Sorry guys, still playing catch-up on Q&A topics you’ve submitted, but I love the questions, so keep ‘em coming!

Shelby Craig asked me this question on Twitter.

How do you follow up with students that haven’t been to youth group in a while?

First of all, how we know when a student has been missing for a while is very important. The typical strategy is to take attendance or have everyone sign in when they show up at youth group. After a couple weeks, if Quiet Jonny’s name hasn’t been checked off for a while, then we know to give him a call.

The problem with that approach is that it’s very impersonal. The only way we know if Quiet Jonny is missing or not is because of boxes that are not checked on a sheet of paper, not because we were looking for him specifically and missed his presence at youth group. Maybe we notice when the outgoing kids are gone, but rarely the quiet kids.

In my ministry, we don’t take attendance. When I get the question, “How many kids are in your youth ministry?” the honest answer is, “I don’t know.” Frankly, it doesn’t matter much to me if we have 1 kid show up or 100. We’re excited about whoever is there and will invest into them personally.

And I think that’s the key — investing into every student personally. If every student has a personal connection to an adult leader who is looking for them and can’t wait to talk with them once they show up at youth group, not only does that kid want to be there, but that adult leader notices when he or she is missing. It is then that leader’s responsibility to contact the student during the week.

So here’s the plan, especially for large-group meetings:

1. Have enough adult leaders to meet a 1 to 5 ratio of leaders to kids. As the youth group grows, add more leaders to maintain that balance.

2. Every leader is responsible for 5 specific kids. These leaders are intentionally looking for those students so they can catch up with them about their week.

3. If an adult is responsible for a kid who brings a friend, that friend becomes one more person that the adult leader will get to know and look for in following weeks. If one leader’s group of kids grows too large, then another adult joins and slowly they divide into two groups.

4. When one student is missing, the leader who was looking for them at youth group contacts them during the week just to say HI, hear about their week, and let them know they were missed. (NO guilt trips!!!)

5. Be sure to have designated greeters who look for visitors that come by themselves. Usually they’re pretty easy to spot because they’re sitting alone, looking uncomfortable.

This isn’t a branded process in our ministry. Most of the kids have no idea this is even intentionally happening. They just know that one adult in particular enjoys them, loves their presence, and notices when they’re absent. That feels a lot nicer than being known by a checkmark on an attendance sheet.

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Have a youth ministry question you’d like me and other readers to answer? E-mail it to me! Please keep your question brief and to-the-point. Thanks!

A Life In Student Ministry reader who wishes to remain anonymous emailed me with the following question:

How am I supposed to deal with a Senior pastor that passionately wants to make (most) decisions about our youth ministry? I understand that I must be humble and submissive to his authority, but little room is left for the leaders and kids to participate in the decision making process.

Observation Period

It’s probably best to try to understand why he is a micromanager. Is it fear of failure? Is it insecurity? Is it a trust issue? Is it something that he learned from a previous ministry? Have you made big mistakes in the past? Is someone else micromanaging him? Is he just very detail-oriented in general? Get to know this man on a personal level and establish as much trust is possible. Let him see that you’re on his team and that you support him 100%. Trust and respect on a ministry team is huge! The thing about trust, though, is that it’s not a right someone will automatically give you just because of the position you hold. You have to earn it. That takes time. It takes years to build trust and only seconds to destroy it, so be patient and be careful.

While earning his trust and respect, try to observe what kinds of situations kick him into full “micromanaging” gear. What do each of those scenarios have in common? Do certain issues make him breathe down your neck more than others? Is it mostly after a board meeting? Is it when his wife just yelled at him on the phone? This will help you understand him and his leadership style and also know how to better respond when you know he’s about to flex his control-muscles.

During this time, also pay attention to your own job performance. Are you meeting the expectations laid out for you? Are you casting a compelling vision for the ministry? Are you doing anything that could possibly give him reason to feel uncomfortable with your leadership? Are you undermining his leadership in any way?

The Confrontation

After you’ve spent time observing these things, confront him about it. All the normal principles for confrontation apply. So do all the rules for fair fighting. Be honest about how it makes you feel. If you’ve noticed your own shortcomings, admit them. This may be one of the hardest conversations you’ll ever have, but, Lord willing, it could also potentially be the most rewarding and freeing conversation you’ll ever have. But even if it isn’t, there’s no other way this issue can be resolved. This kind of thing won’t go away on it’s own. You have everything to gain and probably not much to lose.

