A Church Planting Mindset in Youth Ministry

I read a great question on twitter the other day from Eric Bryant - who oversees the leadership team at Mosaic in Los Angeles (Eric is now a part of the team teaching and leading at Gateway Church in the Austin, TX area). He asked something to the effect of "If you were planting a church with the same number of people you have at your church and with your current income, what would you do?" I ponder this question on a couple different levels:

1. How would WestWay be different if we had a team of 300 church planters instead of 300 attenders? How would our system (the way things get done) have to change to support that kind of mentality? One of the things that I think would have to change is the under-utilization of gifts in the church. We need to do better at helping people maximize the gifts God is giving them. Instead of recruiting volunteers to fill the positions to maintain what we're already doing, we would channel energy into developing, empowering, and releasing leaders to do ministry as the church. (Also, I'm not sure a church planting team of 300 people would only be planting one church at a time!)

2. What if I really viewed the students and adults involved in the student ministry as a church planting team? Could we effectively plant a church within a church in a healthy way that doesn't just start separate churches for separate ages? Again, our system would need to shift from thinking about filling volunteer slots to unleashing creative leadership. Helping students identify and develop their gifts and channel their passion into Kingdom ventures would be vastly more important than talking more kids into going to camp every summer. The expectation of and dependence on God to be at work among us would have to be cultivated to become strong enough to quash the apathy that invades the soul of so much of youth culture... and that would be a very good thing.

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I originally wrote this post about 2 years ago. It keeps getting visits, so I wanted to update it a little bit, but as I started to do that, I began to evaluate as well. What's changed in the last 2 years?
- While adult attendance on Sundays has dropped lately, our Wed. night Middle School & High School group is 2 - 3 times larger in terms of attendance. The low count weeks are higher than previous highs. While there are still weeks when I feel like no one's paying a whole lot of attention (to me or to what God has to say that night), they're much less frequent.
- Students aren't just "bringing friends to youth group" but are actively sharing Christ with them outside of our organized meeting times/activities. But I wouldn't quite say they are passionately engaged in being a church planting group.
- There is a strong group of students that are committed to living by faith, but many of the students are still mostly concerned with their own little worlds. A lot of eyes & hearts are still pretty focused on themselves. We're not "there" yet...

And so, I continue to ask: If I were planting a church with the same number of people I currently have, what would I do? Have I really wrestled with this question deeply enough to have forged convictions that make a difference? How would things be different if I viewed my 50 - 60 students as a team of 50-60 church planters?

Marks of Manhood

I know in our society, manhood is esteemed somewhat on par with slughood or renal infection, but that is only serving to snowball the problem, and I want to offer an alternative picture. Being a man is something that popular media seem to equate with an uncontrollable sex drive, killing stuff, and a general oblivion to all things outside of myself. Our culture has defined manhood in a way that's not just unhealthy, but also actively corrosive both to men and to society as a whole. In short, we'd be a lot better off if our boys had a better way to figure out what it means to be men.

One of the best possible methods that I've ever observed functioning toward that end is mentoring: Someone who knows what it takes and has experienced the transformation, consistently walking through life with someone who hasn't. In a workshop last summer at CIY, Mark Moore outlined these 10 characteristics to mentor boys in becoming men that contrast with the picture painted on the big screen (and small screen).

Honor vs. Selfishness - This means doing what is right because that is who you are, not because it's the easiest option. It is radical obedience to a standard that places value on others, not just on me.
Respect vs. Self-Centered Myopia - This echoes Honor is placing a high value on others. Boys see what affects them and their own little world. Men see and consider the effect their actions will have on those around them and are able to make a deeper impact on the world because they do.
Gratitude vs. Entitlement - Boys are concerned with getting what they can. Men live lives filled with an attitude that is thankful regardless of circumstance.
Generosity vs. Greed - A boy will hold on to everything he gets. A man freely gives everything he has in terms of time, talent, money...
Discipline vs. Unreliability - Part of being a man is disciplining yourself to carry through when someone's counting on you. Prioritize your life in able to consistently be where you're needed when you need to be there.
Priorities vs. Mediocrity & Frivolity - How many boys do you know who are great at things that don't matter but who barely scrape by when it comes to more important aspects of life? Being a man means learning to understand what is really important and working to excel there - even at the expense of your golf game (or Halo addiction).
Humility vs. Arrogance - We need to teach our boys to view themselves through the lens of God's grace, not some crap philosophy that artificially inflates their self-esteem to a point that blinds them to their need of that grace.
Honesty vs. Deceit - Our culture is a lying, deceitful culture. From relationships to tests at school to national scandals about SATs, boys seem to think that if it'll get them what they want, then butchering the truth is no big deal. We need to mentor them to honest integrity that holds up the truth even when it's more difficult to handle the consequences.
Purity vs. Swayability - A man has learned what is right and good and will not easily be dissuaded from that path. A boy may be easily distracted by the shiny and new (or scantily clad).
Wisdom vs. Foolishness - This is an overall quality that a man possesses helping him know what to do to act and live in agreement with the nature and character of God. It's knowing and doing what's right vs. doing what will often make the situation worse.

