Archive for May, 2009

by Carol Bailey

Revelation 2:17 reveals that overcomers will receive a white stone inscribed with a new name in heaven. Today, receiving a rock with your name in gold might not be such a prize. This white stone represents our fresh start, our place in Christ’s heart “known only to him who receives it.”

One of the most consistent encouragers is Helen Ruth. For decades, she has sent hand-written cards to dozens among her family and friends on their birthday–practically a lost art. When her husband, Roy, was diagnosed with cancer, he created a chain of encouragement to continue after his death. He consulted a local jewelry designer who created a bracelet with replaceable links to hold precious stones. On the first Christmas after his death, Helen Ruth received a gift from Roy—a gold bracelet. On the second occasion, without realizing that the bracelet was incomplete, a gem for the bracelet arrived. Each subsequent holiday, she received another precious stone. Helen Ruth received the final jewel on the date of their fiftieth wedding anniversary.

The significance of Helen Ruth and Roy’s love may escape us. We did not witness the care that Helen Ruth offered to Roy during his final months. Similarly, no one knows the intimate details of our walk with Christ other than Him. He will assign our new name in heaven, based on the intricacies of those shared adventures.

As leaders, we cannot perceive what is going on inside our students. Even the toughest or most outgoing student struggles with whether he is loved, whether she is making a difference, or whether he is really God’s child. Our encouragement to persevere through their struggles represents treasure stored in heaven.

Just as Roy devised an earthly legacy in Helen Ruth’s gemstone bracelet, we leave an imprint on teens with our words. Only our students recognize what sort of mark we are leaving on their lives. Let’s encourage them to be overcomers and share in the rewards to come.

Carol Bailey is a freelance writer who has ministered alongside her husband, John, through the trenches of student ministry for over 20 years. Her claims to fame are her two daughters who have survived “the fishbowl” to the ripe old ages of 18 and 20. You can read more of their family’s tales at baileysonmission@blogspot.com.

by Carol Bailey

As believers we are salt to the world. We bring the preserving power from our Father into an otherwise decaying society. As in the salt analogy, a little encouragement can go along way with students. Encouragement takes many forms. From a positive comment about an extracurricular activity or recent achievement to an act of kindness that you have observed, look for creative ways to intersect your students’ lives.

A single sentence can build up or tear down. Checking our speech might alter the way that we interact with teens. The Lord hears every word that comes from our mouths. Finding positive ways to tease, rather than falling back on sarcasm, builds bridges rather than erecting walls with our students.

One way to speak Truth over your students’ lives is to pray Scripture. A friend in Arkansas taught me this gem when she wrote back after sensing a need in my life. Rather than shooting a message, “I’m praying for you,” she typed her prayer in the email. What a way to bathe our students in God’s Word!

Send messages that imitate God’s love letter to them. For example:

• I’m struggling with my temper: Lord, help Kyle be “quick to listen, slow to speak and slow to become angry” (James 1:19).
• I want to share my faith: Father, create in Candace a desire to be ready always “to give the reason for the hope” she has (1 Peter 3:15).
• I cannot forgive myself: Dear Lord, bathe Brandon in Your peace; reveal to him that there is “no condemnation” for him because Christ holds him safely (Romans 8:1).
• I want to know Christ: Father God, “my heart’s desire and prayer to [You] for [Anthony] is that [he] may be saved.”

Carol Bailey is a freelance writer who has ministered alongside her husband, John, through the trenches of student ministry for over 20 years. Her claims to fame are her two daughters who have survived “the fishbowl” to the ripe old ages of 18 and 20. You can read more of their family’s tales at baileysonmission@blogspot.com.

Ben Stroup,
Author of the new book Church Giving Matters

Fully funding your youth ministry will look different in every context. There is no one-size-fits-all solution. (Sorry!) Jesus told us that the harvest was plentiful but the workers were few. We typically interpret this with the lens of evangelism. I think this also applies to ministry funding. The easiest way to raise money is to tell a compelling story that inspires someone else to support (or better fund) your ministry. If transformation is taking place within the lives of your students, tell anyone and everyone who will listen. That begins with the people who sit in the pews of your church.

I’ve been in small church youth ministry. It’s tough. I remember the first few months I was one staff at my last church. The youth ministry seemed to be in a perpetual fund-raising mode. As a former youth minister and now pastor, I realized that planning and executing a fund-raising event was as complex and involved as the mission trips we were attempting to fund. I knew there had to be another way to fund what I believed to be one of the most important ministries of our church.

No one raised their hand when they decided to take on a ministry leadership position thinking they would ever have to deal with funding their ministry budgets. In fact, most people drawn to such positions are averse to the subject of money simply because it has been the bane of so many for so long.

