Student Ministry: Building Relationships
Today I woke up at 4:45 to go bow hunting with a friend. Afterwards, I met up with one of my small groups from our Wednesday night student ministries. They were doing a service project by raking leaves to help out others. We raked leaves for a couple hours and then headed out to eat for another couple hours. It does reinforce one thing for me, the absolute best way to get to know students, get them to trust you, and lead them in ministry is to build a relationship with them. Not a superficial, say hi in passing type of relationship. I am talking about a personal one on one relationship. We had fun doing the service project and got to know each other a little better over lunch as we told stories from when we were younger, talked about things going on in the...
The Youth Hayride
I just got home from our annual youth hayride and bonfire. We began this tradition last year with about 15 students. We took the teenagers on a hayride down through the woods to an open area with a big bonfire. We ate, hung out, and played games in the dark. This year we decided to do the same thing, only instead of 15 teens we had over 40 show up. Needless to say I had to do some last minute scrambling to get van drivers and some of my adult leaders who were gracious enough to let us do this on their property had to find another trailer with hay bails on it. Here are a few Hayride tips that I have learned this round: 1. Get some idea of the number of people who might show up (although it is impossible to get an exact number). This serves you well when you have...
Parenting Teenagers (Part VI)
This is the conclusion of: Parenting Teenagers Part I Parenting Teenagers Part II. Parenting Teenagers Part III Parenting Teenagers Part IV Parenting Teenagers Part V Critique of the Literature. It is important to first understand that the goal of these authors is essentially the same. In just about every article that I read on the subject of parenting teenagers, the ultimate goal was to give the parents ideas on how to become better parents for the sake of their teenagers. The techniques of each piece of literature are defiantly different and are based on the cultural, spiritual, and personal convictions of the authors. What I see as an offensive and wrong way of parenting as a Christian may be a right and good way in the mind of a non-believer, which is...
Parenting Teenagers (Part V)
This is a continuation of: Parenting Teenagers Part I Parenting Teenagers Part II. Parenting Teenagers Part III Parenting Teenagers Part IV On the website, Families Online, Alan Bright writes a couple articles concerning raising teenagers and proper discipline. Bright offers several suggestions for becoming better parents. The first suggestion is to catch your children doing things right. Bad behavior and punishment should not be a major part of your relationship with your children. Parents should always praise the good behavior of their teens. The second thing Bright suggests is that parents should agree with each other in front of the teens. A third tip is that parents should give instructions in a normal voice, if not you are training your children...
Parenting Teenagers (Part IV)
This is a continuation of: Parenting Teenagers Part I Parenting Teenagers Part II. Parenting Teenagers Part III Jean Walbridge is a licensed clinical social worker in the State of Illinois and she was at one time the president of the Board of Directors for the Youth & Family Counseling agency. Jean consults to the Illinois Department of Child & Family Services and runs a website called Parenting Adolescents where she gives advice on raising teenagers. Giving advice to a mother about the sexual activity of her teenage daughters Jean reminds the parent that it is the teenagers private life and she questions whether the parent should get involved in a direct matter. She suggests that the parent should let her teenagers know that this is normal behavior...