What are you doing to help boys know what it means to be a man? What if you chose a few teens in your family or church and mentored them over the course of the next year in these 10 characteristics? Model the traits and walk through life with a couple guys who need your help. Paint a better picture for the next generation of men.
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(Just a quick disclaimer - the list of characteristics came from Moore, but the descriptions are my own embellishments and aren't meant to be technical definitions of those traits. Don't hold them against him.)

EDIT: I just found a pdf called Boys to Men on Mark Moore's site that succinctly outlines these 10 characteristics in his own words. Check it out.

12 in '12 Tuesdays

A little more than 12 years ago, I was six months into my first ministry. I was ready to give a report at my first annual meeting, when a little interruption came into the picture and shifted pretty much everything in my life. Suddenly, a meeting that seemed to be a high stakes, high pressure affair was put into a completely different light. I gave a report that night about where I wanted to take our student ministry over the next couple years, sharing my vision for a church that was touching the lives of students in ways we had only dreamed of until then. I did my best to make it through the meeting, but the interruption was already casting her own hue on what I said - It was pink, and it didn't put much stock in Robert's rules.

For the past 12 years, my life (and ministry) has been tinted with various shades of pink as I've sought to be Emily's dad while doing the best job I can as a youth pastor. With Emily being 12 for most of 2012, I thought I'd do an ongoing series on what it's like fathering a 12 year old girl as I lead students who are now her peers to be the church He's calling them to be. I've already asked for her help, and I'll have her do a few guest posts throughout the year. (When I asked for her help on my blog, she just grinned and tried to negotiate a deal to get her own blog; I'm sure you'll enjoy what she has to say.)

Be watching for the 12 in '12 posts on Tuesdays this year. I'll be sharing what I learn about parenting a 12 year old (who thinks she's 22), being a youth minister with your own kids in the student ministry, and letting Emily give her perspective on growing up with a middle aged dad who likes to hang out with her friends as well. Anything you want to ask along those lines? Throw out your questions in the comments section and they'll become the fodder for Em & I to knock around in the coming weeks' posts.

Gracenomics & Creativity in Youth Ministry

One of the last books I read this year was Gracenomics from Mike Foster. In a chapter about putting grace into practice at work, he describes a scenario:

"The boss pretends the company never fails. Never has, never will.

The employees know this is a bunch of bull. Always has been, always will be.

But because they know their boss is fixated with erasing all evidence of the company's failures, the employees trade in the goal of advancing the company for the boss' real goal: covering up mistakes - along with anything that might've been learned from them.

Creativity is choked out.

Innovators are handcuffed.

Dreams die."

Grace allows creativity and dreams to flourish because grace makes room for failure. I know that he was talking about the workplace with this picture, but I can't help but forward this dynamic into the church (maybe because that's my workplace). In a group of people who are admittedly depending on God's grace, what if we're so intent on covering up mistakes (or maybe we just ignore them and hope they'll go away) that we don't really let anyone learn and grow from them, that we don't learn to give grace ourselves?

I believe the result is the same: creativity is choked out, innovators are handcuffed, and dreams die. Only, in the church, instead of continuing to punch the clock and collect a check, a lot of creativity will look elsewhere for an outlet and the less patient of the innovators will walk away long before the dreams die.

Through youth ministry, I have been given the chance to shape both the church that is now and the church that will be. I want to make sure I'm giving students and other leaders the freedom to fail. I'm not sure I've always done that well, and I can't help but wonder what dreams and creative ideas have been stifled by my bottling up of the grace that's been given to me...

What were the latest mistakes you or your church has addressed with grace? What did you learn?

Social Media Awkwardness

Have you ever wondered what social media are doing to us? What are we becoming as a people who are so pixel connected? There are a number of aspects of social media that I've noticed:

Twitter Trolling - If you followed me, just so I'd follow you, but I didn't on any of the 16 occasions you've tried to get my following attention, what are the chances that I'll follow you on attempt number 17?

Begging for Celebrity Retweets - "Hey Mr. Famous with your thousands of followers who don't really pay attention to what you say, would you include my name in your next tweet so some of them can come ignore me, too." I don't get it. Maybe there's a famous for being famous gene I didn't get or bug I didn't catch, but if I'm going to be known, I want to be known for doing something - not for having my name mentioned by someone who's done something. I don't know how @BrianDawkins puts up with it.