Realistic Expectations

If the confrontation goes well, don’t expect things to change right away. People don’t normally change their life-long patterns instantly. This may be a hard journey for him to start letting go and trusting your leadership. So, look for the little victories and thank him profusely when they occur. Let him know that you notice the progress and think he’s the best guy in the world because of it. And, of course, continually go out of your way to support him and his leadership, both publicly and privately to his face.

Give your input

This is a pretty touchy subject and I’m certainly no expert on it. What do the rest of you recommend? Drop a note in the comments below. Thank you!

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Have a youth ministry question you’d like me and other readers to answer? E-mail it to me! Please keep your question brief and to-the-point. Thanks!

NOTE: I hope you guys enjoy Q&As here at Life In Student Ministry because I’ve had a backlog of them queued up for a while. I’m going to publish a lot of them this week and next before the answers are irrelevant to the people who originally asked.

Jeremy Zach emailed me and asked, “Have ya’ll ever done a youth Sunday? Basically where the students lead the church service. If you have, what key ingredients are essential to make this Sunday work? Any recommendations?”

I actually think Youth Sundays are a really bad idea. In my opinion, every Sunday should be a “youth Sunday.” I don’t like what youth Sunday unintentionally communicates to kids: “This is your Sunday. The other Sundays are not so much for you.”

We don’t have youth Sundays. Instead, I make sure teens play significant roles in church every Sunday. I want them to feel like they have significant ownership and responsibility in the body here every week. Fortunately, our church is very good about using teens in services every week and integrates them into the life of the body pretty well, but I realize not every church is like that.

Here are some easy ways your teens can get involved every Sunday:

• Leading worship
• Leading a time of prayer
• Ushering
• Passing offering plates
• Sharing testimonies of how God is working in their life
• Leading a “children’s sermon” or even the “adult sermon”
• Running lights and sound
• Engaging visitors before and after service
• Serve communion
• Dramas/skits that illustrate the sermon
• Dance (depending on your denomination!)
• Pray with the pastor(s) before each service

Help teenagers take ownership of the church outside of services, too. Some ideas:

• Maintaining a church website, Facebook page, YouTube channel, and Flickr photo albums
• Participate in the decision-making process in board meetings (seriously!)
• Visiting shut-ins and making hospital visits
• Teach children Sunday school classes
• Lead a workshop for adults on things like Facebook and txt messaging
• Leading small group discussions among their peers in youth group
• Pray for prayer requests that are submitted during services

Other responses

I asked on Twitter for people to give me their ideas for how they integrate teens into both the church body and church services. Here’s some of the feedback I received.

“Communion assistants, Worship leaders, Greeters, Acolytes, Help with Family Service Groups, Allow them the ability to lead Everyday services, Pray with the pastor, ect… lots of ideas!” — via Jeremy Hallquist in Facebook

“worship team, video/computer/sound, children’s ministry, cafe, welcome, greeter, usher, list goes on and on…” via Kevin Twombly in Twitter

“we only do multi-gen missions, teens are on worship team, serve in children’s min, etc…” via Chris Szulwach in Twitter

“For the tech geeks – I’ve plugged them into the sound/video team for church services. I’ve also plugged them into being door greeters for church services. It gets them plugged into the church and if families with teens come for a visit they can introduce themselves and help the visiting teen feel more comfortable. I’ve also done something we called ministry shadow. In short have your students shadow someone for a day that serves in a ministry within your church.” via Brian Ford in an email.

“getting them on committees if the church has them.” via Russ Bowin in Twitter

“We have our youth read scripture and usher on the 3rd sunday of the month.” via Nicole Cox in Twitter

“help in nursery, be a Sunday School teachers aide for younger kids” via June Camizzi in Facebook

Give your input

Do you have “Youth Sundays?” Why or why not? What would you recommend for Jeremy? Drop a note in the comments below.

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Have a youth ministry question you’d like me and other readers to answer? E-mail it to me! Please keep your question brief and to-the-point. Thanks!

Dewaine Cooper emailed me and asked, “How do you handle students who don’t want to participate in youth activities?”

