Summer Camp vs. Mission Trip - choose wisely

In meeting with a small group of student leaders recently, one comment in particular caught my attention. One minister declared; "well, we don't DO summer camp any more, we do mission trip. Our kids would rather do missions than camp and I think that reflects mature ministry."

For a little while I managed to keep my mouth shut and not respond (but those 15 seconds passed fast). I was hoping he would clarify his position a bit before my mouth opened. Hurry, clarify that with something intelligent. I prayed for strength to hold my tongue, I applied my hand to my mouth in hopes that it would remind my lips to stay neutral. To no avail, as soon as an appropriate pause entered our presence, I shared my thoughts on "mature" ministry. Stepping up to my summer camp soapbox, I began; Friends and neighbors, young and old, stupid and brilliant, egoistic and humble, beginners and veterans - It is of course not an either/or and it is also not about both/and, at least not automatically so. Rather, it is about planning with stinking purpose . . . for the hundredth thousandth time. And let me just add a side bar here for the GenX and Millennials; contray to popular belief, Doug Fields did not come up with the idea of Purpse Driven Ministry. It is not a Saddleback concept. Now for those of you who drink weekly from the faucet of www.simplyyouthministry.com, please put your swords and paintball guns down. Make no mistake about it, I am glad for Doug's book and resources. PDYM was long overdue in a time period in modern youth ministry when we were becoming overstocked with slackard and disfunctional student ministries. In fact, I built an entire course around it (STM 310) as the primary text book at the Baptist College of Florida. But with all due respect to the decade old Purpose Driven movement, I was taught the concept of planning with purpose and creating mission satements by old professors back in 1981 at New Orleans Seminary. And, I might add, they seem to teach the concept as if it was an old staple of mature ministry even when it was taught to them- way back in the day.

Ok, back to Camp vs. Mission trip - when I hear this idea of missions rather than camp, what I am often times really hearing - besides bla bla bla bla bla bla bla is:
1. I cant afford to do both summer camp and mission trip, so we pick the one that is the easist to garnish financail support from our senior adults and others to pay for most of it.
2. I am not very successful in doing outreach to connect to the lost community, so we just nurture our "core" kids and take them away on mission trips.
3. We dont have any peripheral students or lost kids hanging around our ministry so we dont have much need for a camp where the lost will be saved.
4. It is much easier to herd "core" students than manage a pack of wild students who think, talk and behave like lost students.
5. I am a "Lone Ranger" style of ministry and I simply can not coordinate and direct two major events during the summer and keep our other minsitry programs up to speed.
6. It sounds more spiritual to declare our love, support and intentionality towards the call to mission endeavors.
7. Serving others through missions makes our ministry look more Godly even though many of our students who are passionate about serving in Jesus' name never apply His purspose for living to their daily life actions.
So when someone says: "we don't DO camp, we do mission trips" it may not be for one of the reasons above but the real point of position is this: We must plan our ministry caledars with purpose towards accomplishing a comprehensive and balanced ministry which can and perhaps should include two of the most productive ministry initiativfes on the calander - Summer Camp and Mission Trip. In doing so, we help push on towards accomplishing the neccessary balance of Evangelism, Worhsip, Discipleship, Ministry and Fellowship (thanks Doug)

What in the world are you talking about?

Good communication is an essential element of accomplishing any youth ministry. We communicate to students and leaders, to parents and church staff. We communicate in large groups and small groups, with our words and our actions, and in our fliers and our bulletins. Nearly every aspect of ministry involves communication. Our purposes may be determined, our programs developed, and our principles defined, but we must communicate what that purpose is, where and when those programs are, and how the ministry will be accomplished.

In short communication is central to a healthy professional youth ministry. So what? So why does it seem like many youth leaders treat the job of researching the scripture and planning their weekly student sermon like it is an incidental element. Why do many treat the meeting with parents as a necessary evil with little to no advance planning, no agenda, no hand outs or consideration of what a parent is looking for from the time spent. I'm just saying . . . come on guys - lets plan to be more professional and respectful of the time our volunteer teams and parents give towards His ministry under our direction.

If we want to be taken serious, then we need to put on our big boy boxers and plan more like professionals OR . . . just admit that you're not up to the job and move it on down the road so those who are serious about the world of Student Ministry can lead it to Grow Up and Become what God intends and what the church needs.

Five Fundamentals of Filtering

Just saw a great update from Walt Mueller over at CPYU. He was discussing the ever changing world of Marketing, pushing the envelope and how that "push" of the envelope affects our response, perception, and ultimately, our ministry. That caused me to think about how we spend our energy in ministry trying to keep up with the change, wanting to know the culture and yet not wanting to be changed by it regarding the message of hope in Christ. I have always felt that it was more biblical and practical to teach students FILTERING skill rather than concepts. Concepts tend to be more abstract that must be applied to each situation. Filtering skills are one step closer where we can apply our developing filters to anything we see, hear or experience. Especially for Middle School students, we need to be as concrete as we can. With this in mind I thought it would be beneficial to share with you the SME filtering questions that I share at Parenting Conferences. These five were adapted from Walt Mueller's list called The Simple Seven Ad-Filtering Questions.

