Doing Ministry

Lizards, Spider Water, and Ministry

Posted on July 11, 2012 by Josh

I am writing this in case I ever get too big of a head doing ministry and need to be reminded what real ministry really looks like. I also want to give you an idea of what it looks like to work in a church so you don’t think it is all meditation and Bible reading.

So, this week I am the only staff member in the church office as the others are out-of-town on a mission trip. While my idea was to simply sit around and watch over the church with my crown and scepter, I have instead had the privilege of two outside the box tasks.

Task One
Last week my task was to remove a rather large lizard from the prayer room. This task was not too difficult and really pretty much looked like me playing lizard hockey with my broom until I knocked him outside. He did put up quite a fight, but I took care of it without much difficulty.

Task Two
This week’s task was a little more involved. We have a baptism planned for this Sunday. As we made plans to get the baptistery filled, we discovered that it was not emptied after the last baptism, which was about six weeks ago. So the setting is this–cloudy, still water. It gets better though because in the water there was obviously a spider clan’s baptism gone wrong with about twenty dead spiders spread out in the water. The problem is that no one has been able to get the plug out to let the nasty water out. So who does this task now fall to? The guy who was left in charge.

Attempt 1: I tried to use a long pole to poke plug out.
Result: Utter failure.

Attempt 2: I tried to tie a trash bag around my arm so my skin did not touch disgusting water. I then hung over the side, but I could not reach deep enough.
Result: Wet bag, kind of wet arm, and failure.

Attempt 3: Now I decide that it is time to use the baptism waders. Put waders on and walked in to see if I could get a better angle to pull plug using trash bag arm.
Result: No luck, still too deep. Can’t risk going any deeper or water will fill my waders which only go up to my chest. Failure.

Attempt 4: I realize that I need to lower water level. Using a trash can, I take about 10 loads of water out and pour them down the toilet which is about thirty feet away. I then realize that the water level is still too high so I am going to have to go completely shirtless because I have to put my whole shoulder in the water to reach the plug (almost took a picture of this, but did not want to lose total credibility with my church). I wade back into the water with my waders and reach my torso into the spider water. With my hand in the water I realize that I will have to go deep enough to let a little water into my waders. I don’t care at this point, and I become a little worried that the spiders are actually water spiders who are just sleeping. I take the plunge and finally get the plug out. As I am leaving the water, I realize that the waders I used have some holes in them so when I take them off, I have a number of awkward wet spots on my jeans.
Result: Wet arm and shoulder, soaked pants, and an emptying baptismal. Triumph!!

The moral of the story is either “we must do whatever it takes to get people baptized” or “being a minister means sometimes doing the dirty work.”

Categories: Doing Ministry | Tags: funny | Leave a comment

How To Work With Parents

Posted on July 10, 2012 by Josh

I have made a number of mistakes in student ministry, but working with parents is one thing that I have done pretty well (I think). I rarely have any of those meetings with parents where you just try to keep your head down while criticisms zing past you. Here are a few things that I have done in order to maintain good relationships with the parents of our students.

1. From the beginning I let our parents know that things would be done professionally. I try to communicate with them in a professional way, keep my commitments, and always have a plan. When we take a trip with the students, I map out where we will eat lunch and where we might stop for bathroom breaks. My goal is for parents to know that we always have a plan and that we are responsible. I want parents to trust that I will do what is best for their student, and I will do it as professionally as possible.

2. I am clear on why we do things. Because we have a strategy and values that shape what we do, we have a specific direction that the program is built around and we communicate that. Sometimes a parent will suggest a program or event that really doesn’t fit with our values or our culture. When this happens, it gives me an opportunity to talk about why we do what we do and how what works in the big picture. By keeping the main things in front of us (discipleship and spiritual growth), I am able to not only cast vision, but also reassure the parents that we are working towards something.

3. I encourage them to be a part of the student ministry, and I acknowledge that they actually are the most important part of their students’ discipleship. When I invite students to events or programs, I try to be sure that parents know that they are invited to come as well. They don’t even have to come as chaperones or helpers, they can just come and experience what their student is experiencing. I have had a number of parents who attended events with us who confessed that they were wary about what we did only to later realize, after attending the event, that things were far different from what they had imagined. Some of my best volunteers have come from this, by the way.