The Declaration of the Unfollow - If you don't want to read what someone tweets, just don't follow them. No need to announce it or threaten to unfollow them. Just leave the room. @markschlereth takes all kinds of crap because his football followers don't want to hear about his chili, or some food snob chili fan just found out he was a gridiron gladiator, or because his son didn't pitch away from some hitter, or because he just posted another of his 'churchy thoughts'. "Sorry Mark, if you can't be as one-dimensional as I am narrow minded, I'm not following you anymore." What kind of person finds it necessary to tell someone that you're not going to read their tweets anymore?

Facebook Relationship Status - Let's just all put "it's complicated" and leave it at that. (I would follow my own advice here, except that I'm already statified as married, and the switch would REALLY freak people out.) Relationships are ALL complicated, why complicate them more with this feature?

MEdia - What makes us think it is ok to be SO self-centered just because we're digital? Even in the digital universe, other people exist, and they don't just want to talk about me(you)! But I really am glad you told me how good your toast was this morning, do you put the jelly on with a knife or a spoon?

There are a ton of other strange moments in social media I'm sure you've noticed. The Old Flame Friend Request. The Terribly Public Argument That Should Have Been Behind Closed Doors. The Wall Post of Passion That Definitely Should Have Been a Private Message (closely related to the Tweet That Should Have Been a DM).

Which ones are most awkward for you?

Content To Be Frustrated?

I've been struggling to manage a tension lately between contentment and my constant (and perhaps idealistic) desire for improvement. I seem to always want things to be better. Call it perfectionism or whatever you want, I just always seem to see ways to improve and desire to implement those ways. I remember getting my ACT scores back when I was in high school and paying the extra money to get back my answers. I wanted to see where I'd fallen short, and when I realized the silliness of the mistakes I'd made, I knew I could do better. I even thought about taking the test again to improve my score, to reach that perfect 36, even though doing so would have had absolutely no bearing on my college choices or scholarship options, my upcoming marriage (yes, I was processing wedding bells and Pomp & Circumstance at the same time), or any other aspect of my life. It was just a desire to do better.

I've carried that penchant for improvement with me throughout my life and work, which has mostly been helpful, but is sometimes really frustrating. (Maybe even more frustrating for those that get stuck working and living with me... sorry.) People sometimes get annoyed with my tendency to expect better, because in the church, contentment is held as one of the highest of virtues. Paul, himself, hoisted the banner of contentment several times in his writings to the Christians in Philippi and to Timothy. 

I've asked friends to be praying for how I handle the frustrations that have come up in the current struggle, but lately have come to a conclusion: Contentment with anything less than what God wants is not a virtue. It's sin and I don't want to go there.

Doesn't God deserve our best? Not just settling for our "best efforts", but working diligently and intelligently for the best results possible. I know I don't earn anything from Him with my incremental improvements in ministry techniques or tactics. I'm not trying to get a better score on some Kingdom entrance exam - in Christ, my score is already a 36. I'm in! But in light of what that has cost Him, doesn't He deserve me doing my best AND working to gain the capacity to do better?

It's one thing to be satisfied with a job well done, but it's something else to think we're finished with the work. When does contentment creep its way into that dank and squalid hole of complacency?

The Future Is Orange, Predominantly

The other day, I saw a bunch of lemmings patting each other on the back and celebrating how awesome their collective lack of perspective was. As their bandwagon rolled along, I couldn't help but feel a twinge of compassion for them as they mindlessly followed their own tails. I was in my truck, so I compassionately ended the misery that was their bandwagon existence. I'm not really a bandwagon guy.

Having said that (fictitiously of course), this post is going to sound a little bandwagonesque - ok, a lot! There, you've been warned. When it comes to the Denver Broncos, I have no shred of objectivity. I've mentioned here the pain of watching them crumble the past few years, but I'm glad to say the pain has subsided considerably.

Actually, the past couple months have been the most fun I've had watching the Broncos play since I sat in my grandma's living room and listened to her cuss out John Elway's gunslinging comeback ways. It's a little scary that we now have to worry about the 4th quarter heart conditions of the elder set of Broncos fans again - and a little refreshing. Take some aspirin before the game - I hear that helps the heart...

A few quick Broncos thoughts:

- Tim Tebow is just inexplicably getting it done. 3 completions through 3 quarters of play? No problem, what if we just have 18 completions in the next few minutes, okay guys... Win. For the record, McDaniels did a lot of crazy stupid things in his time in Denver, but drafting Tebow was not one of them. I loved the pick then, and I love seeing Tebow lead this team after waiting a year and a half for his shot. The lack of off season work put him in a bad spot, but he seems to be making up the learning curve pretty quickly. Character matters - A LOT.

