Category: Leadership

Free PDF Resource

Crisis Response Decision Tree

With just a few simple questions, you and your team of volunteers can know which response may fit your situation best and what steps to take in following up with your teenagers and their families.

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If we asked you to share your favorite memories from ministry, it might take you a minute. Ministry is full of things to remember, from the funny, random things teenagers can say to the life-changing decisions they make for Jesus. You’ll have dozens of favorite moments throughout your time in ministry.

But if we asked you about some of the most challenging times in ministry, it would be a lot easier for you to name them. The hard seasons tend to stick the most. Our difficult seasons as ministry leaders are often connected to the teenagers we serve. When they struggle, experience tragedy, or find themselves in crisis, we’re often right next to them, helping them process and stay connected to God in the middle of it. We check in with our students and their families, take them out for coffee, pray for them, and help them walk through what they’re experiencing.

If you’ve ever found yourself in one of these situations, you may have not felt prepared. When we think of ministry, we tend to put our energy into teaching, building a weekly environment, and working with volunteers. Helping a teenager through a crisis rarely makes the list. What we do know is that teenagers have a complex spectrum of experiences. What one teenager experiences each day can be similar but pretty different from the experience of someone two chairs over. Two teenagers might not even interpret the same experience in similar ways. For the most part, developing a single, definitive strategy for walking with a teenager through a crisis may not be helpful. Instead, we can build a simple database of strategies to help lead us to something helpful for our teenagers, their families, and us.

To help you out, we’ve made you something to help you remember some of the potential responses to any crisis situation you face. Before we get there, though, let’s talk about what a crisis is.

WHAT COUNTS AS A CRISIS?

As an adult, when you talk about crises, some ideas probably pop into your head—natural disasters, major health scares, major international events, and a few other things. Because we have this larger scope and frame of reference, we can be quick to dismiss things we don’t personally view as a crisis. Teenagers might share a problem they’re facing, and we may think, “Just wait ’til you’re older!”

Sure, what the teenager in your small group is experiencing may not seem like a big deal to you, but it is a big deal to them. Their whole existence might feel like it’s wrapped up in this problem, and they need a trusted adult to help them through it. What counts as a crisis comes from your life experience, context, and resources. So, just because it doesn’t feel like a crisis to you doesn’t mean it’s not experienced as a crisis to a teenager to someone else.

A crisis can be any situation that feels like a threat or danger to ourselves or our situation, leaving us feeling like we may not have the tools to navigate through it successfully. Through this lens, we can be more empathetic to the experiences of the teenagers in our ministries. They don’t have as much life experience. They may not always know where to find their answers or how to start looking for them. They have less control over their decisions and finances than adults do, and they have a sense of more immediate social stressors pressing in on their experiences. With all this in mind, no wonder a teenager might have the same response to a breakup as they would to failing an exam or experiencing bullying. That sense of dread, panic, or confusion can cloud their ability to access the tools they need to overcome what they’re feeling.

That’s why we recommend you take every problem seriously. This doesn’t mean every problem is addressed with the same urgency, but every time a teenager tells you about an experience they’re having, they’re giving you a chance to support them, empower them, and lead them into a deeper relationship with God.

Now that we’re on the same page about what a crisis is and how it can show up in a teenager’s life, let’s look at a few ways you can respond whenever you encounter a teenager in crisis.

Free PDF Resource

Crisis Response Decision Tree

With just a few simple questions, you and your team of volunteers can know which response may fit your situation best and what steps to take in following up with your teenagers and their families.

Download Now

5 CRISIS RESPONSES

1. ENSURE SAFETY

Any time a teenager starts to share about a crisis, it’s up to you to make sure the current situation is safe for them, others around you, and yourself. Safety for everyone involved is the theme of each of these crisis responses.

Part of ensuring safety means being upfront and honest about confidentiality. If a teenager asks, “Do you promise not to tell anyone?” you need to be clear that there are situations where you’ll need to inform others according to laws, church policies, and other factors. Most notably, situations involving abuse—physical, sexual, emotional, and neglect—are legally required to be reported in most states.

