Relational Leadership Collaborative

Leadership Training

Peer Ministry Leadership

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ADULTS SAYING, “YAY!”

REPRINT THIS! 
Make it from you. 
A Letter to All  Our Adults!
 

     YAY!

We recruited you! What? You did not know? But, you said, “Yes!”
You are now on our youth ministry team. Thanks for agreeing! Are you excited?
Fear not, you do not need to sleep on floors or play laser tag!
We need you to say, “YAY!”
“YAY!” by knowing young people’s names!
    “I know I am loved by the sound of my name in your voice.”
“YAY!” by finding and affirming all that is good.
    “Everyone else is telling me what I do wrong.”
“YAY!” by telling young people’s parents all you see that is good.
    “You see things my parent’s don’t.”
“YAY!” by showing up for me.
    “Thanks for coming.  It tells me I count!” 
“YAY!” by telling me you lit a candle and prayed for me.
    “I am lucky to know people who actually practice faith.”
“YAY!”” by sharing your faith stories.
    “You became real when you shared your stories with me.”
“YAY!” by listening to a young person’s stories.
    “You make me real when you take time to listen to me.” 
“YAY!” by asking for a young person’s help.
    “I need to be needed.”

“YAY!” in as many ways as you can!

Why is this essential? Because as good as our congregation’s programs are, youth learn faith through people who live it. Relationships with our adults of all ages and stages of life are essential. You provide the sticking power for faith! “Kids don’t care what you know until they know you care.” Young people need a church full of people who all are saying, “YAY!”
We need your help. It is simple, but it must be intentional. Youth ministry is much more than program ministry; it is about connecting young people to people of faith. Thank you for joining the youth ministry team. Thanks for your intentional face-to-face, heart-to-heart, person-to-person, “YAY!” for our youth.

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STEAL THIS QUESTION



Here is the question!  

“What Spirit nudges did you sense this week?“
  • What did you see, hear, or sense that caused you to be concerned for another?
  • How did you celebrate another? Or affirm? For whom did you say, “Yay!” for? How?

    So what? Now what?

  • How do you respond, or want to respond to the needs you saw?
  • What might God be calling you to do? Options? Ideas? Responses?
  • What and how can we pray? 

To Our Youth! (Make this from you!)
Did I tell you that you are our front line vital ministers?
I would love to think that, as your pastor and church staff, we have effectively touched the lives of a boatload of kids. I think we have, but I have no idea how big that boat is. Here is what I do know: you, our youth, touch the lives of more people than we will ever have the chance to meet.  More youth ministry is done through you than through any of us who are paid! You are our front lines of ministry. Your ministry boat is much bigger than ours.
I believe you are already doing ministry, but we may have forgotten to tell you. Your relationships – the people you care for, welcome and affirm every day, everywhere and in every relationship – are about God. Ministry is about loving because Christ first loved us. Ministry is about “doing likewise.”
You have friends. You know their great joys. You also know their great sorrows. You are the first to know when life needs to be celebrated or when there is pain that needs comforting.  You hear, see and sense things in others people you don’t even personally know. Your heart tells you when something doesn’t quite feel right. We call these Spirit nudges.
In our groups, we often ask about the highs and the lows of your week. We are also going to start asking …
“What Spirit nudges did you sense this week?”
You can share the concerns you felt for others. You may have been able to act on them by listening, welcoming or affirming someone. You may have just seen or heard about a situation and wished something better for this person.
We can pray about these Spirit nudges, and we can also help each other with ideas and support for being present when others need us. We will celebrate our ministry together when you do get to care.
This will be one of the ways we can support the ministry you live every day. It is one of the ways our church can be your ministry partner.
Be attentive to those around you. You are God’s hands and feet. Let’s help each other to help others.
Ready for more ways to help your youth be
caring, welcoming, affirming leaders?     
Shoot me a note! I’ll share some great outcomes that we help you implement!

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BESIDE THE WELL

FACE TO FACE
HEART TO HEART

Jesus sat with the women beside the well and offered living water. (John 4:1-26) For her that day, living water may have been that someone was willing to know her story. It was not a pretty story, probably not one she talked about to anyone. Probably it was a story that got talked about behind her back. For her, living water is being understood. No hiding or pretending. She was able to be real, painfully real, but also found relief in being known, known by someone she could trust.

If Jesus sat down beside the well with you, what would he be able to understand more than anyone ever has?

If Jesus sat down with one of the teens or young adults who wrote one of the following clips, what would Jesus be able to understand that others don’t seem to?

(Quotes are written anonymously from real people.)

