Our lives can boil down to two essential questions: Who do I say Jesus is? And who does Jesus say I am? How can discovering the answers to these questions help us discover our true purpose and identities? Join Rick in the last episode of a series devoted to practices that naturally draw us into a closer “orbit” around Jesus.…
Of course, January is synonymous with New Year’s resolutions. At our church, this resolution mindset is driving us to make and clarify goals for a new season of ministry. What I’m about to share with you is not a list of personal resolutions that I can let slide.…
Remember when you had the perfect ministry role? It was the night before you started serving in it. After that, and every day forward, you likely thought: “This isn’t exactly what I expected.” Maybe it was close enough that you stuck it out.…
Serving in youth ministry is both rewarding and challenging. As a leader, you’re a catalyst for helping teenagers grow as disciples of Jesus, a ...
In the often-chaotic cloud that is everyday youth ministry, one goal always rises to the surface—growing disciples who follow Jesus with an all-...
Fortnite, 13 Reasons Why, Snapchat… The shifting currents of culture all play a role in shaping the teenagers you serve, and give you unique opp...
Our lives can boil down to two essential questions: Who do I say Jesus is? And who does Jesus say I am? How can discovering the answers to these questions help us discover our true purpose and identities? Join Rick in the last episode of a series devoted to practices that naturally draw us into a closer “orbit” around Jesus.…
What’s wrong with young people today? We’ve all heard about the symptomatic things that may characterize today’s teenagers, such as lower church attendance. But what’s underneath these trends? For many young people, it’s a suffocating sense of loneliness and isolation. “This is the most lonely generation,” said Josh Packard, sociologist and author of Church Refugees.…
Some years ago, I started an annual holiday tradition that involves just two people—Jesus and me. At the core of the Gospel is John 3:16: God gives… And because He gives, we long to give back. King David prayed, “Everything comes from you, and we have given you only what comes from your hand” (1 Chronicles 29:14).…
We’ve already plowed through the meat of the new school year. And if your life is anything like mine you’ve catapulted from the bustle of summer into the craziness of fall. My schedule is fuller (how is that possible?), overshadowed only by the packed calendars of my teenagers.…
What’s wrong with young people today? We’ve all heard about the symptomatic things that may characterize today’s teenagers, such as lower church attendance. But what’s underneath these trends? For many young people, it’s a suffocating sense of loneliness and isolation. “This is the most lonely generation,” said Josh Packard, sociologist and author of Church Refugees.…
I was born on the front pew of a church during a Sunday night worship service. Before I could say momma, I said Jesus. Enough exaggerating. I wasn’t born on a pew, but I was born a preacher’s daughter. Going to church was more important than anything else in our world.…
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.…
As we prepare to celebrate MLK Day, we’ll see plenty of “greatest hits” quotes from Martin Luther King, Jr. So much of what he said about social justice and racial equality is still relevant today. But Dr. King said a lot of powerful stuff that will never make it onto a meme.…
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