You can find the Making Sense of Ministry podcast on all major platforms including Spotify, Apple Podcast, and Audible.
In today’s conversation, Heather and Joel Pancoast from Gator Wesley join us to discuss serving in ministry alongside your spouse. If you are married and in ministry, this is an excellent episode for you.
You can find the Making Sense of Ministry podcast on all major platforms including Spotify, Apple Podcast, and Audible.
Do you struggle to get young people to engage with Scripture? Have you ever considered the impact of the ministry of presence?
In this episode, Kirsten and Brian invite Joel Lusz from Suntree United Methodist Church into a conversation around how to engage students with Scripture and the impact of incarnational ministry.
You can find the Making Sense of Ministry podcast on all major platforms including Spotify, Apple Podcast, and Audible.
Are you searching for your next ministry role? Or perhaps you might be in the near future?
In this episode, Kirsten and Brian invite Maresi Brown into a conversation around how to land your next youth or children’s ministry job. And because we work with churches all around the country, we know what they are looking for in candidates.
Have you ever experienced feedback? Even the best feedback can be challenging to receive. Now imagine receiving that feedback on stage, in front of your entire group. Watch as Josh shares about his recent experience.
INTERESTED IN A BECOMING A BETTER MINISTRY LEADER?
Youth Ministry Institute leadership coaching is designed to give you the tools to become a healthier, better, and more complete ministry leader.
Josh is originally from Sevierville, TN and now lives in Knoxville where he serves as Director of Students at Cokesbury Church. Josh has been in Student Ministry for more than a decade. On par with loving students is his desire to see student workers succeed and be equipped for the joys and challenges of Student Ministry. Josh is married to Ginny and dad to Mattie and Beau. Outside of church work, he loves golf, Tennessee Volunteers football (naturally), and Kansas Jayhawks basketball (unnaturally, but it feels right).
It can be a difficult task to make a difference in a student’s life. Sometimes, it can feel like there are many obstacles that you have to deal with to impact students. While that is true, if your students are connecting with each other, you will definitely find it easier to impact the students in your ministry positively.
If you’ve done youth ministry for any length of time, you have probably discovered that this does not generally happen on its own. So, what are some things that might keep your students from connecting with each other?
Here are four reasons in particular that your students are not connecting.
FOUR REASONS YOUR STUDENTS ARE NOT CONNECTING
You Have Not Created a Culture of Fun
I know, I know. “Youth ministry is more than just fun and games.” That is true. But, students most easily step into new friendships and strengthen old ones in fun situations. I am sure you remember this from your middle and high school years as well.
So, be intentional about the games that you play; think them through beforehand. Who is going to enjoy this game? Is the playing field relatively even? Is it fun to watch for those who are not playing or who got eliminated? Are you repeating the same games over and over again?
You also need to be intentional in including fun in your youth ministry events calendar. Make space for students to connect out in the world. Play mini-golf. Spend a day at the beach. Schedule a movie night. Have a silly theme one youth group night. Just be sure to do things your students will enjoy together.
One of the great things about youth ministry is that it puts students together who might not otherwise socialize. Make the most of those times.
Prayer is Not a Big Enough Part of The Ministry
I love to see students develop memories or inside jokes from a game or trip, but that is not a connection that will get them through tough times. Simply having students share prayer requests aloud in the group allows them to be vulnerable in the group. As they do that, others connect to that vulnerability.
Praying allowed shows students that they are not alone in their struggles.
Additionally, students can start to see how much another student cares for them when they hear them pray aloud. I am sure that you have vivid memories of how loved you felt when hearing someone else’s prayers for you. While your students may not articulate or even understand it, hearing other students pray for them goes a long way toward greater connectedness.
You Do Not Have a Plan For New Students
What do you do when a new student shows up and does not have a friend with them? If you cross your fingers and hope they make some new friends, that will probably not work out. At the very least, you need to get some information from them and/or their parents upfront.
What is their current grade? What school do they attend? How did they hear about your ministry? Questions like these can tell you whether or not you already have some students in your group whom they might know or with which to connect.
“You go to __ school? So does Ashley! Let me introduce you to her!”
While this does not guarantee a student will return, it will develop a better culture of connection among your students.
