A program-less youth ministry

Adam over at Pomomusings has invited dialogue on program-less youth ministry.

here's my response to his question.
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lots of thoughts on this man.

1. I love the heart of this.
2. I'm guessing you know more about this than I do.
3. I might ask the question a bit differently. The way the question is inherently retributive in nature, it's the like the kid who is growing up asking who will I become, as long as it's not like dad. The question contains barriers the possibilities are you hoping for. The goal isn't program-less ym so much as it is, what are the possiblities for great ministry to/with/for/from youth and their families. Or perhaps better than that is a series of questions for each community to answer like:

What might community look like in our context?
What is the role of a pastor in a community?
What is the role of a community member, and how well am I (as a member) contributing to youth and children?
How important are youth to me as a community member and what kind of commitment am I willing to make to kids here?
What rhythms and activities in my life (as a community member) encourage and interfere with our hopes for community and spiritual formation for youth?
Are youth important to us as a community, and in what way have we lived this out?

It seems to me that how a church answers these questions will lead them to answer yours. To declare youth ministry be program-less is actually another subtly colonial leadership style to impose on people in a church. The vision of program-less youth ministry then becomes one more way in which a leader declares what they think is best and attempts to align people with their program. buy in or ownership in this circumstance will likely not happen on a meaningful scale, because it is essential the same thing as program driven youth ministry, just a different means. A leader trying to leverage influence to minister to youth.

the question then is, instead of how do I as a leader, or resident expert try to create a program-less youth ministry that I believe in, it becomes, what environment do I need to create to enable the congregation to care for youth in a way that is meaningful, healthy, and faithful to them.

Just a thought or two.

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I think this is true for any area of ministry actually.

What do you think?

We See What We Look For

Watch this Video

We see what we are looking for, don't we. Whether it be in presidential candidates or each other. It's more convenient to see people how we want to, rather than see what's actually there.

Andy has caught on

My friend Wade went to Catalyst this past October and sent me the following notes from Andy Stanley's talk to pastors in the room. It's nice to hear people like Andy catch on to systems thinking, or at least to finally be talking publically about it. This was Andy's final address to the people of Catalyst.

Here are the notes:

Liberating Your Organization – Creating a Leadership-Friendly Culture.

The bottom line … it’s all about developing, implementing, and improving systems to affect change in your organization. Here’s much of the content from Andy’s discussion:

Introduction

1. There are organizational systems that are conducive to ministry and organizational systems that impede ministry.

2. There are organizational systems that free leaders to lead and organizational systems that obstruct leaders.

3. Defined: Systems are your organization’s approach to getting things done.

I. Systems create behaviors.

A. Examples: Family vs. Student Ministry, Marriage vs. Marriage Series, Western vs. Middle Eastern

B. The systems you inherit, adopt, or create will eventually impact what staff and volunteers do.

C. Examples: Anytime you hear, “Well, our people just won’t …” you are listening to someone who doesn’t understand the influence and importance of systems.

D. Components of a system: 1) Expectations/Rules, 2) Rewards (or lack of), 3) Consequences (or lack of), 4) Communication (content and style), 5) Behavior or Behavior Patterns (of those in charge)

E. Systems have a greater impact on organizational culture than do mission statements. This principle explains why it is so difficult to transition an organization. If a new leader casts a new vision and never addresses old systems, nothing changes.

II. The NT does not present us with a comprehensive system or model.

A. In the NT we discover what the early church did. The NT does not lay out a comprehensive plan instructing church leaders what to do.

B. Always differentiate between what is pre-scripture and what is de-scriptive.

C. The NT and OT do offer some principles that should be integrated into our systems. 1)Delegation: Acts 6/Exodus 18, 2) Accountability: Acts 15, 3) Authority: Romans 13, 4) Interdependence: Paul’s discussion of spiritual gifts, 5) Point Leadership: Modeled in OT and NT, 6) Seeking council: Proverbs, Acts 15

III. Systems Imperatives

A. Your system should allow you to involve and hire the best person for the job.

B. Your system should provide you with the flexibility to get the right people to the table to make a decision.

C. Your system should allow you to make complex decisions within the context of a small group of empowered individuals.

D. Your system should ensure that only one person answers to “they.”

Andy concluded with a recommendation to:
1. List the 3 behaviors you want from your staff.
2. List what you're doing to encourage these behaviors.
3. List what you're doing to encourage the opposite of these behaviors.

Systems thinking … it’s the key to improving the effectiveness of your ministry.

The Hidden Secrets to Dialogue and her strange cousins:. Part 4

The Grand-daddy named Generative

Remember Advocacy and Inquiry are the keys to dialogue.

Before I explain what a Generative Dialogue looks like, It's helpful to know that each of us have a natural way in which we engage in conversation. These are the ways in which we have learned to engage the world around us. Observing, Telling, and Asking are all natural means by which different personality types flow, but Generative dialogue is a skill.

1. Politicking: Every cousin has it's dysfunctional side. Politicking is the act of giving the impression of balancing advocacy and inquiry, while being close-minded.

2. Skillful discussion - Balancing advocacy and inquiry really well. (close to dialogue, but not quite) The Skillful discussion participant is genuinely curious about what others think and their reasoning, while also clearly articulating their personal reason explicit. What makes this person great is that they begin to unearth the other persons assumptions without being critical or accusing. This person asks questions and inquires to get at the foundational work done in the other persons mind, not simply for information, but for better understanding.

3. Drumroll please. Finally, it's Dialogue!

Dialogue suspends all assumptions creating a container in which collective thinking can emerge. A dialogue does not mean I give up on all my ideas, opinions and thoughts, but that I'm able to suspend those ideas and the assumptions that support them so that I can engage in collective thinking. Collective thinking is the ability for a group to have a growing conversations that moves all of it's participants forward. It is generative. It is free from agenda, other than the teams purposes. It's free of people simply observing, telling or asking.
It's the wonderful blend of advocacy and inquiry.

The Hidden Secrets to Dialogue and her strange cousins:. Part 3

The Cousin with Big Ears

Remember that true dialogue is a unique blend of high support and advocacy with a high level of inquiry.

We've talked about the ugly cousin who observes while remaining silent, withdrawn, bystanding and sensing. This is low support and low inquiry.

We talked about the tall cousin who tells everyone what they think via dictating, asserting or explaining. This is high support, but low inquiry.

The Cousin with big ears is an ASKER.
The ASKER has a high level of inquiry as you can imagine. But they aren't really all that supportive. Have you ever encountered the ASKER?

The ASKER takes three main forms.

1. Interogating - "Why can't you see that your point of view is wrong?" This person inquires about your thoughts, but not for support. The interogator asks questions to debunk your thoughts and ideas. These folks are often wise enough to know better than not to ask questions, but hidden, sometimes masterfully, under the surface is an agenda. This is dysfunctional inquiry and is the ugliest forms of the ASKER.

2. Clarifying- "What is the question we are trying to answer?" This is sometimes a very helpful kind of conversation that has lost it's course, but when it occurs within a dialogue it actually deters the team from moving forward in the purposes of the group. Notice that this is not a supportive question either.

3. Interviewing - Exploring others' points of views and the reasons behind them. This might sound like a pretty nice option to some of my readers. It's not often someone actually asks you enough questions to get more than a bullet point or condensed version of your idea out and on the table. When someone interviews you it feels wonderful, but in a pure interview there is no advocacy or support for your ideas. The Interviewer remains objective leaving your ideas just laying there on the table with no legs. Interviews without advocacy and support there is no dialogue.


Tomorrow... we talk about actual dialogue.

Is this helpful? With no comments on this series, I'm wondering if anyone is reading them...

