by Abby Johnson From Part of the Suburbs to Serving the Suburbs I live in a large city, but the church I serve cannot be classified as urban. It is on the edge of the city, far from its urban center and into the affluent suburbs. I came from an affluent suburban neighborhood myself, and […]
by Paige Bach In my first year serving at a small church, there were fifteen youth regularly attending programming. In my second year, the number dropped to ten. By my third and final year, I had a core group of just four youth consistently coming to programming. At first glance, this seems bad. You might […]
At Cultivate this year, we are exploring the ideas of human flourishing and innovation in ministry. We will do this through the unpacking of a real life case study. We have numerous academic and on the ground innovators speaking, however, you won’t hear any of them do their normal packaged talk. They will respond to […]
Volunteers who care passionately about students, disciple them, and help plan events are the common thread among effective ministries for young people. If you struggle to find these amazing people, take comfort knowing that many other ministry leaders struggle in this area. In this article, we’ll share several strategies for recruiting volunteers to your team. […]
In consulting with churches through Youth Ministry Architects and CYMT, I hear over and over again about how students become less active or drop out of youth ministry around the age of sixteen. I’m sure you are aware of the culprits: sports teams, jobs, and – dun dun dun – the driver’s license. I would […]
My Problem I can remember counting every hour I worked my first two years in youth ministry to justify a raise. I don’t remember the exact number, but I went to the personnel committee averaging somewhere around 65 hours per week. How in the world did I average 65 hours? Well, I counted the 40-50 […]
Monday—7:00 a.m. It was a Monday morning like every other Monday morning. I was half awake and tired from a long day at church the day before. I was climbing into the shower wondering why my senior pastor thought Monday morning meetings were a good idea. Just when I was almost asleep in the shower, […]
One of my firm beliefs is that youth ministers have an important task on church staffs … making working at the church fun! Working at a church can be difficult especially when the staff does not have fun and celebrate. For whatever reason, these things do not come easy to churches. We help others worship […]
Does the church take itself to seriously? Yes. Do we take our jobs to seriously? Yes. Don’t get me wrong we are in the Kingdom business and our work is eternally important. Of course, we are God’s instruments and sometimes I think we play funny notes. When we do, we should laugh. This is the […]
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