I call mine: The Five Fundamentals of Filtering.
1. Is someone trying to SELL me something?
2. If I "buy" it, will I also be indirectly purchasing an idea, lifestyle, behavior or world view.?
3. Is there bait, hook or promise that lures me out of my zone of Christian standard?
4. Is the person communicating information or selling "products" to me trustworthy?
5. Does this idea, attitude, lifestyle or behavior reflect Christ?

Write something original

I can tell you that after 27 years in student ministry, I am not very easily shocked - not by students, not by leadership and not by parents. From sex in the baptismal pool to telling a parent to shut the crap up during a heated meeting, I have heard of many situations and actions that would, under normal circumstances be hard to believe. But in church life and considering some of the people manning the helm, I just don't often hear much that is unbelievable.

That being said, I confess that recently I was shocked when a youth minister shared with me over some hot wings something that I just could not believe. At first, I thought I misunderstood what he said, so I interjected a few thoughts and questions to gently confirm my understanding. To my amazement, I did hear him correctly. I was actually hoping that my age was affecting my hearing to such a degree as to have just heard him wrong. But that was not the case. What he told me is a simple by-product of our time. It is something that our culture has produced and encouraged. It is an activity that has been slowly slipping into our modern ministry culture. Now don't worry, I am not naming names - not a good idea in the consulting business anyway - but since he is not a big shot in youth ministry, you want know him and he wouldn't care anyway. He already knows I am blogging about him and doesn't give a rip about what other student leaders think of him because he is in a great church, paid well and has good support. No wonder he doesn't care what you think. The fact is he doesn’t care much about what you think is really rather indicative of the appalling action I am about to reveal. If he cared about your opinion, then he might care about his weekly messages to students. I know they are breeds apart but it speaks of his attitude towards excellence and preparation. What is this nearly unbelievable action? HE HAS NEVER PREPARED A STUDENT SERMON FROM SCRATCH! Are you kidding me? No I am not kidding you. He has never prepared a single sermon for his students from his own personal, from scratch, bible study, preparation, exegesis, analysis and assimilation of message ideas put to outline and text. What does he do? He does what a growing number of student leaders are doing - He uses several of the many Ready-set-go, Wing-it, web based short cut solutions available through the miracle of click. Yep, its today’s Youth Ministry in a Box - here ya go - all ready for ya -slick, affordable and downloadable or copy pasted all in under two minutes. Hey, this one even has an ice breaker/mixer to match the message. Now, I am not saying that we don’t take, borrow, steal ideas and beginning points or other partials to develop a sermon or a series of messages. That is just good research and networking. Rather, I am talking about the regurgitation of what someone else put together. And neither am I talking about the occasional need for a break or even taking a short cut due to an emergency or extra busy week. But rather, I am speaking of the microwavable messages that have become the common place easy route simply because . . . well it is easy.

So what’s the big deal with taking a short cut? Well I am glad you asked.
1. Your creative juices are not being squeezed and enjoyed. God gave them to you, use them.
2. You can't preach from your heart what has not been laid upon it.
3. The “Study to show thyself approved” sort of fades out of the picture.
4. It is more difficult to preach with power and conviction when it came from someone else’s power and conviction.
5. Unless you are giving credit where credit is due, then you are lying - ok, white lying - but hey, it is for kingdom impact, so extra grace applies - double up.
6. Your sermon development and interpretation muscles (a little thing we call hermeneutics) are being underworked and growing weaker by the day.
7. The raw development of sermons will flow from your bible reading, your devotional time and your life experiences based upon the needs of your students. This is terribly difficult to accomplish on someone else’s dime.
8. Your maturity as a speaker, presenter, preacher, teacher and gospelizer is dependent upon your personal study and development time.
9. It is easier to remember and preach what God is revealing to you than what God revealed to someone else.
10. Authenticity is a hot commodity. Students will recognize the difference and you will notice a change in your connection with them after sitting under your "word" to them, for them from Him through you, their shepherd.

OK, somebody shoot this horse before I make an enemy or two or three or four or . . .

I’m just saying: Write it from scratch . . . they will come.

Three, no Four Absolutes in creating an honest healthy ministry.

1. ALWAYS Plan with Ministry Purpose! It doesn't have t always be serious or deeply spiritual but it does need to meet of of the biblical based essentials (Fellowship, Evangelism, Ministry, Worship or Discipleship)

2. Remember that Every Student is a Window to a FAMILY - not represents a family but rather is a window to a family. That means we minister TO and THROUGH students to the greater end.

3. Every Student counts the same in a healthy ministry. Never, Never court, lure, enlist or pursue the athlete, musician, singer, beauty, stud or skilled student over and above the average, normal introverted struggling teen.

4. Prayer will supersede a boat load of stupidity! No matter whether you consider your student ministry to be one of the HAVES or HAVE NOTS, without prayer, it is empty, lifeless and . . . unhealthy! No matter what it looks like on the outside.