- The Broncos are not winning in spite of his first 3 quarters of play as some have suggested. What the Broncos are doing on offense is what they have to do on offense. They are playing for first downs and field position. Tebow's throws are much more consistently getting where they need to be, and the offensive line is working like some kind of dump truck tank the A-Team would've put together is some rancher's barn in New Mexico. (Sidebar: What would you give for a Mr. T sideline sighting with about 10 minutes to go? Sidebar spawned afterthought: What would you give to see Tim T. with some feather earrings and a mohawk!?)

- When the receivers catch the balls they should be catching, Denver could be putting good teams away early. I know Marion Barber helped out in a big way by not going out of bounds yesterday, but if the Broncos receivers had caught 6 or 7 more passes (that were right to their hands!) earlier in the game, he wouldn't have been in a position to gift-wrap the final moments for the Broncos. Can you imagine Dumervil/Miller/Williams getting after a quarterback who HAS to throw because his team is down by a couple TD's?

- The defense is looking stronger than it has in a long, long time. I loved the draft pick of Von Miller. Along with a couple other pickups and health improvements, the front of this defense improved in a big, big way. Champ & Dawkins are still playing like they always have and offer an incredible amount of leadership and work ethic to the young guys. If those young guys are listening and learning from that tandem, the defense could be back to the Orange Crush standard for several years to come.

- I love watching a quarterback run over DB's and shove linebackers to the ground with a well placed stiff arm as they desperately try to dive at his legs. (The Revis Matador was pretty sweet to watch as well.) I know, I know, the purist NFL fans want to see the QB stay in the pocket and look pretty, but I'd much rather see my field general crashing the front lines. Injuries happen, so depth is important, but then again, how many pocket-passing QBs are currently sitting around injured because they got blindsided standing 6 yards behind center?

It's good to be a Broncos fan. And it's enjoyable again too, now that every week doesn't bring another beat-down. There's hope again in the Mile High fan base. The future is orange... predominantly.

/fan boy ravings
/band wagon basking

Compassionate Christmas Sharing?

When it comes to food, we have some pint-sized picky eaters in our house. They're often hearing from LuAnn or I that they need to be content that they have food every meal, even if it's not something they like. I remind them that while they complain about their potatoes, there are kids all over the world who are going to bed hungry... again. Today, we got confirmation that the message is getting through. Sort of.

Lizzie's preschool class has been gathering food for an elderly lady, so before we left this afternoon, she took a couple cans to donate from our pantry. Noticing what she was happily providing, I asked Lizzie if she thought the lady would like the green beans.

"Yeah, probably..." was her first reaction as she hurried to get the cans into her backpack. But as we left the room, she expounded upon her initial enthusiasm (to herself in a very matter of fact manner):

"She should just be happy that she has food."

As LuAnn and I overheard from the next room, we humorously wondered how we've warped our kids in so many ways... I'm afraid the compassion runs so deep in that one that is has yet to fully surface.

What They Don't Know...

Last night, after our youth group met, I noticed one of our kids sending home another student with one of the well worn Bibles our children's minister keeps handy. Why would this 16 year old kid in western Nebraska be needing an overused Bible? Because he didn't have one. Last night we were talking about what the church is supposed to be and how we can only really find out who we are by paying attention to Who made us. How we find ourselves when we find Him in His Scriptures...

Img: Ron Loveday at CreationSwap

But this kid had no Bible until last night, and he's hungry to know more because the whole idea is new to him.

Let that sink in for a minute.

He has 16 years of life surrounded by steeples and church-goers, but without an understanding of who God even is... or maybe even that God is. This is the second time recently that I've been confronted with the stark reality that my generation is largely failing when it comes to teaching the next generation. We can no longer continue to think (or maybe it's just pretending) that everybody already knows who Jesus is and that every upstanding American has already chosen to follow Him. How can they believe if they haven't even heard? And how can they hear unless someone is sent to tell them? (Check out a bit of Romans 10 for more on that.)

Still think we're living in a Christian nation?

Wake up.

The mission field is right outside your front door. Your community is full of people who have no clue who Jesus really is. Go make disciples.

Generation iY

I seem to have a perpetual stack of books that I keep hoping to get to that sits on my desk. The stack often gets interrupted by some other new entry into my reading whims, so sometimes books will sit in the stack for quite a while. Last year at Christmas time, one of the books I was wanting was Tim Elmore's Generation iY. I got the book in Decemeber, but it has sat for almost a full year, waiting...

