I thought it would never happen, at least not to me. After 14 years of ministering with youth and their families, I was going to take the great plunge. I was going to do the unthinkable: Become a senior pastor. Honestly, I never intended to betray my first love (youth ministry). The thought of defecting to the other side of church leadership was unpleasant at best. Yet here I am, the senior pastor, the big cheese, the head honcho; amazingly, I am excited about it.
My reservations about becoming the senior pastor all seemed to revolve around the (unfounded) fear that I no longer would be involved with youth ministry. Not true!
I remember a conversation with a good friend and fellow long-time veteran of youth ministry. I was expressing to him my fear about leaving youth ministry behind and heading in a different pastoral direction. What he said next radically changed my understanding and outlook on my transition. He said, “Ken, becoming a senior pastor only increases your responsibility and role in the youth ministry. You will have the opportunity to mold the next generation of youth leaders.
“As I see it, your responsibility and role in youth ministry only increases as a senior pastor.”
This brings me to the point. I now lead a ministry staff that includes two paid youth pastors. During the search process, a friend asked, “Now that you are a senior pastor, and after 14 years of working for senior pastors, what advice about youth ministry and getting along with the senior pastor would you give to a young youth pastor?” Well here goes:
Principle #1:
-Seek Jesus:
I love the song “Audience of One” by Big Daddy Weave. The first verse says, ” I come on my knees, to lay down before you. Bringing all that I am, longing only to know You. Seeking Your face and not only Your hand, I find You embracing me just as I am.”
The most important thing you can do as a youth pastor is seek the face of God. Long to know Him. Don’t just spend time praying about your youth and your programs. Don’t just study Scripture in order to develop your next lesson. Moses got it right in
What a leadership prayer, Moses was faced with the task of leading the Israelites through great transition and opportunity, yet his focus was on learning about and intimately knowing God. How much would your ministry change and grow if your first priority was to know the living God deeply and intimately? How much more effective would your youth talks and small-group materials be if you spent most of your time plumbing the depths of God’s wisdom and applying it to your own life? Seek His face!
Principle #2:
-Don’t Be Fadilicious:
Simply put, don’t jump on every youth ministry fad that comes down the pike. There are a lot of great youth ministries, doing a lot of great, yet different things; and they are all having a great impact on the youth culture in their areas. If you tried to follow all of their examples you would wear out your youth, your leaders, your program and possibly your welcome.
God has placed you (a unique person), into a youth ministry (a unique church and community environment) to accomplish His goals (a unique outcome). The job before you is not to become like everybody else but to find out who God has called you to be right where you are planted. Here are five suggestions you can use to begin the process of finding the unique identity God has for the ministry you currently are serving.
1. Pray! Ask God to lead you through the process. Be patient with God in prayer. He may not come right out and lay a three-point vision statement on you, but He will walk you down the road of illumination through a period of time in order to help you find His will.
2. Identify your culture. Ask questions about the church, community and region that will help you determine what will work and what will send you home with a bruised ego. Questions such as: What is the vision of the church or organization where you’re serving? What are the ministry traditions, taboos or strong points of your church? What has and has not worked for those who previously held your position? What is your community like?
I minister in a largely middle- to lower-middle class community with a high Spanish immigrant population and a fair amount of low-income housing. These factors do not make my community good or bad; but they can tell me a lot about the types of needs required from my ministry, the activities my ministry target audience will want and be able to attend, as well as the resources that will be available to me in order to facilitate ministry. Identify the worldview of your region. Ministry in the spiritually confused and pluralistic Northwest will look very different than ministry in the spiritually traditional Southeast.
3. What gets you spiritually fired up (i.e., worship, prayer, Bible study, evangelism)? The way in which you are spiritually wired largely will determine the spiritual priorities of your youth ministry.
4. Look at some of the other youth ministries in town and talk to those youth pastors. What has worked for them? What hasn’t? What are some of the greatest challenges facing young people in the community? What principles and philosophies guide their ministries? Are there ways for youth ministries in the same community to partner together and support one another?
5. Talk to your youth ministry leaders and student leadership to see what God is putting on their hearts for the ministry. Ask them to pray for God’s leading as a vision is set. Get them involved in the process.
6. Last but not least, try something, evaluate it, redevelop it and try again. Remember that numbers are not the only indicators of success. What is God’s definition of success for your ministry?