However, no ministry leader can escape the subject of money. The reality is that ministry–even small church youth ministry–takes money. As the demands on small churches continue to increase, the tension of fully-funding that ministry rises. What I’ve done in Church Giving Matters is translate non-profit funding strategies into the language and practice of local church ministry. It’s not beyond the reach of any ministry leader, but it does require us to be intentional about EVERYTHING we do.

People give to causes or organizations that help them achieve something they can’t do on their own. Think of your church membership as investors. What do you think you’d need to tell them, or what would they need to hear in order to invest in your venture? Once you figure that out, you’ve done the hard part. Now, tell them. Only don’t tell them once, tell them again…and again…and again. Don’t be obnoxious, but realize that people forget, especially people who aren’t as close to the operations of your youth ministry as you are.

Giving is an outward sign of an inward commitment. When you capture the heart of the people in your pew, giving will follow. Since there are more than three times the number of traditional non-profits seeking the dollars of the people who sit in our pews, it’s essential that we make a compelling case grounded in the ministry and transformation taking place, something only the Church can foster and facilitate through the work of the Holy Spirit.

I know you can do this. We just have to begin thinking about the subject of funding ministry differently. A friend gave me some advice a long time ago that I tell myself often: Look it in the teeth (even if it bites back)!

Ben Stroup, Chief Broker of Opportunity
LifeWay Envelope Service
“More Money. More Ministry.”

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Editor’s Note: Ben’s new book, Church Giving Matters, releases in June. While it is not targeted to youth leaders in small churches, the principles are directly applicable to the work we do as small church youth leaders. For more information, check out www.churchgivingmatters.com.

What are the signs that a teenager has been discipled? I suppose there are a lot of things that should be different about a teenager who is growing in his or her faith. However, when teenagers are discipled to the point that they can disciple others, they are on the right track.

The research for my dissertation identified seven youth ministry essentials agreed upon by youth leaders from 27 countries on six continents.

Essential 6: Disciple youth to the point that they can disciple others.

While youth ministers all over the world seem to value guiding youth to disciple others, I suspect they struggle as much with how to make this happen as youth leaders in America do. Small churches may actually have an advantage over large churches in accomplishing this. Small youth groups are usually tight, like a family of older and younger siblings. Yes, they may fight like siblings, but they also know each other well and usually care deeply about each other.

A few years ago, I was serving as volunteer youth minister to a small church with four high schoolers and six or seven middle schoolers. Everyone was in one Bible study class. As you would expect, the high schoolers were irritated by the noise of the middle schoolers. I decided to plan a retreat for the high schoolers. We didn’t have the money to do anything else, so we had the retreat at my house. Three of the four students agreed to come.

I really wanted the high schoolers to get about three ideas, so that’s what we spent our time on in the retreat. First, I led them to understand that they were leaders. Whether they chose to lead in a positive way or a negative way, younger students would follow them. Second, I helped them to understand that they needed to being investing in their own spiritual lives if they were going to offer any help or support to the younger students. Finally, I told them they needed to be ministering to younger youth as they were receiving ministry. We divided the middle schoolers up into groups and the three high schoolers each took responsibility for loving and encouraging some of the younger students.

Leading youth to be disciples is good, but leading youth to be disciplers is really the point.

The concluding episode of this year’s “Celebrity Apprentice” pitted 75 year old comedian Joan Rivers against poker champion Annie Duke. Donald Trump’s Board Room was a malicious fight between these two stalwart women. It boiled down to this: Annie accused Joan of personal attacks on her. And she was right. Joan accused Annie of being two-faced, acting calm and business like in the Board room but talking about her viciously behind her back. And she was also right. I can’t think of two better examples for those of us who work with teenagers. Examples of what not to be, that is.

For my dissertation, I researched objectives that youth leaders all over the world would agree are essential to youth ministry. Seven essentials had high agreement among the 102 youth leaders from 27 countries. Six of those dealt specifically with what we are trying to accomplish in the lives of teenagers. Essential seven, however, dealt with who we are as youth leaders.

Essential 7: As youth leaders, be honest, genuine, and sincere in relating to youth.

In Ephesians 4:15, Paul called believers to speak the truth in love. Are we willing to speak the truth to our teenagers?