The subtitle of the book "Our Last Chance to Save Their Future" may seem a little overdramatic, but when you think about what's really at stake for today's young people, it's not such a grandiose statement. The book does a really good job laying out a description of the Millenial generation (especially the younger half), the cultural influences that have shaped them, and what we as parents and teachers and youth leaders need to be doing to help them launch into adulthood.

It was a great reminder of the potential that lies latent in young people and the need for mentors to guide this potential into fruition. Sometimes, I can get distracted by so many secondary frustrations in my job that I forget... We have an incredible generation of young lives who are hungry for authentic direction as they emerge into adult life. They are hoping to mean something to the world around them, but too often we adults are doing a poor job helping them understand how to do so. I was reminded that a huge part of my job is to identify adult-student partnerships and construct frameworks to facilitate the unleashing of potential within those partnerships - making the most of our students' current gifts and opportunities and preparing them to launch into lives of ministry of their own.

If you work with young people or have them in your home, the insight Elmore shares from his years of experience developing young leaders is invaluable. Check out the book for yourself and get some practical strategies and ideas for parenting, mentoring, & employing Generation iY. Also check out Save Their Future Now for more.

Healthy Church Culture

I'm listening to the Andy Stanley Leadership Podcast from last month and hearing some great stuff I wanted to pass on. He's talking about organizational culture - the way a group/organization expresses values/vision. It's the way things are going, the way people are feeling/acting/reacting, the way we do things, attitudes... "This is who we are & how we do things."

We can say whatever we want in describing our vision, but if the culture of our church or ministry doesn't support what we say is important, then even the greatest statements have very little real value. For example, I say the highest priority for our student ministry is to 'reveal God to students'. But if the culture of our ministry doesn't lend itself to eye opening moments and conversations where God is held up to be noticed, then there's not much hope that we'll actually be revealing God to students. So we need to make sure we're consistently showing students where to look for God and helping them learn to recognize Him when they notice what He's doing around them.

Every organization has an organizational culture & the leader is responsible for shaping that culture. Are we just operating by default or are we purposefully shaping our culture? The longer a leader has been in an organization, the more responsibility they carry for the culture of that organization. They also become less aware of the culture of the organization. This is why the 'new guy' notices things that no one else may notice. Too often, we are just doing things because that's what we've always done and we stop noticing the broken tiles and screeching hinges and horrible signage to which we've become accustomed. The problem is those blind spots may be hindering our ability to accomplish what we've set out to accomplish.

Healthy cultures attract & keep healthy people, so the culture of an organization impacts the long term productivity of the organization. Who wants to work in a place where co-workers hate their jobs, shoddy work is passed on to the next department to clean up, and the proverbial floor is made of eggshell? I know I don't. It's de-motivating. A good worker who wants to be productive can only stay in that kind of environment for so long before they either begin to hate themselves as they slowly resign to wallow in the slop... or leave to be a part of a more productive team. In some cases it may be possible for the worker to begin to reshape the culture around them, but unhealthy cultures are very slow to adapt to change, so it's a rough road... This is no different in the church. People who have gotten serious about accomplishing the mission passed to us from Jesus won't be able to hang around very long in a church where not much is happening to further that mission.

Some indicators of unhealthy culture:

• Lots of drama - There always seems to be some big issue to deal with that's not really a big issue. Small things are consistently blown out of proportion, but the underlying issues are probably not dealt with at all. Lots of elephants standing around everywhere, but everybody's pretending they're not there.
• Inward focus - The organization spends most of its focus/energy on itself. Questions like "What do our people want/deserve? What do we owe our people?" are given precedence over matters of outward mission.
• Sideways Energy- There's seems to be lots of motion, but not really any movement. People may feel like they're spinning their wheels without getting any traction... Lots of bull, but no buck - it may look good, it just doesn't accomplish anything.

When we think of the church, we don't always think in terms of organization/leadership, and it may even be a little uncomfortable to talk about the church this way. The church is a different kind of organization, where the leader is the servant, where top-down strategy was flipped over when the "head honcho" got off his throne and picked up a cross. And while we are a living, breathing Body with Jesus as our head, we still function organizationally. We can benefit greatly by shaping healthy cultures in our churches and ministries.

Maybe it's time we learn to "be still" instead of spinning our wheels - to wait for God, listen to Him, then do what He tells us to do...
Are there ways we need to shift our focus away from our own members?
Could we cut down the histrionics if we'd deal with the underlying issues that are causing people to grumble at the slightest annoyances?

Let's get healthy.