Some of your students are going to open up more naturally than others. But a lot of your students will find it easier to be open and honest about their lives in a smaller group setting. So you need to create small group opportunities regularly.
This might mean adding meeting times throughout the week or month specifically for small groups. Or it might mean that you plan to have your whole group broken up into smaller groups after your message regularly. Whatever method you prefer, make sure you are creating small group opportunities. Your students will find meaningful connections with each other a lot easier this way.
As your students become more and more connected to each other, you will find that barriers to spiritual growth begin to disappear. Be intentional in connecting students to each other. They will be a lot more likely to stick it out in their faith if they are walking toward Jesus side-by-side.
Skylar Jones serves as Youth and Family Minister at St. Barnabas Episcopal Church in DeLand, FL. He has worked in many different capacities since he began serving the church nearly 20 years ago. Skylar is married and has a son. He met his wife at Berry College, in Rome, GA, where he graduated with a bachelor’s degree in English. He enjoys sports, music, long walks on the beach, and anything made by Reese’s. Click the social links below to engage with Skylar.
Teenagers tend to naturally leave their parents in the dark. Should we do the same as Youth Ministers? And how important is parent communication?
When I was growing up in youth ministry (in the ’90s), my parents were both very involved in my youth programing. My mom was the snack lady and my dad was the mission trip guy. They were not weekly small group leaders, but my friends’ parents were. I know that I loved having meaningful relationships with my friends’ moms and dads. Plus, I think my parents appreciated having other trusted parents in the “know” when it came to what was going on in my life. Because of my upbringing, youth ministry and parents go hand-in-hand for me.
Later in life, when I started in youth ministry, the question that all churches and Youth Ministers were wrestling with was, “Should teens be a Mickey Mouse ear to the church, or do we involve parents and the rest of the church in youth ministry?”
I have known Youth Ministers that have chosen to not have parents as volunteers. I have also known those that only relay information about their program to teens directly.
But I have to ask – we all know that teenagers do not have fully developed brains, right? This is not a secret. So why are we trusting the information that we as leaders share with them is getting back to their parents? We’ve all played telephone before – it always gets botched up at the end!
Parents really are such a vital part of youth ministry and it can be a real miss for youth programs that leave parents in the dark. A popular youth curriculum called “Orange” has a strategy for how they market their youth ministry:
“We believe that two combined influences make a greater impact than just two individual influences. No one has more potential to influence a kid than their parent. The average church only has 40 hours in a given year to influence a life; the average parent has 3,000 hours per year to influence a life.”
You want parents not only to be informed about what’s happening in the youth ministry but also want them to root for you. They may even cheer you on for being such an awesome communicator.
So how should you communicate with parents? As a communications major, my line of thinking is always OVER communicate! Email. Text. Handouts. Social Media. Newsletters. Word of mouth. Phone Calls. Face-to-face gatherings or meetings over coffee.
Need help communicating with parents? Take a look at the impact YMI Coaching can have on your ministry!
They say it takes someone seven different times to hear something before they fully absorb the information. You will still get a handful of youth and parents saying they “didn’t know” or “didn’t hear.” But if you know you have put the information out there multiple times and in multiple ways, you have done your part and can rest your head easy at night.
We, as youth ministers, communicate and let parents into our ministries because we know that we cannot do our jobs well without their support, their relationships, and their knowledge. We are a part of their village helping to influence their teens, not the other way around.
Parents deserve clear and consistent communication from their youth ministers because we are their support system. Consequently, they become ours as well!
Emily Felgenhauer is a graduate of the Youth Ministry Institute and became a certified Youth Minister in 2010. She has been in youth ministry for 14 years between two different churches in the Florida United Methodist Conference. She recently began serving as the Director of Youth Ministry at First United Methodist Church of Lakeland. Emily currently lives in Brandon, FL with her chocolate lab named Cubby.
As a kid, church was a normal part of my life. During the week, I can remember attending children’s choir practice. I remember children’s church on Sunday mornings. I remember Easter egg hunts at the pastor’s house, and Christmas plays in the sanctuary. Mostly, I remember being one of the rising sixth-graders anxiously awaiting the day I could move up to youth group.
