Top 15 Youth Group Cliches

Check out this snarky and silly video from Blimey Cow on the top 15 youth group cliches (click here to watch if you can't see the embed below):

What'd you think? Which cliche stood out to you the most? Share your thoughts and responses in the comments!

Shutting Down Your Youth Ministry

Have you ever thought about doing this? I’m not talking about shutting it down, closing the doors and never opening them again. What I’m talking about is shutting down your youth ministry over Christmas break, march/spring break, easter weekend, or over the summer.

I’m seeing this more and more and as I speak to youth workers, this is not just denominational specific. This is

Design this, you have time to plan for your youth group.

happening right across denominational lines.

The reasons for this epidemic of shutting our youth ministry down are from paid  and volunteer youth workers:

• i don’t have the resources
• i’m not a paid youth worker
• i have a family
• i have vacation
• we are giving the kids a break
• we give pour volunteers a break
• most of our students go away at this time
• what's your reason?

My response:

• your kids don’t care about resources, they care about you in their life.
• you have not been a paid your worker the rest of the year.
• did you have a family the rest of the year?
• take your vacation. enjoy and rest. let someone else take the lead for the youth ministry.
• kids and youth workers take breaks all the time when they can’t make it out during the rest of the year.
• most of your students going away is not ALL. You need to get over the numbers game your playing and address this with God. It’s not about most but about one.

The one thing I know about youth workers, paid or volunteer, is that you are creative enough to over come obstacles. Just because the school calendar tells us that their is no school does not give us the right to say to our students that God has entrusted to us that their is no youth group scheduled.

There are many reason why youth workers honestly cancel youth group and here are three I have seen:

• insecurity
• control
• greed

Surprise your kids and church by not cancelling your youth group over break. Create a new plan and involve your students to help you accomplish it. They will surprise you, guaranteed! 

Pray and ask God:

Do what ever it takes in me

for your kingdom

for my freedom

so that others may see Jesus

Putting Your "Plan B" Into Action

Ellen says...


Seeing the message of Plan B impact so many lives around me, I am convinced that this really affordable, high-quality DVD study is a proven winner. Pete Wilson is a great, fresh communicator. Highly recommended for older teens / young adult and youth leader studies!


About the resource...

Putting Plan B into Action
Pete Wilson
Trade Paper w/DVD • Thomas Nelson •9781418546076


What do you do with a shattered dream? Or an unmet expectation? How do you accept your Plan B when God doesn't show up the way you thought he would? With powerful real-life stories of disappointments and tragedy along with biblical stories and teaching, Pete Wilson leads study groups through the process of discovering the Plan B for your life, accepting your story, and embracing it as your reality. The Plan B DVD-based study offers you the chance to share with and embrace a community of believers as you begin a journey of real healing and change.

An excerpt... 

More free resources:
Putting Plan B Into Action with Pete Wilson - Session 1
Free Church Resources for Putting Plan B Into Action: A DVD-Based Study

Born and raised on Vancouver Island, Ellen Graf-Martin now lives in the heart of Ontario’s Mennonite country with her husband Dan, where she continues to work in publishing and ministry.Learn more about her work at www.grafmartin.com

Bullying in Youth Ministry

What do you teach from the bible about bullying?

If you don't have a plan, get one. Don't know where to start? Contact me, I'll help you. If you don't think it's worth teaching or even addressing in youth ministry, you should step out of your role in youth ministry and find another vocation?

Why do we only care about the spiritual lives of the kids in our youth groups and not their physical and emotional needs as well?

The Bully Project is in select theatre today.

MUST SEE movie for all youth workers.

Jeff Smyth is husband to Heather and father of one active boy Nathan. He has been involved youth ministry leadership for 15 years in both the local church and non-profit areas of Canada. He has been serving for the past 3 years as the coordinator of community initiatives with DOXAToronto.com the Scarborough are of Youth Unlimited (Toronto YFC). Learn more about him by visiting his blog ThinkYouthMinistry.com or follow him @jeffsmyth

Leadership Is Lonely

Alone.

That's how many youth workers feel these days. Many of us are the only youth worker doing what we do in our little section of God's Kingdom. We may have others who volunteer their time, talent and treasure into the ministry we are involved. Yet we still have this sense of feeling alone.

