5 Volunteer Statements for Your Ministry
No matter what job you do there are certain phrases and words that are specific to your culture. Most of these words and phrases develop naturally over time as a result of events, ministries, or your denomination. For example, I’m in the Assemblies of God. Here are just a few of the acronyms that any minister in the AG (see what I did there) will know.
5 Steps to Managing Your Time this Summer
It’s summertime and for many in NextGen ministries this is not a time to kick back and relax, but the busiest time of the year. You have more and bigger events over the three summer months than you have for the rest of the year. Add to that you have vacations, volunteer turnover, absences, and overall lower attendance, it can be exhausting and overwhelming.
So, what do you do? How do you juggle all the things and still grow the ministry or at least survive the summer?
15 Things I've Learned Over 15 Years of Ministry
Today is my 15th anniversary of vocational ministry. I owe my first job to Steve Lambert who saw potential in me and gave me a shot as a kid’s pastor. He paid for me to finish college, officiated my wedding, and gave my wife and I a place to live. I am forever thankful for his vision and generosity.
5 Essentials for Successful Lead Team Meetings
When you’re first starting out in ministry is so easy to go it alone. You have all the passion and energy and you’re ready to storm the gates of hell. However, if you’ve been in ministry longer than 3 months, you’ve probably realized you can’t do this alone.
The Paradox of Every Service Matters
Right in the middle of my worship set, my entire computer system crashed. I use video worship and teaching so having this crash was worst case scenario. I didn’t have a backup plan, and I was the only one who could fix it.
Looking back now, I’m not entirely sure what we did to get through it, but we did. The Gospel was proclaimed, and we built relationships with the families that came.
But that was just one service. I could fill this post with story after story of successes and failures on big days and small days, and I’m sure you could too.
5 Steps to a Successful Parent Meeting
It was the summer of 2014, and I’m trying to get as many kids as possible to go to camp. I advertised, secured scholarships, made phone calls and much more, but I’d hit a ceiling. Many kids couldn’t go because their parents had already scheduled something that week or they had already committed to attending one of other paid events throughout the summer and couldn’t afford it.
Sound familiar?
3 Questions Every Guest Asks
It’s been said that a new guest makes their decision to return to your church in the first 15 minutes of their visit. That’s a small window, especially when you consider most of that 15 minutes happens before service begins.
What I Read in 2022
Every year I set a goal to read a certain number of books. I’ve gone all the way to 36 but have settled between 20 to 24. This year, instead of focusing on quantity, I focused on subjects that interested me and read a few pages every day. Somehow, I still got 20 books in.
For this post, I broke the books into categories.
Ministry is a Marathon
It’s so exciting when you first start in ministry. There’s so much passion and energy, and you just can’t wait to get in with the kids or youth and change lives.
But if you’ve been in ministry for more than a year, you have to know that not everything moves as fast as you thought they would.
A Discipline Plan That Works
When I first became a children’s pastor on my first Sunday, I sat and observed how the volunteers were managing their service. These were college students with little to no training, just a heart for kids and doing the best they could.
Their stories and games were good. Their energy was excellent during worship, but they had one glaring problem.
Discipline.
The 3 Groups Every Next Gen Leader Leads
Recently, I was having a conversation with a new pastor and he was excitedly talking about all things he was planning to do with his kids. I asked him how he was planning to let parents know, and he said he was trusting the kids.
Rookie mistake.
What I Read in 2020
This year has been crazy to say the least. As much as I love to read leadership and ministry books, I read less this year because of all the stress. I needed an escape. Since I’m a huge Star Wars fan, and we’re in the golden age of Star Wars there are a lot of great books continuing the story.
Building Your Ministry for When You're Gone (Workshop Notes)
One thing I was taught early in my ministry career is that you are always replaceable. You are not going to be where you are forever. Most likely there was someone before and there will be someone after you. You are just the steward of the ministry and it is up to you as to what condition it’s going to be in when you leave.
How to have a Parent Information Meeting
For a few years now, I’ve been holding a parent information meeting at the beginning of the year.
I originally started the meeting to help boost camp attendance. The cost of camp is sometimes prohibitive, and by the time I was getting the information out to parents to sign up, they had already made their summer plans.
5 Questions to Evaluate Your Events
Events and ministry go hand in hand. It comes from when the church was the center of town. Everyone’s social calendar was filled with church activities because the church was the community. Now things have drastically changed, but we still do events.
3 Principles of a Great Volunteer Meeting
You can’t be in ministry for long without having to host a volunteer meeting. A lot of time these meetings can drag on without any clear focus and not get anything done. When you first start in ministry, people show up because they want to hear what you have to say, but if you’re meeting is boring you may have a hard time getting them to come back.
The ____ Department is Not Your Enemy
When I first started out in ministry, I was naïve to think that everyone would get along. We all love Jesus, and we’re all in this together, we should be one big happy family, right? Unfortunately, church can be like angry Twitter.
No matter who you are or where you go there will always be conflict.
Starting Well
A few months ago, I wrote a post about leaving well. The inevitable happens when you leave something. You start something new.
But leaving something and starting something are two different things. They both have their hurts and their joys, but you have to approach them differently. Now that I’ve been in the new ministry for almost a year, I can look back at that first month or two and realize what helped and what didn’t.
Leaving Well
About a year ago, I made a huge change in my career and left my church of 7 years in Montgomery, Alabama and moved to Sarasota, Florida for a new church and new children's ministry. Next week, I will post about how I tried to start there well, but today I want to talk about how to leave well.
3 Methods of Communication that Work
You can talk about the event or program over and over again. You put up posters, make slides, and make an announcement from the stage, and you get crickets. Or even worse, the week after your event, someone asks you when it is.
To have a great Easter Outreach, you need to have a plan. This field tested and approved Egg Hunt Service Schedule will give you the outline your need for your outreach.