It Happens: Conflict Resolution at Its Best and Worst By Dan Lambert “The elders expect you to be in your office at church 8 a.m. to 5 p.m., Tuesday through Friday, and 8 a.m. to noon Saturday. You have Monday off and half a day Saturday. Any time you spend with the youth is on […]
You’re Not My Parent: A Youth Minister’s Role in Discipline By Dietrich Kirk I can remember in my first two years of youth ministry thinking that my role on a trip was to be youth’s parent. Not literally, but I felt a great sense of responsibility for their safety and well-being, and I’m pretty sure […]
A Youth Minister’s Guide to Leading from Your Strengths by Stephen Ingram Many youth ministers struggle for a number of reasons. It may be due to overcommitting ourselves, difficulty finding healthy rhythms, or lack of support and training. However, most of us struggle because we are working from deficits rather than surpluses. We can usually […]
4 Tips for Utilizing Your Strengths 1. Research and understand both the positives and negatives associated with your strengths. This produces a deeper sense of priority and affirms one’s calling and direction. It also helps know where our blindspots are. Every strength has a shadow side, which is when the strengths are operating […]
DEI: Thoughtful Approaches to Youth Ministry By Dwight Johnson Approaching youth ministry through the lens of DEI will require partnership with an individual or consultant that can help you identify the spaces that need reflection, change and implementation. Research DEI consultants in your area that you can partner with or check with other churches and […]
By Andrew Zirschky, Ph.D. As the calendar year rolls over, many families see opportunities for new beginnings and restarts as they consider returning to church or finding a new one. For youth workers, this inevitably leads to evaluating and retooling our welcoming and retention processes in hopes of making our youth ministries friendly places where […]
By Laura Provence My first holiday season at my new church felt like a Christmas miracle. After struggling to maintain our large numbers from the Summer and early Fall, our Sunday night attendance quadrupled for our Christmas Party. These numbers brought a lot of excitement and left the student ministry team expectant for it to […]
By Stephen Ingram I don’t do CrossFit. I’m more of a racquetball then hit the sauna workout kind of guy. Even though I do not do CrossFit myself, it is not from a lack of effort from many of my friendswho are involved in the highly successful style of workout. I would say that I […]
By Meghan Hatcher The first step in product thinking, as Nikkel Blaase writes in an article for the Interaction Design Foundation, is to “determine the problem that your users are looking to solve.” When done well, determining a user’s problem begins with researching the user’s lived experience. From there, a product is ideated and tested […]
by Rev. Stephanie Dodge Steph is a United Methodist Senior Pastor as well as a former Innovation Lab Cohort Participant. For more information on our Innovation Lab Cohort Program (which is registering new cohorts now) CLICK HERE. In 2016, Glendale United Methodist Church was dying. This mostly older congregation was struggling to maintain a large […]
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