When we sit in our office, at local place that hase free wifi so we don't have to go into the office, or even when we are at home relaxing. Leadership is lonely and I've experienced it and I've heard it over and over again. The problem I have with this is that we have bought another lie that we should not believe.

Now wait a minute, you might say. Leadership is lonely, just look into the Bible for the many examples of a leader who was lonely. Be honest, you could list at least 5 or more leaders from the Bible who were lonely right!?! These many leaders had some lonely moments but that they were not lonely, every single minute of their leadership journey.

Yet for those of us in youth ministry leadership we believe that at our core we are alone in what we do. We find ourselves in our own silo from the other ministries and staff. You might even think that youth ministry is not understood at it's basic form it is only tolerated within your organization. You have a good volunteer team but in the day to day realities of youth ministry you feel alone. I understand that loneliness, I've experienced that loneliness and I've tried to hide that loneliness too many times. One of the most important realities about youth ministry loneliness is that it is my fault if I felt lonely.

So now back to you.

Loneliness is your own fault. You have bought into the lie that leadership is lonely. Now I want to confirm that you will have lonely moments but if you feel alone in youth ministry "ALL THE TIME" it is you're own fault or there might be something deeper that you need to explore. But at it's basic form, we were not designed to be lonely, we wer designed for community by the God of all creation.

Here are my top 5 Ways to Always Feel Alone in Youth Ministry:

5) Don't connect with any other staff and volunteers in your organization professionally and socially.

4) Don't coordinate a prayer team for yourself from within your faith community or your family and friends.

3) Don't belong to a small group from within your community of faith.

2) Never be mentored by someone older and more experienced than you in life and ministry.

1) Don't belong to a peer network of other youth workers from other denominations.

We've Got to Pray Just to Make it Today

As a teen, I was a huge Halle Berry fan, not for her acting, but because she was so beautiful. In my early 20's I'd rip a picture out of the magazine of the Halle Berry Shag look that she made famous and gave it to my hairdresser to get the same cut.

When I heard she was divorcing David Justice the baseball player (I was a baseball addict back then) I was so disappointed. I loved them together! Drama followed Halle Berry after that with rumours of abuse, the fights etc. At that point I started to pray for her. As a matter of fact, I chose two celebrities to pray for; Halle Berry and Whitney Houston.

As I got older, I got so used to hearing about celebrity drama that my heart hardened, and I neglected to pray for these two celebrities.

"We've got to pray just to make it today" - MC Hammer

Back in the day, it was just a cool song. Today I wonder was it a cry for help? What would Whitney's life look like if all of her fans, around the world, prayed for her?

When I first found out about Whitney Houston, my heart was so heavy. Actually, that's an understatement. Each night I lay in my bed after watching CNN till the wee hours of the morning listening to all the interviews of the people who knew Whitney, trying to make sense of it all while tears rolled over the bridge of my nose. I was ignorant of her constant battle of not feeling good enough, her desire to be taken care of, her reasoning for staying in an abusive relationship.

There was so much I didn't know until after she died. Whitney Houston was a normal human being with a God given talent that rose her to the top who needed as many people as possible to pray for her so she would resist temptation and walk in God's best for her.

Do you have a kid in your youth group who is in the know of every celebrity? They read the magazines, watch the movies, and get a news feed from TMZ? If so, talk to that student, about doing up a report or info on how your youth group can pray for our celebrities instead of gossip about them.

Encourage your youth group to adopt a celebrity and commit to pray for them. They obviously need our prayers. Where are the Ashton Kutcher fans? He could do with some prayer. Demi Moore needs to know that she is loved unconditionally. All the used to be Hanna Montana fans, where are they at?

These celebrities need our prayers. They have mom's, dad's, grandparents too. Martin Sheen was gravely distressed about the condition of his son Charlie, while the majority of the world laughed. Seriously, the devil has been using fame and fortune to destroy people who have God given talent. He's been taking advantage of Hollywood’s spotlight to negatively influence our youth. Our youth group has the power to break the cycle.

We've got to Pray, to help them make it through today.