If you haven’t already, review your state’s mandatory reporting laws, and train your volunteers on how to abide by these laws as well. Add some crisis response resources to your Volunteer Handbook to make things easier for your team so they know what to do.

2. DE-ESCALATE

We’re not always ready for teenagers to share about their crises. Even if we’re caught off guard, we can remember to help de-escalate the feelings and emotions a teenager might be experiencing.

Your role in any crisis is to be calm and supportive. If you start to panic, the person in crisis might think:

• “This situation requires panic.”
• “I’m messed up.”
• “Why would I share this if others are going to panic, too?”

Some situations might be harder for you to respond to based on your own experiences. Know your limits, but do everything you can to demonstrate calm to the teenager confiding in you.

De-escalating a situation might look like …

• Moving from a crowded area to somewhere quieter that is still in public.
• Speaking in a calm, regular voice. Your tone on its own can communicate a setting is safe.
• Take notice of your reactions and the reactions of the teenager. Are you scared? Defensive? Are they?
• If the situation is causing you distress, grab another adult they trust to step in for you.

3. LISTEN

A crisis is a time when our brains might snap into “fix it” mode. We have a distressed teenager in front of us and want to help them. As much as we might want to, we can’t just jump in with solutions. We need to give teenagers space to talk and express their feelings and experiences. After all, they are the experts in what they’re feeling. If you find yourself wanting to do something, remember listening is doing something important. No matter our age, we all need people to stand with us and hold space with us in the hard times.

Listening to a teenager means…

• Don’t make it about you or offer advice unless specifically asked. It will be helpful if you can relate to what is being shared, but if we jump in before a teenager is ready to receive advice, we may come across as dismissive or uninterested.
• Don’t try to convince them what they’re experiencing isn’t “that bad.” The teenage brain is in a developmental spot where it has stronger emotional reactions to things than an adult brain, which means it’s likely that the pain, anger, or sadness they’re feeling is “that bad.”
• Empathize with them. Even if you don’t exactly understand or relate, you can still show empathy. Phrases like “That sounds frustrating” or “I can tell you’re hurt” can help communicate empathy.
• Ask questions. Asking questions may not seem like you’re listening, but they’re a way to extend the conversation and show interest in what is being shared. Questions like “Can you tell more about that?” or “How did that make you feel?” can help them feel like someone is listening. At the same time, questions help you explore the details of the source of their crisis. Ask questions from a place of curiosity. You’re not interrogating anyone but trying to understand the situation more.
• Silence is okay. Sometimes people just need someone to sit with them. A teenager may not always feel like talking about what they’re feeling. Actually, they may not even know exactly what they’re feeling or have the right words to express it. It’s okay to sit in silence and to just be present with them. And if silence makes you uncomfortable, that’s okay. Your comfort isn’t the only goal.

4. EMPOWER

When we have a teen confiding in us, our goal isn’t to fix things ourselves—it’s to empower them to take the next step. Remember how we defined a crisis? A crisis can be any situation that feels like a threat or danger to ourselves or our situation, leaving us feeling like we may not have the tools to navigate through it successfully. In a crisis, teenagers are reaching out for the resources and tools they need to handle the situation, so you can empower teenagers by showing them the options they can take as they navigate their experience.

Empowering a teenager can look like …

• Affirming their decision to reach out to you in the first place. Talking about a problem takes a lot of vulnerability and can be scary.
• Ask questions like “What are your options?” or “What do you want to happen?” to help teenagers start to put a plan in place.
• Explore past situations where they’ve used their strengths, skills, and other tools to overcome a problem. Looking to the past might help them see a way through their current situation.
• Help them explore their social supports. What friends or family members do they trust? Which of these people could they talk with?

The goal of empowering a teenager isn’t to come up with the solutions on your own. It’s to help guide them towards identifying the tools and responses that they find helpful for their situation. It’s about uncovering their strengths and helping them visualize the options that are in reach right now.

