One of the best quotes from the weekend was from Doug Franklin's seminar on student leadership. He said, "Youth ministry is not the church's ministry to students; it's the students' ministry to their world." When I heard it, I realized he had articulated clearly what I've been thinking for years. I love this shift in perspective, and I hope I can instill this in our congregation and students.
The "Branding Your Youth Ministry" workshop gave me a lot to think about (and makes me really wish I was a professional graphic design artist!). The purpose of branding is to build trust and connect with the group of people you are targeting. I know it sounds kind of business-y, but our church can do so much more through images, phrases, music, video, and other medium to speak more effectively to our culture. I sometimes go back and forth on how much to do this in my youth ministry (that, and I'm pretty uncreative), but I think I'd like give significant attention to our youth space in the upcoming year.
Also, we have a youth-led worship Sunday coming up in May, and I have several great ideas for it. Some possible skits and creative things, as well as some themes and thoughts to share with the congregation about our student ministry. I get excited thinking about our students leading in worship.
One of the workshops I attended was related to family ministry, basically supporting and communicating well with parents. I really liked some of the ideas for getting families more involved in my ministry, but an idea that I thought of while I was in there listening is a parent experiential calendar much like the Lent calendar I am following throughout this season. It would have a different exercise each day for parents to do, such as pray with your kids, lead a family devotion, write an encouraging letter, share a particular memory, play together, etc. I might try to do it next year during Lent or Advent, or some other time of the year when I want to encourage parents to step up in their role as spiritual leaders for their children.
Finally, this was the first year I attended one of these conferences with some of my volunteers. We had a great time eating Chicago pizza, hanging out, and talking about working with teenagers. Usually this has been a conference I attend with my wife, or even sometimes I will have been their with my brother who's a youth minister, or have seen other youth pastor friends around. But it was nice to see a few of my adult volunteers experience this kind of atmosphere where 2500 youth workers who love God and have a passion for students come and hang out together. I'm excited about what this might mean for them and what God is doing in their lives.
Random other notes--
* Set up a shared google document with my volunteers to share ideas and notes, especially with my small group leaders.
* "If you add something, you must drop something else." Very wise.
* One Meal One Day event sponsored by Compassion on October 20th, I'm looking at participating in.
* I heard Les Christie, a workshop leader, say that creativity is often tied to location, and so we might need to find other places than our office to spark creativity. I think this is true for me.
* Doug Fields' final thoughts to wrap up the weekend: Lead Strong + Love Stronger = Lasting Legacy (1 Timothy 1:3-5).
* Oh, and here's a little video from the conference for your amusement :)
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