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Summer Success Stories: RJ
A year ago RJ's parents brought him to youth group. He was mixed up in drugs and failing school. Neither of them had any interest in church or the things of God and in fact were almost anti-Christianity. But they knew RJ needed something to change his life. After a year of ups and downs, we went to camp this summer and RJ finally surrendered his life to Christ.
Within three weeks of Ryan accepting Jesus I had the privilege of leading RJ's sister, who had not previously had any interest in Christianity and had even gotten very mildly involved in paganism, to Christ.
Then within three week
s of her accepting Christ I had RJ's two parents in my office completely broken and in awe of what God was doing in their kids lives and they to accepted Jesus Christ. This family had made a 100% turn toward Jesus!
RJ shipped out for the Army at the beginning of August and now his sister is one of our greatest evangelists, who is willing to share the Gospel with ANYONE! His parents are both regularly attending Bible studies and have actually put together a plan for how to reach some of their co-workers and family members withe message of Jesus!
From Frank in Texas
September 02 2010 - Posted By: Adam McLane | 0 Comments
Summer Success Stories: Jason
David, one of our youth workers, was diagnosed with cancer and was dying. So Jason wanted to show his love and prayer by drawing a picture of the youth leaders heart and God touching and healing it making him well. The David ended up dying and this spurredJason on in art work to create what was flowing out of him.
Jason had never picked up a pen or paint brush before last october. in January of 2010, he entered some of his art work in show and won first place. Then, he went on to win several other awards. In March of this year I took him and 10 other youth to Minnesota to work with homeless men and women. It was there that God exploded Jason's heart even more for working with people on the streets.
Since February of 2010 this student has worked every single Friday night with a ministry in our town with homeless families which provides food and conversation. This summer I found out he has now merged the two by teaching art classes to the homeless men and women.
I'm blown away by this quiet, girl jean wearying, emo-dressing teen whose heart is finding God and his purpose through loving others and art.
From Brit in Colorado
September 01 2010 - Posted By: Adam McLane | 1 Comments
NYWC: The Naysayer
Who is with me?
August 31 2010 - Posted By: Adam McLane | 1 Comments
Transition Story Part 2: The New Guys
My family has been transitioning out of a church family and youth ministry position where we had served for nine-plus years. Saying good-bye was nothing short of hard, as you can imagine. I learned a lot through the process and I wanted to share some of my story over a series of three posts. Read part one here.
PART TWO: What I Learned While Working With the New Guys
It’s already uncomfortable, don’t make it more so. No matter how excited you and the new guys are about the transition, it can always be a little awkward meeting for the first time. I met Derick and Pam on a Sunday morning, their first time visiting their potential new church home – they were still being considered for the position at the time. I recognized him from his online profiles and greeted him at the door.
Here’s what Derick had to say of the experience on his blog: “He introduced himself and helped me get set up for music. Meeting with him that day was not an uncomfortable experience. He was not aggressive towards me. He was not hostile as some men would be when faced with the person who could possibly be the one to carry on the work that he had spent over nine years building.”
Do what you can to make those coming in feel welcome.
Why can’t we be friends? Allowing time for the transition. If the transition is a healthy one in your church, I highly recommend a period of time where the new leaders can spend some time in the office at the new church with the old guard. In my particular situation, the church leaders gave us a month to work together. We planned it so that Derick and Pam could watch us do ministry for a couple of weeks, then doing it together with them, and finally being present in the background as they led and planned their first services.
I understand that an overlapping period like this isn’t possible for all churches and or transitions, but it goes so far in helping the new leaders and students in the transition process. If it is at all feasible, try to make it happen. This time period gave my wife and I the opportunity to repeatedly champion the student ministry’s new leaders and encourage the students that God was going to take the student ministry into the next season.
Let them be themselves. Let it go. The student ministry is not yours to shape anymore. We tried to communicate to the students that while things might look and/or feel different for a while, that Derick and Pam were the ones who were entrusted to lead. It might be hard to see colors on the web site change, song choices morph, and the format sway from your preferred style to another, but it’s important to remember that God didn’t make the news guys to be a “new you”. He’s given them their own personality, styles, and giftings. Encourage them to be who God created them to be.
On the opposite end of the spectrum, Derick and Pam verbally communicated that – for the next year – they planned on keeping the format pretty similar to the way we ran things during our tenure. I think that’s wisdom, too. It takes time for groups to adopt to change.
Share your ideas, learnings and resources. You may not feel like an expert on the matter, but you know more about your students than the news guys coming in. Share with them what’s worked, what hasn’t, the student ministry climate in your area, cultural leanings and tendencies, and everything else that you can think of that would be helpful. Even things like web sites and services you’ve used can be very helpful. If you want them to succeed, give them to tools and resources to help them do so.
Let them know your routine. Fill them in on how you’ve done things. Give them a general outline of what your normal week looks like: how you plan for your weekly rally services and small groups, what kinds of communication you send out and when, regular or annual events that students will be looking for, etc. Don’t let them come into the office their first week clueless. Help them succeed!