• They need to know the truth about the faith. They don’t need more time to talk about the football game. (That’s what math class is for.) They need to know what the Bible says and what it means.
• They need to know the truth about themselves. At times teenagers lack character. They need to know that you care enough to tell them it is wrong when they hurt another student with their words. They need you to tell them when their harsh words to their parents is wrong. Of course, they also need to know that they are carefully made and greatly loved by their Father.
• They need to know the truth about you. This may be the hardest. We like to make ourselves out to be super Christians around the youth. Okay, it’s not true of me or you either. We are flawed. We sin. We struggle to do the right thing. We hurt other people. And we need to be honest with youth about who we really are. The exciting thing is, we are in good company. Nearly everyone in the Bible had the same flaws we have.

However, being genuine is not enough. Paul called us to speak the truth IN LOVE. The point that Joan Rivers missed in her tyrade against Annie Duke was that God has no intention of us being honestly cruel or honestly hurtful. We are called to GENUINELY love. We don’t have the right to not love some of our students. They need to know that we truly love them . . . regardless of the other truths we share with them.

This is a great addition to the 7 Essentials. Yes, we must disciple teenagers. But, who we are is more important than what we say if we are to make disciples.

It’s hard to find good statistical numbers, but most youth leaders are concerned about the number of young people who graduate from their youth groups, head off to college, and drop out of church. Maybe in our efforts to make our youth ministries relevant to the needs of youth, we have failed to give them a faith they can build their lives on.

For my dissertation, I studied objectives that youth leaders in various countries about the world agreed to be essential to youth ministry. Seven essential youth ministry objectives surfaced in my study. This week, I’m thinking about Essential 5.

Essential 5: Guide youth to build faith that will last for a lifetime.

I suspect there are a lot of components to this, but let me suggest three. First, youth need to gain a big-picture knowledge of the Bible. Learning to recite John 3:16 and to know what 1 Corinthians 6 says about sex are good things, but they aren’t enough for youth to build a lifelong faith on. Youth need to understand the story of the Bible and how their lives fit into God’s story.

Second, youth need to be invested in ministry. My friend Dr. Rick Yount is fond of telling his classes that the Dead Sea is dead because it takes in lots of water but never has any water flowing out. We were designed not just to receive ministry, but to give as well. Teenagers who invest in ministry will be better equipped to live out their faith as they grow older.

Third, youth need to learn to put their faith into words. American teenagers have difficulty talking about their faith in anything more than feelings. Youth need to be able to express what they believe and why they believe it.

Does Christian faith have anything to do with cheating at school? A leader in one of my youth groups from past years told me it didn’t. Can teenagers love God and be racists? What does a person’s faith have to do with their television habits, or arguments with a neighbor, or padding your time-sheet with a few extra minutes? Most of us would insist that being a faithful follower of Christ impacts every area of our lives, but do our teenagers get that?

For my dissertation, I studied the objectives youth leaders on six different continents agreed were essential for youth ministry. They agreed on seven essentials.

Essential 4: Disciple youth to follow Christ in every area of their lives.

Total life discipleship may be a stretch for American teenagers. It is not because they can’t intellectually capture the idea that God should have control over everything they do as he guides them. It is that they have seen so few examples of adults who actually live that way. How do you show them the call of God to follow him in every area of their lives?

1. Live it. Let them see you make decisions . . . struggle through decisions . . . with your faith in God being your primary concern.

2. Confess when you fail. Nothing helps kids more than knowing that their teachers are human. Of course, use good boundaries. Your kids don’t need to know about sensitive issues of your life and you should never use your kids as your accountability partners. However, letting them know that you struggle sometimes to follow God in every area of your life teaches them how to struggle through those issues themselves.

3. Love them through failures. Your youth will mess up. They will disappoint you. Love them in those situations and bring God into the conversation by assuring them of his love and of your prayers for them.

4. Teach them how to make spiritual decisions. It may seem simplistic to talk about the importance of prayer, good counsel, biblical principles, and sensitivity to what the Holy Spirit is doing in and around you, but many kids just don’t get those things. Because of their adolescent brains, they tend to make decisions based on their feelings rather than God’s direction.

Involving youth in leadership in the youth group and in the church is a lot easier in a small church than it is in a big church. Teenagers who invest as leaders in the church are likely to be the leaders in their churches as adults. How do you get your teenagers involved? Rick Chromey has a good chapter on that issue in his book, Youth Ministry in Small Churches.

Chromey suggests this process for getting kids involved in the leadership of your church:

1. Identify the needed gifts. Think about leadership positions in the church: running sound, distributing bulletins, serving on the hospitality team. Then identify what gifts, skills, and/or characteristics a person needs to have to do that job.
2. Recruit young people. Ask individual kids who you believe possess the right skills to take on specific jobs. Chromey suggests that you describe the job to the youth and then give them time to evaluate it. If he or she says no, accept their answer, but find out why. Ask if he or she would be interested in other jobs.
3. Plan together. Talk about what needs to be done and how to best tackle it.
4. Train the young person. Chromey says that adequate training will continue until the youth is competent at his or her job.
5. Support and consult. Be available to the young person should he or she need help with the job.
6. Evaluate. Help the youth to determine what is going well and what needs improvement.