The Hidden Secrets to Dialogue and her strange cousins:. Part 2

The Tall Cousin: Telling

In the staff meeting, someone comes up with an idea for the service next month. conversation starts... It's an opportunity for dialogue. Some will observe (see part 1), others will engage the conversation in their quest for dialogue by telling everyone what they think. In fact, Telling is a pretty common phenomenon within some church staffs. It's the time when the usual suspects tell everyone what they think they need to hear. You know you are a Teller, you often think of something to say while someone else is talking and you get frustrated because they keep talking and you are forced to remember your new idea.

Telling is the Tall cousin. It is highly supportive response to engaging, but ranks low when it comes to exploring the ideas of others.

Telling manifests itself in three ways:
1. Asserting - "Here's what I have to say, and here's why I say it!"

2. Explaining - " Here's how the world works and why I can see it so clearly."

3. Dictating - "Here's what I have to say, and nevermind why."

Asserting, Explaining and Dictating are all one way communcation.

Chances are you fall into this. And your staff team.

The secret here is that even though you might feel like you are in dialogue, you really aren't, because you are busy telling everyone what you think, or thinking of the next thing you want to say. A group of tellers often miscommunicate and rarely ever really understand what the other folks are saying. This leads to distrust, alienation and isolation.

If you are on staff with a Teller, there are ways to subvert this pattern, but it takes a lot of patience and discipline.

Part 4 will tell you how, so be patient, we'll get there soon enough.

Tomorrow: Part 3 - The cousin with big ears.

The Hidden Secrets to Dialogue and her strange cousins:. Part 1

Youth Pastors, Emerging types, and leaders from various aspects of the world we live in are often in a quest for dialogue. Dialogue is actually such a rare thing with in church staffs, or business meetings, or "brainstorm" sessions that when it happens it's almost miraculous.

In this series I'll be taking us on the road to dialogue and the sad reality that we all fall into when it comes to working together. The launching point for these is based on the work of Diana McLain Smith.

The setting, unless otherwise stated is a staff meeting. (aw, the wonderful times in staff meetings!) Think about a problem that arises and the team is trying to solve it. (more on this later)

A couple quick prep statements:
Dialogue is about Exploration and Supportiveness.

Exploration is the ability to legitimately explore the ideas of others with an open mind and without judgment.

Supportiveness is the the ability to support the ideas of the person you are talking to.


Ok. Let's get started. But be careful, you'll see yourself in some of these.

The Sick cousin of Dialogue is Observing.
In case you didn't know, observation is not dialogue. It truly is it's sick cousin.

Observation is marked by low levels of exploration and supportiveness.

In a staff meeting this takes three forms:
1. Bystanding: The bystander might talk, but his/her comments pertain to the group process, but not the goal or content of the conversation.

The Bystander sees it as his responsibility to comment on how the conversation is going, how different people are engaging and how it could be better a "conversation." This is pretend dialogue, it often makes the rest of the staff feel like crap, and think that the bystander is an arrogant jerk.

The bystander isn't on the team, they are in the stands. No desire for exploration of the ideas people are contributing, nor are they supportive of what others are saying. They instead choose to talk about something else.

2. Sensing: The Sensor is the person in the staff meeting taking it all in. They see everything. But they don't contribute. They might feel supportive of someone in the group, but because they never express it, they really aren't. They definitely are not exploring the ideas of others.

Sensors won't share the risk of the conversation, so they short circuit dialogue. They kill teams. Sadly these are often nice people.

3. Withdrawing: The person who withdraws from the conversation is dysfunctional. In youth ministry, these are the people who are near the end of the time with a church. Their body may be in staff meeting, but their mind is somewhere else. They have checked-out. This is the ugliest of the sick cousin.

The is no secret: You can't really understand people simply by observing and you can't move forward together by bystanding, sensing or withdrawing.

In your quest for dialogue, you have to find ways within you to inquire about what other people really mean. The inquiring is as good for them as it is for you. You (we) also need to champion the ideas of others even if we think we will ultimately disagree.

Tomorrow we discuss the the tall cousin of dialogue in Part 2.

The Secrets to Dialogue and her strange cousins

I'm going to start a series later this morning on the hidden secrets of dialogue.
This will not be a how to series, but rather a description of the different ways we communicate (or lack there of) and how it effects our ministries.

If you are a youth pastor and you want to learn something super important about what people actually think in your church this is a series for you.

If you are a part of any organization or relationship where you work interdependently you will find something for you here.

I'm attempting to take some of the systems thinking stuff and make it a bit more practical for you the honored guest of the Riddle Group blog.

So we'll dive into the Secrets of dialogue and her strange cousins in a few hours.

Advice to Church Consultants

I'm getting a lot of folks calling me these days talking about wanting to be youth ministry consultants. I suppose there has always been a steady stream of folks who have emailed or called me over the past two years asking me if I was hiring youth ministry consultants. Often after talking to these folks they start their own consulting business, which I'm all for by the way. (If they are helpful to the local church) I'm going to share a few thoughts over the next few months that I've learned about consulting (esp. youth ministry consulting) over the past two years while I'm doing this. I'm not sure how qualified I am to give this advice, but I hope it will be helpful.

Principle One:

The more a church needs your services, the less likely they will actually benefit from them.

It's seems a bit backwards, but the churches I work with have great, gifted, insightful leadership. All of them are smarter than I am. All of them have more experience than I do. All of them, however are learners and it's because they are so good at what they do that makes them open to bringing a consultant in to work alongside their leadership. Certainly there are things you as the consultant know and see that will be really helpful to church leaders, but often this is only part of the reason you are brought in.


The church leaders who most need the services the most are less likely to invite you behind the curtain to see the inner workings of their church. Further, they are much less likely to take your advice, even though the church's youth ministry is in "critical condition".

I suppose the reason for this is habit.

We do what we've always done.

My friend Sarah consistently dates guys that mistreat her which often leads to abuse. She knows she needs to pick a new kind of guy, but struggles to do so because everything in her naturally picks the wrong guy. It's simply easier to pick the wrong guy.

First Church has had 15 youth pastors in 15 years. They are in a bad rhythm. They need to take a break and work thru some things to reach youth in healthy ways. When given the option to be coached through a year long process with a youth ministry consultant or hire a mom with no youth ministry experience, but who is available right now, they choose a the mom. It's not a financial decision, both cost the same. It's not whether they would benefit, clearly this church has something to gain by having some outside eyes walk with them for a year to break some bad habits they have in their youth ministry. They need it more than most of the churches I work with. It's simply easier for this chruch to keep hiring youth pastors and wounding their students.

A message for the United Methodist Church Planting Movement

Here's a article that might help illustrate some things.

First I'm all for the UMC planting more churches. I think church planting may be the single greatest leverage the UM might have at "turning the tide" of decline.
If you are United Methodist, it's worth a read. There are a few Walls this movement to plant hundreds of churches in the US each year will engage


- WALL #1: The Rule that UM churches must be geographically spaced apart with significant distance between each of them. They each get their own territory.
---- the problem with this wall is that MOST UM churches aren't growing, reaching people or reaching new people at all. So by geographically separating themselves from each other, they are simply insuring that they are not reaching people within existing church territories.

- WALL #2: The Rule that UM churches must get land is born from the territorial issue above. If you have a territory, then you'd better get some land in that territory before it all disappears.
---- the problem with this wall is obvious. The unchurched people you are hoping to reach are generally not big givers and it's an assumption to believe that they even want a building at all.

- WALL #3: The Leadership Wall: The UM will likely plant churches with existing pastors within the UMC. If I could be so bold as to suggest that this will be a significant problem. There are some great leaders within the UMC who will make great church planters. But I'm not sure there are hundreds per year. At least not initially. Most of the church planter type folks left the UMC long ago because of the denominations assumptions about leadership and church planting from the past. Turning the Tide will mean the UMC needs to actively pursue church leaders at every level who are gifted at starting new churches. I've simply been to too many UM church plants that are as irrelevant as the um church down the street... Its just that they have a newer building.