4. I welcome comments and criticism. This is not natural for me. I don’t like to be corrected or critiqued. But, for the good of the program and the students, I know that I need to hear other people’s opinions so that we take the best route possible. I make it a point to be available and open to any comments a parent would like to make about the program. Not only does this keep discussions from growing in the background between different sets of parents, it also allows me to understand the heart of the request. Most of the time there is a real reason behind the complaint or comment. If people are upset about the lack of a college class, it is because they are worried about their college student. If people don’t think a program is working, it could be because their kid had a bad experience that I need to know about and then try to correct the environment.

Working with parents is a huge part of being a student minister. Things go infinitely smoother when you and the parents of your students can work together to participate in the discipleship of their students. If things have not always gone well, consider apologizing for your part in any of it, and then you might consider some of the things above. Good luck.

Categories: Doing Ministry | Tags: ministry, parents, vision | Leave a comment

Growth Doesn’t Just Happen

Posted on June 28, 2012 by Josh

A couple of years ago I was trying to cast vision with some of our students regarding growth and bringing in new people. I thought that I had made a pretty convincing case until one of the students told me that he did not want new people because he liked things the way that they were and new people might mess it up. While I appreciated his honesty, I also recognized that we needed to do more than just talk about growth, we needed to make it a value.

Our ministry has several values such as spiritual growth, service, and leadership, but we never really made numerical growth a priority. I guess I assumed that if we had a good program, we would inevitably grow. Once we had an effective program, we still did not see significant growth. Now it makes sense. Even with a good program, people needed to hear about it and be invited to come.

I have learned that if numerical growth is not a goal and a value, then it is not likely to happen. We recently set a goal to have 100 students involved in our student ministry by the end of the year. We currently have about 60 active students so we have some work to do. But here’s the thing–since setting this goal a couple of weeks ago, we have already seen six new students join our group.

It’s not enough to just set a goal for growth; you also need to have a plan on how to get there. Here are a few things that we are doing to accomplish this growth:

We are capturing information from all of our visitors and then following up with them.
We are encouraging students to bring friends and share their experiences of church with people in their circles. We are also setting the expectation that the students will greet and accept the new students when they get there. We have explained to our students that they are disciple makers and they have a job to do.
We are making it a whole church effort. With the whole church involved, it means empowering more people to help steer teenagers to our group. By sharing our big goal, we are letting more people into the adventure and the challenge of reaching teenagers for Christ.
We are working towards making our programs more outreach friendly. If our programs are not visitor friendly, we aren’t going to see people stick even if we can get them in the church.

These are just a few things that we are doing in order to get students in our doors and begin to disciple them. What are some of the things that you have done that brought people into your church or ministry?

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Unwritten Rules of the Donut Shop

Posted on June 19, 2012 by Josh

For about two years one of the most intimidating places in my town was the donut shop. I love donuts, particularly the bakery kind and not the mass-produced stuff from certain chains. My kids love donuts, and one of our best father-children activities is a Saturday morning trip to the donut store. Even though we love them, going to the donut store has often been uncomfortable.

You see, at our donut store there are a number of unwritten rules. For example, you are not supposed to even move towards the counter until you know your exact order and can spit it out fast. Breaking this rule gets a number of sighs and frowns from the workers. There is also the rule that you can only pay cash unless your order is about $10. In fact, for a while they wouldn’t even sell you a few donuts if you only had a card. That gets awkward, by the way. There are other unwritten rules such as what to with your baskets when done and which tables you can sit at if you are under 60 years old. It can actually be a pretty intimidating place for the newcomer.

I’m sure it did not start out that way, but over time I would guess that the business got set in its ways and was not nearly as concerned about the new customers as they were when they first opened. Now that they have a solid customer base, they don’t try very hard to be accommodating. It’s not that they don’t want new customers; they just don’t think that they need to focus on them.

You can probably see how easily our churches can be like this donut shop. Maybe a church starts out fired up and driven to find new people. As more people come, that energy towards outreach shifts into energy towards maintenance. When this happens, we forget how hard it can be for someone to just jump right in and get plugged in when the culture is already established. One of the last things that Jesus would want for his church is for it to be unwelcoming.

