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I received this question from a youth worker in December:

I am speaking at a youth ministry event on Longevity in Ministry. I would love to hear back from you on what your top 10 secrets of longevity in ministry are?

Here’s what I wrote in response (in no particular order):

1. Embrace humility. Ask people to hold you accountable to this.
2. Have intentional conversations with youth workers who have stayed in one church for 10 years or more. Seek their input.
3. Make a list of the reasons why longevity is valuable. Pull it out and read it from time to time.
4. Get over yourself. You are not God’s secret weapon or only option.
5. Ruthlessly develop intimacy with Jesus. Only when you are deeply connected with Jesus will you be able to set aside your ego and weather the temptations to move on.
6. Remind yourself regularly that your calling does not come from people, but from god.
7. Decide how you will measure your success. Bad measures of success = a big program, lots of ego strokes, buzz, impressive numbers. Good measures of success = the faith of former teenagers when they’re in their 20s or 30s (and only longevity allows you to really see that).
8. Consider the cost to your church, the teenagers you serve, your family, and your own soul of constantly looking over the fence for something “better”.
9. Eschew power. Power corrupts your calling and falsely inflates your sense of importance.
10. Value faithfulness over influence.

Oh, and #11: Cultivate a life outside of youth ministry.
How about an even dozen? #12: Be ruthless about establishing and honoring a sustainable rhythm of silence and solitude.

What do you think? What did i miss? And which of these is most difficult for you?

This article was first published at WhyIsMarko.com.
Photo Credit: Paul Prescott – Shutterstock.com

Our world is quickly becoming an interactive world because of social media. One-way broadcasting is being replaced with multi-way conversations. People no longer passively consume media. They interact with it. They talk back through Twitter, Facebook, text messages, and more.

Your church needs to become more interactive if you want to connect with people and stay relevant. How can your church service become more interactive? Churches can either encourage this conversation and guide it into something useful and productive, or they can be left in the dust, once again, seen as hopelessly out of date.

Encouraging interactivity can make some church leaders and pastors a little nervous. It means acknowledging that the pastor isn’t the only source of wisdom in the church. It means allowing for disagreements (and agreeing to disagree). But it can also be amazing as attenders tap into the collective wisdom of the crowd.

Here are few ways your church service might be more interactive:

1. If you stream your services, use an interactive chat platform. Have a host or online campus pastor who greets people and lets folks know they are available for prayer or discussion.
2. Create an online discussion forum or blog post with comments or even a discussion group that meets for coffee after the service. If you really want to get interactive, add a “talk back” portion of the sermon where you actually discuss the sermon.
3. Pastors should consider asking one creative question as they begin their sermon. Designate a text number for people to respond to. One example is something our pastor calls the “virtual pastor question”. He will ask a question relating to the topic he is speaking on. Towards the end of the message he will read the responses. They can range from humorous to serious.
4. Invite people into the message before hand. A pastor could give a preview of the upcoming sermon. Maybe there’s a question that’s troubling the pastor and they could ask for input. This draws people into the weekend.
5. Make sure you have a church Facebook page. Interactivity shouldn’t be limited to the sermon. Let people share what God is doing in their lives. It’s a powerful way to show what God is doing in your church. Encourage the same kind of discussion as you would for a sermon. Post things that are not only about your church but other things that reflect your vision and values.
6. Our church will post pictures of activities happening before and during the service to Facebook and Twitter. That’s a powerful way to encourage interaction and help your congregation spread the word about church.

It’s time to start using all the tools available to help connect people. You can start small and work your way up as you feel comfortable but the important thing is to begin. Jesus and his disciples went to where the people were in their time. We can now use technology to go where people are today.

One of the most frequently asked questions to me is “how do I get the boys to participate in worship?” It seems it’s an area that way too many churches struggle with. It can be for a variety of reasons which we’ll discuss.

Last month I was leading worship at a church in St. Louis. I looked up and saw a nice young man probably about ten or eleven singing along with ALL of his heart. You could see the passion is his face and the joy in his smile. My heart did a happy dance inside seeing him participate in this special time of worshipping the creator of the universe. I was once again reminded that boys can sing, and they will sing.

