So there was a lot of buzz surrounding Dave Ramsey’s new book a few months back.  I loved his book “Total Money Makeover” so much that my wife and I began implementing his strategies into our financial reality… and I am VERY GLAD that we did, b/c his strategy helped us survive going through a job loss and a month of transition between jobs with no income and without accruing any substantial debt.  So I must say thank you to Mr. Ramsey for coming up with such a practical method of managing your finances.  All that to say, I HAD to run out and grab his new book, ENTRELEADERSHIP.  If you are a leader, this is a MUST READ for you.  Ramsey dives into the practical side of leadership and what it means to be a successful entrepreneur.  As a youth pastor, this tugged at my heart strings b/c I feel as if I have to be both at times.  He dives into what he has learned over the past 20 years of what TO DO, and what NOT TO DO.  I found myself agreeing with a lot of what he has said and experienced.  Even a seasoned leader will find practical insights in this book.

MY GRADE FOR THIS BOOK:  A

MY RECOMMENDATION: GO OUT AND GET IT!!!

So yesterday I started a 2 part series that started looking at the differences between middle school and high school ministry and how you might handle it.  I’ll start off by acknowledging the fact that every group is different… but the stuff that I am talking about will generally help… no matter what your group dynamic is.

Yesterday I said that there are basically 2 major differences when it comes to these two ministries: CONTENT & CONTEXT.  We dived into content yesterday, so let’s cover CONTEXT today.

CONTEXT… what do I mean by context?  If CONTENT is what we teach… then CONTEXT is what the environment is like.  Content focuses on learning… while context focuses on feeling.  The way I see it, there are 3 major keys to context within these two ministries: MATURITY, ATTENTION SPAN, & CAPACITY

1.] MATURITY – What your program “feels” like and what your ministry “feels” like should be determined first by the maturity of the audience.  For example: some of the games you play and jokes you tell and messages you teach that work great in middle school come off as lame and immature to High School students (especially Seniors).  Why is that?  Is it because they have lost their funny identity?  Are they “too cool?” Do they need to regain their sense of humor?  Probably, but that is what makes them high schoolers.  I asked a group of high school students one time why they didn’t like playing a certain game anymore… and this is what they said, “We did that in middle school.” (And I loved that game!)  does your context reflect the maturity of the group?

2.] ATTENTION SPAN – Remember the Disney/Pixar movie “UP?”  Remember that one scene where the dog that has the talking collar around his neck is trying to recall a story and in the middle of the story yells out, “SQUIRREL!”  My kids love that part.  That is an average middle school student.  You think you have them locked in.  You think you’ve gained their complete attention, and then someone interrupts and yells out, “SQUIRREL!!!” or so it seems.  Why does that happen?  It’s because a middle school student’s brain is still developing, so their attention needs to jump from one thing to another fairly rapidly.  Sure.. it’s probably from too much Nickelodeon when they were little, but it is the reality that we are dealing with in America.  It has been documented that a child’s mind needs to change its attention every 15-17 minutes.  As they get older… let’s say 10-11 grade, their brain develops more and they can withstand more information and have a longer attention span.  So here is the big question… does your ministry context reflect this?

3.] CAPACITY – capacity is defined as “The maximum amount that something can contain.”  Middle school and High School students have different capacities… meaning that there is a limit on what they can handle… and that limit is different for each group.  Have you ever tried to do a serious, candle lit vespers service with middle school students and it went awesome?  Me either.  (if you have… you are a master, my friend!)  Why not?  Capacity. (in fact… I don’t think I even have the capacity for that )  Why was that video awesome with middle school students, but high schoolers slept through it?  Capacity.  Why is there a minimum age requirement to serve at one of the teenage detention facilities here where I live?  Capacity.  Capacity should play a HUGE role in your context.  Explore the question, “What is the capacity of my group?” and then plan accordingly.

There are probably more.  What did I miss?  leave a response to keep the conversation going!

Over my years in student ministry I have worked as a Middle School Director (overseeing 6-8 grade), a Student Ministries Pastor (6-12 grade) and now I oversee a Middle School Director and work specifically with High School students.  I have been asked, on occasion, what the difference is between those two types of ministries.  I heard someone say it this way one time… and I completely agree with them, that the difference is CONTENT and CONTEXT.  Today I will talk about CONTENT.

CONTENT

I see 3 big differences in content between Middle School and High School: Delivery, Duration, & Depth.

1] Delivery – What I have seen over the years and experienced personally, is that my delivery of content is completely different to middle school students than it is to high school students.  With middle schoolers, I tended to be more of a facilitator and less of a “speaker.”  I would teach for like 15 minutes… and then have students talk in groups about what they heard or what they had experienced.  Middle school students tend to have a little more “energy,” so they need to be engaged in the message more.  With High School students… I tend to be more of a teacher or “up front speaker.”

2] Duration – A major difference between MS and HS is how long they can sit still.  At the most, middle school students have anywhere from a 15-20 min. attention span, so I have 15-20 minutes to deliver the content.  Usually… if it goes beyond that, I have lost them.  HS students seem to be able to pay attention for longer durations… but not much longer:  25-30 minutes.  I have found that if I go beyond the 30 min. mark… I have completely lost them.  Rule of thumb:  MS – keep it short and sweet and to the point.  HS – make sure that you connect and don’t go too long.