Principle #3:
Be Consistent:
Every week I hear about a different survey or blog telling me about youth ministry short-timer’s disease. Youth pastors are not known for their longevity, and youth ministries are not known for their consistency. I find it inexcusable. I have found that it takes at least six to 12 months even to begin building credibility with students, parents, youth leaders, and even the senior pastor. What are we saying to churches and young people when we storm in with words of love and commitment, only to storm out 12 to 14 months later, leaving them frustrated and bewildered. I recently had one of the young ladies who graduated from my youth ministry (where I have been for six years), come to me and thank me because she got to have the same youth pastor both years of middle school and all four years of high school. On a side note, she is now ministering overseas.
When we are willing to stick through the hard times and be consistent, we teach young people important spiritual lessons such as perseverance and faithfulness. Commit yourself to a three- to five-year vision for your ministry. Grow where you are planted and stop looking over the fence at the next pasture; it’s not always as green as it appears. On a professional note, if you are a church-hopping youth pastor, watch out! It will come back to bite you. Search committees and senior pastors are going to want to know why your resume is filled with 12-month ministry tours, and they will question whether or not they want a short timer on their staff. Be consistent!
Principle #4:
Helping Your Senior Pastor Help You:
-Clearly Communicate: Realize that your senior pastor, especially in larger and multi-staff churches are responsible for processing and evaluating large amounts of information. Your ministry may not be the only ministry, and you may not be the only leader in the church who needs the senior pastor’s attention. The best way you can maximize your senior pastor’s ability to assist you in your ministry is to communicate clearly.
-Ask Questions: Find out early in your ministry what specific information your senior pastor needs from you in order to help your ministry be successful. This will give your senior pastor the opportunity to help prepare for staff meetings and briefings.
-Give Details: Don’t just tell your senior pastor that you are taking the youth on a retreat. Tell him where you are going, when you will return, how you are getting there, who the chaperones will be and the spiritual emphasis of the retreat. Provide an event facts sheet for your senior pastor. This will save him time and cover your bases. Remember, your senior pastor can be your greatest ally or your harshest critic. This will be determined largely by his ability to support, promote and defend your ministry. There is nothing I dislike more as a senior pastor than a parent who is confused or upset about an event when I have no information to help that parent with his or her concerns. The adage that “It is easier to ask forgiveness than permission” is not true in this case.
-Understand where your ministry fits into the overall scheme of the church: If you do not know the vision of your church, find out. Ask everyone from your elders, senior pastor, other ministry leaders, to those sitting in the pews. Once you have determined what the vision of the church is, ask whether or not your ministry is in agreement with that vision and how your ministry can help accomplish the overall ministry of the church. If there is no clear vision for your church among the leadership, then maybe you can find some ways to help develop one. The reality is that you cannot do youth ministry alone; you need the leadership and assistance of the total church, so find where you fit.
-Get to know your senior pastor: I am not saying you need to be best friends, but you should have a relationship that goes beyond staff meetings and Sunday services. Here are some things you should find out about your senior pastor:
-What is his ministry experience (the good, the bad and the ugly)? What gets him spiritually fired up? What is his vision for the church, and how does your ministry fit into that vision? What is the greatest accomplishment he has had in ministry? What were the greatest mistakes in ministry? How does he rest, re-fuel and relax? Getting to know your senior pastor will give you insight about where he has been and where he is going in ministry, and it will better prepare you to work alongside him.
-Be professional and consistent: Determine that you are going to break the stereotype that youth pastors are capable of doing little more that playing messy games and making odd noises with their arm pits. Through your professionalism in the areas of speech, conduct, administration and conflict resolution, show your pastor, leaders and congregation that you truly can hack real ministry. Look at what Paul tells Timothy in
A great professional and personal relationship is produced in part by youth pastors who understand their ministry role and seek to do everything possible to help their senior pastors successfully carry out the vision of their churches and give them everything they need to support and promote the success of their ministries.
Intentionally fostering your relationship with Jesus Christ and your relationship with your senior pastor will set a foundation for the success of your youth ministry. It takes a lot of time, hard work, much prayer and unfaltering consistency to be successful in your role as a youth pastor; but with the help of God, you can be all He has planned for you to be. Keep up the good work!
Ken Swatman holds a bachelor’s in Biblical Studies/Christian Ministry from Puget Sound Christian College, Edmonds, Wash.; and a master’s specialization in Theological Education from Western Seminary, Portland, Oregon.