5. REFER

Making a referral might be one of the most important steps to take. You might not be a licensed therapist or counselor, so many of the crises your teenagers face might be outside of your scope. If that’s the case, it’s okay to tell a teenager or parent, “I’m not equipped to handle this, but here is someone who is.” All of us have limits to our expertise and what is appropriate to help with. If you haven’t already, put together a list of local counselors and other resources your teenagers or their families may need in a time of crisis. If your church offers services, include those, but be sure to have a few outside of your church as well.

We know that there are a lot of steps and details to remember, so to help you train your team in crisis response, we’ve created a decision tree. With just a few simple questions, you and your team of volunteers can know which response may fit your situation best and what steps to take in following up with your teenagers and their families.

BE AWARE OF WARNING SIGNS

When working with a teenager in crisis, there are a few warning signs you should watch for. These signs could signal a teenager who has or is currently contemplating suicide and who may need help. Not all of these signs need to be present for a teenager to be considering suicide, and the signs themselves may vary by age, gender, and cultural identity.

• Talking about wanting to die or to kill themselves
• Looking for a way to kill themselves
• Talking about …
  • Feeling hopeless
  • Having no purpose
  • Feeling trapped
  • Being in unbearable pain
  • Wanting it to end
  • Not wanting to wake up
  • Being a burden to others
• Showing rage or talking about seeking revenge
• Use, or increasing use, of alcohol or drugs
• Acting anxious, agitated, or pursuing risky behavior
• Changes in sleep or eating patterns
• Withdrawing or feeling isolated
• Displaying extreme mood swings

If you happen to encounter a teenager displaying one or more of these behaviors or thoughts, take it seriously. Don’t immediately assume they are a threat to themselves, but ask follow-up questions. Start a conversation and explore what is sitting underneath their thoughts and feelings.

It’s also important to know the stories of your students. Knowing these behaviors and thoughts is only one part of preventing suicide, but personal experience also plays a key role in whether or not a teenager is considering suicide. Teenagers who are bullied, or abused, have experienced a stressful situation, or who have access to a means such as pills or a weapon are more likely to think about or attempt suicide.

Remember to always take any mention of suicide seriously. Ask follow-up questions, know the signs, and refer for help whenever you need to.

RESOURCES

You don’t need to handle all of this on your own. One of the best things you can do for your teenagers is to know that you don’t know it all. You don’t need to have the perfect response ready to help a teenager in crisis. You just need to help them find the tools to make it through another day. That could look like being willing to listen to them, helping them troubleshoot their problems, or pointing them to a new resource.

Below, you’ll find some helpful resources from national organizations. These organizations have tools, training, and ways for students in crisis to seek help for various issues. Consider researching the resources your city, county, and state may offer for teenagers experiencing a crisis. These resources can help you guide a teenager toward safety and develop a safety plan. When you don’t know what to do, turn to these lifelines for help.

Suicide & Crisis Lifeline: Text or call 988

Crisis Text Line: Text HOME to 741741

Self-Injury Outreach & Support

Free PDF Resource

Crisis Response Decision Tree

With just a few simple questions, you and your team of volunteers can know which response may fit your situation best and what steps to take in following up with your teenagers and their families.

Download Now

Free PDF Resources

6 Things To Do When Your Youth Ministry Attendance Declines

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Okay, youth pastors. Picture this.

It’s 15 minutes before your weekly program begins, and you’ve got everything planned. Your message is going to be awesome. You’ve got your best worship playlist cued up. You just stocked up on a fresh batch of Doritos. Plus, you’re finally going to cave and set up one of those Impossible Shot contests you’ve been seeing in every single youth ministry Facebook group.

But now it’s 10 minutes until service begins and… well, you notice your crowd seems a little smaller than usual. 5 minutes, and you’re wondering if maybe today is a national holiday you’d forgotten about? Now it’s time for your program to begin and you’re trying really hard not to count the empty seats. Sound familiar?

