HELPING STUDENTS TO OWN IT.

I just got back from teaching a couple of seminars at the National Youth Workers Convention this last week in Los Angeles. It is always so much fun to talk about this kind of stuff with my youth ministry peers. I'm really not sure there's much I love more about my job than helping fellow leaders in the trenches think through how we can do a better job of leading students.

One of the seminars I taught was called, "Creating a Teenage Owned Ministry: Developing a High Level of Ownership Among Your Teenagers". It was all about trying to rethink what it means to help students own their faith. I didn't do so from an "expert" position, but rather from the trenches of one who is trying to do this daily and flush out what it means in my own ministry context.

If you were wondering what it was about, I'll reproduce the basic premise and ideas here. They are essentially my introductory thoughts on the 90 minute seminar.

I proposed that there are at least 4 basic problems in youth ministry today regarding ownership and 4 values that I think we have to champion if we're going to see those problems become a thing of the past:

PROBLEM #1: Students follow Jesus for a season.

• As much as we'd like to not admit it, most of the students that come into our programs will not spend a lifetime serving Jesus. Even the most involved, the most influential, or even the most invested in our youth ministry can end up leaving it all behind in the wake of early adulthood.

LEADERSHIP VALUE: We’re trying to raise up life long disciples of Jesus, not youth group champions. (Mark 8:34-36, Matt 28:19-20)

• This is an issue of OWNERSHIP, not INVOLVEMENT. Our goal should not be to increase student's involvement in church, but rather their ownership of the core values that our faith/church is built on in the first place.

PROBLEM #2: As student's exposure to other world views expands, their “Christian” values diminish.

• Far too many ministries think that we need to build a ministry with big bunker walls to keep the evil out. But my experience says that this works about as well as putting a wild animal in the safety of the zoo and then expecting it to be able to survive again in the wild. Bunker mindsets don't produce owned values, they produce immature and naive children.

LEADERSHIP VALUE: The learning process is more important than the end product. (Matt 7:21-23)

• In other words, the ends don’t justify the means, but rather the means determine the ends. If we want students to OWN their faith as theirs, we need to go through the messy process of helping them interact with true faith in real world experiences. Faking it does no one any good.

PROBLEM #3: Students don’t know how to interact with opposing view points.

• Many ditch their faith because they simply assume they were intentionally taught only half the story. They leave the church, find out that not everyone believes what they believe, and start to think that this must be because they were brain washed.

LEADERSHIP VALUE: We are trying to teach students how to think, not what to think. (Isa 29:13, Acts 17:11)

• I have ZERO interest in teaching students how to repeat the "right answers". I am looking for ways to teach students HOW to think. This means we must expose them to opposing views in our ministries and give students a chance to wrestle with those views. The Bible doesn't hide other opposing views from it's readers, neither should we.

PROBLEM #4: Students are underestimated and under utilized… in our own youth ministry.

• Youth pastors are notorious for complaining that their jobs are nothing more than glorified baby sitting. My push back is not that this is untrue, but rather that many of us have created ministries where this is precisely the case. Before we complain that the rest of the church treats them like children, maybe we need to ask ourselves if we do.

LEADERSHIP VALUE: Students are not only becoming ministers, they are ministers. (1 tim 4:12, Prov 1:1-6)

• Henry Blackaby: “When you believe that nothing significant can happen through you, you've said more about your belief in God than you have about yourself.” Maybe this is true of our how we treat students. When we don't give them significant responsibilities in our own ministries, maybe we are saying more about our own doubts than theirs.
• Doug Fields: “They are not the future of the church, they are the church” I've heard Doug say this a thousand times. I have no idea who said it first, but I'll say it again. I need to remind myself of this all the time if I'm going to see ownership, and not just involvement increase in my ministry.

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I LIKE BUILDING STUFF

Today I helped some friends get their home owners insurance off their back and save some serious flow by building a railing on their porch.  I was dripping in so much sweat by the end of a hot day in SD that I actually showered before going to soccer practice.  Still, it's always fun to help friends build stuff.

Picture makes it look like the first post was put in at about 15 degree angle, but it's an optical illusion, it's plumb my friends.  So glad I don't have to stain it :)

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LEADERSHIP AND PUNISHMENT

I have several roles I strive to lead in that lately share one common dilemma: what do I do when those I'm leading won't listen or don't seem to care? Ie:

• AS A DAD: what do I do when my child won't own up to a responsibility at home?
• AS A YOUTH PASTOR: what do I do when a students refuse to listen even casually and simply text message all through a service?
• AS A COACH: what do I do when a kid is passive aggressive and only gives me the bare minimum in practice?

All of these are real leadership situations of the past 2 weeks, but recently, that last one has really got me thinking. I've had conversations with my assistant coaches particularly on my U14 team about what to do when our players stop listening to the coach. I coach on a field that has several other teams being coached on it at the same time, and the answer to that for many of my peers is "make them run".

But I have a problem with punishment leadership. It's not that I don't believe in consequences, but I think that every time I have to call on my title and force a child, student, or player to do what I say... there is only one thing we can be teaching: submission. When I make a student run, we are no longer coaching soccer, I'm only coaching them in one thing: "I'm the coach, and you're the player, and now we can't do anything else until you get that straight." There is a time for that, but I hate it... and it ALWAYS takes a lot of time to recover to the place of relationship. For a while, I'll be simply "coach" and they'll be "player". It's hard to be friends, mentors, or even to laugh together. Some will argue that the relationship will be better afterwards and that it is weak sauce to avoid it, but my experience says "punishment leadership" has a high price tag with it.

