• 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.

• 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.

• 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.

• 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.

• 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.

• 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.

• 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.

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 🙂

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:

… about stuff I probably should.

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.