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March 9, 2015 by Chris Parker Leave a Comment

Perhaps this is your first time to stop by lifeofayouthpastor.com or you have been here before. How about from now on you don’t need to “remember” to come back and check out new content, let me take care of that for you. Subscribe in the top right corner of this page and each new post will be delivered directly to your inbox for FREE. What kind of stuff will you get when you subscribe?

Content such as these articles & downloads:

A free download of my student ministry handbook.
For student pastors and youth workers that feel alone – DIY student ministry.
An important question for you to answer, “What kind of youth pastor do you think you are?”
Here’s a free and easy group game that students love!

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What kind of youth pastor do you think you are?

February 17, 2015 by Chris Parker 35 Comments

Last week I found myself in a room of guys and gals from across the city of Austin who held the title of youth pastor, student director, high school pastor, etc. It has been neat to network with others that find themselves in my shoes and do the work that I do. We can exchange victories and failures in a safe place where we really understand the unique yet adverse opportunities we face on a weekly basis when working with students, parents and volunteers.

However, as I shook hands in this room full of 25 other youth pastors and started exchanging position titles, our job descriptions, and current goals I realized quickly that I’m a bit different than the majority. [Read more…]

5 reasons you should leave your church and go to another one.

January 28, 2015 by Chris Parker Leave a Comment

Ever wonder what meetings are like on the other side? At a different church? How have they already solved the problems you are currently having in your church? Take a closer look at the churches around you. What appears the same on the outside could be very different on the inside. [Read more…]

Inside peek: Planning our Winter Camp.

January 8, 2015 by Chris Parker Leave a Comment

The only successful to-do list includes this formula: Assign + Execute = Done.

What appears to be a massive to-do list is almost just that. Some of these to-do’s will take 10 minutes while others may have taken 10 collective hours poured into them by our entire NextGen team. The multi-color spreadsheet to the right is our master schedule of 3 camps happening simultaneously at the same location on one weekend: 3-5 grade, 6-8 grade and 9-12 grade.

Assigning. This is probably more important than execution. If the task is assigned a champion to ensure it is completed then you do not have to worry about the 10 minutes – 10 hours it may take to execute the to-do. Evenly distributing your workload for a huge task like winter camp is the only way to go. It should never be one person’s job. If the item is not correctly delegated it will most likely not get done or present a source of frustration for the whole team. On our to-do board, in each checkbox there are initials representing the champion of that task, most of our team picked their own tasks to own. This came out of experience in a certain area or a gifting that made that task more preferable.

Executing. It usually always takes longer than you think, so allow double the time you think it may take so that you can produce quality work and not simply just get the job done. I’m not only talking about your input or work on the project: take into consideration graphic artists, t-shirt companies, shipping+handling timelines, and room for error if something needs to be redone. Set some timers. Today I had 15 minute timers going to keep me on task to execute my current to-do so I could move on to the next one. In the same manner, when a team-mate finishes their tasks you should start playing dominos (let one person that is finished fall into another persons task to help them until they are finished so that you can speed up the endgame)

This is probably not far off from what you and your team does before a camp or retreat. In a project as this you will be heavily reminded the importance of teamwork, if not you may be doing something wrong. You might be able to lift a few heavy things but you can’t do it all. Learn that now and you will still be sane in a few years and perhaps even your longevity in student ministry will increase.

A word of advice: Don’t wait until the last minute to think out loud with your team and start assigning and executing tasks. It’s never too soon to begin a project, but too soon can turn into too late very quickly. Set dates on your calendar now for planning your next big event, set alarms on your phone, and reminders on your calendar for certain tasks. I suggest 4-6 months ahead of time.

Do you want more students at your camp? Do some forward thinking like some of your families.

If your personal and work life feel like they are overflowing with to-do’s try this exercise, I call it the “brain dump”.

#winning

December 22, 2014 by Chris Parker Leave a Comment

When your leaders win, you win. When you win, your church wins.

You want your leaders to feel like winners don’t you? They work with students every week for months and sometimes years at a time. This can be discouraging and feel more like a weekly task rather than an eternal investment. I want my leaders to feel like they have won each week. To do this I have developed a WIN calendar for them. Each week the WIN is a little bit different, they are made aware of the WIN earlier in the week through an email or our app. During our meeting (pre-game show) we discuss the WIN for the week and why it’s important.

Do you give your leaders a tangible WIN each week? Here are a few WINs that I rotate through:

Make contact with the parents, ask how you can be praying for them.
Attend your students lunch or extra-curricular activity.
Throw a small group party.
Tell a student how much you care about them.
Send an email home reminding parents of upcoming events.
Talk about camp in small group and how to sign up.

These wins are much more effective in and through small groups, more than they ever would be from the stage.

The pre-game show.

December 4, 2014 by Chris Parker Leave a Comment

The pre-game show could be the most important piece of information for the viewer, especially if you haven’t been keeping up with your team all week. During the pre-game show you are filled in on all the facts, flaws, hopes and expectations for what you are about to watch. Whether it is tuning in 5 minutes before kick-off or an hour worth of discussing replays from last week and how the team hopes to overcome potential obstacles for this week, the pre-game show is a wealth of information.

Every student ministry has a pre-game show. How well are the leaders educated prior to the big game–the program or their small group? It has been my experience that much of the success of the program or small group will be determined by the quality of your pre-game show. Talking with other youth pastors I understand there are many different ways to run a pre-game show, that’s not the point right now, the point is to remember that you have a pre-game show whether you know it or not.

