by David Hanson | Nov 7, 2013 | The Youth Ministry Blog
This week our student ministry has been walking through a tradition of ours called Maranatha. Maranatha is a word that can be translated as “Our Lord Come.” It’s not a word we use or hear a lot today, but for the early church it carried great importance. It was a reminder… a reminder that Jesus would come again. It was a source of hope. The early church would say it to one another as a an expression of joy that their Lord would come back one day, but also to remember they needed to be praying for His return. It became so common that the early church would use it as they greeted one another. There was an understanding that Jesus would return and they needed to prepare themselves and anticipate it.
We are commanded in Scripture to be looking and praying for the return of Jesus. “waiting for and hastening the coming of the day of God” 2 Peter 3:12. It’s a reminder that this world is not all that there is. We have a promise of a greater future with Jesus.
Another part of waiting for the return of the bridegroom is found in Mark chapter two. People come to Jesus and ask “Why do John’s disciples and the disciples of the Pharisees fast, but your disciples do not fast?” Let’s be honest, they really want to know why Jesus’ disciples don’t look as religious as these other guys. Ok Jesus, if your supposed to be this great man, teacher, and possibly the Messiah, then why don’t your guys fast like those other disciples. How come they look more religious than your guys do? It’s funny how religion can become a competition for us.
Jesus says that fasting has changed now that the bridegroom (Messiah, Savior) is now with them, but there will come a day when He is taken away and “then they will fast in that day.”
Then they will fast…
Jesus seems to understand that when He is taken away his disciples will fast. He does not give exclusions or ways out of this, just simply that they will fast. When I first understood this I was floored. When I was saved in high school, I was a part of a church where if anyone was fasting they certainly weren’t talking about it. No one had ever taught me about fasting or showed me how to fast, and here’s this clear call from Jesus to fast. Once I realized this and began to fast, I saw the great importance and benefits of fasting. Because of this, I made a clear decision to teach and tell others about the discipline of fasting.
Today, I lead a youth ministry full of some pretty awesome students, some of which have expressed a strong desire to grow deeper in their relationship with Jesus. I wanted to provide an opportunity present the heartbeat of Maranatha and fasting to them. Since, it is a call in Scripture I wanted my students to learn this in a biblical way. We need to be praying for Christ’s return and fasting for the Bridegroom that has left us. Out of this came our Maranatha week. We spend one week a semester in fasting and prayer.
Maybe you are thinking, “How could he ask students to fast from food for a week?” and some of you extra religious types are thinking “Fasting is to be done in private!” First off, we do not ask students to fast from food, but to fast from something that will allow them to spend more time with God and in prayer. (Television, social media, their phone, their snooze button) To the other objection, we see throughout Scripture that there were times of corporate fasting where it was one voice crying out for God. There are many disciplines (quiet time, prayer, fasting) that are intended for the individual alone, but if we don’t teach them how to biblicaly practice these things then how will they learn?
These weeks have been amazing. We started this two years ago and I still have adults that can’t fathom young people giving up their cell phones, television, or social media to spend more time with God… but they do. Given a challenge like this, your students will surprise you. Our students rally around it, they ask one another before we begin what they will be fasting from. They encourage one another to stay strong and hold each other accountable. We meet every night from 7-8 for prayer and students come and go. We pray for Jesus’ return and for students in our community to know Him. It has been especially refreshing for me as a pastor. We can get caught up in the big events, loud music, teaching, and games that we rarely stop to have quiet moments of prayer with our students.
I talk about the spiritual disciplines often with our students and I would encourage you to try something like this with your students. You may need to change some things to better fit your group, but here are some suggestions when talking about fasting:
1. You can talk about fasting and ease students into it. You would have parents freaking out if you told their students not to eat for a week. Plus, with athletes and young people it’s not good for them to be skipping meals. So, I spend time teaching about fasting from things that hold us back from spending more time with God and introduce food fasting. This gives them a clear line of growth and we’ve had some of our older students give up a meal.