Whether your youth ministry averages 5 or 500 teenagers each week, we’re guessing you know what this feels like:

• The disappointment of realizing your attendance isn’t what you expected.
• The frustration that your students maybe aren’t as passionate, or interested, or invested as you’d hoped.
• The pressure to keep your numbers steady, or even growing.

If you’ve ever struggled with low attendance, you’re not alone. We’ve been there and, actually, just about every youth pastor we’ve ever met has been there. You don’t need to be in ministry very long before you begin to hear the stories of youth workers who are feeling discouraged, frustrated, and under pressure to grow their ministries. Worrying about numbers and attendance kind of comes with the territory in youth ministry.

But just because drops in attendance are to be expected doesn’t mean we shouldn’t do anything about them, and just because number fluctuations are usually normal doesn’t mean there’s not sometimes a deeper problem that needs to be solved. So what, exactly, should you do about declines in attendance? (You know, besides giving away an Xbox or bribing students with pizza so they invite their friends?)

Well, that’s something our team at Stuff You Can Use has been talking about for a while. If we could sit down with every youth pastor who’s feeling discouraged about their numbers, we’ve wondered, “What would we say? How could we help, or encourage, or maybe even challenge our youth ministry pals?”

Well, here’s what we came up with. We may not have all the answers, but we’ve spent a lot of years doing ministry, volunteering in ministry, and learning from some pretty incredible youth ministry people. So the next time your numbers are discouraging you, here are 6 steps to staying sane, moving forward, and maybe even growing your attendance numbers. 

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6 Things To Do When Your Youth Ministry Attendance Declines

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WHAT TO DO WHEN ATTENDANCE DROPS:

1. DON’T PANIC

Here’s the thing. Fluctuations in your attendance patterns are completely normal. Sometimes, those patterns are universal, like:

• Increases at the beginning of the school year or after Easter.
• Decreases over the summer, during final exams, or when sports seasons kick in.
• On top of that, you’re going to have patterns that are unique to you. Your attendance might drop the week of your town’s annual chicken wing festival, or when Taylor Swift comes to your city, or when that one family with, like, nineteen kids goes out of town.

The point is, attendance will fluctuate. So don’t panic. Instead, pay attention to those patterns and try to figure out when, and why, they happen. Because if you can predict it, you won’t be so surprised or discouraged when it happens next time–plus, you’ll be able to provide context to your numbers if anyone asks. So expect fluctuations, and prepare for them too.

And remember, where attendance is concerned, you’re probably not as awesome as your best attendance day and you’re definitely not as bad as your worst attendance day.

2. DON’T COMPARE

We’re all tempted sometimes to compare our numbers to the numbers of other ministries. But maybe today you need a quick reminder of something you already know: comparison kills joy. So don’t compare yourself to anyone else. Your ministry, your church, and your students, are unique and uniquely resourced. That’s exactly the way God designed it. So be you. And don’t compare yourself to the church down the street or the ministries you see all over Instagram, okay?

3. CLARIFY WHAT MATTERS

When attendance drops, don’t hear us saying numbers don’t matter. Numbers do matter, because every number on that attendance spreadsheet represents a person, a life, and a family you’re caring for. It makes sense to want to include and care for more and more teenagers. But the number of students who show up each week doesn’t tell the entire story. Your ministry effectiveness can’t be summarized by your weekly attendance reports alone.

Your attendance can tell you some things about your ministry effectiveness, but it can’t tell you everything. That’s why it’s so important to clarify what matters most to your church — you know, besides getting kids to show up each week. Once you know what matters most, you can look for ways other than weekly attendance to measure your success and impact. For example, you probably want your students to grow spiritually, right? Then try measuring some numbers that could indicate if they are or not, like:

• How many of your students are serving in your church or in their community.
• How many teenagers made commitments to Jesus.
• What percentage of your students are engaged in a small group.
• How often a first-time visitor actually comes back.