The short answer: generally speaking, I don’t do much. Instead, I focus my energy on those who are excited about where the group is going. However, I always reach out to those who don’t participate just to catch up with them and make sure they know they’re always welcomed and invited. I think it’s important to build a relationship with them, or ask one of the adult volunteers to be intentional about contacting them — comments on their Facebook pictures, txt messages saying you’re praying for them today, etc. But if you’re asking if I have a program in place to do anything more than that, I don’t.

There’s often a variety of reasons why teens might not want to be involved in youth group: relational conflict, they don’t see the value in it, and other things are demanding their time, just to name a few. It’s important to talk through some of those reasons with those teens, not so you can convince them that their reasons are wrong, but just so they feel that their voice is heard and valued. Remember, the point isn’t necessarily to get them to attend your group as much as it is to encourage them spiritually. If they don’t get that encouragement at youth group, do it outside of the normal meeting times.

Two things NOT to do:
1. Don’t guilt them into coming. “So-and-so thinks you’re stuck-up because you won’t come to youth group.” Guilt will never work to your advantage — it’s manipulation. Instead, try, “We miss seeing you on Wednesday nights! I really enjoyed that one time you came.”

2. Don’t pressure them. Just listen, hear them out, and don’t take it personally if they think you and your ministry are lame. If they have some valid points that you could change in the ministry, do it. Better yet, use them to implement the change. But regardless, don’t beg them to come every week. Just listen to them, pray for them, and give them some spiritual attention outside of youth group. Give them open-ended invitations when appropriate.

What input do you have for Dewaine? How do you handle students who don’t want to participate in youth group?

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Have a youth ministry question you’d like me and other readers to answer? E-mail it to me! Please keep your question brief and to-the-point. Thanks!

In the comments of my recent blog survey, David Thorne asks a great question:

“What should we do when less than 5 kids show up at youth group?”

Probably the #1 rookie youth worker mistake I see is when 3 kids are sitting in a Sunday school class or youth room and the leader asks with a tone of disappointment, “Where is everyone?” I completely understand what the leader is thinking: “I just spent hours of my weekend putting together a great Bible lesson that I want everyone to hear, but no one thinks our youth group is important enough for their time. Why should I spend my time on it then?” Completely understandable.

But think about it from the perspective of the kids instead. You come in and act disappointed in low attendance, how does that make the other teens who are there feel? Especially if you proceed to talk about the missing students and why they’re absent. The other teens are sitting there thinking, “I guess to get attention in this group I have to stay home. What about me? I’m here!” I know that’s how kids secretly feel because, as a boy growing up in church, I was one of them.

Here’s a better response: Look at the 3 teens who are there and be genuinely excited each one of them! With only three 3 kids, you can talk at length about their weeks, what’s been going on in their lives, and then use their stories as examples in your Bible study together. In fact, call the parents and tell them you’re taking their kids to to Dairy Queen. Teach your Bible study there over ice cream. Grab a board game or two to play there, also. Imagine Iff is a great relationship-building board game and is a lot of fun! (Available at any Wal-Mart or Target.)

As those 3 kids sense your genuine love for each of them and start growing in the Word through your teaching, I guarantee they’ll become excited about youth group and before long they’ll be inviting friends.

A couple tips:
1. Make sure you call the absent kids during the week, not to make them feel guilty for not being at youth group, but to let them know that you missed them and that you still want to hear about they’re week. Ask how you can pray for them.

2. If only 1 student shows up and you’re all alone, head to a public area to hang out and talk. If it’s someone of the opposite gender and there’s no adult to join you immediately, there is no meeting that night.

I actually wrote about this issue last year, too: “Focus on the kids who ARE there.” That post is from my personal experience with Sunday school teachers as a kid.

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Have a youth ministry question you’d like me and other readers to answer? E-mail it to me! Please keep your question brief and to-the-point. Thanks!

Casey writes with the following question:

“I am sitting here trying to burn my energy and all my time and can not seem to come up with a youth group name. Are there any resources for this or websites that can help me out?!?”