So for those of you needing some help motivating this particular group here’s a few areas to inspect and possibly re-evaluate:

1. What does your music sound like?

For the past six decades Rock music has been a genre of music. Boys love to rock. No matter the area of the country. No matter how straight laced their parents are… boys like rock-n-roll. If your music is too chintzy, they will roll their eyes, cross their arms, and decide they don’t like it and therefore not participate. Ta dah! Make sure you’re using music that will appeal to them by the way it sounds!

2. Who do you have on stage leading worship?

I’m not saying this from some sort of popularity contest ego trip. I’m saying this because boys need great role models. If who you have on stage is not some one they would aspire to be like then it’s much harder to get them involved. Having young people like high school and college students involved is huge. It provides great role models to your older elementary students especially plus is really motivating to the boys. Give them “Positive” peer pressure by having people on stage (both guys and girls) that are cool and passionate for Christ. That coolness and the passion will rub off and turn into participation.

3. Make sure your leaders look like they like to worship?

If the people on stage aren’t excited then how can you expect the people in the audience to get excited? It doesn’t work like that. Make sure your worship team is full of energy, smiles and authentic “having a great time praising God” sort of charisma! This needs to be evident with all the other leaders in the room too. Even those volunteers in the back, the aisles, or wherever else you staff your rooms need to be encouraged that they need to set the example and participate.

4. Teach why and how.

“Faith comes by hearing and hearing by the Word.” There is an element of worship that is completely natural cause it’s part of how God created us. However, some of us need more help then others. Make sure little by little, week by week you’re teaching your students why we worship and how to worship. I see in my travels that often times a lack of participation is due to a lack of understanding. How can we expect them to act a certain way that would be filled with singing, clapping, and hands lifted if we’ve never taught or shown that’s worship? Explain what worship is and little by little even the boys will get it and apply it to their life evidenced by their actions

I hope one or all four of these sparked something new for you. Go back to the drawing board. Make changes and improvements to make your ministry better and more relevant to the boys and the girls. I believe nothing brings a smile across God’s face like His creation old and young honoring Him by our worship.

I love it that more and more churches are valuing students enough to be intentional about integrating them into the larger church body, realizing that a youth ministry in isolation can have some very detrimental effects. Here’s a few ideas I have for integrating teenagers into the church body and some thoughts on each.

1. Serve in the church service.

So far, this seems to be the main extent of “integration,” and it is definitely a good start, but too often we pat ourselves on the back and say, “Hey, kids are serving in the worship band, greeting at the doors, and running the sound system! They’re integrated!” A few important questions:

• Does this really make teenagers feel like they have an equal stake in the church along with the adults?
• Do some teens feel like they’re mostly serving the adults in “their” space?
• Does it make the kids who aren’t serving feel like the others are “in” but they’re still “out?” (This perception doesn’t seem to be the case as much for adults who aren’t serving. What’s the difference?)
• Does this really lead to a comprehensive perception among all teenagers that they’re an equal part in the worship experience?

Maybe some of your churches can answer positively to some or all of these questions, and that’s great! I’d encourage you to ask some of the students themselves, too, and hear what they say. Going to the source is always a good idea.

2. Invite teenagers to youth leader meetings.

Hopefully our youth ministries are moving toward “youth doing ministry” more than “us doing ministry to youth.” If that’s the case, we need to include teenagers who are serving in our trainings, decisions, and plans. The approach for getting teens involved in ministry should not be adults who determine what the ministry does and then tries to get teens to do it. Instead, invite teens into the process of shaping the ministry from the very beginning. That’s where true ownership really begins.

3. Encourage your Sr. Pastor to speak to them.

Often we say, “We want to integrate teenagers into our worship experience,” but then never talk to them once they’re there. Encourage your Senior Pastor to take a moment in each of his messages to speak directly to the teenagers and other oft-overlooked demographics, like young singles and newly married.

Although it might be a bit outside your pastor’s comfort zone, he could also use illustrations and examples that connect with those age groups specifically. In fact, he could teach an entire sermons series that is directly aimed at teenagers! After all, there’s probably been enough aimed at the adults lately. Let’s even it out a bit.

To take this a bit further, have your senior pastor come engage with kids at youth group, too. It’s easy to say we want teenagers to join the adults, but let’s make an effort to “cross pollinate” both directions. The influence your senior pastor can have on your teenagers is often greatly underestimated. After all, he is their pastor, too, not just the “adults’ pastor.” If he joins them in their group and engages with them there, maybe the invitation to join the adults in “their turf” on Sundays feels a bit more genuine.