If spiritual growth is what matters most, then those numbers matter even more than your weekly attendance numbers. And they’re a lot more interesting, too.

4. FOCUS ON WHO’S THERE

Have you ever made the mistake of saying something like this in front of your students on a low attendance day: “Wow, where is everybody?” When you’re visibly disappointed about drops in attendance in front of your students, it’s a pretty good way to kill the vibe. Imagine how a teenager in the room might feel if they heard you wondering “where everyone is.” Like, “Uh, I’m here! Am I not good enough for you?” So when attendance declines unexpectedly, don’t let disappointment distract you from the students who are right in front of you. You’ve still got ministry to do.

Sure, maybe a drop in attendance means you can’t play that gigantic game of Hungry Hungry Hippos you were looking forward to, but a week with a smaller group of students is an incredible opportunity to build relationships and spend more focused time with the students who are there. You’ll have plenty of time to worry later about the students who aren’t there. But for now, be present with the students who are. You never know – your attention might be exactly what one of those teenagers needed that week.

5. IDENTIFY THE PROBLEMS

Now that we’ve spent some time feeling encouraged, and remembering that our identity and success aren’t determined by the number of teenagers who show up each week, we can’t leave things there. We’ve got to talk about some harder things, too.

• Yes, sometimes attendance fluctuations are out of your control.
• No, your attendance numbers aren’t the whole picture.
• And yes, sometimes a smaller group of students allows you to do better ministry.
• But while low attendance isn’t always a problem, low attendance can be a symptom of a very real problem.

When your attendance drops, take time to identify the problems in your ministry—or maybe even in your leadership. Because, let’s be honest, none of us are actually good at everything in ministry, so it’s okay to admit you have a weak spot or two. You’re not good at everything, and you don’t have to be good at everything. But as a leader, you’ve got to know what you’re not good at so you can put systems (or even other people) in place to help you be better in the areas where you’re weak.

So if you really are seeing drops in attendance that can’t be explained by something obvious, like holidays, exams, community events, or global pandemics, it’s time to start looking deeper.

To help you identify what those deeper problems might be, we broke this down into 7 areas of ministry where problems tend to show up. (If you’re familiar with Grow Curriculum & Annual Strategy, these 7 areas might sound familiar.)

If your numbers are dropping, start with this list and ask, “Where are the problems?” Because one, or more, of these areas of ministry could be impacting the drop in your attendance.

1. WEEKLY ENVIRONMENT: Is your weekly youth ministry program a place where students actually want to be? And do they actually want to bring their friends? If not, what might the problem be?
2. TEACHING: In both your large group teaching and smaller group discussions, do teenagers feel they’re hearing something relevant, memorable, and worth listening to? And are they doing something about what they hear? If not, what might the problem be?
3. DISCIPLESHIP: Beyond just what happens during your teaching time, do teenagers have the tools they need to grow spiritually? Are they inspired to be more like Jesus? If not, what might the problem be?
4. EVENTS: Are the special events on your calendar really making a difference, rather than just using up time and resources? Do teenagers want to show up to them? If not, what might the problem be?
5. VOLUNTEERS: Do you have enough volunteers? Do the volunteers you do have feel equipped and empowered and released to do significant ministry? Do they like showing up to invest, serve, and lead? If not, what might the problem be?
6. FAMILIES: Do the parents or caregivers of your teenagers feel supported and cared for by your ministry? Do they believe in what you’re doing? Do they trust you with their teenagers? If not, what might the problem be?
7. LEADERSHIP: Is your ministry known for having a plan, a strategy, and systems that are reliable? Can teenagers, volunteers, and families trust that your ministry will lead them toward greater growth and health? If not, what might the problem be?

Remember, you are not going to be naturally excellent in all seven of these areas, so your job as a leader is to identify the problems—but to do that, you’re going to need honestly.