What do you think people see when they get to your church? Do they know where to go or when to go there? Do they know how to get into a class or group and then do the regulars act like they are excited about their being there? Are there any unwritten rules at your church that would intimidate the newcomer?

In my opinion, the best solution to this problem is to have people who will serve as interpreters of the experience. It would have been great if a regular or an employee would have said, “Hey, you must be new here. Let me show you the ropes, and never, ever get to the counter without a clear decision on what to order or they you will get sighed at.” Imagine the church version of that. Imagine what it would look like if you and the other church members felt a clear responsibility to show new folks the ropes and teach them the unwritten rules.

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Youth Ministry on a (Tight) Budget

Posted on June 12, 2012 by Josh

One of the harsh realities of ministry is that, in most cases, a budget does not mean much. You might have budgeted $10,000 for the student ministry this year, but unless that money comes in, you don’t have it to spend. Oh, and in today’s economy, that money is not coming in. Having come to terms with this realization, I’d like to offer up some of what I have learned about doing ministry with very limited funds.

1. Don’t lament what others have spent. In our suburban town of 50,000 people we have two of the biggest student ministries in the country. Not one, but two. If I am going to be a good, reasonable steward with our funds, I cannot try to do what these other churches can do. I don’t have the facilities, nor do I have the people. I need to be okay with setting our own course that may not look anything like the churches down the street. In fact, if I try to compete with those churches with 20x my budget, my programs will not succeed.

2. Don’t give up, get creative. Rather than worry about what you cannot do, build your program around things that you can do. You can’t bring in a huge concert, but you can have awesome small group times or great retreat experiences. Experiment with programs and events and find what works for you. Get other creative people around you to brainstorm ideas. There is a lot that can be done for little to no cost.

3. Master the break-even event. We have become experts in creating events that pay for themselves. It’s pretty simple, don’t spend more than your event brings in. This means cheaper food and more work, but it also means more events. Remember, though, if your event is going to cost parents more money, be sure that you can communicate the value of the event.

4. Find investors. One of the greatest things we have going for us here in the student ministry is the willingness of people to invest in our program. We have church members who see how important student ministry is and have begun donating money towards our program. We have people who provide scholarships to camp, people who pay for our gas, and people who just donate money for whatever we need. Some of these investors are parents of our students, but many are people who simply buy into what we are doing. The money that they donate enables us to do so many things that would be impossible under the budget constraints.

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So You Want To Be A Student Minister

Posted on May 31, 2012 by Josh

I’m no expert by any means on being a student minister, but as I often encounter people who tell me they want to one day become a student minister, I thought I would offer some advice on what that journey looks like. If someone was to prepare for a career in student ministry (or any form of ministry, here’s what I would suggest:

1. Consider seminary. Seminary was invaluable to me as I began to understand the Bible and theology. I had a great time and grew as a learner and a follower of Christ. I don’t, however, think that seminary is absolutely essential to be a minister. I have many ministry friends who did not attend seminary, but I will tell you that those who did not attend seminary and are successful have a deep commitment to learning and reading. If seminary does not work for you, there are so many books, blogs, and training conferences that will exponentially increase your ability to minister.

2. Start working in ministry as soon as possible. In the church world, experience is key. Even if you have to start as a volunteer, connect to a ministry and begin working as hard as possible. Learn as you go and strive for a variety of tasks that will let you learn what you are good at and what you need to grow in. In my own opinion, finding a large church that has a healthy program is the direction you should go. Some people start out at smaller churches where ministry has been a struggle and the new guy thinks he can fix things, but often what happens is that the new guy gets burned out or discouraged before they learn what in the world they are doing. Student ministry is one of those weird occupations where people with the least amount of experience get put into the hardest jobs. Try to take the hard jobs when you know what you are doing.

3. Find a mentor and a network. We all need coached up and encouraged. Tiger Woods has a swing coach. LeBron James is quick to credit all of his coaches. You will need a mentor and other ministers who can encourage you and give you advice (and you will need advice). Find someone who has been successful in ministry for a while. Find other ministers who are just starting out and build some camaraderie with them as you go on this ministry journey together. One of the most impactful things for me has been the relationships I have with other ministers in my area.