Hey Casey! There’s no website for it or anything that I know of. When I try to think of a name for a ministry program, I start by asking, “What is the desired outcome from this program/meeting time?” Call your ministry something that reflects whatever your answer is. That helps everyone, including myself, stay on track and remember what that ministry is all about. Honestly, sometimes the process of thinking of a good name takes a couple months, but keep praying about it and discuss ideas with different people until the Lord brings something to mind that just clicks.

For example, our high school large-group meeting on Sunday nights was called just that for a long while — “Sr. High youth group on Sunday nights.” lol After several months of dreaming and thinking, we decided to call it, “Impact,” which honestly just popped into my head when I woke up one morning. The meaning is two-fold: we’re here to be spiritually impacted so we can go out in the world and make an impact for Christ. Maybe “Impact” isn’t a highly original name, but it fits our sr. high large-group time well as a constant reminder of what that meeting is all about.

Other Responses
I asked this question on Twitter last night and got a couple responses from other youth workers, too.

Kevin Twombly said: “ask the youth - pray - match a name with what the vision of the group is - pick out of a hat (sarcasm…)”

ruthEbabes said: “we wer tryin 2 get a new yth grp name & set a nite aside 4 them 2 share their fav bible vrs/passage. We used a key word from 1 of them.”

Ben Kraker had a longer response and messaged me on Facebook:

Use the Bible as your guide to develop a name for your youth ministry. What passages of Scripture have been encouraging for you and/or your students since starting at your church? During my ordination service as youth pastor, my senior pastor read Ephesians 3:14-21 as a prayer over me and my work with the students. He prayed that I would be rooted in Christ’s love, and help my students find their “ROOTS” in Christ’s love as well. Choosing a name is easy when you can “name” what God is doing in you, through you, and sometimes in spite of you in your youth ministry setting.

Our name, “Roots,” comes from that passage which was prayed over me during my ordination service. I try to base all of what we do as a youth group and all of what I do as a youth pastor on those verses. It gives me a framework to work from.

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Have a youth ministry question you’d like me and other readers to answer? E-mail it to me! Please keep your question brief and to-the-point. Thanks!

Luke McFadden asks for some input about what to do with the youth group on his very first night as a youth pastor.

I’m starting at my first ministry position this coming week. What should I do for the first night? I know it is important to build relationships early on in ministry, but I don’t want to neglect the Word either.

I highly recommend that you don’t come in and start an in-depth Bible series on the first night. Although I totally understand what you’re saying, that first night no one is thinking, “I wonder how well this guy can teach the Bible?” Instead, everyone is thinking, “Who is this guy and why should I listen to him?” So, take the evening just to introduce yourself. Share about your teenage years, your family, how you came to know Christ, what God has been teaching you lately, your hobbies, interests, etc. Also come prepared to ask them questions, especially if it’s a smaller group. Give every individual student special attention as they go around the room and share a little bit about themselves. While they share, show interest by asking a follow-up question to something they say to learn more details. For example, if they say they like to read, ask what books they’ve recently read. Or, if they’re on a sports team right now, ask them how they’re doing so far this year. Stuff like that. Basically, even if you’re not a super-relational guy, you kinda need to be that first night because that’s when you’re going to set all the first-impressions. Be intentional about what first-impressions you leave. The main one you want kids to sense is that you’re a real person they can relate to who cares about them individually. The old cliche really is true: people don’t care how much you know until they know how much you care.

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Have a youth ministry question you’d like me and other readers to answer? E-mail it to me! Please keep your question brief and to-the-point. Thanks!

A lot of you are submitting questions for the Q&A series here at Life In Student Ministry, which is great! Now I have to try to keep up with them. lol

Brian Sheeler asks, “I was wondering what curriculum you use with your teens. What have you used? Do you pick your Bible lessons according to the teens you have and where they are at?”

I actually don’t purchase curriculum at all. In fact, I’m a pretty avid fan against canned “one size fits all” twists on all the same ol’ Bible stories. I write all of my lessons. Our small group leaders, however, pick different books and resources to use and I leave that up to them unless they want my input. (When I delegate responsibility, I also delegate the authority that goes along with it, which could be a whole post in itself.) However, I don’t use any specific curriculum myself.

When I lead a small group, I usually teach from my own life and the Lord’s interaction with it. More details on that here.