Facial Intertia

The month is almost over, which means semi-psychotic shoppers who had way too much turkey being incredibly stupid to beat the rest of the half-crazed commerce corps to that greatest deal ever on that one gadget that will be completely unappreciated and probably forgotten by the spring thaw. (No, I'm not cynical at all, what are you talking about?) In happier news, it will also mean a merry end to all the No Shave November hoo hah.

I know most of the rest of the civilized parts of our nation have already forgotten that this was a thing, but we're more than a little trend-challenged here, so No Shave November hasn't become last week's news yet. Young guys are sporting shaggy chins with pride for another week or so, but I have to admit - I don't get it.

Is manhood really something to celebrate by letting the inertia of life just take over your face? Do we really think it means something that we can grow hair on our faces? (And if so, what does it mean when we can grow hair on our backs?) Is there some kind of statement being made in all of this? I have a suspicion, that culturally, it has something to do with guys trying to assert their manhood without having anyone to help them do so in a meaningful way. If you're a man and you know you're a man, would you do something to help a younger guy figure out how he can be one, too? Would you see, in the scratchy young faces of No Shave November, an invitation to mentor boys (even boys who can shave) as they learn the essence of manhood?

Near the beginning of the month, I quipped that guys should put down their moms' mascara and stop pretending if no one had noticed their participation in the no shave lack of activity yet. Conversely guys, if they still haven't noticed, either a) you're kidding yourself about that peach fuzz, or b) you already had the hobo look nailed before the month began. Either way, being a man doesn't have jack to do with facial hair.

What does it mean to be a man? Comment below with how you'd fill in this blank: "Being a man means ________________."

What Do I Teach In Youth Ministry?

Image via DcJohn on flickr

I recently posted some thoughts about Teaching In Youth Ministry. I talked about personally not having good results using pre-packaged curriculum and summed up by saying that I basically try to pass on to my students what God is teaching me. That post wasn't meant as a knock on curriculum writers. I don't want to be arrogant and think that all my lessons are better than all of theirs. In fact, for the most part, I think they are providing valuable resources for those who are trying to teach youth in the church today. My approach is not the one that every youth leader should take. To raise the level of transparency a bit, I'll say that my own questioning of whether it is even the way I should be doing things is part of what precipitated that post.

So, having said that, I want to share a framework I've used to answer the question, "What should I be teaching in my youth ministry?" I don't offer this as a definitive scaffolding for other youth leaders to build on, but as a glimpse into my own heart and mind when it comes to teaching.

First and foremost, I consistently reinforce that it is not me and my teaching that students need. It is God - so the primary task I have when it comes to teaching is to answer the question, "Who is God?" Our spiritual development process starts with "revealing God to students". He is the one who makes the transformation in their lives and mine. I often use the metaphor of Wind & Water to capture this concept. Wind and Water both shape the landscape around us, sometimes subtly over the course of many years, sometimes drastically and suddenly. My teaching needs to depend on His Spirit to blow away the layers of sediment already building up in young lives and on His life-giving Son to cause growth.

With that aim clear (to reveal God), there are 5 characteristics that I want my students to carry into life that I teach toward:

1. A permanent attitude of worship. Worship is not what we do a couple times a week when we're with all our church friends - it's the life we live. I want to teach my students to offer every moment and act of living to their Creator. I want to teach them to make Him their 'magnificent obsession' for all of life.

2. A kingdom view of the church and the world. As globally connected as we are, we can have a pretty narrow view of what's going on in the church. I want to teach my students to look beyond our own front doors and labels to see what God is doing in His church all over this planet.

3. A passion for revealing God to people who don't see Him. Just as I am not the change agent for my students, they are not the change agent for their friends, either. Their responsibility in evangelism is to let their friends see what God is doing in their lives. I want to teach them to notice His work and be able to point it out to people who don't notice.

4. A commitment to local service as the church. It's been too long that youth group was some side-light ministry of 'big church'. We've mirrored our culture that pushes kids aside as the adult world busies itself with its own stuff, then wonders why they're not ready for 'the real world' when they hit 18. In the church, we wonder why kids leave when they hit college. Often, they never really were connected to the church in the first place - only to the youth group. I teach my kids that if they're disciples of Jesus, they are the church. Now. Are they complete? Mature? Fully formed? No, not yet. But then again... am I? Are you? I want my kids to know that all of us who have allied ourselves to Jesus and are living our lives in service to His mission are the church, young and old. They need to know they have a job to do now, and they need guidance in figuring out just what that is. The local church is a great context for doing that.

5. A desire for depth in their relationship with God. I don't want my students' relationship with God to depend on them getting a fresh dose of Scripture and some good worship music out of me once or twice a week. I want them to develop a hunger for His Word that's only filled when they dig into it themselves. (I've found some of my most significant teaching moments have come as a direct result of my students poring over their Bibles, then coming together with questions that come up from what they're reading.) I don't just want to tell them to read their Bibles, but I need to help them understand what they're reading, and even how to read it for the highest impact.

