This is a topic that freaked me out my first year in youth ministry. As a young parent myself, it’s not easy telling grown ups how to deal with their children. So it took me a while to really get to a place where I was comfortable with talking to parents.…
I had the privilege of taking a few of my student leaders to a workshop where they were a part of a Q & A panel. There were youth workers there asking questions about their experience in youth ministry. Now, they had a few of the questions beforehand, but I didn’t prep them nor did I shape their answers.…
Fall is the perfect time to build youth ministry hype. Fall is a prime-time outreach for students. It’s the time of the year where students are injected back into their mission field. And I’ve learned that as a youth minister, one of our many jobs is to create a place where it’s easy for students to invite their friends.…
I had an interesting conversation not too long ago with a fellow youth worker who was feeling overwhelmed. Our conversation kind of centered around this statement, “The world is getting crazier and crazier, and it almost seems like what we’re doing isn’t working.”…
I got an email from a youth worker asking for some guidance. He’s feeling the holiday pinch concerning the engagement and attendance of his students. So I sent him my response and thought I’d share it with all of you since we are all in the same boat one way or another this time of the year.…
Being a small group leader is great and scary at the same time. I took a group of guys from freshman year to senior year. It was great, but there were some things I had to learn to be okay with throughout the four years that I wish I knew at the beginning.…
(EDITOR’s NOTE: This post by Aaron Crumbey was written several years ago, in the wake of a string of brutal police encounters with African-Americans, setting off yet another crisis. What Aaron wrote then is still profound now.) I’ve been thinking about writing this post for weeks.…
I was hanging with my pastor one day and we started talking about momentum. He said something that made so much sense. He said, “AC, most leaders want the momentum and think that’s the best and most important part. But the best and most important part is the opportunities the momentum creates after it’s gone.”…
I remember like it was yesterday. I was sitting on my couch eating lunch watching TV. My wife was at work and I was at home. 9/11 had happened and it literally shook my world. It stopped my wife and I completely in our tracks and held us breathless without an idea on how to help or move forward.…
Ten years ago my wife and I made the biggest transition in the history of our lives together. We moved from Michigan to California. My first thought when we started discussing it was, “You don’t move away from family.” And my reasoning was, “It’s just something you don’t do.”…
