In an extended pick-your-brain session with longtime youth pastor Ralph Paige, I sat with a group of young youth workers eager to learn from Ralph’s veteran wisdom as another school year rockets off the launching pad. In Part 1 of this series, Ralph focused on the foundational importance of prayer.…
Almost 50 million people attempt to diet every year—as we all know, most never reach their goal. The reason has less to do with willpower and more to do with our brain’s stubborn dictatorship. Neuroscientist and author Sandra Aamodt says: “Whenever your weight changes too much, your brain will intervene to push it back to what it thinks is the correct weight for you.…
As teenagers drag themselves out of summer and into their next school year, they have a lot on their mind. I want to access all of that “seismic activity of the soul,” so I avoid coming off like I’m interrogating them.…
We are shorthand people who prefer shorthand solutions to complex problems. That’s true in life, and it’s true in youth ministry. In the past, our shortcut paths to deeper discipleship included… • What Would Jesus Do—”Go beyond your identity as a church-attender and have the courage to live like Jesus.…
Type “teenagers” into Google, then spend 30 minutes browsing the links. I did this the other day and was confronted (over and over) by one overriding reality—Gen Z teenagers are suffering from more depression, anxiety, and stress than ever before. EVER before.…
A mission trip is like the Olympic steeplechase—you’re running as fast as you can over, around, and through every imaginable obstacle to get to the finish line. Maybe it’s the girl who shows up with a piece of luggage the size of a small horse casket, or the guy who forgot to study the packing list and brought clothes that won’t work well in your context.…
Each summer for the last three years, our youth ministry has served our city through a weeklong local mission trip called “I HEART LINCOLN” (or I❤LNK). Our teenagers pay a $100 fee and are placed on a team with two leaders—each team is assigned a pre-arranged service project organized by a local organization in our city.…
Your summer mission trip is on the launching pad—the countdown is on. Maybe you just completed your last leg on the fund-raising marathon (who knew teenagers could sell that many over-priced balls of cookie dough?). Your spreadsheet mapping the intricate details of the trip is filling up.…
At the end of this summer, you want to look back on your missions experiences in awe—the transformation in your teenagers was not only obvious but ongoing. Your kids crushed it; your leaders crushed it; you crushed it! And then the biggest question… Now what?…
Parenting my own children has helped me become a much better youth leader. Young, single, fun and crazy youth workers have the TIME to invest in teenagers, the ENERGY to go the distance with them, and the FRESH EYES to change things up.…