Stay in communication. There will be questions that come up after you leave. If you are willing, leave them your number so that you can be available after you are gone. I understand that this is above and beyond the call of duty, but it’s all about helping sustain lasting ministry. After a while, I think you’ll want to cut contact down to a minimum, but do make yourself available short term if you can.
Thanks for reading. I’m praying for all of you that are in transition this week. My last post will hit briefly on the part of transition that may be the hardest, “saying good-bye”.
August 30 2010 - Posted By: Shawn Michael Shoup | 2 Comments
How remnants work in church hallways
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We have this ominous bulletin board outside of our youth office space. It's one of those things that everyone sees week after week—hundreds of people walk past it as they journey in and out of our church—yet it stared blankly at us most of the time. With the roll out of our yearly calendars, events, and other fun stuff I started thinking about how we could display everything without falling back on butcher paper, newspaper, or even bulletin board paper (how boring compared to all of the layouts you can pick for your blog or myspace page right?)
I have a few leftover pieces of fabric where I miscalculated for a quilt I made. (Ok, I ended up making two quilts on accident. I can't help it I'm not so good at math.) I wondered what it might look like if I took some of the scraps and stapled them to the wall. I tried a few pieces but they weren't big enough. So I asked a friend of mine who sews all the time if she has any leftovers. She told me to come over and grab whatever I wanted. So I went back to our office and told our awesome assistant Matt about my idea. I could see the look in his eyes. "You want me to do what with these?" While he was away at a meeting I stapled them to the wall and loved the outcome. And it was cool to show Matthew what I was thinking in my head. I'll have to post a picture of the board with information on it too. It's exciting to see what a few scraps can amount to.
As I was working on it, a Gungor song I've been singing for a few months rang true in my head. "You make me new, you are making me new. You make beautiful things. You make beautiful things out of dust. You make beautiful things, you make beautiful things out of us." I could see God quilting away my life, taking the scraps and the pieces and making me new. The pieces that don't match or make sense end up working out after all.
I wonder how many loose ends we have lying around in our budget restricted ministries that might be useful to make something truly innovative and wonderful? I'm guessing we've got quite a bit on our hands and probably even enough to share.
Thanks M.E.K.O. for sharing your scraps with me. They have, in a simple way, helped us to think on such a great truth.
"Rev 21:1 Then I saw a new heaven and a new earth, for the first heaven and the first earth had passed away, and there was no longer any sea. I saw the Holy City, the new Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from God, prepared as a bride beautifully dressed for her husband. 3 And I heard a loud voice from the throne saying, “Now the dwelling of God is with men, and he will live with them. They will be his people, and God himself will be with them and be their God. 4 He will wipe every tear from their eyes. There will be no more death or mourning or crying or pain, for the old order of things has passed away.”
Rev 21:5 He who was seated on the throne said, “I am making everything new!” Then he said, “Write this down, for these words are trustworthy and true.”
Want to make a fabric bulletin board? Find the quilter in your church and ask to see the remnants. You might be surprised at what you'll find and the stories that go along with the pieces.
August 26 2010 - Posted By: Brooklyn Lindsey | 1 Comments
Real World Parents Training at NYWC
Have you heard about some special training you can get at NYWC? It's called Real World Parents, here's the skinny from its creator, Mark Matlock:
Real World Parents will train you to provide a three hour, three session parenting seminar (including curriculum for six optional follow up small group gatherings) for your church and community based on the book Real World Parents, published by Youth Specialties. Participants completing this pre-conference event at NYWC will be trained to present Real World Parents and supplied with presentation media, follow-up curriculum. You’ll be prepared to present Real World Parents in your own community. (To conduct seminars outside of your local church, you will also need to sign a presenters agreement, and meet some additional criteria.) More information can be found at realworldparents.com. If you are one of the 200 some presenters previously trained, Mark has significantly updated and improved the seminar based on the hundreds of seminars already given. You are welcome to attend the training to receive the updates.
August 24 2010 - Posted By: Adam McLane | 0 Comments
Transition Story: How I Survived
My family has been transitioning out of a church family and youth ministry position where we had served for nine-plus years. Saying good-bye was nothing short of hard, as you can imagine. I learned a lot through the process. I wanted to share some of my story over a series of three posts.
PART ONE: Some Things I Found Helpful in Preparation for the Transition
Praying for the new couple that would be eventually taking our place. I think it’s wise to be enthusiastic about this part of the journey. Who wouldn’t want the people that are coming in to replace the ministry you’ve invested in to be the ones that are called and equipped by God? I prayed often – every time I thought about the students and student ministry. Without realizing it, I believe that God was preparing my heart for the transition, too. Maybe even preparing me to see the next couple through His eyes versus mine.
Communicate openly with interviewees. I fielded quite a few questions back and forth on Facebook, e-mail, and over several lunches with student ministry candidates. This opened up the passions and genuine interest— or NOT — in those applying for the position and also made the transition more of a reality for me. It started the process of my thinking about what I personally needed to do to prepare the ministry for the transition.