2. Make sure they know the focus of fasting. We focus on Jesus and not what we’re doing.
3. Be sure to teach on it. You would be amazed at how many students know very little about fasting or that it is a Christian discipline.
4. Not everyone is able to fast because of health reasons. If someone has trouble with eating disorders or can not physically do it, then they should not feel ashamed. This is where fasting from other stuff becomes so important.
5. Show them how important it is to say “God is greater than anything else in my life.” If you cannot give up television for a week to spend more time with God, it might be an idle in your life.
If you are not currently fasting, may this be an encouragement and challenge to seek out this spiritual discipline. God gives breakthrough and speaks in powerful ways through fasting.
Brandon Weir is the Student Pastor at The Fellowship Round Rock near Austin, TX. What does Brandon love? “I love my wife Jules, my dog Ranger, Texas Tech, being outdoors, the Texas Rangers, camping, hiking, reading, Torchy’s Tacos and I love me some Jesus.”
by David Hanson | Oct 30, 2013 | The Youth Ministry Blog
Jimmy Kimmel has done a bit the last couple of years where he asks parents to tell their kids that they ate all of their Halloween candy, and then video the response. It’s my favorite part of Halloween. I love to see the kids go absolutely ballistic when they don’t get their way. I need to know who my future politicians will be (low blow?). It makes me excited to be a dad some day. You should pray for my future kids. The rest of Halloween I could do without. You could say I don’t fancy Halloween much. I don’t enjoy all the dark images, demons, and evil that surrounds it and I definitely don’t trust candy from strangers. I know it makes me sound old school, kind of like your grandma, but I have never liked it.
The truth is that the rest of the world seems to be going in the opposite direction. Before I moved to Round Rock, TX (original name I know), I barely saw Halloween decorations, but now our neighborhoods are filled with them… my neighborhood is filled with them. It makes me wonder about the kind of people living around me when their yards are filled with bats, ghosts, tombstones, dead bodies (fake I hope), and all sorts of ghouls. I’m just trying to survive this crazy holiday.
Don’t get the wrong impression though, just because I don’t like Halloween does not mean I’m the kind of youth pastor that rants to my students about how terrible it is. There are battles I choose to fight and spend my time on in youth ministry…this isn’t one of them. I won’t spend Wednesday night talking about how it’s wrong to go to haunted houses or dress up. I will ask my students to be safe and wear appropriate costumes.
As youth pastors we have to be mindful of the tone we take about such matters. Blasting Halloween may remove your opportunity to talk about the deeper issues of the holiday. Halloween carries a ton of spiritual aspects and image struggles for students, whether it’s girls with their body image or people simply wanting to be something else. When discussing topics like Halloween, I do not want to be a ministry that simply lays out a bunch of do’s and don’ts, telling people what to think and never teaching it’s people to think for themselves. Choosing to fight a surface level cultural battle may mean you lose the chance to talk about the spiritual war going on. Here’s what I mean…
The other day some people in our Lifegroup of young married couples were talking about one of those demon movies (aren’t all scary movies these days?) and I made an off hand comment that we don’t watch those. They thought this was weird, you could tell. At this point they felt the need to clarify, they said they don’t watch scary movies that could actually happen, but since demons aren’t real then these are fine. To them, movies with demons are okay because they have no real elements of evil within them. These are “good” church going people and they don’t believe demons are real.
Our world has an odd concept of evil. We agree that murder is wrong, rape is wrong, and bullying is wrong. It seems our world has a concept of what’s wrong with the physical world, but when it comes to a spiritual realm we leave that to people with backwards beliefs in third world countries and the charismatics. Many people in the church today do not know or believe in “the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly places.” (Eph 6:12)
Our churches today have shied away from talking about this realm. We act like it doesn’t exist. Often, celebrating Halloween the way that the world celebrates it, lifts high the spiritual evil and darkness of the world. It magnifies darkness, death, evil, fear, anxiety, and demons. While I will concede that most of this is done in the name of “good fun” and “pretend”, I would contend that this ignorance and embracing of evil is the greater problem. Many people are worshiping darkness without understanding what they are doing.
For many students, you are the most spiritual person they know in their lives.