3] Depth – There are just some things that you can’t talk about in the same way with a MS student that you can with a HS student.  Sex, Dating, Partying, etc…  It’s not that you can’t or shouldn’t talk about these things… but the depth that you go with them is determined by age.  Most middle school students don’t have the experiences to draw from when it comes to some of this stuff… so they cannot immediately relate.  HS students are immersed in this stuff all the time.  So when you are putting together your messages, audience becomes a driving force on how deep you go with it.  I usually look at it this way: MS = INFORMATION… so I can generally talk about it and what God says about it.  HS = EXPERIENCE… so I can talk specifically about it and what God says specifically about it.

There are probably more that I have missed… but this is a good framework to start thinking about the differences between these two CRUCIAL ministries in the church when it comes to the CONTENT we teach.

Tomorrow I will look at the major difference of CONTEXT.

I love the New Year.  It just represents so many awesome things: Fresh starts, new goals, new vision, a chance for change, and the list goes on and on.  I think about this concept every year in the week between Christmas and New Year’s Day.  I especially start thinking about this in two areas: My personal life goals… and my ministry goals.  Personally, I try and take some time to think about things to change and grow in during the next year: Exercise, family leadership, personal reading goals, etc… I also take a day or two and go after some major goal setting for my student ministry.  I pray and try to evaluate where our students HAVE been the past year and where God might want to take them this year.

What are some things you do in the new year?

So I was wrestling with a concept the other day and I wanted to write about it, but I hadn’t yet come to any kind of conclusion.  My team and I were talking one afternoon and a student’s name came up.  I said, “Ya know, __(insert student’s name here)___… I’ll just show you who they are on facebook.”  Then it dawned on me that this student did not have a facebook account.  My mind immediately went to, “What kind of loser doesn’t have a facebook account.”  It was terrible. I know…  How can you not have a facebook account?   But this whole thing got me thinking, “Is this student better off or worse off for not having a facebook?  On the negative side, she isn’t connected online to anyone, doesn’t know what’s going on in her “friend’s” lives, and doesn’t receive any of the online stuff that our ministry does. But what if… what if she is FAR more connected than I think?  What if NOT having a Facebook account has caused this student to ACTUALLY be connected to REAL FRIENDS?  What if she has REAL conversations with LIVING, BREATHING people rather than getting her info from quippy statuses?  What if?  From what I have seen over the years in student ministry, our students ability to relate to others and connect has dropped significantly.  The 2 culprits in my opinion?  Facebook and Texting.  We’ve traded real friendships for online “friends” and we’ve stopped talking and started texting.  Now… I am all for facebook.  I am all for texting (unless it is while you are driving).  But I wonder how we, as youth pastors, can help parents and students learn the difference between an AWESOME tool that can be used for connecting with others… and something that we are ADDICTED to.  Our ministry uses facebook as a tool to help students connect with events, weekends, etc…  But we can’t be SOOO dependent on the technology that we forget about the ACTUAL RELATIONSHIP.  This is my advice to students about things like facebook:  It’s awesome, don’t get addicted… and make sure you spend some time actually talking to REAL PEOPLE this week!

This is a relational ministry model that is based off of peer to peer evangelism & large group/small group discipleship and serving.  I use this often as I evaluate where my student ministry is at and how affective we are.

1. Learn how to say the word “NO.”

That is the first step.  None of us wants to be a “NO-face”… but we cannot afford to be “Yes-Men” either.  We need to learn to say no to things sometimes.  it’s okay… go ahead and practice it: N-OOOOOOOO.  Think about this for a second… Jesus had to say no to some people.  I think that if it was okay for the Son of God to say no… then it is okay for us to say no as well.

2. Learn the “Busy” seasons of your ministry year.

This was a huge lesson I had to learn.  There are always going to be ebs and flows to the ministry calendar year.  When you know what season is busy, you can better prepare yourself and your family for it.

3. Be a better communicator with your family.

One thing that has helped me (though I am FAR from mastering it) is learning to communicate with my family what my schedule looks like for the week and how busy I will be with church stuff.  This has helped with the tension.

4. Clarify your church’s & supervisor’s expectations of you & your time.

I have been guilty, on occasion, of assuming that I had to be somewhere when I did not… or that someone expected something of me when they clearly did not.  Why?  Because I did not clarify others expectations of me and my time.  When I clarify expectations… I know exactly what I need to do and what I do not.

5. Choose more family, less church activity.

There will always be more ministry… There is only one of your family.  There are other pastors to care for people… There is only one dad or mom to your kids.

6. Value the important over the immediate.

Sometimes we get going on things that we think have got to be immediately done… but in all reality, they aren’t that important.  But what if we started valuing the important things over the immediate?  What would that look like in our schedules?  Families?  Work?

There is probably way more that I missed… what would you add to this list?

“Hurry is not of the Devil… Hurry IS the Devil.”   – Carl Jung