Barriers

Barriers have come up a few times in conversation over the past few weeks.

Often what keeps us from changing or doing something in our lives/ministries better is because of a wall in the way.

Sometimes the walls are real. Some rule, some person, some program, some thing in the way that will not let change happen.

Sometimes the walls are in our mind. It's our imagination working against us. These walls are assumptions we carry about new realities or expectations we place upon ourselves that create a wall in mind keeping us from moving forward.

My wife won't call the doctor because she says she knows everything the doctor will say or have her do.

My son won't go outside when our 11 year old arthritic lab is outside because he's afraid of what the dog might do to him.

A pastor in a church with 2 adults under 70 won't invite his friends in town who go to different very large church to join him in a new adventure of missional living. He doesn't want to "steal sheep" even though he's friends with the other church's pastor and none of his friends will ever be in a seat of leadership in the other mega church.

A youth pastor search team won't do the work of preparing for a new youth pastor because they think the congregation won't want to change.

What are the walls in your life? Are they real? If not, make a change. If so, walk around them.
A pastor

Cell Phone on our Mind- and church planting

The next 2-4 weeks will provide a fish bowl for us all to observe and learn something that only happens every few years.

The iPhone buzz apple is creating will benefit all cell phone companies. Big time. The iPhone has put cell phones in the minds of people. Many will not buy an iPhone, but a lot will buy a blackberry, a treo, or another new cell phone.

iPhone means business for everyone in the cell phone business, because people are thinking about cell phones. They've had a date in the mind.

June 29th.

Some are on the fence about a first generation phone.
Some are on the fence about an Apple phone.
Some are on the fence about AT&T/Cingular.
Some are on the fence about the price.

There are a lot of people on the fence and they are waiting.

They are waiting to see if people like their iPhone.
How the battery life is.
Some will want to touch and use one before buying.

Other will not buy an iPhone, but they will buy a cell phone.
The iPhone is an opportunity for all cell phone companies. I'm not sure all the cell companies are ready. If you are Sprint, June 29th, you should double your staff. Be ready, because they will be coming.

This happened 10 years ago when Krispy Kreme came to Tulsa. Opening week, you couldn't find a donut in any store anywhere in tulsa. People had donuts on their mind.

There is a similar phenomenon that occurs with church planting. New churches create energy and they get people thinking about church who haven't been in a long time or ever.

They might attend the new church, but land somewhere else.

This is why most churches should embrace church planting in their communities and not see them as competition. Church plants get people thinking about being a part of a church and it's an opportunity for every church in the area. Sadly, few churches are ready.

Assumptions on Motives

In a recent post on Priorities an anonymous commenter said,

"One should never assume he knows the questioner's motive by the content of the question."

To which i replied in the next comment, "Fair enough."

After some additional thought I'm adding a bit to my response.

Fair enough. However it's good to keep in mind that Everyone Always assumes he knows the questioners motive, not matter the content of the question.

There is always an assumption. It might be more or less correct. It might be way off-base. But there is always an assumption.

We may assume the motives of someone speaking to us are benign, or we may assume that the speaker is "on our side", but there is always an assumption.

Assumptions aren't absolutely evil and neither are those who make them. We make assumptions to survive. For better or for worse, assumptions are always with us.

Double Loop Learning and the Emerging Church

The emerging church's is a good start on Double Loop learning.
Folks associated with the conversation are often very good at questioning the Governing Values / Variables of the church. However, they are not as good about building action and strategy around those governing values.

Viewing from afar Doug Pagitt seems to have intuitively been able to connect a new set of Governing Values to New Action / Practices.

For example, his book on Preaching is a questioning of what most people consider a a standard normal practice in church. Then he takes something of a new action in it's place.

In my experience most churches who call themselves emerging are simply changing the strategy /action plan, by adding the infamous coffee and candles for their emergent service. this is fine, but it's very different from what Doug is doing.

I'm really curious if I'm making sense?
This is applicable to all organizations by the way, not just churches.
What's clear? What's fuzzy? Do you even care about such things?

Change in Organizations - Part 3

Here's a visual.

So our day to day decisions are born from governing values /variables that are things we take to be normal. These generally are not questioned. Personally or organizationally.

Some folks in the church implement change, but the only thing they really change is the strategy. This is single loop learning. When they change it assumes a certain foundation of understanding.

So a private high school is training teachers about how to create an environment conducive for learning. They might: teach teachers to greet students with a hand shake and eye contact rather than working at the teachers desk as students arrive. These actions are attempts at single loop changes. They may or may not work.

But when a teacher says, "Since we all know that studies show that high schoolers learn best after 9:30 in the morning, maybe we should arrange the schedule of the day?" That teacher is looked at funny because what he is voicing is in direct contradiction to the basic understanding of normal expectations. In other words, it goes against the governing values /variables of the people in leadership.

In a double loop learning environment, the question about the school day schedule can be questioned and even changed. Which in effect changes the action plan and strategy.

Is this making sense?

Change in Organizations - Part 1 - Some Groundwork

I'm pretty excited about this series. It might be a bit hard to wade thru in the beginning, but bare with me... I think it will be helpful.

While some churches aren't committed to change, there is a growing number of churches who are. Some folks have called these churches "traditional" churches. These are churches who, by and large, are committed to do things how they have always been done.

The past 40 years have seen churches who pride themselves on not saying, "I've always done it this way." These churches were more often than not, church plants, but we have all heard stories of "transitioned" churches. These churches are more self aware than their unchanging counterparts. There are two kinds of churches who fit this catagory and I'll delineate them first by their commitment and level of permission.

Since I'm sorta making this up as I go I don't have cool names for these two kinds of churches. At this point I'll use Chris Argyris's terminology, of "Single Loop" and "Double Loop."

Single Loop churches are committed to change and connecting to their culture, but there is a refusal to to permit those within the organization to question or change the terms on which they will do it.

Double Loop churches are committed to change and connecting to their culture, and they give permission to question the terms they hold to and even change them.

Does your Church have a Learning Disability?

Wikipedia definition:

Learning disability (U.S.) -- In the U.S., the term is used to refer to a learning difficulty that is unexpected given the general intelligence of the affected individual. That is, the academic performance of the affected person is much lower than the individual's general intelligence would predict.


For a variety of reasons church leaders tend to to think of themselves as static organizations with hard and fast rules not only for developing dogma in the minutia of life, but also in their organization.

The world is changing. How a Church engages it must change.

If this is so true, then why is it so hard to move your service time from 9:30am to 9:45 without their being an uproar?

Because change means we might lose something and church is the place people go to keep from grieving.

What I'm talking about here is the ability for the church organization (organism) to learn. Not only learning from successes and failures, but also identifying assumption your church holds to that were often solidified from past experiences.

Most churches simply do not learn about why they are they way they are. They do not look to see how their practices, behaviors, programs, communication, staff, expectations and theology all teach and move us toward action that generally doesn't work. But they still do it. over and over.

This is the essence of a learning disability in churches.

The Youth Ministry Vacuum

It happens too often. I visit a local church or ministry and there is an issue that someone (or a group of someones) wants to deal with.


Inevitably someone says one of these things:

"I don't have any kids in the youth ministry, but I can tell it's struggling. Attendance is low and it needs to be like it was when my kids were teens. What is the youth pastor going to do about this?

or

"We have plenty of children in early elementary, why don't we have more kids in the youth group?"

or

"Our kids aren't committed to the church. How can we get the kids to be more committed to coming to youth group?"

or

"We need more adult leaders in the youth ministry. The youth pastor needs to do a better job of recruiting volunteers to take care of these kids. Why won't she do it?"