Involving youth in leadership may be more work than doing the job yourself, but it is worth the effort. Students will learn more while they are leading. And they will have more invested in your church.

When asked to list the challenges of leading a small church, a group of pastors identified “lack of commitment” as one of the biggest issues. As a youth leader in a small church, you probably feel this deeply. You know you need other adults helping with the youth. After months of searching, you finally find someone who will co-teach the youth class with you on Sundays. She shows up one week, shows up late the next, and quits the third. How do you deal with the lack of commitment that can be a problem in the small church?

First, understand that low commitment is not unique to small churches. Few churches of any size (or other organizations that depend on volunteers) have volunteers who always follow through with what they commit to . . . or will even commit at all. Whether it is a problem with over-commitment, immaturity, or lack of spiritual depth, low commitment in volunteer leaders can be a consistent problem. Some larger churches solve the problem by paying people to do all of the essential functions of ministry. That usually isn’t possible for smaller churches.

1. When you enlist a new volunteer . . . whether it is to plan a fun event or to teach an on-going Bible study class . . . make an appointment to sit down and talk about the job. Be clear about what you are asking them to do. Help them to understand how much time it will take. Then, give them time to pray and think about the job before they make a decision.

2. Give them responsibility. People want to be involved in things in which they believe they are making a difference. Asking someone to sit in on your Bible study may be good for you, but probably doesn’t give a new leader a sense that he is investing much in the youth group. Asking him to plan part of the lesson will give him more of a sense of investment.

3. Let them do things their way. When the youth group is accustomed to doing things your way, it may be hard for them and for you to let someone lead in a different way. As long as their way is biblical and ethical, let them try doing things differently.

4. Applaud the efforts of other volunteers. Everyone likes to feel appreciated. Find ways to help your leaders feel valued by the church, the kids, and by you.

5. Be realistic about your expectations. You may never find anyone as excited about youth ministry as you are. You may never find anyone who will invest the time you will. Set others up for success by making the job manageable for them. Finding four or five leaders who will help in small ways is probably better than finding one who will invest in everything you are doing.

Commitment may be a problem in small churches, but don’t let that discourage you. Keep looking for people who will lead smaller parts of the ministry and then encourage them. Some people will disappoint you, but you will find some who will step up in ways they never have before.

A few years ago, I was encouraging youth to bring their Bibles to Bible study. (Novel idea, I know.) I made a big deal about it, even gave kids candy when they had a Bible with them. It worked . . . sort of. Within a few weeks, most of the kids had a Bible with them for Bible study. Some of them would go find a pew Bible and bring it into class. A couple of guys came up with a more creative solution. They just left their Bibles in a cabinet in the classroom. When I asked how they were studying the Bible at home if their Bibles were always at church, they just gave me a blank stare.

In the research for my dissertation, youth leaders all over the world agreed on 7 essential objectives for youth ministry. It should probably not be any surprise that this was an essentials:

Essential 3: Guide youth to spend time with Jesus in prayer and Bible study as a way of developing their relationship with him.

Teenagers today are about as religious as American teenagers have been for as long as we have been measuring such things. The disappointing thing is few of them know the truths of the Bible, can identify the stories of Scripture, or spend any time perusing (let alone studying) the Word of God. That’s a pretty big disconnect. So, how do we instill the essential disciplines of prayer and Scripture in their lives?

1. Help them understand the purpose. Few of us really get excited about new routines to add to our lives. Teenagers feel full-up with studying. While prayer and Bible study are disciplines, they are not the cold, dead routines teenagers may imagine. How many of them would let a love letter (er . . . romantic Facebook message) from a boyfriend/girlfriend sit around for weeks before they read it? When they see the goal of prayer and Bible study as being the deepening of their love relationship with Christ, they are on the right track.

2. Acknowledge that prayer and Bible study take effort and time. It’s okay for teenagers to begin doing Bible study by looking at a few verses a day or spending about 10 or 15 minutes. However, don’t short-sell the importance of time alone with the Lord. Help them to understand that spending time with God needs to be a priority in their lives.

3. Give them a plan. Often teenagers look at the Bible and get overwhelmed. Where do you start if you really want to hear from God? Give them tools to use in both praying and studying. Help them to find a time and place to spend with Jesus. Answer their questions, but also help them to learn to find the answers for themselves.