Last year I had the opportunity to observe another youth ministry, the youth pastor was a friend of mine. We were 15 minutes out from the program start time and I was in the back of the room chatting with some of his volunteers. The closer we got to program start time the more eyes of leaders would drift to the youth pastor looking for some sort of direction or instruction. Nothing happened. As students poured into the room the youth pastor went over the sound booth and grabbed the microphone, he was headed to the stage to kick-off a program the leaders knew nothing about. That was there pre-game show.

Every student ministry has a pre-game show. Your leader’s experience prior to your program or their small group can greatly benefit or unfortunately burden your ministry. Take a moment to evaluate your current pre-game show.

If I were a leader in my ministry, would I feel well equipped for my role?
Does our pre-game show (leaders meeting) feel rushed, do we need more time?
Is there a good relational and informational balance in my pre-game show?
Do my leaders understand what a clear WIN looks like for their small group on that specific day?

I’d like to take a closer look at these questions based upon my own experience in ministry over the next few days.

Gift yourself – free book for first commenter.

December 1, 2014 by Chris Parker 1 Comment

Your a student pastor, perhaps a dad, a coach, a part-timer at Starbucks, or just someone looking to dive deeper into the student ministry realm. For those that want to be a better youth pastor…yes that’s all of us, then you need to gift yourself this book. Whether it’s with your church budget (they will thank you for reading this book) or your own money (you will thank yourself for reading this book) you must read Make Believe. Once I picked it up I couldn’t put it down, this book builds a strong case for why the larger nation wide student ministry could be suffering and how you can be part of reversing that statistic by building a ministry that outlasts you. I tell you what, I believe in this book so much that I want to give one away for FREE, I want to buy you a copy. The first student pastor/director to leave a comment that doesn’t have this book, I will ship you a copy.

In this book you will find that Ben and Kevin (both leading very successful student ministries) hit the nail on the head. Once again, I think this could be the best book out there for student pastors right now…other than the Bible of course 🙂

A different perspective.

November 6, 2014 by Chris Parker Leave a Comment

I know it’s bad writing to give it all away in the first few sentences, but I care this much for you, so I’m going to give you the nitty gritty up front. You need to look at things differently. We are all guilty of a biased view of most situations and that is ok, God gave you a perception and the free will to feel and observe differently than those around you. You as a student pastor may be feeling opposition, lack of support or feel like your entire staff or volunteers just aren’t seeing what you see. Take moment to look at your situation or problem from their point of view. Look at it through the lens of your senior pastor, your boss, your students, your volunteers, your parents, etc. This can greatly impact the way you lead through something or react to others during confrontation.

One of my jobs while being in college was wedding photographer on the weekends. Bumping up against other photographers I realized quickly that the art is totally subjective. A great angle to take a photo for one photographer, may be seen differently by another photographer. Art is subjective, one artist may love this style while another artist doesn’t care for it or think it can be done better. The way we run our programs, retreats, use of budgets, recruiting and developing of leaders is not too different. There are 200 different ways to do programs, 300 ways to develop leaders and a million ways you can shift your budget to fit your ministry goals and desired outcomes.

When someone critiques what you are doing or you are feeling big opposition, do yourself and the other party a favor. Look at things from their perspective. This should help give you a broader perspective so that you can make a better decision for yourself and your ministry.

Does failure define a leader?

October 21, 2014 by Chris Parker Leave a Comment

A leader should be measured not only by successes but also by how quickly he or she can recover from failure. Great leaders are born out of failure. They’ve messed up, made a wrong decision, or perhaps tanked an entire industry. The defining moment will come 5 minutes after the realization of that failure. Will they sit and sulk? No. A leader will admit the fault, attack the problem and come out on the other side with a solution and move on to encounter another day of leading.

I’ve seen a variety of professional and personal failures that end up defining a leader for the worst, making them sound like “they were a leader once upon a time.” On the contrary, I’ve seen dozens of amazing leaders share their professional and personal failures and how they bounced back from them with the support of God, family and friends.

Don’t let the failure define you, overcome it with this truth from God’s word:

Let us not become weary in doing good, for at the proper time we will reap a harvest if we do not give up.

Galatians 6:9

All is NOT lost.

September 18, 2014 by Chris Parker Leave a Comment

With me growing up around sailboats and loving survival skills, I think Robert Redford did an excellent job with All is Lost. Composed of just a few sentences and hardly any soundtrack, this very real, jaw dropping thriller will make you feel isolated and hopeless through it all.

There are too many times in student ministry we (youth pastors) feel this way about our ministry — isolated — hopeless. If it weren’t already hard enough to sail a boat across the Indian Ocean, the guy just happens to hit a shipping container in the middle of nowhere! With what seems the already impossible task of running a stellar weekend program, having every leader/volunteer slot filled and ensuring every visiting student returns, the ominous adversary that is determined to sink your ministry comes unfairly unexpected.

Isolation and hopelessness come in all shapes and sizes, whether it be an ignorant staff member stirring up rumors about you, an irate parent disagreeing with your philosophy of ministry or perhaps budget cuts so bad you can’t spend a penny. You need to hold fast and weather the storm to develop perseverance in yourself and for the sake of your ministry. There’s no denying it, you will hit one storm after another, especially in student ministry. With each storm weathered comes a victory and even victories can be disguised as hard lessons learned, all is not lost. Through it all you will become a stronger leader and a better youth pastor for your ministry and your church.

Consider it pure joy, my brothers and sisters, whenever you face trials of many kinds, because you know that the testing of your faith produces perseverance. Let perseverance finish its work so that you may be mature and complete, not lacking anything. – James

Life of a youth pastor .