4. Invite teens to give input into the sermon.

Some pastors meet with their staff every week to review the upcoming messages. They collectively give input, share creative ideas, point out gaps, and poke holes in the content so it’s a solid presentation and message when it’s delivered. It would be great to invite some teenagers into that process each week, as well.

Although it’s probably difficult to do that on another evening of the week when teens are not in school, you could at least grab some home schooled kids and ask them to be a part of the weekly brainstorming meeting during the day. They can definitely give input that will help your pastor craft the message for their demographic in ways none of us can.

And I guarantee that those kids will be listening intently when the message is delivered. They will feel like they have a huge stake in what’s being presented because their influence was heard and respected. They’ll retain a lot of what’s taught, if not all of it!

5. Include teens into small groups with adults.

A friend of mine who’s a pastor at another church in my town shares a story about their intergenerational small groups. They didn’t necessarily want the small groups to be intergenerational, but because there wasn’t anything else for their children during that time and because the kids were too young to leave at home, they brought them along to their home groups and included them in the discussions.

While he thought the discussions might become a bit juvenile for the adults, he says it actually became very valuable for them. Their young kids speak up and challenge them on so many levels. They have insights and questions they never considered.

One evening they were taking about Good Samaritan and his 8 year old son said, “So, why do we just sit here? We need to go out and help people.” The parents sat there for a second, feeling a bit jarred from the comfort zone of the couches, and had to admit that he was right. So in the weeks that followed, the small group took their kids out to serve in the community in place of their normal meeting time. As a result, the families grew together spiritually and bonded in ways that never would have happened had they been split up into age appropriate groups.

6. Invite teenagers into church board meetings.

I suggested this to one church and a deacon said, “No way! I would be embarrassed for my teenager to see what happens in there.” All the more reason to get your act together and have teenagers in there!

Seriously, don’t dismiss this one too quickly. I’m not saying they have to be voting members of the church board, but they can certainly give valuable input and perspectives in an advisory role. Don’t discount this aspect of church as for adults only or, “Teens wouldn’t be interested in this kind of stuff.” Some are! Find a couple solid and spiritually mature teenagers and invite them to be a part of the church’s bigger picture decisions and meetings. Teach them how a church budget works, how your church’s values play out in your decision making process, how church conflicts are resolved, and more.

The key isn’t just to integrate teens into areas that are comfortable and easy for us, but to plug them into every aspect of the church and form the church’s plans around them as much as anyone else. Give them the opportunity to have the same stake in your church that the adults have. Hold them to a higher standard and expect them to step up to it. Many of them will.

This article was first published at StudentMinistry.org.

Here are a handful of innovative movements I long to see in youth ministry and am committing myself to.

Go organic. Buy local.

Youth ministry simply must become more organic and local. Of course, your practice of youth ministry is local, but I’m addressing the whole engorged body of thinking and resourcing and modeling in the world of youth ministry. Sure, national events can be great, but remember that model church isn’t in your neighborhood and isn’t populated by your teenagers and parents and doesn’t necessarily share your values.

Do not listen to me (or any other youth ministry “expert”) when we tell you what you should do. We might stir your thinking or imagination (and that’s a good thing); but you and I simply must cultivate an active life of spiritual discernment and organic contextualization when it comes to our approaches, models, and methods.

Integration

I don’t know how we’re going to do this, and I’m certainly not the only one saying it. But we have to work against the isolation of teenagers, particularly in our churches. This, alone, is the single biggest failure of youth ministry over the past four or five decades.

Models and Practices for Non-professional Youth Workers

Sorry to be the doomsday guy, but the era of professional youth workers is going away, eventually. It might linger longer in certain denominations (like, Southern Baptist) or geographies (like, the Southern United States); but it’s on the decline, and it’s not going to return.

Small churches, of course, have long done youth ministry without paid staff. But mid-sized to large white, suburban churches (where the majority of paid youth workers exist) have no idea how to even think about youth ministry without paid staff. Very soon, the money is just not going to be there.

What other innovations do you think are needed in youth ministry?

This article was first published at WhyIsMarko.com.

My friend Mike asked me, “What are the top ten characteristics of a healthy youth ministry?” There are a million lists like that floating around, but it did make me stop and commit to a “top 10″ list for myself.  So here’s my list, subject to revision.