4. Never forget that ministry is about serving God. It’s not about building a career or a platform. It is about serving God and glorifying God in all that you do. It’s an honor to serve God by discipling students, and the only way that you will succeed in this endeavor is if you maintain your relationship with God. You will minister out of the overflow of your relationship with God so make that relationship a priority.

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10 Reasons Next Generation Ministry Matters

Posted on April 13, 2012 by Josh

As a student minister I hate to hear that people see ministry to the next generation (ministry to preschool through high school) as something secondary to the work of the church. I know that there have been poor examples of next generation ministry. There are student ministers who seem to be trying to get fired because of their lack of discernment (basketball dodgeball anyone?). There are children’s ministries who are more committed to a method or a program than to the actual discipleship of our children. Despite these examples, there are those who are truly seeking to plant the seed of faith in this rising generation. Here are 10 reasons that ministry to the next generation matters.

1. We are called to make disciples in all nations and let’s assume of all ages. Ministry to the next generation is obedience to the commands of Christ.

2. The next generation will be the leaders of our churches tomorrow. Let’s be honest, what we invest in the children and students of today will be the foundation that the church will be built on tomorrow. If students learn to appreciate God’s word, then the churches of tomorrow will be taught this desire. If our students understand that their faith is something that is lived out every day, our churches of tomorrow will fight for something more than a Sunday morning faith.

3. The next generation will be the incredibly annoying church members of our churches of tomorrow…unless we can present them with a love for God and His church that allows them to see the church as a God-ordained missional community rather than a place that caters to their desires.

4. The next generation has genuine problems that the church can help with. Spend a few minutes in Wal-Mart. Look at how some of the children in there are treated by their parents. Don’t you think that a place offering unconditional love and the story of a Savior might be relevant for those kids? In this past year I have ministered to students with eating disorders, problems with cutting, suicidal thoughts, and bullying. Some of them have imprisoned parents, divorcing parents, neglectful parents, and parents who have kicked them out multiple times. These kids have problems and if the church is not able and willing to help them in this time, who would it fall to?

5. These children will be the parents of tomorrow. Our students are 5-10 years away from being parents. They will be responsible for raising another generation. Ministry to the next generation speaks into more lives than you will ever know. The church can have the honor of breaking patterns in families and reversing the fortunes of families for years to come. The church can have the honor of building a foundation that healthy families and healthy marriages are built upon.

6. The next generation is not set in their path. It seems to me that the older you get, the harder it is for you to change. You mature over time, but over the years we build up a pretty sizable amount of baggage. Intervening in a student’s life before they make bad decisions or set out on a bad path is an incredible way to make an impact. We can’t control the student, but we can at the very least offer an option that is different from everything the world will be telling them.

7. The next generation can make an impact now. I just read that a 27-year-old sold his company for 1 billion dollars. There are teenagers moving to other continents because they believe that sharing the gospel is more important than living a life of comfort. We continue to hear stories of young people doing extraordinary things. Our world has evolved to the point that anyone can make a difference. There are no age limits, but if we want to see young people continue to do extraordinary things it will take mentors and adults who can guide them and inspire them.

8. The next generation can reach its own generation. As we minister to the next generation, we recognize that we are also creating missionaries who will be able to go out to their own crowds and share the gospel in ways that an adult would never be able to.

9. Teaching the next generation gives us a deeper way to learn. As we minister to the students and share the truth of the Gospel, we grow as disciples because we too are encountering the life-changing lessons we are teaching. In fact, by teaching the word, we often develop a greater understanding of the word than if we had simply experienced as a participant in a class. In addition to teaching a lesson, learning to disciple and serve students allows us to grow in ways that we could not grow without those relationships.

10. When we serve the next generation, we are also serving their families. In fact, ministering to children and students must involve ministering to their parents. We don’t just partner with students in next generation ministry–we partner with families. As we partner with families, we are actually ministering to a significant portion of the church from preschoolers to grandparents.

Ministry to the next generation is disciple-making in one of its truest forms. Churches who get this concept will be building up individuals who will be the salt and the light of their generation.

