How To Engage Teens 2

Build a Team It's really simple to keep 5-10 students engaged. You can know them all personally. If you want to grow you have to build a team. Authentic relationships that model and point to christ are the key to life change. For this to scale you need more people building relationships with students.

My first few years of youth ministry I had "helpers" show up but they constantly asked me "What do you want me to do?" That should have been a HUGE warning, but I was too inexperienced to understand how I was failing my team.

A team can only function as well as the leader. I wasn't organized. I didn't plan ahead. I didn't comunicate vision. My helpers soon felt like babysitters. They felt like they were waisting their time because I aparently didn't need them. I had to do EVERYTHING myself because I wasn't organized enough to hand it off to someone else. I felt bad putting my help in the position of doing stuff last minute so I just did it myself. They thought I didn't trust them enough to handle stuff. A lack of organization will kill your team!

You have to think through logistics so that students don't feel like your wasting their time. You have to build authentic relationships with your team so they can invest in your students. This means a lot of administrative work. If you don't track when a student visits, and get their information then how can you or your team followup and build relationships?

Lack of organization is the number one reason my youth ministry didn't grow.

You need both adults and student leaders on your team. Identify their gifting and call that out in them. Connect their abilities to the vision. Invest! Invest! Invest!