So, I have a few "rules" I'm trying to lead by before passing out punishments:

1. DON'T ASK OTHERS TO DO WHAT I'M UNWILLING TO DO. If I ask my kids to keep their room clean, then I need to. If I ask my players to give me their best effort, then I need to do that as a coach. If I ask my students to turn off their cell, I should unplug too.
2. AVOID SURPRISE CONSEQUENCES. I don't want to ever surprise my kids, students, or players with a consequence for their actions. My kids should know clearly what is expected of them and what the consequences will be for not doing it. I can't pass out a restriction without first making sure they clearly understood the expectations and what would happen if they ignored them. If I'm going to make my players run for not paying attention, I should have told them clearly that's what I was going to do before practice even officially started.
3. PUBLIC STUFF GETS PUBLIC CORRECTION. PRIVATE STUFF GETS PRIVATE CORRECTION. If you make a big deal of something in front of a crowd, I'll correct you in that crowd. If you make a mistake as a player in a drill, I'll pull you aside and correct you quietly. If a player says something disrespectful to me in front of the team, I'll correct them in front of the team. I rarely if ever call anyone out from the stage as a youth pastor. I default to private confrontation and use public settings only when I seem to have very few if any other leadership options.
4. OFFER CONSTRUCTIVE SOLUTIONS FIRST: Before punishing, I try and offer alternative solutions. Before telling a player to run laps or taking away a privilege from a child or whatever, I try and tell them that there is another option. The consequence then to some degree become their choice. This isn't avoidance of leadership on my part, I think it's a way for me to keep leading instead of simply punishing. Thus, "If you do ___________", we can continue our relationship and I don't have to stop leading so I can simply be a cop.
5. ONLY AS A LAST RESORT, LEAD FROM POSITION: If I have to say, "because I'm the dad and I said so", my leadership level dropped to the lowest common denominator. I try and avoid it at all costs. If I have to use this one, it is me throwing in the towel and saying, we can't do anything more until you realize this. I'm the coach, and you will listen to me. I'm the pastor, and you can't behave like this. Period. There's a time for it, but I try and only use it as a last resort.

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I DON'T GIVE A RIP

... about stuff I probably should.

In fact, I've been stewing on this for a while now. I think this is a BIG piece of my jacked up self. I think it affects so much of my emotional, physical, spiritual, and relational energy cuz I waste too much of it on stuff that doesn't matter.

For the last 3 thursdays... I have shown up to teach my kids soccer at 4pm and there's been a dad there sitting on a bucket of baseballs teaching his kid to hit and pitch. They practice for 20 minutes and leave. I wonder how many days they do that? Even though I left my office at 3pm to get my kid from school so that I could be there to coach 2 teams for 3 hours of soccer, but somehow I still feel like a tool.

What has that Dad said no to in order to be there? Why do I do this? Why does he? What really matters?

For sure I care about stuff I should just say, "skip it" to and I don't care about stuff I should probably pay a lot of attention to. Call it what you want, but I think it's a daily wrestling match when deciding what to even accomplish on my to do list.

Sadly, I think I even care about stuff God doesn't care about and I don't care enough about stuff God does care about.

On the one side. This is ridiculous. I can't possibly care about all that God cares about the way He cares about it.

• the poor
• the homeless
• the sick
• the dying
• the helpless
• the hurting
• the lonely
• the spoiled
• the desperate
• the complacent
• the happy
• the carefree
• the .... there is no one that God doesn't care about.

In our world of social needs, there seems to be an endless list of dying children, water shortages, disease victims, budget shortages, health care needs, struggling business and families and ..... it seems ENDLESS and overwhelming- the list is so long and so baffling that I sometimes want to quit for sake of the sheer volume of things I don't care about.

So I do my part. One step at a time. One day at a time. Trusting God to be WAAAY bigger than I am. I'm saying yes to some things and no to others. Each day trying to get it right. I think I fail at it more than I'd like to admit. I dunno.

Maybe I should give a rip.

Maybe I should go to bed.

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YEAH FOR FRIENDS WITH CAMERAS

Our church has a grip of photographers at it.  Lots of them helped me capture the moment of baptizing Tyler.  Once I gather all the shots from those with the clicks... I'll see if I can't create some kinda collage.  But here's 5 more I got today from Jonathon Cervantes.

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TYLER GETS BAPTIZED

I had the joy of baptizing Tyler today. This was an answer to prayer and the second of our five kids that I have baptized- TJ did it several years ago. I hope to one day have the pleasure of having baptized all 5! Maybe the next 3 will choose to do it at the same time... that will make quite the pic! Anyway, it is such a great joy as they choose on their own to make this step.

When Tyler came out into the water I reminded him that he didn't have to do this for "us". He wanted to do it a year ago, but we thought he was too young to truly be ready. Tyler said he knew that it was his decision and he was excited to do it. It was great to be able to pray for him and celebrate this step of faith in his young life.

Oh by the grace of God go I. (thanks to sarah tolson photography for the pic!)

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