The youth room in our church was the coolest in the building. There were brightly colored couches, a ping pong table, and a fridge filled with soda! I couldn’t wait to cross that threshold as a rising sixth-grader!
I honestly don’t remember a lot about starting youth group but I remember feeling shy around the older kids. But I don’t remember the logistics of how things progressed. I remember we had “move-up Sunday.” As a graduating fifth-grader, I received a Bible and that afternoon, I started attending youth group.
As a youth minister, I want to be more conscious of the transition of sixth-graders into my youth group – I want them to be as excited about starting youth group as I was, and I want their experience to be memorable.
Before Sixth-Graders Join Your Youth Ministry
Plug into the Kids’ Ministry
I make it a point to work closely with the children’s minister. We are in constant communication about annual events (VBS, Easter egg hunts, Trunk or Treat, etc.) I try to be a regular fixture and volunteer for all major kids’ ministry events.
Maybe that means being a small group leader for the fifth-graders during Vacation Bible School. Or maybe that means helping lead crafts at the annual Easter fest. After all, they will be rising sixth-graders soon!
I also try to work a few multi-generational events into our regular calendar. A couple of times a year, we host movie nights for all ages. We host a Parents Night Out – an evening for parents to drop their kids at church for free childcare (provided by adult volunteers and teens from the youth group) while they enjoy a few hours on their own.
Allowing time for the teens and children to interact is crucial in helping ease the transition from one program to another. Events like these allow the teens to practice their leadership and mentoring skills and they allow the kids to engage with the teens in personal and tangible ways.
Becoming a regular presence for the children and allowing teens to do so will grant the ability to begin building relationships early. In addition, it will allow you to learn the names of those kids getting ready to join youth group and help the kids feel at ease when it’s their time to move up.
Get to Know the Parents
I’m not a parent, but I am an aunt. Watching my nieces and nephews grow up is an exciting and slightly heartbreaking time. I love watching them discover new things! I love watching them grow. But I also wish time would slow down a little. I can imagine parents feel the same way, probably multiplied by ten!
Being a regular presence in the children’s ministry will not only allow you to get to know the kids, but it will also give you a space to get to know the parents. Opening the doors to parents and building relationships with them will help put them at ease as their child is a fifth-grader prepared to move up into youth ministry.
Rising Sixth-Graders Youth Group Preview Day
As the school year draws to a close, it may be beneficial to offer a preview day for parents and rising sixth graders to learn about youth group. This could be a time to allow youth and parents to explore the youth meeting location, to interact with the volunteer team, for the youth minister to share the mission and vision of the youth program, and for parents to ask questions and voice any concerns they may have. This can also be a time to set a starting date for new youth to start attending regular youth group meetings and events.
Personal Follow-up
Consider the follow-up and personal touches that can make a new youth feel significant. After your preview day with youth-written letters welcoming each sixth-grader to the youth group family. The letter will likely end up in their bible, bulletin board, or book. Wherever the letter ends up is insignificant – what will matter is the statement of value it makes to the recipient.
I think we can all agree, the step from the children’s ministry into the youth ministry is a big one – and not just for the kids. It can be exciting and scary for the kids and the parents. I’ve lost youth in the past by not properly helping prepare them. As Youth Ministers, we can help make that transition easier for the new sixth-graders by collaborating with parents to make their kids as comfortable as possible, by building relationships early and nurturing those relationships as the kids become teens.
Sarah Taylor has been the youth director at Gulf Cove United Methodist Church in Port Charlotte, Florida, since 2017. She has a Master’s Degree in Youth Ministry from Wesley Seminary as well as a Master of Fine Arts in Creative Writing. She loves books and writing, has a borderline obsession with Harry Potter and Gilmore Girls, and loves Cherry Pepsi. She lives in North Port, Florida, with her 14-year-old cat, Milo.
You know the urge. You look around the youth room, your program, or even the team and think – I really need to make changes. But should you? How do you properly time change in ministry?
A Change of Photos
When I started in my position, nearly four years ago, I remember walking into the youth room. One of the first things I saw was a bulletin board covered in photos of kids I didn’t know. There were photos from mission trips from years prior, photos of boat trips and trips to Disney and local water parks. The faces smiling back at me were kids long aged out of the youth program.
