There are more than 1,500 multi-site churches in this country, according to some estimates. Multi-site churches launch new campuses as they grow, reaching out in a new region. They become one church with many locations, each guided by the same vision.
According to a 2007 Leadership Network survey of these churches, two-thirds say there is youth ministry happening at at least one of their campuses. That’s the case for the multi-site student ministry I pastor, where we began our student ministry at our second site the day we launched.
Since that day, we’ve been “one” student ministry with multiple locations. Every week, we run an identical, concurrent youth worship service at each campus. As the youth pastor, I rotate between campuses, facilitating the service at one campus while other adult leaders oversee the service at the other. Students from all campuses unite for all other events.
Multi-Site Benefits
Though complicated, there are many benefits to multi-site student ministry.
One benefit is its team approach, according to members of the Student Ministries Team at The Chapel in northwestern Illinois, who sent their comments to YouthWorker Journal via e-mail. “So many youth pastors are on their own to figure everything out,” they said. “We get the opportunity to work with a team of people that are like minded and skilled to help each other do what we are all passionate about.”
Another benefit is shared resources. Our second, smaller campus has all the benefits of a large student ministry, including a paid youth pastor, generous budget, youth praise band, and opportunities to participate in a wide-range of events.
Multi-Site Challenges
Unfortunately, multi-site ministry also has its challenges.
One challenge is the limits of the leaders. In a ministry where success hinges on relationships with students and families, having a youth pastor rotate between multiple campuses makes those relationships difficult to form.
Steve Garcia, Student Ministries Director at The Chapel in Ohio, also has struggled with this. For three years, he rotated between two campuses. As a result, Garcia said, “The students didn’t feel like they had a consistent pastoral presence at their campus. We are now making the adjustments to have one person who oversees one campus.”
Another challenge is identity. As a campus ages, its student ministry begins to develop a unique identity, making it harder to continue being one student ministry, and more difficult to integrate students at all-campus events. Different growth rates can also leave newer campuses feeling inferior to more established campuses, leading to unhealthy competition.
“The biggest struggle facing multi-site youth ministry is that we are competing with ourselves,” said Bill Haslim, Pastor for Student and Children’s Ministries at Community Presbyterian Church in Danville, California.
Solutions and Lingering Questions
Despite the challenges, solutions do exist.
One solution to the leader challenge is to develop interns to serve as “campus pastors” who build relationships with students at each campus, thereby insuring their care. Another is to intentionally mix students at all-campus events to foster friendships across campuses that lessen competition between them.
Having recognized both the potential of the multi-site model and the reality of its challenges, I cannot help but wonder, is the model sustainable for student ministry? I also question why, according to the Leadership Network survey, more than a third multi-site churches lack student ministries at most of their campuses.
While I don’t know the answers to these questions, I do know that for effective multi-site student ministry to occur, we must be willing to experiment and fail, to ask tough questions and seek honest answers, and to humbly depend on God.