Categories: Doing Ministry, Ministry Philosophy | Tags: ministry, next generation | Leave a comment

Why Some Student Evangelistic Events Make Me Uncomfortable

Posted on March 20, 2012 by Josh

I have a deep, deep desire to see every one of my students make a decision to follow Christ. I have a deep, deep desire to see every student in our community make a decision for Christ. I support people who are trying to make this happen through all kinds of efforts, but sometimes I get uncomfortable. I get particularly uncomfortable at large, high energy events where a call to salvation is made and kids are encouraged to come down and get saved.

It has taken me a while to understand why I feel uncomfortable about having students go down and make a decision. A few of the reasons are:

The events are often emotionally charged environments where the expectation for the students is that they would come down front. For younger students who want to comply with this cool new authority figure, the natural thing to do would be to repeat after them and go down. Also, it is so easy to make a student question their salvation, and we have to be incredibly careful when it comes to helping students understand the need for salvation versus the need for further sanctification.
Coming down to the stage is often treated as the one and only step in becoming a Christian. Frequently the speaker says “now that you have repeated my prayer and come down, you are going to heaven.” That might be true for a percentage, but many of the kids who went down came with friends, misunderstood what they were doing, or were simply caught up in the moment. If anything, there still needs to be some confirmation that the student knows what they are doing and what they actually believe. Coming down is a fine first step to talk to someone, but it is not necessarily the only step. When a kid gets to the counseling room and cannot explain why he came down, he will still have heard the speaker say that because he came down he is a Christian.
Too many students are getting re-saved all the time. There is no such thing as getting re-saved. I’m not convinced that there is actually such a thing as a decision to recommit your life given that you cannot de-commit your life to God, though I do understand that there are times when we find ourselves refocusing on our faith. When a student tells me that this is the third time that they have been saved, it makes my head explode. There is a fundamental failure on our part somewhere to explain salvation, justification, and sanctification.
There is simply too much emphasis on numbers. It may just be my cynicism, but I do believe that sometimes we make things easy so that we can have more kids make decisions and have more numbers to report to our churches or financial backers. I do not think that anyone does this intentionally, but I do think that it is easier to just baptize a kid who came down rather than take a few months to ask questions and ensure that he or she actually has truly repented and believed.

I am not saying that I will never take my students to an evangelistic event, and I don’t want to come across as judgmental. I simply want to ensure that we are doing what is best for our students. I believe that evangelistic events can be great jumping off points for students who are becoming interested in the things of God. I am saying that I believe that debriefing these experiences is of prime importance. We need to be the best stewards possible when it comes to how we approach our student’s salvation. Perhaps we ourselves need a fuller understanding of salvation, justification, and sanctification. We want to be faithful to what the Bible teaches us about these things and many times this means taking a big picture view of our methods and our vocabulary.

Categories: Doing Ministry, Ministry Philosophy | Tags: decisions, evangelism, students | Leave a comment

5 Things to Know About Working in Ministry

Posted on February 16, 2012 by Josh

When I look back, I probably did not know much of what to expect when I became a full-time minister. I knew about the job and my responsibilities, but I had not yet immersed myself in the world of ministry. Over the past few years, I have learned some very valuable lessons about ministry and what it means to be a minister.

1. You are always a minister, even when you are “off the clock.” If you are an accountant, you can basically stop being an accountant when you leave the office. If you want to have an unbalanced checkbook or want to overspend your bank account, it will not likely impact your career as an accountant. As a minister, you are always a minister. When people see you at Wal-Mart or at the movies, you are a minister. At night when a student needs to talk because of a mistake they have made or they have been thrown out of the house, you are a minister. When you are doing your morning prayers, you do so as a minister. It’s not something that you turn off. It is who you are.

2. Working at a church changes how you worship at your church. This is one of the big observations that many ministers make early on in their ministry. It may not be universal, but working at a church will likely affect how you approach your church’s worship. If you are like me, you wince each time you see a misspelled word on the worship slide or you get antsy when a transition seems to be taking too long. I find myself having to fight the urge to constantly be evaluating the worship service while it is happening. Some ministers also find that their current church has a very different style than they are used to. It takes work, but there is a great deal of comfort and encouragement in looking around the room and realizing that these people are here to seek after God and you are there to help them do it.