All questions (or varients of them) that I hear often.

Here are some questions I ask instead:
Is it possible the fact that the Pastor and Youth Pastor who left to start our church taking 80% of the families with teens has had an impact on our current situation and that it has little to do with our current youth pastor's performance?

How does this church show that it values teenagers?

Why would a youth want to come to this particular church?

Does the fact that the average age of the congregation and it's leadership is over 65 years of age have anything to do with the youth ministry? If so what?



Youth ministry doesn't exist in a vacuum. In fact, I'd suggest that in most cases it is a prime way gauge the temperature of a congregation.

Everything decision in the church has in impact on the Youth ministry in one way or another. It can never be a department on its own, youth ministry must be a concerted effort on behalf of the whole congregation. Often the problems that arise from within a youth ministry are symptoms of a church issue.

So the next time you point at a problem within your churches, take a step back and see if what might be a few of the contributing factors to making it that way.

By the way, this is not a ticket for youth pastors to whine or complain about why their church sucks and is keeping the youth pastor from accomplishing great things. Don't be a victim. As the youth pastor, your job is to lead the congregation to understand the impact of it's decisions upon the youth ministry.

Not one Solution

If someone tells you they have a plan that will fix all of your problems or a single solution to involved parents in all churches... they don't. Pay attention to them.. learn something... then remember there is no universal solution no matter what color it is or how organized it is.

Solutions are always contextual.

The best solutions are discovered by critical thinking and understand your own unique situation. That's where there truly good news is.

Mixed Messages Part 2

In Part 1 of my three part series I discussed the mixed messages we get from schools. In this post I will discuss the mixed messages we give as churches working with kids.


I wonder if many churches actually rely on parents not being involved, no matter how much they encourage participation?

I wonder what we mean when we say we want parents to be involved?

Here's my guess:

1. Involvement means you show up to parents and information meetings.

2. Involvement means volunteer for security, cooking at youth events, organizing fundraisers. You know... the non-spiritual stuff.

3. Involvement means getting your kid to you on time and picking them up on time.

4. Involvement means paying for all the events, t-shirts, candy we sell, camps and missions trips we decide are good for your kids.


1. Involvement does not mean that you have input into what the church or youth program actually looks like and how our program is run. After all we are the experts.

2. Involvement does not mean helping shape the how we define success.

3. Involvement depends on keeping parents uninformed on information that might frustrate them or lead them to believe they are not responsible for their kids.

4. Involvement means the same things it means for our kids. Fall in line. Do it our way. You have no alternative. The youth leaders know best.


On one hand, come help us.. be responsible parents.
On the other hand, we are the experts and we know what your child needs better than you do.

Mixed Messages Part 1

This morning after dropping the kids off at school I was wondering.
I wonder if schools really want parents to be responsible for their children's education? Some schools are more vocal about this kind of thing, but I'm wondering if our public (and even private) education rests on a few unspoken assumptions. What comes out are mixed messages. Something akin to the guy who is waving you toward him with his left hand and waving you off with the right.

I wonder if schools rely on us not being involved, no matter how much they encourage participation?

I wonder what they mean when they say they want us to be involved?
Here's my guess:

1. Involvement means you pay $5 or %10 and join the PTO and show up to our PTO meetings.

2. Involvement means volunteer for organization class parties, school events, parking lot duty and the walking track. You know... the non-education stuff.

3. Involvement means make sure your kid does his/her homework.

4. Involvement means getting your kid there on time and picking them up on time.


1. Involvement does not mean that have input into what the school day actually looks like and how a classroom is run. After all they are the experts and know that it is developmentally appropriate for a 9 year old to have 10 minutes of recess a day and gym once every three days. etc.

2. Involvement does not mean helping shape the how we define success. Experts and our president have mandated that "No Child Left Behind" be the way of the land and as a result teachers are forced to teach to the test or they will loose their jobs.

3. Involvement depends on keeping parents uninformed on information that might frustrate them or lead them to believe they are not responsible for their kids.

4. Involvement means the same things it means for our kids. Fall in line. Do it our way. You have no alternative. The school leaders know best.


On one hand, come help us.. be responsible parents.
On the other hand, we are the experts and we know what your child needs better than you do.

Still with me??? Then wait for my next post...

An Assumption I've been Carrying

I should know better. And though my friends leading the WCC Youth Ministry would tell me, "Don't should on yourself"... I am right now. I really should have known better. Maybe we can all learn from my faulty assumption. Perhaps you hold this faulty assumption. Perhaps you have lived in the understanding I'm coming into.

But let me back up a bit.
We all carry assumptions about the world we live in, why it is the way it is and how things will always be. We often don't actually see our own assumptions very clearly because they are quite simply the ruling ideas that define our criteria for making important decisions based on our memories of our experiences and encounters with the world.

For instance, my wife has never taken an allergy test, but she refuses to eat shrimp. Once she ate shrimp and she had the sensation of her throat constricting. A scary experience that left here with a new rule for eating. No shrimp. Was it actually the shrimp? Probably. Could it have been something else? Yes. Perhaps because we were sitting in the smoking section (a rare place to find us) Pam was reacting to the smoker at the next table. Perhaps it was some other ingredient in the food. It makes no difference, because Pam made the assumption it was the shrimp that caused her reaction. I think she's right by the way. This re-enforces her assumptions.

Now the assumption I've been functioning within is under the radar. It's not shrimp it has to do with change and the church. I'm honestly not sure where my assumption came from but I can just say it's been with me for quite a long long time.

I have always assumed that people leading the church understood change to be discontinuous. Alan Roxburgh describes discontinuous change as disruptive and unanticipated. It's the kind of change that demands change within us as people because, as Alan writes, "The skills we have learned aren't helpful in this kind of change."

He contrasts discontinuous change to continuous change which he describes as a change that "develops out of what has gone before and therefore can be expected, anticipated and managed."

Good stuff.

I have always known that there are people who, when faced with a challenge and need to change simply refuse to do so. This is still true. But there are those who desire to change but simply misunderstand the the nature of change. For them, change is to be managed. Change is dependent upon the skill they have already learned. Which it does, sometimes, when change is continuous.

But you can not depend upon skills you currently have for discontinuous change. It requires a new set of assumption about life, ministry, family and God.

So I must admit. I thought, or at least I've been functioning under the assumption that everyone understood this.

Measuring Success

My friend, Chris Folmsbee has posted an interesting post on how we measure success in youth ministry here. I wrote the following as a comment... but thought it might make a good post here too.

I really like these questions. it's really tricky isn't it. I think it was W. Edwards Deming who said that 90 precent of what matters in an organization can't be measured. (and he was talking about business, not the church)

How we measure or understand success is a very important question because it informs how we do things.

To really get this, we need to understand that unless a person or organization is really willing to do a lot of reflective work to understand his/her/their motivations, you probably don't know what all of your measures for success are.

The result of our conventional measures in the church lends itself to manipulation. Who hasn't felt the pressure to round the numbers up a bit when working for a church who values attendance figuires? or Wanted simply been a bit more preoccupied with getting more kids, because of the measurement standard? The problem with this type of measurement as well know is that the organization actually isn't getting the information is actually wants! I believe all churches actually want to see people grow closer to Christ, to build his kingdom, to serve others, to care for the least of these. (but this could be my assumption)
The problem is, that the conventional ways of measuring success in a church actually lead the church away from what it actually values.

I'm not saying we shouldn't measure, but I'm just advocating have a better understanding of what happens when we do and remembering that what we measure is only a very small part of what we actually value.

Over time measurement leads to reductionistic thinking.

Man I could talk about this for a long time... So I'll drop a few more thoughts.

I think that creation is critical for helping us understand how we can measure.