It’s my prayer that when you speak to your students about Halloween you will use it as an example to teach truth about the spiritual realm. This holiday opens up massive opportunities to have honest spiritual conversations. We can not run from it or ban it. Our world today is more interested in it than ever and it’s not going away any time soon, no matter how much you yell about it from the stage. Let’s be youth ministries that respond and teach well, no matter our preferences.
And for all you Halloween people, enjoy seeing all the foxes, Miley Cyrus’, Monsters’ U, Minions, and whatever else is popular right now. I’ll be on my front porch chilling, handing out candy and watching out for crazy neighbors.
Brandon Weir is the Student Pastor at The Fellowship Round Rock near Austin, TX. What does Brandon love? “I love my wife Jules, my dog Ranger, Texas Tech, being outdoors, the Texas Rangers, camping, hiking, reading, Torchy’s Tacos and I love me some Jesus.”
by David Hanson | Oct 23, 2013 | The Youth Ministry Blog
It’s happened to us all, we sit down to create something for ministry and there’s nothing. We’ve pulled up to Starbucks or closed the door to our study to write another sermon, curriculum or blog deadline (gulp) and we’ve got nothing… I mean nothing. Everyone is looking to you for the next great idea for your upcoming event and you have no idea how you are going to engage your group’s imagination. Or maybe you are at the other end of of the spectrum right now; you finally have the time to take a break and refresh your soul in the Lord, but you’re getting nothing from it. For a month you have looked forward to that free Saturday that you blocked out to spend time with the Lord, but you don’t feel like you got anything from it. The job of a pastor is learning how to consistently and creatively pour out from a place of being filled up by God. We seem to be in a constant fluctuation between taking in and creating. Finding a productive balance that is not completely draining is difficult. For some of us, balance may seem elusive, a myth, like it’s the Yeti of ministry.
I preach/teach a lot in my current role, more than I feel comfortable with but this is my current stage in life. I know, I know, you’re going to link some article about students needing to hear other voices or training up other teachers but sometimes you have to do what you have to do.The reality is that as difficult as it can be at times, it’s been good for me as a young pastor. I’ve learned so much about finding a rhythm, trusting God, and striking a balance between in-take and create that I would not have found otherwise. I wish I could tell you that I learned this truth without messing up and wearing myself down, but it would not be true…I’m a slow learner. Yet God is faithful, and He has used this period of my life tremendously to grow me as a communicator and a creator, but mainly as a follower of Christ.
Whether you know it or not, finding balance is important to your life as a pastor. It’s a question of health. Young ministers coming out of school seem to fall victim to this at an alarming rate. They have spent years building up all these ideas and thoughts, only to exhaust themselves and their ideas six months into ministry. Like a person who has dove (dived, doven, diven?) too deep and is struggling to make it back to the surface, they desperately need air to breathe (refreshment). Often, we hide behind the excuse of being too busy. If you are ministering well, you will live a busy lifestyle. You might need to cut some things out of your life to find balance. Skip the Grey’s Anatomy Netflix marathon this weekend. Get off of Twitter. Stop listening to the podcast. We can not just resign ourselves to being on the razor’s edge of burnout forever. Striking a balance of taking in and creating leads us to a healthier place.
In-Take
This is the beginning stage of creating anything for God. Do you have grandiose aspirations of being an author some day? Are you tired of singing every one else’s songs? If you have ever wanted to create then you must refresh your soul in the Lord on a daily basis. This is the time we spend with the Lord, thinking on the Lord and learning new things about the Lord (note: this is not sermon preparation). As a minister, you have to spend time with the Lord. It’s probably not a new revelation to you that Jesus retired away to a quiet place to be with God, but it’s still true. Jonathan Edwards used these verses to show that Christians need to wake up early to spend time with God. I will not go this far, but I will tell you that you must allow your personal relationship with Christ to remain a priority if you ever hope to minister effectively. It’s important to realize that we do not spend time with the Lord so we can write an inspiring blog or paint a beautiful painting; we do it to know the Lord. Outside of this, reading books, listening to music, sitting silently, and being around God’s creation are just some of the many ways we can refresh our souls.
