For years now I have worked with primarily “unchurched” students. Honestly, I’ve gotten used to a group of students with no Biblical foundation or pre-conceived ideas about Christianity.Yet, I guess I always thought if more of my students had grown up in the church then it would be different.…
Groan. Roll eyes. I know you have a hard time getting people to show up for parent meetings. That used to be me until I changed my perspective about what parents are up against and what it means to come alongside them in caring for their teenagers.…
I (Tasha) am a counselor, and I have been working with men battling internet pornography addiction for over a decade. The pornography problem is an epidemic in the Christian community. • Promise Keepers did a study and found that 53% of their participants had viewed pornography in the last week.…
We were at a red light when my life changed forever. I was on my way to Walmart with my youth pastor—he’d invited me to tag along on a shopping trip for an upcoming lock-in. We needed to buy chips and Hula-Hoops.…
Sometimes the movement of history feels glacial; sometimes it turns on a dime. And sometimes, today for instance, history shoves us off the subway platform onto the tracks. Now we must learn how to “live and breathe and move” in a world where “pandemic” is no longer a plot device in a film but a present reality.…
The administrative work in ministry is hard for me. Diving into the details always stresses me out. That’s why, at the beginning of every school year, I make sure I’m making six critical connections before we launch. These are conversations that help everyone, including me, know where we’re going, and why.…
What’s your big dream for your youth ministry this year? And can you sum it up on a T-shirt? Leadership guru Peter Drucker made the “T-shirt” challenge famous—his argument was that big goals should be so easy to understand that they fit on a T-shirt.…
By Rick Lawrence I was driving home from a writing retreat, where I’d been off the grid for four days—no Wi-Fi, no cell service. I called my wife to let her know I was on the road, and I heard that edge in her voice that I know all too well… “Rick, there’s an active shooter situation happening right now, at the STEM school that’s 10 minutes from us.…
Revisiting a Whiteboard Wednesday experiment, Rick explores five crucial practices that make it possible to “go into the cave” on behalf of students or their parents—five things that give us the foundation to offer real help in times of great trauma, tragedy, or challenge.…