Some things I've learned from nature.
1. Nature doesn't count. A management accountant named H. Thomas Johnson taught me that.

2. Nothing grows forever. The other way of saying this is, everything dies. Which begs the question, what is a church life cycle and why do we see it as a bad thing when a church closes it's doors. To embrace life as a church, we must embrace that our local church will not last forever and that this is a good thing.

3. Reductionistic thinking leads to mechanistic thinking... which disrupts our understanding of nature.

Ok. I'll stop....
Thanks for the opportunity Chris...
I think this post might find it's way to my blog.

What Mega Churches can learn from Starbucks

Below is an intentionally leaked Starbucks email from the CEO of Starbucks. He morns the loss of intimacy and experience of a small company. A series of decisions that lead to an undesired reality is common for large churches I work with. Read below and draw your own conclusions.

From: Howard Schultz
Sent: Wednesday, February 14, 2007 10:39 AM Pacific Standard Time
To: Jim Donald
Cc: Anne Saunders; Dave Pace; Dorothy Kim; Gerry Lopez; Jim Alling; Ken Lombard; Martin Coles; Michael Casey; Michelle Gass; Paula Boggs; Sandra Taylor

Subject: The Commoditization of the Starbucks Experience

As you prepare for the FY 08 strategic planning process, I want to share some of my thoughts with you.

Over the past ten years, in order to achieve the growth, development, and scale necessary to go from less than 1,000 stores to 13,000 stores and beyond, we have had to make a series of decisions that, in retrospect, have lead to the watering down of the Starbucks experience, and, what some might call the commoditization of our brand.

Many of these decisions were probably right at the time, and on their own merit would not have created the dilution of the experience; but in this case, the sum is much greater and, unfortunately, much more damaging than the individual pieces. For example, when we went to automatic espresso machines, we solved a major problem in terms of speed of service and efficiency. At the same time, we overlooked the fact that we would remove much of the romance and theatre that was in play with the use of the La Marzocca machines. This specific decision became even more damaging when the height of the machines, which are now in thousands of stores, blocked the visual sight line the customer previously had to watch the drink being made, and for the intimate experience with the barista. This, coupled with the need for fresh roasted coffee in every North America city and every international market, moved us toward the decision and the need for flavor locked packaging. Again, the right decision at the right time, and once again I believe we overlooked the cause and the affect of flavor lock in our stores. We achieved fresh roasted bagged coffee, but at what cost? The loss of aroma -- perhaps the most powerful non-verbal signal we had in our stores; the loss of our people scooping fresh coffee from the bins and grinding it fresh in front of the customer, and once again stripping the store of tradition and our heritage? Then we moved to store design. Clearly we have had to streamline store design to gain efficiencies of scale and to make sure we had the ROI on sales to investment ratios that would satisfy the financial side of our business. However, one of the results has been stores that no longer have the soul of the past and reflect a chain of stores vs. the warm feeling of a neighborhood store. Some people even call our stores sterile, cookie cutter, no longer reflecting the passion our partners feel about our coffee. In fact, I am not sure people today even know we are roasting coffee. You certainly can't get the message from being in our stores. The merchandise, more art than science, is far removed from being the merchant that I believe we can be and certainly at a minimum should support the foundation of our coffee heritage. Some stores don't have coffee grinders, French presses from Bodum, or even coffee filters.

Now that I have provided you with a list of some of the underlying issues that I believe we need to solve, let me say at the outset that we have all been part of these decisions. I take full responsibility myself, but we desperately need to look into the mirror and realize it's time to get back to the core and make the changes necessary to evoke the heritage, the tradition, and the passion that we all have for the true Starbucks experience. While the current state of affairs for the most part is self induced, that has lead to competitors of all kinds, small and large coffee companies, fast food operators, and mom and pops, to position themselves in a way that creates awareness, trial and loyalty of people who previously have been Starbucks customers. This must be eradicated.

I have said for 20 years that our success is not an entitlement and now it's proving to be a reality. Let's be smarter about how we are spending our time, money and resources. Let's get back to the core. Push for innovation and do the things necessary to once again differentiate Starbucks from all others. We source and buy the highest quality coffee. We have built the most trusted brand in coffee in the world, and we have an enormous responsibility to both the people who have come before us and the 150,000 partners and their families who are relying on our stewardship.

Finally, I would like to acknowledge all that you do for Starbucks. Without your passion and commitment, we would not be where we are today.

Onward…

A New Normal - Part 1

My list earlier was what is widely considered normal in youth ministry. This might be what life was like in the future if churches addressed the systemic issues of the church related to youth ministry.


A new Normal.
1. Youth pastors and churches stay committed to each other and they each deal with the issues that currently lead them to break off relationships. This kind of commitment is viewed as a long term relationship and both parties work hard to assure the other is healthy and cared for. Turn over will never go away, but the expectation and norm for the "New Normal" will be longer committed relationships between church and youth pastor. To see this happen, churches will think about specific expectations ahead of time for their staff. The expectations will be managed by non-staff people who are committed to supporting the congregation and the pastor. These expectations will be reasonable and healthy for the youth pastor. In the "New Normal" churches who are unwilling to do this difficult task will find themselves without a youth pastor, as youth pastors will learn to pass over these kinds of congregations.

2. In the New Normal, the success or failure of the spiritual nurture of our students will rest on the local community starting with, but absolutely not limited to the parents. A youth pastor will still play an important role in the nurture of kids, but the ministry and spiritual nurture will not longer hinge on their ability. Ine the New Normal, Churches will remember what the role of the pastor is, while developing better habits of doing life together, and have a level of expertise in the congregation. (aside from a youth pastor) These congregations will be fun to work with as a pastor, and will give consistancy to students in their discipleship.

more later

The Gospel we Preach

Yesterday I had a conversation with Dr. Danny Grimes of Oral Roberts University. He's in Phoenix with the Free Methodist education bigwigs and has been visiting with really smart folks. I won't include who Danny is quoting, because I'm not sure it was a comment for public consumtion, though I think it would be fine. Ted Haggard came up in the conversation and something close to this comment was made to Danny.

"Ted has always preached a gospel that would allow him to do what he did."

Wow.

I immediately began to wonder, what does the gospel I preach and live allow for me to do? Thanks for asking great questions Danny and sharing that with me.

Something I'll be chewing on for a while.

Of course I know my answer right? It's the stuff I deal with and have always dealt with. The gospel I preach allows for that. But how? What would change?

Things to think about.

Marko jokingly says my last post is a bit cranky. I'm not so much cranky as disappointed and unwilling to live with the status quo of youth ministry any longer. (that's why I'm investing my life in what I am) Cranky feels angry, which I was 3-4 years ago. I also want to be clear, that I'm not casting any blame in this post. If you really read the list and let each point soak in a bit, you'll recogonize that to blame one group of people like senior pastors, youth pastors or church leaders would be far to limited in scope. Pointing fingers might be the easiest thing to do, and it certainly is the most natural thing to do, but would be a significant waste of time, emotion and energy.

My friends, things do not have to stay this way. Your frustration and energy would go far more to invest looking at the big picture and then making small simple observations and corrects as we go. (which is easier than it sounds)

From the Intro to my Book Proposal / A glimpse into my preferred future

So I'm finishing up a section of the introduction to my book and here's what I've written. As I was writing it, I thought that it might be a glimpse into my heart for what I believe to be the preferred future of youth ministry might look like.
This is a list of things the church has come to accept a normal, but that you and I can no longer accept.


To put it simply, it's no longer acceptable that these things happen in most churches in North America.