Immediately, I saw a change in ministry that I needed to make.
I knew to help move things forward, this board (or at least the photos) would have to come down. I also knew I needed to be careful.
While those pictures may have been dated by a few years, one young person’s face in those photos was still active within the youth ministry. I knew he’d had a strong connection with the previous Youth Minister, and I didn’t want to do anything to fracture that connection.
Those were some of his memories on that board. So, I left it alone for about a year.
When I felt the time was right, I asked the young person for his blessing in taking the photos down. I asked him to help me, allowed him to look through the photos and keep the ones he wanted. The rest we put into box and stored in a closet in the youth room.
It was a minor change. But it was a step toward making the youth room a space belonging to the current group. It gave us a chance to begin making our own memories to display.
So, when is it okay to make changes (big or small) in a youth ministry?
Timing Change
If you are just getting started in a new ministry, it can be easy to start making changes immediately. I would caution against this, for at least six months – maybe even a year.
Giving yourself, and the youth group, that time to grow relationally is critical. It gives you time to get a feel for the ministry and to build relationships with young people and adults.
Listening Well
Allow the young people, the volunteers, and parents involved in the ministry to share their hearts.
Let them share what has worked well in the past (along with why they think it worked well). And let them share stories of things that maybe haven’t worked well. This can be a great time for them to share their thoughts on what changes they’d like to see.
Your Vision For Changes
You can also take this time to share ideas for things you would like to do – whether it’s introducing a new program, a new lesson, or maybe it’s getting rid of an old program.
The key is to allow for open communication for those potentially impacted by the change.
When to Make Immediate Changes
Sometimes, though, waiting isn’t the best option. And sometimes the changes we need to make aren’t major. Sometimes the change needs to be an internal one.
I tend to teach by the Socratic Method. I present a topic, have teens share in reading Scripture, and lead their discussion by asking questions.
Sometimes this works. Sometimes it doesn’t.
I’ve learned that by changing the way I present a lesson can make a drastic difference in how the teens respond. If discussion isn’t flowing, maybe I try lecturing for a time. Or maybe we try a video series for a few weeks. Or maybe we skip the lesson altogether and just spend time together.
Sometimes the change has to be an internal one – an acceptance that, as the Youth Minister, we don’t always get it right.
We have to be willing to be flexible and adapt to the immediate needs of our teens.
Changing Sunday School
Let’s face it, we’ve all been faced with the issue of change within our ministries. Sometimes the changes are big. Sometimes they’re small.
One change I made within my own ministry was to do away with Sunday school. It was a major change I made about a year after my hire.
I’d just read Sticky Faith and felt a connection to the suggestion within the pages. But the ultimate reason was to better allow my youth to be present during worship.
Sunday school took place during the 9:30 worship service. Young people would come to church with their families; their parents would attend worship while we left the church building to go to our youth room. We’d spend 45 minutes chatting, sometimes struggling through a lesson, and then try to make it back to the worship service in time for communion.
The teens would then leave church with their families, sometimes never engaging with the broader church community.
I felt like the young people were isolated. Adults in the church didn’t see the teens regularly, and the young people did little to interact with the broader congregation. So, I made a change.
Primary Purpose of Change
Change within a ministry program should always be about fostering relationships. Priority should always be given to fostering the teens’ relationship with God.
Is the change allowing for growth? Will this change help young people to experience God in a new and personal way? Is the change fostering relationships within the broader church community? Are teens being engaged and challenged in their faith by others outside their immediate church circles?
If I can answer yes to these questions, I feel like the youth ministry is headed in the right direction. If not, well then maybe there’s a change in the making.
Sarah Taylor has been the youth director at Gulf Cove United Methodist Church in Port Charlotte, Florida, since 2017. She has a Master’s Degree in Youth Ministry from Wesley Seminary as well as a Master of Fine Arts in Creative Writing. She loves books and writing, has a borderline obsession with Harry Potter and Gilmore Girls, and loves Cherry Pepsi. She lives in North Port, Florida, with her 14-year-old cat, Milo.