Cleaning house. In addition to a lot of deep thinking about how to best prepare each element of the ministry for new leaders, there were the technical details of cleaning my files off the youth PC, transferring iTunes files from my personal laptop, and boxing up personal effects in my office and the youth room. This process took way longer than I would have thought. I guess it comes from making myself “at home” in my work environment. I had stuff all over the place!
Leaving everyone in good shape. It’s far too easy to let things slack a little when you realize that you’re not going to be around very long. Fight that urge and instead push hard to finish with excellence. Don’t let the student’s last camp experience or run of student services be a stinker because you have already thrown in the towel. This applies to other areas as well: don’t neglect that last pile of receipts — they are calling out your name! Leave in good relation with everyone – including your treasurer!
Don’t talk about your impending transition all the time. I had a tendency to have a running countdown going on at all times in me head. My problem was that I kept making that countdown public. My wife and co-pastor had to remind me several times not to announce to students the “last time” we were doing each activity together or how many days we had left before our departure. After a while, that gets old and probably makes it appear that you are looking for transition-sympathy from students.
When we started making connections with Derick and Pam – the new student pastors – for the first time, it felt like it was God-ordained. They seemed to be everything that we had been praying for as a staff. In part two, I’ll share more about meeting them for the first time and our month-long transition period of working together.
August 23 2010 - Posted By: Shawn Michael Shoup | 8 Comments
NYWC: Big Time!
We hope to see you at NYWC this Fall for big time encouragement!
August 20 2010 - Posted By: Adam McLane | 0 Comments
Facebook Places as a Youth Group Game
There are a lot of people cheering the release of Facebook Places today.
With more than 500 million active Facebook users and the rapid expansion of GPS-enabled smart phones hitting the adolescent market, there's a good chance youth workers will need to take notice.
Let me say that again.
- 500 million Facebook users.
- 97 million teenagers already own a mobile device.
- Teenagers like their phones, they like Facebook, and now there is a built in game.
The industry that Facebook Places fits into is called location based social media. (LBSM)
Now, I'm sure that within the next few days there will be a whole slew of news stories about how dangerous LBSM coming to Facebook is. Without a doubt there is an editor at a major newspaper putting already sending a team of researchers to find a story of how teenagers are going to use Facebook Places for secret sex hook-ups or to sell drugs or dangerous flashmobs or everyones favorite teenage scapegoat, the underground party. OK, that's a rant for another day.
I'd like to beat those bad news stories to the punch by sparking your creativity with a simple, fun, and free way to use Facebook Places in your youth group.
5 Ways to Use Facebook Spaces as a Youth Group Game
- Scavenger hunts – Give your group a list of things to find within a shopping center or neighborhood, then cut them loose with some leaders and have them check-in when they find items. A twist would be to plant a bunch of items in your community for them to take pictures of as part of their check-in. I'm a big fan of gnomes. But cardboard cut-outs or stuffed animals would be fun, too. Yet another twist would be to have them do a can collection drive and check-in at all the houses that give.
- Road rally – This is an old school staple, with a twist. Print out a list of clues and a block of time. As they go from clue to clue you can assign points by the order they check-in. First team gets 1000 points, second team 750, third team 500, each additional team 100. You could also add bonus points for obscure clues or check-ins if they get also post a picture with a non-playing member of the church. Also within this category of check-in game, you could do an Amazing Race theme by requiring teams to go through an obstacle or complete a challenge before checking in.
- Check-in Olympics – This would work best in a suburban or urban area. Break into three teams and assign each team a category of places to check-in. (Fast food joints, gas stations, coffee shops.) Teams earn points by checking into as many places in their category as possible in the given time window. (2 hours would probably work best) Then add strategy to the game by making the more rare places worth more points. So, they'd get 100 points for a McDonald's but 1000 for an In-n-Out. That way they'd have to chose to try to hit all the big and obvious places and earn lots of places or just go for the big ones. You could also add a twist by assigning each category a secret, sealed location. At the end of the game you would unseal the envelop and award bonus points to the team that checked in there.
- Crazy Costume Check-in – You could expand the time window to a whole day, week, or mission trip by challenging teams to check-in creatively at places. For instance, a group could check-in at a KFC all dressed as chickens. Or they could all check-in at Wal*Mart dressed as smiley faces. You get the idea. Somehow there is a BIgger or Better tie-in.
- Hide-n-seek – Malls and other public venues are sensitive to these types of things, so you'd have to be careful where and how you did it. But it would be really cool if you played a massive game of hide-n-seek. You could assign the food court as the jail and require that each pair or team check-in at every store they go into. The person who is "it" could keep refreshing their Facebook news feed to see where teams are at. The last team caught would be "it" for the next round. There's lots of variations to this game, get creative!
What are other fun ways you can think of to use Facebook Places within a youth group setting?
Thanks to Amy Gilchrist and Ian Robertson for some ideating on this post.
August 19 2010 - Posted By: Adam McLane | 3 Comments
Poll: Will you participate in See You at the Pole this year?
August 18 2010 - Posted By: Adam McLane | 5 Comments
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The Me I Want to Be, Curriculum Kit
Becoming God's Best Version of You, Five Sessions