Things We Have Come to Accept in Youth Ministry.
1. Youth pastor turnover- That a youth pastor will only stay for a short time.
2. That the success or failure of the spiritual nurture of our kids is based primarily on the giftedness or lack thereof, of a person filling the youth position.
3. That the assumption by church leadership is that best youth pastors are young.
4. That a youth pastor can/will/should disciple themselves without the guidance of a senior pastor.
5. That a healthy gauge to tell when youth ministry is going well is when there are no complaints.
6. That Senior Pastors should not be involved in youth ministry.
7. That parents should not be involved in youth ministry.
8. That we give lip service to parents being the primary spiritual nurturers of their children, but do absolutely nothing to actually support parents in our church.
9. That so many youth pastors who feel called to ministry, leave vocational ministry before they turn 30.
10. That youth ministry is church for teens.
11. That youth have different basic needs than adults.
12. That youth have been systematically abandoned by adults within the culture and the church has done the same.
13. That having a youth pastor means the youth ministry is taken care of.
14. That the best youth ministries keep kids busy.
15. That it's a sin to bore a kid.
16. That kids don't think about theology or they aren't ready for it.
17. That we do very little theological reflection when it comes to why we have a youth ministry.
18. The assumption that kids just want fun and games rather than relationships and theological engagement.
19. That Christian Education is an answer to all our problems.
20. That parental involvement in the spiritual development of their children is optional.
21. That the systematic estrangement of adolescents in our church is best for the kids and their “age level appropriate” activities and living out the gospel.
22. That kids only receive the benefits of a youth ministry/youth pastor and do not need to contribute to make this ministry happen.
23. That youth ministry is something only some of us in the church do.
24. That youth ministry is something that happens in a program at the church.
25. That all problems can be fixed with a program.
26. The perception that once I’ve grown my kids into college that I no longer need to work with youth.
27. That the youth pastor is actually just a director of activities.
28. That we no longer remember what a pastor is in many local churches.
29. That youth pastors have forgotten the reason they got into youth ministry in the first place because they are burdened with responsibilities they are miserable at accomplishing.
30. That the Jesus himself could not live up to the wildly inappropriate expectations a church has for a youth pastor.
31. That there is no healthy way to manage the expectations of the church.

Myth #4: God will Show Us our Next Youth Pastor

If you don't read this whole post you might misunderstand my point, so please don't jump to conclusions.

I spend a lot of time around search teams, senior pastors and church leaders responsible for hiring a churches next youth pastor(s). I often ask the question, "How will you know when you've found the right person?" Almost always the response is, "God will show us." Sometimes it's said, "We're trusting the Holy Spirit to lead us." and theirs the occasional, "We'll just know."

For clarities sake, I believe that God does speak to people and that God does connect pastors and churches in often mysterious ways. God is greater than our search process and can and does orchestrate a good deal of good things in the hiring process.

That being said, the idea that God will just "show us" sounds very weak from where I'm sitting more often than not. Can I be frank here? It's just lazy not to have a better explaination than that. To be fair, most search committee's have never been a part of a search team before. In the truest and most noble sense they don't know what they are doing. Some churches throw parents in to lead the team because there is a particular issue that parents have been vocal about in the past and they are available to lead or need to be appeased in someway. Some churches throw a business person in to lead the team. These are the more sophisticated churches. They probably do everything by the book. But it comes off feeling like a business... and churches should rarely hire like a business. Some churches throw a volunteer youth worker in to lead the team. Regardless of who is on the team, or what variety of folk, most churches are not good at hiring staff, especially youth pastors. This can be disasterous in the long run for everyone involved.

After I ask, "How will you know you've found the right youth pastor?" and the response is "God will make it clear to us." I've started asking a follow up question.

My response. "Yes, God will show you. But you have more criteria than that for making such an important decision. What is that critiria?"

Often there is extended silence.

The reality is this. Most search teams have very specific ideas about what they are looking for in a youth pastor, but they are not aware of them. (or most of them)

"God will show us" sounds very spiritual, but it comes across as lazy.

Saying, "After spending hours in prayer together, and days in a prayer on our own and after hours of conversations and evaluations of our situation here is what we feel God is leading us to and here is the kind of person who we believe God will bring to us." Then specific characteristics follow. Specific vision follows.

For those of you who are still upset that I called this a myth. Let me use a common subject for pastors and preaching from a few years back.

Pastor #1 would say, I'm not preparing for my preaching. I'm going to show up and talk about what God inspires me to say. The problem with this is that ironically the preaching becomes very pastor focused because he says pretty much the same thing every week.

Pastor #2 would say, "I'm preparing very thoroughly for my preaching with detailed notes and stories or even an outline. I'm going to trust that God will show up in my preperation and will be present as I'm actually preaching. If I need to I can deviate from my notes.

Search teams who can only really say that "the Holy Spirit will show them" as their criteria are like pastor #1. Their hearts are in the right place, they genuinely want to follow God and hear his leading, but when the rubber hits the road, because they failed to do the hard work of preparing, they end up being dazzeled by the most compelling candidate, not the best fit for their congregation.

So if you are searching for a youth pastor right now, what is your response? How will you know when you've found the right candidate? How are you preparing the people of your church to search for this person?

Myth #3 - The Buck should stop with Youth Pastor

After every big youth event, someone will be upset with you? Have you learned this yet?

This is not a post griping about that... there's actually nothing to gripe about when it comes to this pattern... the quicker you accept this reality as normal the more sane you will be.

This is a post about who is responsible for the actions of the congregation. Is it the youth pastor who is responsible for the mistakes the community makes in regard to youth ministry?

A quick story.
Rob and Jill were the parents of Bobby, a sixth grade boy in the middle school program. Rob and Jill are great folks, and committed and balanced parents of 5 kids. Bobby was the middle child you could alway find him in a crowd by dependable screeching shrilly noise he would make when you asked for a cheer, or enthusiastic response from these early adolescents. Bobby, was a bit nerdy, but the kids really liked him. He would however, sometimes be the brunt of a bit of teasing, often initiated by Bobby's uncomfortable and unhealthy way of connecting with other kiddos.

So when my boss, the executive pastor called me into his office and told me Rob and Jill were upset about the retreat last week. Evidently, Bobby had been picked on by a few older middle school guys and sought out the help of two of our adults, Todd and Pete. Todd and Pete evidently dealt with the issue temporarily, but teasing continued after their discipline. Todd and Pete also failed to let me know any of this was happening, so I learned of the situation when my boss called me to his office.

So far nothing to get to upset about. Average disfunction right? Somewhat correctable.

Everyone was very nice and respectful.
My boss, Rob, Jill and I were in the room. They told me their frustration. I thanked them for letting me know about it and I apologized for the behaviors of the two volunteers (and later talked to both of them about better ways to handle situations like those). I still think this was the right thing to do. However, there were people missing from the conversation. In most churches today, the buck stops with the youth pastor. If something happens that's bad in the youth ministry the youth pastor is ultimately responsible. According to this logic, in this situation, I suppose I could have been more organized, trained my leaders better to communicate with me the exact situations that need my attention and a few other things. All to keep this kind of thing from happening. Ever.

This taps into the "I just need to work harder" mentality I posted of a few weeks ago.

What we don't see, is that handling this situation, in this way, with the expectations limited to the youth pastor creates a big problem.

Here are a few of the problems:
1. It re-enforces the idea that the responsibility for spiritual nurture belongs to the paid staff people.

2. It removes the opportunity for discipleship from the youth workers. Think about how great it would be for the youth workers to engage in this process with the parents and student.

3. It re-enforces destructive behavior in youth pastors who desire to please their pastors and parents and kids.

This kind of scenario goes down in a dozen different ways in a youth ministry. It's rarely exactly the same in my church as it is in yours. But you get the idea. This is part of the systemic behavior and structural problems in a lot of our churches. Certainly there are some churches who would say that the 3 points above aren't really problems. Those are points that re-enforce what they actually value. I certainly appreciate their desire to minister to youth. But I think that they are often harming kids and their long term walks with God.