I know these 5 characteristics are a better representation of the intended outcomes of what I'm teaching than the actual content that I teach. But that's kind of the point. When I find a passage or resource that can effectively move my students toward adopting one or more of these characteristics, that's the content I'll use.
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As a youth pastor, I'd think this would be self-evident, but I'm not new at this... I know someone will question it, so let me just say that throughout my teaching toward all of these characteristics, the primary source of teaching material is the Bible (just as it is for any good Bible curriculum writer).

Question: What are you teaching toward? How do you decide what to teach?

Thoughts on Klout & Influence

Several months ago, I was invited into a beta of something called Klout. That may sound kind of cool and trendy, but I think it just means I write a blog and have a twitter account and Klout found my e-mail address somewhere. Regardless, it's a site that aims to measure the amount of influence a person has online. By analyzing "pieces of content and connections" (2.7 billion of them each day), Klout formulates a person's online influence.

I hesitantly decided to splash around in the Klout waters a little bit. I jumped in because I'm generally curious, plus I'm a sucker for something new and techno-social; but I was hesitant because it just seems weird to be trumpeting how much influence I have or don't have. Self promotion has never felt right, even when the darker parts of me crave the adulation it brings from time to time. And self humiliation is something I'm already pretty good at and with which I don't really need the help of another web site. Besides, if you have to tell everyone you're influential to get them to listen to you, are you really that influential?

One of the interesting aspects of the Klout site is that they'll designate certain topics in which you are most influential. There are a lot of different topics. A couple days ago, I received notice that my influence was being recognized in a new topic. Thinking of all the things that are important to me and that I blog or comment about, a list of possibilities flitting through my mind. But when the site loaded and I saw what the topic actually was, it was nowhere near my list of possibilities: Mascara. Yes, friends, it seems I am influential in the realm of mascara. It dawned on me that I'd made a flippant comment on twitter about boys trying too hard to make something of no-shave November that was re-tweeted by a couple guys (Thanks Drew & Robert). Because they repeated what I said, that must mean I'm influential, right? Ok, maybe not!

So anyway, I'm currently sporting a Klout score of 26, with a 'conversational' style, influencing 53 people (one of whom apparently clubs baby seals with sticks of kittens). But what the heck does that really mean? What does it really mean that I have 168 'followers' on twitter? (It was 170 before I re-tweeted Rick Warren this afternoon, but that's a whole other issue.)  What does it really mean that there are 531 people who 'friended' me on facebook?

What this really has me thinking about is the relationship between online connections and real life influence. There are people whom I know I heavily influence in some areas who will never show up on some websites radar. There are others who, according to the data, appear to be being influenced, but are they really?

What do you do with influence when it's granted to you?

How do you handle influence?

What are the benefits and drawbacks of measuring influence?

Teaching In Youth Ministry

Image via DcJohn on flickr

I have a confession to make: Despite teaching students for 20 to 30 minutes every Wed. night and 45 minutes or so every Sunday morning, I haven't used a youth ministry specific curriculum in a really long time. For that matter, outside of a 1 week curriculum that was provided at a conference (CIY Move) I haven't used a pre-produced teaching curriculum of any kind for quite a while. It's not that I'm a curriculum hater, or that there aren't any good options (and there are TONS of options), but there are several 'hangups' I usually have (some of the problems are my own, some are not):

1. The publishers and writers do not know my students. In writing lessons for an unknown audience, lesson writers are forced to keep things fairly vague and general. Sometimes so general that there just doesn't seem to be much substance.
2. I have a personal aversion to short-cuts. I can be guilty of re-inventing the wheel when it comes to teaching time, but I would rather wrestle with a tough passage and how to interpret it for my students than just parrot someone else's thoughts. I don't think I can really help my students effectively apply a lesson to their lives unless I've already applied it to my own - and often, a canned lesson offers a mechanism for trying to do just that.
3. Often, there are better alternatives. One of the things that's kind of prickly for me in the youth ministry world is the 'youth edition' of whatever the new thing is. Someone writes a great book, so let's have someone else put together a replica that uses smaller words and video game illustrations and call it a youth ministry edition... Why not challenge our kids to struggle with the original if it's something through which they'd grow? Are we really doing them any favors by 'dumbing down' what we really want them to know?

"So how do you know what to teach?" Without having a weekly topic decided for me, how do I decide what to teach? Thanks for asking...

