The fallout of NYMC

Like I said, lots of good stuff in the seminar I went to. It was about building and sustaining a healthy ministry. What I appreciated was the depth of detail we went in to from an organizational point of view. The administration of ministry or lack of it can greatly impact the health and sustainability of that ministry. I found that I was already doing lots of the stuff he talked about (which was encouraging, as if I am on the right path) but also gave me some pieces to fill in on the structure part. We didn't talk for a minute about which method of ministry is best or works best, it was a seminar anyone from any style of ministry could have taken and benefited from.

2 things in particular came up and I didn't realize their importance until thinking about it. He said healthy ministries have 3 types of leaders, the camp counselor types (kid magnets), the organizers/administrators, and the architect (vision person). I see my self as the architect and I think we have an administration type in place (Mary, my assistant that does a great job) but I think we could use more camp counselor types. We don't really have many college folk during the school year but we do have a good group of young singles. The second thing that caught my attention was the importance of setting and evaluating goals. As far as I know we don't do that as a staff here but I think I ought to get on it for my own good, even if Mary is the only one to check me on them. I see goals as helping guide me and understand the real priorities we have as a ministry. We'll see how long it takes me to implement these things.

NYMC

Wow. By far the most helpful conference on Youth Ministry I have been apart of (I have been to 6-7 so far). I loved teh seminar format, 8 hours on one topic, rather than the 90 minutes 4 or 5 times in a weekend. In other conferences I found that I wasn't excited about 4 or 5 of their offerings, they don't change them every year, maybe just 1 or 2 new ones. I still found the cost to be prohibitive for bringing a bunch of volunteers along. The session I went to was about building a healthy and sustainable youth ministry. I think every youth leader ought to go to this one 1 time in their "career". Lots of useable stuff without going in to programming. I'll talk more about it later, but just so you know it was awesome.

Forecast

I would love being a weatherman, as long as someone who watches you on TV sees the weather you predict you are gold. Anyone else get annoyed when teh weather forecast covers an area of like 500 square miles? This is especially true with snow and rain, some areas get a ton and some could get none. I think I am thinking about this cause I am traveling Friday and there is supposed to be some freezing rain in Alexandria, Philly and Cincinnati. Normally I wouldn't mind except I can see us getting delayed, especially in Philly. Bad airport for on time stuff, good airport to keep you busy.

Conference

This weekend Colleen and I are going to a Youth pastor/leader conference in Cincinnati. It's called the National Youth Ministry Convention, done through Group Publishing. It's set up differently from the National Youth Workers Convention (done by Youth Specialties) and it's smaller and hopefully better. I have to say that the second time going to the NYWC I was disappointed, not enough new stuff. If I were to go every year I have no idea what break out sessions I would do. So, this year I am going somewhere else, we'll see what happens.

good talks

I had a couple good conversations with students this weekend. I have only been here about a month so I am glad they feel confy enough to talk with me. I really want them to know that I am open to hear what they have to say. Same thing with parents. I don't want to just be safe for students but also for parents, sometimes they hurt for their kids more than their kids know and they could use soem encouragement.

our group

There are students from at least 27 different middle and high schools that are a part of our group. Those schools represent about 75-80 students. Our next big event is DNow, first weekend in April. Looking forward to it, we're talking about purity and playing laser tag. Good combo. Also I think I may have secured a great band for our labor day retreat, Jason Lovins Band. Right now we are looking in to seeing if a couple other churches nearby want to come with us, we'll see what happens

identity

So we are putting together a new identity for the Youth minsitry here and I think we came up with something. When we thought about who we are and what we want to be doing, what we want to be all about it came down to transformed lives. Now Transformers is a good name, for a movie, but maybe not so much for a youth group. What we came up with is Alter[ed]. The idea being that as followers of Christ we should be changed/altered and at teh same time we want to be change agents in the lives of those around us helping them to change/alter their lives. Now if we could just get some ideas on a creative logo...

I suppose it doesn't matter if anyone reads this. I mean who goes around reading other people's journal...um I guess all bloggers. If you just started reading my journal you will get some info on my family, my church, and my work, so basically it will be like everyone elses, except different. Feel free to comment on stuff I say but don't be worried if I don't respond back, how dare you have an opinion about my opinion! Ok but seriously feel free to explore my life and meander through my thoughts.