10.  Safe space.

We live in what sociologist Ulrich Beck calls “a culture of risk.” There are lots of dimensions to that, but what it boils down to is a loss of certainty (I would say confidence) that were once provided by traditions and institutions. The upshot is a current of anxiety running through our culture that we mask with consumerism (“retail therapy”), attention to self-presentation (working out, body art, etc.),  an overabundance of activities (“extracurriculars keep kids out of trouble”), and countless other practices designed to keep anxiety at bay.

Young people need safe spaces in their lives where they can “be” themselves instead of trying to “prove” themselves. Safe space can means time, relationships, or physical space where young people have the emotional, relational, physical, and spiritual freedom to explore, to risk, and to fail in a safety net of love–real love, not the Hallmark stuff. Safe spaces give youth the experience of being really “seen” and known as God sees and knows them, as beloved brothers and sisters of Christ.

(It goes without saying that “safe space” in youth ministry assumes a system of protection for sexual misconduct is in place.)

9.    A culture of permission and creativity.

A safe space yields permission–permission to take risks, to move outside comfort zones, to initiate and to lead. Healthy youth ministry creates a culture of permission where young people can follow Christ where they sense they are being led, where adults are guides but not programmers, permission givers rather than gate keepers, trail guides rather than tour operators.

Creativity requires freedom–which safe space and permission provide. Young people need practice in multiple “faith languages” – words and actions, art and prayer. Increasingly, the language of the arts is becoming a “spiritual language” for young people (especially emerging adults). Healthy youth ministries recognize that young people live in a participatory culture, where they create cultural content as well as consume it. Treating youth primarily as consumers (of worship, programming, mission) fails to recognize that they are created in God-the-Creator’s image, and also makes church seem unwelcoming and archaic.

8. A culture of theological awareness.

Youth ministry ought to help youth see their lives the way God sees them–which means becoming aware of theological categories like grace, forgiveness, redemption, sin, hope. One of the findings of the National Study of Youth and Religion is that churches are not helping very much on this front. The result is that kids growing up in churches frame their lives in pretty much the same was as anybody else–which makes it tough to buck cultural norms that run contrary to the gospel. Healthy youth ministry creates a culture of theological awareness, teaching young people how to imagine themselves as participants in God’s story.

7. Integration into worship and congregational life at every level — while maintaining significant peer groups of faith.

Teenagers need people to reflect back to them who they are; this “mirroring” is basic to the process of identity formation, and for the church to be absent from this process is a lethal sin of omission. Only in the church do young people begin to see themselves through the eyes of people who try to see them as God sees them:  beloved, blessed, called. Interaction with Christian peers is part of this process, but adults are significant mirrors as well.

Christ calls teenagers, like the rest of us, to follow him–which makes youth as integral to the Body of Christ as anybody else. Separating youth out from the larger congregation is both theologically irresponsible, and a pragmatic mistake. Segmenting youth exclusively into “youth activities” leads young people to associate church with their peer groups–making “graduation” into the intergenerational faith community extremely difficult.

6. A community of belonging that is authentic, fun, and passionate about living as Christians in the world.

Truth is, it doesn’t really matter if the community of Christians in which youth participate is a youth group, a choir, a drama troupe, a Bible study, a parachurch organization or even the congregation as a whole (though the larger the congregation gets, the less likely people are to experience it as a community of belonging apart from small groups of fidelity, intimacy, and prayer). The point is that teenagers need to feel like the church is a place they belong, and not just attend–and belonging means they participate with joy alongside others who are living in the same direction.

5. A team of adult youth leaders who are actively growing together in faith and who embody the quality of community with one another and missional attitude that we want our kids to have.

You can’t lead where you don’t go. Adults need to unpack their own baggage so we don’t accidentally bring it into our relationships with youth–and we need to model the kind of spiritual investment in ourselves, in one another, and in the world, partly because it’s a faithful way to live, and partly because youth need examples of what communities that support each other in living as Christians in the world looks like.

