Bonfire Youth Ministry

I think we've all heard stories of the kids who have had that experience around the bonfire.  They've been at camp for a week and get caught up in the emotion of it all and have that moment where it all comes together and they accept Christ.  God uses those experiences and I don't want to discount them.

However, there are some youth pastors who do ministry as if they are trying to set the world on fire.  They are pros at creating the bonfire experience.  Their time is spent trying to create a unique, high impact experience (organized) when in reality the most valuable thing they could create is shared experience (organic).  In my opinion, this is one of the ways youth ministry has to change.  Our churched kids are growing up in an environment where their spiritual experiences are manufactured.  These manufactured, high impact experiences have a beginning and an end.  They have a high and they have a low.  For youth ministry students this is all the more true because these manufactured experiences end when they graduate high school.  All of a sudden they are out on their own, making their own decisons, deciding for themselves if they wan't to go to church and what are they looking for in order to make these decisions...a bonfire experience.  Shared experience, no matter how big or small, is what will keep our kids grounded in the church.  I've found that by allowing for more shared experience the unique, high impact or bonfire experiences just happen.

What does all of this mean?  I think that it means youth ministry needs to be more of a slow burn.  Kids, youth pastor, and volunteers need to be living a day to day life together and find the bonfire experiences in the shared experiences of life.  Their relationship with Jesus needs to be functioning day to day and not just whenever their is a church activity.  It is the youth pastors job to keep the fire burning.  I think their needs to be less emphasis on big missions trips and big activities and more emphasis on big relationships.  Relationships that can find a bonfire experience while camping with some guys instead having to manufacture one at camp.  My point is that kids are not always going to be able to go to camp, but they will be able to camp with the guys.  If this is the experience our kids have while in youth ministry, it will be the experience they look for or even try to create when they graduate.

On my iPod

A few things on my iPod...
Ryan Adams
Counting Crows
Brad Paisley
Old Crow Medicine Show
Kings of Leon
Regina Spektor
Robbie Seay Band
The Fray

The Future...

I have spent the last 12 years working with teenagers, and to my surprise, I have enjoyed it more and more as time went on.  I had always thought that as time progressed I would lose relevance and lose passion for teenagers.  God has definitely worked on my behalf on both accounts.  However, my overarching passion is for the church.  God has given me insight and discernment in many areas of the church world.  While I am most actively seeking a youth ministry position, I am also seeking opportunity to use my abilities in making the church a better place.  I believe that the ways that God has gifted me administratively and creatively will be a unique asset to the church who is willing to acknowledge and use those abilities.

Philosophy of Youth Ministry (part 1)

My passion is to develop lifelong disciples of Jesus Christ.  The key to that being that they begin their relationship with Jesus as a teenager and continue it through college and onto adulthood. There is a crisis in the American church in that the vast majorities of students who attend church in their teenage years are dropping out of church as they enter college.  A recent Rainier Research statistic discovered that 70 percent of young adults drop out of church by the time they are 22.  That number jumps to 80 percent by the time they are 30.  What is wrong that is causing this exodus?  In my opinion, it is the lack of consistency in the lives of our churched youth.

Until recently, the average term of a youth pastor in the United States was only 18 months(there has been a slight upward trend). An 18 month term means an 18 month relationship.  Assuming students are in youth ministry from the sixth grade, they would have 4.67 youth pastors in their seven years in youth group.  This is hardly a model of consistency.

It is my desire to find a church home that is willing to invest consistency in the lives of their teenagers.  Yes, invest consistency.  It isn't about money and it isn't about programs.  It is about the consistent relationships that are formed between the church and these kids.  The kind of relationships that they can take to college and return to when they graduate.  If the church is nothing but a revolving door, our kids will sneak in and sneak out of it.  But if the church is a relationship...if it is a reunion of relationships...if it is consistent and models Christ's relationship with us, they are much more likely to be consistent in their relationship with the church and with Jesus Christ.

In part 2 I will write about the importance of corporate worship in the lives of teenagers.

Welcome!!!

The purpose of this blog is for churches and pastors to learn a little bit about who I am.  I am currently seeking a ministry that can use my abilities and skills.  I have been in youth ministry in some capacity for the last 12 years.  I know that my gifts are not just confined to youth ministry and I am looking forward to ministering in whatever capacity God might have.