3. You minister out of the overflow of your relationship with God. If your relationship with God is struggling, you will struggle as a minister. So many of my great ministry moments have come from sharing what I am personally learning or what I have recently read rather than from the talk that I spent time preparing. If you are faithful in dwelling in the Scriptures, you will find yourself with a greater depth of ministry. When you shrink back from God and try to do ministry on autopilot, everything suffers. Ministry is too difficult for a foundation built on anything other than a desire to work for God’s glory and for His kingdom.

4. Ministry requires initiative. Some churches have highly structured schedules and tasks for their ministers. Most churches, however, simply expect you to take an incredible amount of initiative when it comes to accomplishing the work of your ministry. Truthfully, it can be quite easy to coast in a church position. There is a challenge in making sure you use your time wisely. This takes constant evaluation and self-assessment, but when it works, you find yourself achieving things you never thought possible.

5. There is always more to do than you can possibly accomplish. Your goal is not to make 60 cars in a month or bill 300 hours. Your job is to help people become true disciples of Christ. This takes time and does not work in some type of linear progression. Your people will have ups and downs. They will have mountain top moments and crises of faith. They will experience transformation in one area and ridiculous choices in another. And that is okay. The goal is to be on a journey with Christ, being ever transformed. Our goal is to do what we can in the time we have been given to help people along in that journey. At the end of the day, we cannot control other people or even convince them. We just do our best. There will always be more people we could meet with or more Bible studies to write, but when we know that we have honored God with our time and efforts, He will do the rest. A minister who works 80 hours a week will only be a minister for a few years. Pace yourself.

Categories: Doing Ministry | Tags: job, ministry, worship | Leave a comment

Setting the Example

Posted on October 27, 2011 by Josh

Sometimes you read a passage in the Bible and you realize that it says something you have never noticed before. This week I was reading in 1 Timothy and came across the classic young minister’s verse at 1 Timothy 4:21, which reads:

¹² Let no one despise you for your youth, but set the believers an example in speech, in conduct, in love, in faith, in purity. (ESV)

As a relatively young pastor, I have often considered the first part of the verse to be an encouraging piece of advice that allowed me to see my youth as irrelevant to my ministry effectiveness. As a student, this passage was often given to mean that even teenagers can serve God in powerful ways. Perhaps the verse has even offered some swagger for young ministers who are out there doing ministry among people who are two to three times older as if it is some kind of get out of immature ministry free card, but I am not sure that it is saying any of these things, at least without clarification.

It was not until I began contemplating the second part of the verse that I started to recognize how the first part was supposed to work. Paul calls on Timothy to set a tremendous example for the other believers so that his youth would not even be an issue. If taken as 4:12a (which I really hate because that little “a” can make a verse say a whole lot of things it is not supposed to say), then the verse could read as a sort of “shake it off” platitude. Instead, the “b” part decides to make things just a tad more difficult as it challenges Timothy to set an example in the five hardest areas that exist when it comes to setting an example.

Speech: Use words that glorify God and His work. Use words that demonstrate the character of Jesus. Speak in a way that is both true and compassionate. Speak words that always build up and never tear down. Speak words that are consistently gracious to all people all the time.

Conduct: Even if your words are good, your actions must also be setting the correct example. Do good works. Treat people fairly. Act justly. Use time wisely. Pray all the while that your actions demonstrate the character of Jesus.

Love: At all times desire the good for the other person, regardless of their speech or actions. Have compassion. Experience anguish over sin and rebellion while offering grace and mercy. Sacrifice your own personal comfort.

Faith: Believe and be strong in your belief. Allow your faith to keep you from worry, pride, or judgment. Trust God in everything, and allow people to know where your strength comes from. Let your faith permeate every part of your being.

Purity: Don’t sin. Focus on what is good. Reject what is bad or might have the appearance of evil. Keep your thoughts and actions pure and reflective of a holy God.

The emphasis of this verse seems to have more do with setting a good example than age. This good example will allow us to use the influence we have as leaders to build our people up. As a leader you have influence. With influence comes responsibility. A large part of that responsibility is to set an example that others might follow and find themselves becoming more like Jesus. As a student minister, you have become an important part of a student’s spiritual development. However, we must be good stewards of this role if we are to see the transformation in our students or parishioners. Your presence creates an impact, but your effort and example determines what kind of impact you will make in a person’s life.