4. A supportive congregation where people actively seek God and that talk about God as the subject of sentences.

Let me unpack this one. First, I’m convinced by the 2003 Exemplary Youth Ministry study  that congregations where young people reliably develop mature faith “talk about God as the subject of sentences.” Two things are important in that phrase: 1) People talk about God, which means God is a lively concern in these congregations; and 2) God is the subject of sentences, which mean when people talk about God, they are saying that God does things. God is an actor in their lives, in the life of the congregation; God is doing things through them; God is alive and present and in their midst. And, they talk to God as well as about God.  You can probably think of churches where God is about as inert as the couch in the church parlor. But congregations that help young people have vital, lively faith talk about God as the subject of their sentences.  God happens to them and through them.

Talking about God as an actor in the world is an indicator that people in a church are actively seeking God, and that they believe God makes a difference. That’s Step #1 in becoming a supportive congregation for youth ministry. But I’m equally convinced by Mark DeVries’ thesis in Sustainable Youth Ministry that congregations that impact young lives deeply invest in the infrastructure and leadership (lay and clergy) that make it happen.

This is not in lieu of investing directly in teenagers; people in congregations need to know young people by name, and welcome them “as they are” (even kids who don’t fit the congregational norm, and who look, sound, and smell differently from the kids we imagined). Supportive congregations give young people given concrete evidence that they are known (“Hey, how did it go with that teacher who was giving you trouble?”), and challenge them to grow beyond who they already are, and into the person God has created them to become (“You can’t smoke weed here. I care about you too much to let you hurt yourself.”) They give youth opportunities to grow in their faith and to live into their vocations, naming teenagers’ God-given gifts and inviting them to use those gifts on behalf Christ in the church and in the world.

Third, a supportive congregation is one where the whole community invests–visibly–in growing in faith together, and where teenagers witness the fruits of this investment as people takes risks on behalf of others in Christ’s name.

3. A senior pastor who is crazy about young people.

See #4, above – all these things are true for people who lead congregations as well.  The senior pastor or head of staff, in many ways, embodies the congregation’s “brand.” If a congregation supports youth ministry, it will be clear because the head of staff talks about young people (positively) in public, includes them in leadership, embraces the faith development of parents, knows youth and their leaders by name, and makes himself/herself available to young people for spiritual conversations.  The senior pastor is youth ministry’s head cheerleader:  Go, team.

2. Lots and lots of parents who are growing in, and living out, their love of God and neighbor (and who are aware that this matters to their kids).

You’ve heard it before: parents are the most important youth ministers young people ever have. No variable in the National Study of Youth and Religion is more important in young people’s faith identities, or in their ability to sustain those faith identities between high school and emerging adulthood, than parents who are religiously active while their kids are teenagers. And if young people don’t have parents who are investing in faith, then churches need to be places where kids can find adults who are investing in faith, and who are willing to  “spiritually adopt” these teenagers so they can eavesdrop on what it looks like to be an adult follower of Jesus Christ.

1. Jesus.

I know, I know:  the “right” answer in church is always “Jesus.” And of course, Christians understand God as three-in-one, so Jesus is not the only person of the Trinity who matters in youth ministry, so please don’t misunderstand me as reducing God to the Incarnation.

But Christians understand God as Triune through Jesus, whose life, death, and resurrection reveals who God is and who we are in relationship to God. Doing youth ministry without God is like doing dinner without food:  you can come to the table, but there’s nothing to eat…so why bother?

This article was original published at KendaDean.com.

We now live in a day when everyone has access to share their message on the Internet, and millions of people are doing just that. One estimate noted that every two days we create as much information as we did from the dawn of civilization up until 2003. All that content is being scattered everywhere online, and it can be quite the challenge to find the valuable content we ought to hear.

Even with all this technology available at our fingertips, we are only hearing a part of all that the Spirit of God is saying through His Body. We tend to hear only what is distributed by those who have the resources of finances, marketing-savvy, and popularity. Yes, God has used the resources of the wealthy for Kingdom impact; for example, Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, David, and Solomon. And, yes, God can use gifted communicators since He is the one who gives gifts.

But there’s more.

We now have the potential to hear (and read and watch) all that is God-inspired from the entire Body of Christ around the world. With the free availability of the Internet, people everywhere can contribute content and freely share all that God has inspired them. And as the people of God
are edified by that content, they serve as the body of Christ to confirm what God is inspiring and that must be shared and lifted up.

Let’s not forget that God also spoke through ordinary people and the unwealthy; the likes of Amos, Micah, and, ultimately, Jesus Christ. He who was rich became poor. And he spoke the most powerful words of all. Can we learn to hear those voices also?