Create
We are all made to create. From the beginning of humankind, we have been called to create. It’s a purpose given to both Adam and Eve. It is a natural outflow from the worship rising within our hearts and a release for us as human beings. God created beauty for us to interact with. It’s not just looking at a beautiful sunset, but it’s writing, drawing, making music, and a hundred other expressions to God. If you do not think you are creative, it simply means you have not found your creative expression. Creativity has nothing to do with talent. You are not creating for others, you are creating for God. We express the new life we have in Christ by being creative. In a recent keynote, Tim Cook of Apple (yes that Apple) said that “designing something requires focus.” This is true of creativity… it will require focus and time. Let’s be people that create for the glory of God.
These two worlds have to be balanced. If we are simply taking in we will quickly become spiritual gluttons. If we are creating too much then we will always be running on empty. Here’s a few things I’ve observed:
1. There’s beauty and immense value in both of these working together.
2. Habitual unconfessed sin disrupts these processes.
3. You have to make time for both. The Enemy will tell you that you don’t have time, but this is a way of keeping you unhealthy.
4. You will need to plan small moments of refreshment and larger moments of refreshment. You cannot hope to run to the point of exhaustion and just plan a day away and hope to get refreshed. It needs to be a regular part of your life, even if it’s 10 minutes of quiet a day. (car ride home!)
5. Schedules and discipline is vital for both of these. Do you have a set time for both of these? If you don’t, it’s the first step towards health and balance.
6. We all have different ways that we do both of these.
What are some of the ways you in-take and create?
Brandon Weir is the Student Pastor at The Fellowship Round Rock near Austin, TX. What does Brandon love? “I love my wife Jules, my dog Ranger, Texas Tech, being outdoors, the Texas Rangers, camping, hiking, reading, Torchy’s Tacos and I love me some Jesus.”
by David Hanson | Oct 16, 2013 | The Youth Ministry Blog
It’s Sunday afternoon and God has just moved in incredible ways in the youth ministry I pastor, so why do I feel so awful and dejected? How can I not hear the encouragement from others and find myself planted on the few things that did not go right? Is there something wrong with me? Does this have anything to do with me?
The feeling at the end of a great weekend retreat, Disciple Now, camp experience, mission trip, or any of the other events we do can be exhilarating. The group feels a sense of camaraderie and the spirit of the group has completely changed from when you arrived or started. We all love events for this reason (it’s definitely not for the planning). An event can accomplish some things that a weekly service can’t. The part that’s not talked about and that those outside of student ministry don’t get is what I like to call “event lag.” It’s the negative feeling or happenings after an event that just can’t be shaken. It threatens to ruin the whole experience or make us doubt what God has just done.
Often, the problem with “event lag” is that it makes us immediately look towards ourselves. We’ve (hopefully) spent an entire weekend talking about how it’s all about Jesus and within a blink of an eye it’s back to being about us. It is hard not to take the parent gripping about something, or the young person tweeting something dumb, personally. We’ve invested so much into the weekend and we want everything to go smoothly. Part of it is because we want the students/parents to think they have the best youth pastor in the world, but another part of it is that we want to honor God in what we do. How do we respond to criticism? How do we react when things don’t go the way they are planned?
Sometimes events do not work out the way you planned and situations go haywire. Don’t take it personal. Imagine Robin Williams holding you right now saying “It’s not your fault… It’s not your fault… It’s not your fault.” At our fall retreat, my worship leader messaged me two hours before we left to tell me he couldn’t make it because he has diverticulitis… two hours! Diverticulitis! Who’s ever even heard of that?!? I went into a mini-panic, but then I realized that my freak out was not helping anyone. God worked it out when a buddy of mine stepped in to lead worship. Worship was amazing that weekend and it was not something I planned. At the end of the retreat, we planned more than enough drivers to pick us up and we had 4 or 5 that didn’t show up. Just…didn’t…show…up. There are certain things that are within your control, but you can’t control everything. On a side note, if you are a lazy planner or unprepared then you need to repent and get on that grind. Your students and God deserve better.