For large group teaching times, I start with a text of scripture, study it myself using Observation, Interpretation, and Application. Then I apply it to my personal life to learn “how it works” so I can use personal illustrations. In doing so, I find that I teach from my heart instead of from my notes. This is very important because then I’m actually passionate about what I’m teaching since I’ve already internalized the principles and application. Passion isn’t something that can be faked. When it’s genuine, it becomes contagious. Besides, I never ask my students to do something spiritually that I’m not already doing. If I’m going to challenge them to share their faith, I need to make sure I pop my Christian bubble and share my faith with unbelievers first.

I pretty much follow Ezra’s example in 7:10, “For Ezra had set his heart to study the law of the LORD and to practice it, and to teach His statutes and ordinances in Israel.” Study the Word, practice it in your own life, then share it with others.

If you’re a full-time youth pastor and don’t have time to prepare deep meaningful Bible lessons, then perhaps you should evaluate what it is you’re spending time on. I’m not saying that using curriculum is bad — just that you should never use it as an excuse to devote your time to something other than internalizing the Word yourself.

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Have a youth ministry question you’d like me and other readers to answer? E-mail it to me! Please keep your question brief and to-the-point. Thanks!

Luke McFadden writes asking, “From what I have seen from your [youth group's] site, your summer schedule is different than your in school schedule? Just curious of the reasons for this, and how you feel the church/youth take this as well.”

It’s actually not just me — our entire church shifts it’s ministry programming dramatically during the summer for a couple reasons.

1. Attendance is usually pretty low during the summer since so many people are traveling, at camp, visiting family, etc. We never stop events just because numbers are down. It’s more because this is the most natural time for reason #2 to happen.

2. Our volunteers deserve a well-earned break so they’re refreshed and ready to go in the fall. That doesn’t mean that the relationships and personal ministry to students stop — only that there’s not as many “official” events on the calendar.

3. It allows us, as church leaders, to take a step back from the normal ministry grind and reflect, evaluate and cast vision for the next school year. Otherwise we become so entrenched in the same ol’ stuff that we never take time to critically evaluate properly and implement changes for the next year.

Our calendar doesn’t reflect the actual ministry taking place (it never does!). We’re not “shutting down” the youth ministry — it just takes on a different form. It’s the perfect time for more personal hang-outs and building relationships to take place, especially when everyone’s schedules are not as conducive for programming and calendar events.

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Have a youth ministry question you’d like me and other readers to answer? E-mail it to me! Please keep your question brief and to-the-point. Thanks!

I sometimes post the youth ministry questions readers submit, with permission, of course. Figured I’d turn it into a regular series starting today. Please voice your answer in the comments below.

Wes Olsen of Seattle, WA, is currently leaving his Christian school junior high teaching position to enter full-time vocational youth ministry. As he and his family begin the transition, he asks:

What is the strain that being a youth pastor has had on your family?

Hey Wes! That’s a great question. The strain youth ministry has on my relationship with Dana is actually pretty minimal. I think there’s a couple reasons for this.

1. Before we met, we were both youth workers at different churches. I was working part-time at a church while attending seminary and she was the interim youth director at a church near Houston. When we started dating we both already had an idea about the demands of ministry, expectations, and pressure of working in a church environment. There wasn’t a whole lot of adjustment required for her except to shift from being the main Youth Director to being my main supporter.

2. We’re both P.K.’s (Preacher’s Kids), so we each grew up having a “behind the scenes” outlook on ministry. We married somewhat knowing what to expect and how Pastor marriages work.

3. We’re intentional about not letting it strain our marriage. I say “no” all the time, not because I don’t love people or want to serve them, but because I already spent 5 hours in the office and 3 hours out with kids that day. It’s time to go home and hang out with Dana. Rarely do I have meetings in the evenings. In fact, I have an evening meeting at church about once every 3 months or so and that’s it. I arrange my schedule so I’m either home with her or she’s out doing ministry with me.

4. She’s involved in the youth ministry with me, so she has a handle on what’s going on, personalities I work with, and has the same heart for the kids that I do. She understands what I’m talking about when I ask her opinion on various issues we’re facing. Since we do ministry together, it’s less of a strain and more of a mutual affection.

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Have a youth ministry question you’d like me and other readers to answer? E-mail it to me! Please keep your question brief and to-the-point. Thanks!