lead and mentor, not just hoping to fill time
• Breathe life and encouragement into students
• Have the tough conversations without fear of pushing them away – that’s where the relational side of ministry must be present

When students look back in life, I want God’s work through me to be in the trophy room of their memories. Will they point back to these efforts as beacons for Christ in their lives when they go through dark times? Will they exemplify them in the way they serve others?

Ministry is strategic, intentional and should be life-changing over time. My efforts must, then, be more than keeping them safe and out of earshot of the deacons’ council. My ministry to them must be targeted to building beacons in their lives like people built for me.

I want to construct beacons in their present that will guide them one day from their past. That’s what others did for me. That’s what I want to do for them. That’s what I want them to be for others one day. I would love nothing more than to send out beacon builders for Christ who will continue lighting a life-altering path that others lit for me and I’m lighting for them.

Traditions get kind of a “that’s my grandpa’s generation” reputation around the church. I’m kind of a fan of tradition and rites of passage. I believe it’s important to have a connection from one generation to the next.

All of this came to the forefront of my mind tonight when I saw a guy wearing a Kappa Phi Kappa sweatshirt. I was a member of Kappa Phi Kappa in college. It turned out this guy went to the same college so we were part of the same chapter, but separated by over a decade in active membership.

This stranger and I spent about 20 minutes talking about traditions and legends of the fraternal order. Our conversation included rituals and legends. It was funny that he knew about some of the stories that happened when I was in college. I was able to fill in some gaps in his information.

While it was fun to talk about that stuff, it really doesn’t mean anything to me. I would much rather have that conversation about the heritage of the church; sharing legends and filling in gaps in information about that, instead. I don’t really have those conversations, though.

I remember Tony Campolo getting us all worked up about protecting the heritage of the church and passing down the traditions to the next generation. The 2,500 youth workers in attendance were all whipped into a frenzy on the topic that year at the National Youth Workers’ Convention. Since that time, the concept has been dormant in my mind. I wish it wasn’t. I’d like to do something about it. I’m glad I have a platform as a small group leader and blogger to begin the conversation.

Even as I write this, my mind goes to the pain in the past of the church. I believe it’s important to pass on the good with the bad. It’s who we are and what we want the next generation to avoid becoming.

Got comments about keeping the heritage of the church alive? I’d love to read them.