Blog posts from Alvin
Most of our church ministries operate with volunteers. Without them, many of our ministries would shut down. Many youth leaders have a problem recruiting volunteers. However, that's only one part of the puzzle. It's not just how to bring volunteers in service, it's also how you care for them. I've heard from some volunteers who feel they are essentially cheap (i.e. free) labour. Some don't feel appreciated or cared for.
Abraham Maslow deduced a hierarchy of needs people unconsciously strive for. The second level in his hierarchy is "safety needs", where a person desires physical protection, security, stability and freedom from fear. The Hemorrhaging Faith report also alluded to this in one of their four drivers (under "Teachings and Beliefs") where young adults: can freely explore the tough issues: sex, different world views, etc. They want to be prepared to
We've revised our starter kit for church youth ministries. The overview document gives the church and youth leader starting points when determining what their new youth ministry may look like. From there, sample templates are included to help establish the foundations of the youth ministry with bonus documents which will help you take it to the next level. This starter kit is available on our Access Card. (If you don't
Lately on Facebook, people have faced the Gratitude Challenge (the Huffington Post had a feature article on this). The premise of the challenge is to list 3 items of you're grateful for over a 10 day period. It's been shown that having a thankful attitude has positive effects on ourselves (there have been numerous studies looking at the correlation between gratitude and happiness). This shouldn't be any surprise for the
Theology, as a basic definition, is "the study of God and God's relation to the world". As a Christian, we view everything through that lens of discovering God's relationship to everything. Youth ministry is no different. Youth ministry is no longer seen as "glorified babysitting". Youth leaders would rarely call it that. (Some parishoners may have subconsciously viewed it as such.) However, in the last few years, the connection between
Over the years, we've coordinated what we called an event internship where youth and young adults came to serve at Avalanche and Blizzard while honing their ministry skills. Over the last 12 months, we've redesigned that program into what we call "Slingshot". We recognize that today's young adult isn't always able to commit to a program long-term (some don't even know what they're doing the next hour). We also recognize
In all areas of life, we continue to change (whether progressively or regressively). Our ministry skills are no different. It's not to say that you must make a major investment in every area of your life all the time. But, to ensure you're not neglecting one area over another in the long term, you need to balance where you're placing your energies in your next steps. Ministry development can happen
At Assembly 2014, Tanya Yuen and I presented a learning session on "Lost in Transitions", exploring how churches could better support children and youth in various transitions. Since then, we've begun to broaden the ideas shared at that learning session into a new blog site. Starting next Tuesday, we'll be publishing a new blog entry elaborating on the key components from that seminar. You can subscribe today at cboqtransitions.wordpress.com. In
Take a deep breath. Over the next few days, you'll feel a rumbling. It's the sound of everyone gearing up for life after Labour Day, when the summer unofficially ends and we are back in our "normal" routines. It's also the start of a new youth ministry year, with new students, some familiar faces, and everyone having grown older by a year since the last September. But before that comes,
Everyone has a system of how they keep track of details, from contacts to tasks and everything in between. As you're getting organized for this next ministry season, here are some online tools we've found helpful in our office. Bufferapp: Keeping up with social media can be daunting, especially when you're sending out content. This app allows for you to schedule your posts ahead of time. e.g. Want to remind