We are all to blame Part 1

This post by Marko has spurred some thoughts. It somewhat reminds me of a post I wrote in January of 2002. Below is an unedited copy of what I wrote then. I'm going to read it with you, as I haven't read it in years. I'm assuming there is a bit of emotion in it, that may or may not be present with me now. But I'm guessing I'm going to draw the same conclusions. Here we go.

My name Mark Riddle and I'm a Youth Pastor. I've built my life around being a lifer. One of those guys who said he would never be a Senior Pastor and dedicate my life to youth ministry. I excelled in my vocation. Leading groups of 20, 50, 150, 300 teens each week. I'm good at what I do. I've read a lot of books. Books on youth ministry, business and church life. I've been to all the cool conferences several times. You know the ones I'm talking about. The big "national" conferences where all the youth pastors gather and the small regional conferences too! I could give half the worships at these national conferences word for word I've been so many times. I even lead workshops at some. I'm fluent in what all the progressive churches are doing around the world in youth ministry. Ok... around my world..America. Chicago, Mission Viejo, Tipp City, Edina, Louisville, Tulsa, Eden Praire, Irvine, Dallas, Houston, Colombus, San Antonio, or Colorado Springs I knew churches there and what they were doing. Eventually I even gained friendships with some of the people employed by these churches. I use their names in conversations with other Youth Pastor's to help them look up to me. I know their programs and other like em... Purpose Driven (PDYM), Son Life, YoungLife, Youth For Christ, oneighty, Kingdom builders and Ground Zero. I know words like Post Modern. I know the litany of churches and people who profess to be post-modern. I've tried the postmodern youth minstry thing.
I've built programs. Boy have I built programs. Programs for Jr high students and programs for SR high. I've put programs with Purpose's, I've filtered programs through funnels and cones. I've built programs for students at various levels of commitment.. even seekers. I've done small group programs, Hyped-up David Letterman crazy programs written up in youth Group magazine programs, multi-level missions to the world programs , student leadership programs, youth worship services, enourmous outreach programs, concerts, retreats and Bible Studies. I've also built teams to build the more programs.
After over a decade of cramming for the Youth Pastor test in the sky and building youth ministry machines that will be perpetuated long after I'm gone, I have this very sick feeling. Something like Jack Nicholson in "About Schmit" I have discovered I have misspent a large portion of my life. I'm not called to be a lifer. I'm not called to be a Youth Pastor. You may ask how I discovered this fact? You may say that I've impacted the lives of hundred, if not thousands of students over the past 12 years. I would say to you. Yes I have impacted students.. but probably less for the good than the bad. I've taught them (unintentionally mind you) that the enourmous and diverse bride of Christ is a youth group. That life should be fun and that the church should cater to them. I've taught them that they don't need adults.. and any needs they have from adults should be brought to them by adults... I've enabled a generation of young people to leave the greater community of God to find a local church to meet their needs. I've taught them to be selfish spiritually. I've taught them that church is about fun and God. I've enable lazy parents when I've taken the primary spiritual nurture of their kids in my hands. Youth group is not real life. I was paid to minister to students on behalf of a congregation. What lesson am I teaching students about ministry, community and God when I leave for another job? I can't do this anymore. No. I will not do this any more. Teens need adults in their church, not volunteers. They need churches where communities naturally flow from relationships with various generations. Don't call me a youth pastor. I hate that term. I will not be a youth pastor to you or to anyone. I feel the weight and burden of misleading a generation of students. I feel the pain of creating, building andperpetuating a system that teaches a different Gospel. Am I being to hard on myself? I think not! The community is where God meets his people. The whole community. What kind of God does a group of teens isolated in their youth group see? What does he look like? Are you called to do this?
We must reimage what it means to be involved in the lives of students. We must reimage our role!
My name is mark. I used to be a youth pastor and I'm sorry I was. Will you forgive me?

----------------------------------
My thoughts today (Feb. 2nd, 2007). Ok. I remember some of what I said then. It's personally really interesting to me to see what I was writing then and see how I've most some of these very thoughts into action today. I feel on some level like I've been moving too slow. The line "I was paid to minister to students on behalf of a congregation." really stands out to me. I still say something like this almost every day as I work with churches to help them change the role of youth pastors and to actually own the ministry they have to kids.

I'm curious what stands out to you? Does it sound angry? IS there a line that you like? Did you read this when I originally started posting it a few years ago? Does it read differently to you today? I really want to hear your input on this.

Myth #2 - The Search for the perfect church / model

I often disappoint myself. It seems my default for fixing problems is often to seek out the solution that will permanently fix the problem I'm facing. PERMANENTLY. Whether it be the program that is "just right" or a training rhythm for youth workers that equips them for success AND balances an appropriate use of their time. or just the right curriculum roadmap.

Regardless, my default setting, when facing something that is less than ideal, I want to make it perfect, for good. So that once I set in place a curriculum for 6-12 grades I don't ever want to have to look at it again. Maybe you don't have this problem. No. Problem isn't the right world... psychosis is the right word.

The driving underlying statement for me "If I can get to a certain point, it will be fixed."

What I'm still learning is that Youth Ministry and the church is always evolving. Always changing. Always rethinking itself. As I read the last two sentances I think "duh! no kidding riddle!" but I don't actually live like I believe this is true.

Humility is the key to great leadership in this regard. The drive to have the youth ministry or church that "isn't like the church or youth ministry down the street" or that is "different" is to approach ministry in arrogance.

Why? Because the model / church/ youth ministry you are seeking asylum from, running from, reacting against will be the oppressive model for someone else who is to come. In short, your solution will be someone elses problem.

This shouldn't keep you from trying new things, coming "over-against" as brueggeman says, but it should bring a strong dose of humility. Your program may actually solve a lot of problems for others, but it will not be perfect and it will need to evolve, change and one day die. Knowing this when you start something new, especially a new church, will save you some heartache in the future. It will keep you from having to guard and protect your model / church/ youth ministry in the future.

There is no perfect way to do church.

Therefore, church who learn to learn will be the churches who impact their world.

maybe more later... got go to a meeting.

Quote for the Week:

"For every complex problem there is an easy answer, and it is wrong."

-- H. L. Mencken

(thanks to my pastor Steve of the quote.)

Myth #1 -Why a New Youth Pastor isn't the Answer

Every week or so I talk to another church looking for a youth pastor. As I talk to the church's representative, generally a Senior Pastor or a "lay-person" leading the search, I have come to expect several things that are almost always true. "Almost" may be misleading though. Every church I have talked to so far has believed this myth and lived into it's subsequent behavior pattern! I say "almost" because I haven't personally spoken to all the churches in North America and I'm leaving the door open that churches don't always believe this myth.


Myth #1
If we just get the right youth pastor, that individual will lead us to a healthy youth ministry. The formula for this myth would be something like this:

Just the Right Youth Pastor = Success

The evil twin for this myth is: If we find the right youth pastor and he/she brings us the right program/vision then we will have a healthy youth ministry. That forumla might look like this:

Just the Right Youth Pastor + Just the right Program = Success

Of course success can be defined in a lot of ways. Because most churches are not very good at articulating what "success" actually is, it will lead to problems down the road. But that's another topic.

If things go wrong (maybe I should say when because something always goes wrong on some level) churches who believe this myth can only point to one reason. The youth pastor or the program/vision that the youth pastor brought us. (which still points to the youth pastor.) The formula for this?

Failure = The Wrong youth pastor

How might a church make this right? They get rid of the problem. And hire who they percieve will be the solution.

Of course by now the problem is a bit more complex. Aside from being simplistic it's goes a bit against what the church actually believes about faith and development. Maybe I'll find some time to unpack this sometime too.