God can use these hiccups to remind us to trust in Him. It’s easy to slip into a mode of trusting in our own understanding and not His. God will accomplish His work and use every event as a teaching moment for our benefit. Do not let “event lag” come and steal your joy, remember that it is found in God and not in events. Talk it out with a buddy in youth ministry… gain some outside perspective. It’s good to know that you aren’t alone in your feelings. Open up to your spouse, use this as a point of intimacy. Most of all, when your soul feels drained, tired and beat down after an event, be still, and listen to God’s voice. You are a child of the King above being a pastor.
Brandon Weir is the Student Pastor at The Fellowship Round Rock near Austin, TX. What does Brandon love? “I love my wife Jules, my dog Ranger, Texas Tech, being outdoors, the Texas Rangers, camping, hiking, reading, Torchy’s Tacos and I love me some Jesus.”
by David Hanson | Oct 8, 2013 | The Youth Ministry Blog
My favorite movies growing up consisted of some form of Karate. I loved the never say die attitude in them, the fighting and the sound effects. One thing you learn quickly in martial arts movies is that you “Never Give Up, Never Surrender.” While this makes for a thrilling movie, it’s not consistent with life, especially in ministry. Many pastors take these unrealistic expectations with us into ministry. We bring a refusal to give up or trust anyone mentality with us into ministry.
When I say “give up”, I’m not trying to get you to quit your job. I mean doing your job better. I mean giving up on your ego and trusting God. It’s a better way of doing ministry when we trust and know Jesus. Here’s a few things I’ve given up on in my three years of doing youth ministry.
1. Give up on changing students lives’
Realize that it’s the Holy Spirit that changes lives and not your words, actions, or power. I’ve spent much of my young ministry trying to be the difference maker. I thought if I phrased things perfectly or spent enough time crafting my message that it would change lives. In reality, it’s the Holy Spirit’s job to change lives… not yours. If I’m not connecting with Jesus then I’m trusting my own power, strength, intelligence, ideas or words to change students’ lives. This is a lonely road that ends with many youth pastors trying to grow their own ego, quitting when they see little fruit, and moving on to something else.
2. Give up some of your power
Empower your people! I know it will take a lot of time and training, and sure, they won’t do it as well as you (or so you think), but you need to trust them. Ministry can’t be done alone and sometimes an effort you deem as “B team” is actually better for your ministry. It gets people bought in, and gives your ministry multiple voices. When people are bought in, they will devote more to a ministry. Multiple voices are needed for your ministry, and I don’t just mean from the “pulpit.” When people are invested it gives them a fulfillment and you shouldn’t hold back that joy from people.
3. Give up your need to be “right”
This mentality infiltrates every area of your ministry. You work with students, and guess what??? This means they are going to make mistakes. How you love and guide them through this has a profound effect on the rest of their lives. I find myself being too judgmental and not showing grace or love often enough. We love to hit students with rule following, but how do we show grace?
Needing to be right, hinders our ability to listen when others are critical of our ministry. That parent or other staff member might be right… It hurts our pride when we’re wrong and often we take it personal when others are critical of our ministry, but what if they’re right. If you don’t always need to be “right” then you might get some valuable information for your youth ministry. I’ve been guilty of getting so fixated on doing ministry my way that I’ve missed out on opportunities to grow.
Giving up takes confidence in what Jesus is doing in you and your ministry. You have to be able to hear God’s voice in it or it can wreck your self esteem. All of that said, it’s a better way of doing ministry. It requires you to find the gifts of those around you and bring them out. It means not getting offended by the fact that someone in your ministry might be better than you are at something. It means loving others enough to give them a shot. If we never give up, we’ll never see what all God can do through us.
Brandon Weir is the Student Pastor at The Fellowship Round Rock near Austin, TX. What does Brandon love? “I love my wife Jules, my dog Ranger, Texas Tech, being outdoors, the Texas Rangers, camping, hiking, reading, Torchy’s Tacos and I love me some Jesus.”