As a rule of thumb, I teach what God is teaching me. At times, this may look a little haphazard, and it's certainly a messy and difficult way of doing things. Every lesson is always "in process" and not quite finished - because I'm not quite finished. I'm ok with that because I don't want my students to think I've got it all together and everything will someday be wrapped up in a nice little package for them like it seems to be for me (which is the impression sometimes left with pre-packed lesson plans). I want them to be engaging in a life-long pursuit of knowing God more fully.

There are some difficulties with doing things this way, though.

- It's too easy to wing it. If we're working through a curriculum book and I'm not well prepared, it's obvious. But after 12 years of ministry, I can stand in front of a room of students and buffalo my way through a lot of stuff if I have to. This is a dangerous place to be, because it lets me fake it if I don't really have anything to say. Instead of winging it, I want to spend significant time in prayer begging God well ahead of time for something to deliver.

- What if I'm not really learning anything or if what I'm learning isn't really applicable to younger lives? This gets back to the last point a little bit; if I'm humbly asking God to use me, His grace is sufficient. He knows my students and knows my heart better than I do and wants them to know Him even more than I want them to know Him. I have to spend time seeking His heart for my life and my teaching. He'll deliver. But if I'm not doing that, I won't really have anything to say worth hearing.

- I have to be vigilant to not get stuck on a few issues. All of us have pet issues that we like to pull out and pass on. Often, they are things that we are very passionate about and can be more easily taught that some other issues. These are ok, and we should teach about these things, but not exclusively. This is why, for the Sunday morning class that I teach, we have been walking through books of the Bible. The last 2 we've done have been Revelation and Acts. We go through verse by verse, week after week, talking about whatever those passages bring to light. Often, these issues are not things I would have naturally brought up myself, but are exactly what the class needs to hear. This approach also opens the door to talking about issues that are tough to bring up without seeming like I'm calling out specific individuals. Our rule is that if it's in the text, we'll talk about it.

There are some specific touch points that I seems to gravitate toward regularly in my teaching. These are foundational to everything else, and we can dig into that in another post. But for now, what are you teaching? More importantly, how do you decide what to teach?

Traditions & Alternatives

When I was growing up, "church tradition" was a term in my mind that had more to do with old habits from the 50's and 60's than anything from previous centuries. Singing verses 1, 3, & 4 in the old green hymnals (Did anyone else secretly feel bad for verse 2?)... Vacation Bible School and camp in the summer... Mercifully shipping off the kids to children's church right before the sermon (that must've been so long and boring as to warrant our exodus)...

Most of what I thought of as traditional, I decided I didn't like. I still have this propensity to dislike stuff that's done just because 'that's what we do', but I'm realizing that my problem isn't really with tradition; it's with pointless tradition. If you want to observe something traditional, that's fine, but if you want me to participate with you I have to know why. I just cannot bring myself to get into something just because a bunch of other people like it - and have liked it for the last 30 years. Tell me "Why?"

But I'm also thinking today about another side of tradition. It's a side where the point is not missed - a side where the reason still matters, and still shapes action. And here is where I'm finding myself a little dis-advantaged. In the big picture, is a practice that's 30 or 40 or even 50 years old really worthy of the label 'tradition'? The church has been around about 2000 years, so what we're calling tradition is probably BRAND NEW! And in the eddies of independence in which most of my church family swims, our traditions often extend about as far as the nozzle on our self inflated floaties.

Yesterday and today are a great case in point. It's become traditional in many church circles to have some kind of alternative to Halloween. So instead of staying home and connecting with our neighbors, we can all get together in a safe environment to have some safe Jesus fun together. It might be called a Fall Festival, or a Harvest Party, or even Jesusween (I didn't make that up, it's actually being used), but I wonder if this new tradition could be reshaped to be more than a means to duck & cover from the biggest pagan bomb in our culture? Could a deeper look at history offer us anything?

Enter November 1st. It's just November 1 to most of the people I know, but for hundreds of years, this has been a huge day for the church: All Saints' Day. A day to celebrate the church through the ages - to realize our connection with the 'saints of old' who are collected with us into that 'great cloud of witnesses'. But, at least in the church circles I've lived in, All Saints Day was a tradition that had long ago lost it's purpose, fell out of practice, and which is now collectively forgotten. (Check out this interesting article for more on All Saints' Day then come back and let me know what you think.)

If we could recapture the purpose of Nov. 1, could Oct. 31 become more than something from which we think we have to hide? Could there be more to anticipate than a boat load of candy and sugar tainted dreams at the end of the night? I don't really offer an answer here, because this is something I'm still wrestling with. And I don't mean any disrespect to those who want an alternative to Halloween as it is. I just wonder if there's a more meaningful alternative to the alternative we've come up with...