The youth pastor, is rarely the answer to problems your congregation is having. don't get me wrong, I think that youth pastors cause plenty of problems for churches. Whether it be because they are immature, or undisciplined or they just do something stupid. But the real issue is generally not the youth pastor. (The church hired that particular immature, undisciplined youth pastor after all)

Rules of Systems Thinking being broken:

1.) There is no blame. Not in systems thinking. You can never point the finger at someone within a community without owning a part of the blame yourself. It's my experience that a vast majority of youth pastors are viewed on some level as outsiders to the congregation. I haven't thought much on why this is, but I'd be willing to bet that one of the reasons churches keep youth pastors at arms length (in almost every case subliminally) from being "one of us" is because leverage for influence changes dramatically when a church staff person becomes a percieved part of the community, rather than simply a staff person who loves the church. I will say that most youth pastors do actually want to be considered to be a peer to others in the community. Many (usually inexperienced youth pastors) believe they are "one of the congregation" and if the relationship changes to "staff person" it might accompany a great deal of pain for that individual rooted in feelings of betrayal.
The cure for this rule, lies within the churches relationship, and understanding of the youth pastor and more specifically, the individual you have hired. A book could be written on this one. So, I'll move on.

2.)Cutting a teenager in half does not make two teenagers. The integrity of decision making in your church is rooted in being able to see the whole of the interactions the church is making. This myth is rooted in the fact that most churches don't allow for many people to see the whole picture. They generally only see their part. Not seeing how everyone in the church is effected/affected by the youth pastor position and youth ministry leads to either reductionistic thinking (ie. A youth pastor will solve all our problems) or sectarian thinking (ie. The youth pastor will make the changes I want him/her to make)

3.) It gets better before it gets worse. That is to say, Often hiring a youth pastor actually works and seems to solve the problems the congregation has. Generally though, at some point in the future it will get worse than it is today. This is a particularly difficult point. The reason most churches believe the Myth that finding "Just the right youth pastor = Success" is because often in the short term it actually seems to work! A new youth pastor shows up and some of the success indicators for the church light up! Numbers may go up. Kids may be happy. Parent's don't complain as they get a feel for the newbie.

4.) All of these things within the local church are also influenced by (and also informs) the greater North American Church and culture.

What do you think? Have you seen this? Do you think I'm being overly dramatic?

Myth we believe and behaviors we live - Intro

I'm starting a series of posts on patterns of behavior I'm encountering as a consultant within churches. I'm hoping that this might be a helpful tool for folks to understand their current context and maybe give them some guidance as they love kids and families here in north america.

I'm using the term myth, because by and large these are accepted understandings churches have about staffing, youth minstry, youth pastors, and youth. These myth's are subtle and because of that can be a bit tricky to see. They are the water we swim in.

The reason it's so important to address these mythical beliefs is simple. They inform the cultures and expectations of our churches. Our systems are dramatically impacted by these false beliefs. More importantly these myths feed the dysfunction within the local church you and all your friends talk about.

Trying to Explain Systems Thinking in the Church:. Part 1

I'm often talking about systems within the church to leadership or other ministry professionals. Often they assume I'm talking about logistics or administration, which to be fair are a part of systems, but only a small part. So on my flight from Charlotte to DFW this weekend I decided to throw something together to try to explain it a bit more.

Case Study - You want to change Sunday School to another program in your church. The following list represents SOME of the parts of the average system. Do any of these sound familiar?

1. Mary is a 7th grader. Her parent's loved Sunday School when they were growing up.

2. Approximately 50% of the parents of kids your Sunday School want a break from their kids in the adult Sunday School class.

3. Influential congregation members believe Sunday School works and is the primary means by which "christian education" occurs

4. It's written in your Job Description that you must to have Sunday School and you must lead it.

5. Your congregation values parents and adults more than kids. They entice adults (giving units) by having a great children's minitry.

6. Complaints from parents are functionally considered a priority over biblical values. (or any values for that matter)

7. Values of excellence demand that Sunday School work very well.

8. Bill has been teaching 8th grade Sunday School for 15 years.

9. Your church is pround of points 7, 8, 23,40.

10. Your church has always done S.S.

11. S.S. works when you show a Nooma video, but they don't make Nooma videos fast enough.

12. Not doing S.S. means your church might have to think about why it does youth ministry.

13. Your church doesn't like to think.

14. The kids in SS feel entitled to be catered to.

15. Youth Pastors in your church have traditionally been very inexperienced.

16. The last 3 Youth Pastors tried to change SS and failed. (No one told you this until you had announced the big change to the congregation)

17. Joe, a committed volunteer, wants to change SS like you do.

18. Several parents secretly distrust Joe, for something you will never know about.

19. Because you trust Joe, some parents secretly distrust you.

20. Some of these distrusting parents serve in your youth ministry because of point 19.

21. Fear is a key motivator for parents in your youth group.

22. There's a lot to be afraid of in your city.

23. Your Senior Pastor doesn't think about youth ministry unless you bring it up or if there is a problem.

24. The church thinks that youth ministry is your job.

25. People, especially parents fear loss for their kids. Loss of opportunity, faith, relationships etc. This is strongly tangeble for them in your programming.

26. The church down the street has big attendance in SS.

27. The Music Pastor feels like all the churches musicians belong to her.

28. The Music Pastor has been on staff for 20 years.

29. The Senior Pastor is afraid of the music pastor.

30. Teaching SS is in your job description.

31. Every adult in your church used to go do SS.

32. A lot of parents remember a cool youth pastor in their SS class when they were kids.

33. Your church built SS rooms for your Middle School and high school students to meet in. They have the nicest white boards.

34. "Didn't the trustees just spend $3,500 painting and fixing up the SS rooms?"

35. For much of you congregation, if they can't see kids involved in ministry , the simply believe there is not ministry happening.

36. Kim and Brad only come to SS because they are sooo busy with school activities.

37. Some church members think you only work on Sunday mornings. Why would you want to cancel kid's church?

38. SS is perceived to be church for youth.

39. The church secretary told some parents that you are lazy because you are never in the office.

40. As the youth pastor you buy into 4, 7, 12, 17, 21, 22, 24 and 26 and you are largely unaware of the rest of the points on the list. But you still want to change SS because it's only a "small change" in your Big plan.

41. Your church leadership feels it has a very high value on teens and youth ministry.

42. Your SS budget is $20,000 a year. (that includes your FT salary)

43. You secretly feel inadequate about SS not working and your inability to make it work.

44. You secretly feel like the expert and everyone else is an idiot.

45. SS is one of the 2 things your church counts and equates with success. The other is the # is of people baptized.

46. You think the reason the youth ministry doesn't work is "them". Them = parents and other non-descript people who are working against you and God's plans.

47. Some older folks think teens will be fine regardless of the youth ministry you lead.

48. Your church loves to gossip.



Now here's where it gets fun.

If you are a youth pastor and you are looking at this list you likely have a few responses depending on your personality and a few other things.

1. "I give up" - It can't be done! I'm going to work for UPS.
The Result - You have an inner battle about your calling and it tears you up.

2. "Screw-up!" We're changing SS whether the people like it or not!
The Result - Bye Bye.

3. "I can methodically address each of these issues as tehey are revealed to me then we can change SS.
The Result: Partial change and frustration. What you don't realize is that the sum of these ideas, attitudes, perceptions, behaviors and beliefs actually form something of an eco-system for your church and how it works and how it understands itself. These are the norms of your church. Your church isn't simply 50 individuals / groups with perceptions. (though they are that.) Your church is alive like an animal that will fight tooth and nail to maintain the status quo. you can't change the church in a sustainable way without addressing the system. This is why The Riddle Group exists. This is why so many seminars you have the opportunity to attend are waisting your time.


more to come