Have you ever thought that ownership and talents go together? Perhaps the teens in your youth group are just looking for a place to use their talents. And I wonder, could talents be a key to their faith?
If your youth group is anything like mine, you’ve got a hodge-podge of teens with various gifts, talents, and skills. My group currently has one extremely talented athlete whose goal is to try out for every sport her school offers before high school. We have a few musicians in our group – many of them active in their school orchestras. One of our middle school boys loves to dance and isn’t shy about doing so every time a song comes on with a decent beat.
We also have an aspiring chef in our group! He’s currently enrolled in the culinary program at the local community technical college. He wants to go to culinary school after graduation and open his own restaurant.
Considering Our Purpose And Their Talents
Now bear with me for just a moment…
My goal as Youth Minister is to introduce my teens to the gospel. It is my desire to share with them the love of Jesus Christ and to equip them to do the same for others.
That said, it is also my goal to help develop them as young people. It is my goal to support them and encourage them in their individual endeavors. It is my goal to speak affirmation into their lives as they pursue their interests and passions. Giving teens an avenue to explore their gifts, within the scope of the church and ministry, is a great way to help cultivate their spirituality.
Young people will learn through experience, what their faith is about, how to express it, and ways to grow in their faith.
If I can encourage them to display their talents within the church setting, a young person who feels jaded toward the church may find their heart opening to God in a new and real way. Not only does this give the teens an avenue of expression, but it also allows them to feel invested and valued within the church family – to experience God in a way they may never have before.
Allowing teens to use their talents helps develop them as individuals and helps them learn what worship means. It helps them experience worship in outside-the-box ways, perhaps bringing them to the realization that worship does not just have to look one certain way.
So what are some ways we can open avenues for young people to use their talents within our ministries?
3 Avenues For Young People To Use Their Talents
Youth Sunday
Most of us have led Sunday morning worship with our teens at least once. This is a prime time to showcase our young people, to allow them to help lead worship in intimate and personal ways.
Maybe you have some musicians who can step up and lead the congregation in song. Perhaps the thespians in your group would step out and lead worship with a skit. Maybe that middle school boy who loves to dance can do a freestyle interpretive dance during the offertory!
Giving our teens this kind of outlet helps them to experience worship in new and personal ways. It allows them to take some ownership of how they express their adoration for God.
Youth Group
While youth Sunday seems to be a once-a-year occurrence, youth group happens at least once a week for most of us. Allowing young people to assume leadership of a youth group meeting (maybe even just once a month) is a great avenue for them to use their talents and gifts. Maybe they can write their own prayer, share their testimony, or write a devotion and share it with the group.
The musicians in your group can lead weekly worship for your meetings. Maybe you have a teen gifted in teaching. Allowing them to teach a lesson or preach could boost their confidence immensely!
What about the chef in your group? Why not let him fix a meal for the group! Instead of recruiting an adult from the congregation to supply tacos for your group, help the young chef create a menu and prepare a meal for your group once a month. This allows them to develop their skills, but it also allows you, as the leader, to show just how much you appreciate them.
Service Opportunities
Encouraging your teens to serve the community can be challenging. Focusing on the things that drive your teen will also drive their desire to serve.
That young chef in your group could help organize a community meal! Maybe the dancers and musicians in your group could lead a community workshop for kids – teaching the dances and songs of worship!
Perhaps, as the pandemic ends and facilities open, you can take those skills to a local nursing home. The athletes in your group could become coaches for community leagues. Upward is a great example of incorporating athletic skills, sportsmanship, and faith. They could even get plugged into their school’s FCA program and share their faith journey with others.
The key to engaging teens is to first learn what drives them and then tapping into those passions for the ministry. Teens will take ownership of a program and their faith when they feel they have something to offer. And they have so much to offer!
Sarah Taylor has been the youth director at Gulf Cove United Methodist Church in Port Charlotte, Florida, since 2017. She has a Master’s Degree in Youth Ministry from Wesley Seminary as well as a Master of Fine Arts in Creative Writing. She loves books and writing, has a borderline obsession with Harry Potter and Gilmore Girls, and loves Cherry Pepsi. She lives in North Port, Florida, with her 14-year-old cat, Milo.