  • “I feel as if there’s no one to talk to about anything! I don’t even know if I even have REAL friends. They just seem to be people I can hang out with. I can’t trust them with anything.”
  • “I love my friends. My family. Anyone who is nice to me. But I feel like they don’t know me at all. I feel like I hide under a mask from everyone. I feel like if I tell someone how I feel they will judge me. I feel like if i tell someone something, I can’t trust them.”
  • “I go to school. I have to act like I’m so happy, which I’m not in the school I’m in right now. I have to act all happy with magic rainbows. I wish I could be alone all the time by myself. All alone in my room; that’s my heaven right there.”
  • “I feel so alone in this world. I have felt that no one understands me. I feel like a lot of the times that I’m the only one that has gone through every kind of abuse you can think of. Does anyone understand or care?”
  • “I feel like I can’t be myself in front of anyone. I cried in the bathroom at school because I heard my friends talking about me. I was so mad like, “Keep my name out your mouth.” They didn’t know how much I was crying. They keep on thinking that I’m so happy all the time. I always feel left out. They just don’t understand me.”
  • “The only person I can actually trust, I don’t even tell her anything. She knows practically nothing about me, yet she knows more about me than any other person. No one knows about my need to cut, my want to die, smoke, and do drugs. She’s the closest person to me, yet I’m still partially invisible to her.”
  • “I feel like no one understands me, and I just want to fit in, and not be the odd girl or the fat girl out. I feel like I have no friends and that they just say, “Hey,” or talk to me because they’re next to me, I feel like my parents aren’t proud of me, and they just say it cause they have to. Ughh, it sucks, soo much. Maybe one day it will change, I hope.”

Hear the hunger to be understood? Hear the need for people who can be trusted? Hear the need for Peer Ministry Leadership?

Beside the well, imagine yourself taking the time to sit and understand, willing to listen, to offer people living water. Why? Because God understands and loves you. “We love, because Christ first loved us.” (1 John 4:19).

Maybe reading the clips above seems overwhelming? No need to take on the world! Empathy requires hearing and understanding. There is no need for take on all the negative feeling. That would be sympathy.

Listening to people is to learn about people. Therefore, listening will take a lifetime of continuous learning. You won’t just “get it” because of a listening session. Still, it is great place to begin. Welcome to the well!

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STORY AFFCIONADOS

There are connoisseurs of fine wines, sports enthusiast, T.V. addicts, architectural admirers, nature lovers, and now there are story aficionados! (Aficionado? – I think it is a neglected word! It means, “Knowledgeable and enthusiastic about a subject or past time.”) As a story aficionado, you are a deep listener who loves to hear of people’s passions, their joys and their sorrows. You are willing to ask the questions that uninterested people never care enough to ask. You are unique, willing to ask the questions and appreciate the qualities of the person who emerges. Asking questions shows your interest and curiosity; you have a desire to let another share and discover who they are. Your art for asking good questions comes from your genuine enjoyment of others, being honored with their trust, delighted in their honesty, and handling their stories in careful, respectful ways. And when you ask questions that reflect your fascination, people say “I’m glad you asked.” Or, as one young man responded, with delight and surprise, “Dude!”
 
Here is some of the wisdom from other story aficionados.

“Everyone has a story!” The young retreat participant expressed her Ah-Ha moment. Her discovery is a life changing shift! – a shift from a person being another speck in the nameless crowd, to a human worthy of being known; a person who shares humanity with the great joys and great sorrows that go with it.

“You cannot hate a person whose story you know.” – Margaret Wheatley
Sharing human stories bring people together, breaks down barriers, allows for differences, values uniqueness. Sharing story allows a person to see around the masks and appearance that we mistake as identity. Cliques break down. Cultures come together. Religious differences are understood.

“And when two or three of you are together because of me, you can be sure that I’ll be there.” (Mt. 18: 20 The Message) There is something holy when two people connect through caring enough to know the other. Some have described it as a bit mystical. Relationship is a faith practice. I was taught that a sacrament uses earthly elements, bread, wine, water – as a means of grace. Maybe relationship should have been named a sacrament also. People are certainly earthly forms and the power of God’s grace is never more real than when the conversation connections take us deeper.

I have always had a passion for story! Thus the creation of resources that help stories get told!
Scripture Talk
        (1997, Vibrant Faith)
Real Questions
        (2000, Augsburg Fortress, out of print)
Heart Ignite
        (2003, Vibrant Faith written with Diane Monroe)
Faith Talk Coaster
        (2005, Vibrant Faith, written with Dick Hardel)
Blessing Bowls
(2008 by artist Dawn Deines-Christensen, I originated the concept for Every Day milestones version and was the lead on the development of this product for Vibrant Faith)
Faith Talk
        (2006, Four Key Version, Vibrant Faith with Andrea Fieldhouse-Griner)
Doing Likewise
        (2011, EveryDay, now available on line )
Candle Times
      (coming this summer!)
Jesus Quotes
    (FREE discussion cards… EMAIL me at PML@EveryDayLLC.org)