A student recently told me, “We used to like going on the mission trip because it was relaxed. There were no rules.”
She was referring to a mission trip I inherited.
Truth be told, I’d suspected this was the case for a while but never had someone...
“Mama, do you need me?” my 2-year old daughter, Hope, cried from the living room.
The truth is, I didn’t.
When Hope cried out to me, I was cooking dinner – making homemade mac & cheese out of squash. I had two boiling pans on the stove and the...
My new book, Unleashing the Hidden Potential of Your Student Leaders, is out! I'm convinced that when done well, student leadership has the ability to transform your youth ministry. With that in mind, over the next few weeks, we're going to be...
I recently went to a youth ministry event at a local, well-known Christian college. I arrived at the event on-time only to remember too late that youth workers seldom arrive on-time to anything. The school's greeters directed me to the event space...
Today, I'm linking up with Kate Motaung's Five Minute Friday. The rules: Write for 5 minutes flat – no editing, no over thinking, no backtracking.
This week's prompt: Hidden.
I have this expression I use around my student leaders: “You have a...
On a recent call with Alan Roxburgh, author of Structured for Mission, I heard Al say two really compelling things. First, people are no longer hardwired to go to church like they once were. Second, given this changing culture, those of us who...
It's easy, I think, for teens to pity people, to feel sorry for someone else. It's much harder for teens to cultivate and develop empathy, the ability to feel and understand another person's experience. This is true, I'm afraid, even for church...
Earlier in this Student Leadership Team Basics series, we talked about how the role of your student leadership team is to create a culture of welcome in your youth ministry. One specific way you can do this is by having your team recognize and...
Some of my good friends are long-term medical missionaries in Nepal. Every once in a while, I'll get an e-mail from them saying, “We popsicle stick prayed for you this morning!”
Every day our friends – along with their three young children – pray...
In addition to requiring student leaders to read and blog, another way I train and equip students for leadership and in particular, for creating a culture of welcome is by conducting frequent evaluations of each week's youth ministry programs.
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