• BE HONEST WITH YOURSELF. Like, ruthlessly honest. None of this wishful-thinking or rose-colored-glasses stuff. Be honest about the weak spots in your ministry and in your own personal leadership.
• ASK OTHERS TO BE HONEST WITH YOU. Ask people you trust to give you feedback on both you and your ministry so you can begin to identify the potential problems. Talk to co-workers and mentors. Talk to volunteers. Talk to parents. Talk to students. Ask them to help you identify your weakest areas, and really listen.

Wherever those problem areas are for you, please don’t be discouraged. It means you’re one step closer to diagnosing, and solving, the source of your attendance problems, and making your ministry healthier overall. This part of the process requires humility and courage. It’s not always fun, but it’s worth it. If one of your weak spots is causing your numbers to shrink, or is preventing you from growing, a fancy new youth space or an Xbox giveaway won’t fix your attendance problems. The only thing that will help is identifying, and addressing, the real problems.

6. DREAM UP SOLUTIONS

We’ve covered a lot, but there’s one more step you can take when your attendance drops, and it might be the most important one. After you’ve not panicked or compared, clarified what matters, focused on who’s there, and identified your problems, here’s your last step: start dreaming up solutions that address your biggest problems and help pave the way for long-term growth.

Maybe you’ve noticed, but you can’t really force numerical growth. Not in a healthy way, anyway. If you want real, long-term, sustainable growth, you’re going to have to identify your big-picture problems and put strategies in place to solve them. In other words, if you want your ministry to grow, you need to first decide what kind of growth you want.

• If you care more about numerical growth than healthy growth, then sure! Quick fixes (like big giveaways, a social media campaign, or a cool event) will probably work. But just because something grows in size, doesn’t mean it’s healthy or good. Quick fixes to attendance problems aren’t sustainable or healthy, and they don’t address your ministry’s actual problems. Instead, they simply distract from the real problems that need to be addressed.
• But if you care about healthy growth, you know the “fruit” your ministry produces is the real indicator of your ministry’s success—and “fruit” isn’t synonymous with “numbers.” So instead of trying to get your numbers up in the short-term (like before your next staff meeting or annual evaluation), think about how to make your ministry more healthy in the long-term.

We know fluctuating attendance patterns can be hard, and discouraging, and frustrating. But remember: your success as a youth pastor isn’t determined by your weekly attendance. It’s determined by the fruit your ministry produces. So take a breath, hang in there, and keep working to better care for the teenagers and families you’ve been called to serve.

And if you need help creating a strategy for healthy growth, we have some ideas that could help. Check this out.

Free PDF Resources

6 Things To Do When Your Youth Ministry Attendance Declines

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In youth ministry, we all know what it’s like to leave our planning to the last possible second. Maybe you started planning that big event of yours a few weeks too late and now you’re scrambling to get it all done. Or maybe you’re halfway through the school year when you realize…Wait, when’s the last time I sent a parent email? Or maybe it’s Saturday night and you’re frantically Googling, “free no-prep ministry lessons.”

We’ve all been there, but let’s be honest. Procrastination is the worst. It’s stressful and time-consuming and we always, always, regret it. So how about we try something different this year? How about we start planning our ministries an entire year at a time? It only takes one day each year, and it’s going to make the other 364 days of your year so much more fun, peaceful, and effective.

If it sounds too good to be true — well, it’s not. It’s actually possible with the Grow system and strategy! And it all starts here: schedule an annual planning meeting.

BEFORE YOUR ANNUAL PLANNING MEETING

1. SCHEDULE THE MEETING

Try to plan your meeting at least a month before your school year begins, but if your ministry year is already in progress, then just schedule your meeting as soon as you can!

2. INVITE THE RIGHT PEOPLE

Think about inviting your staff, key volunteers, fellow ministry leaders, or even your lead pastor to be a part of this meeting with you. Invite people who understand strategy, ministry, and the teenagers you lead. Don’t do this alone!

3. MAKE A PLAN

To make sure you’re not wasting anyone’s time, come up with a game plan in advance. (And, no, asking the question, “So, what do you all want to do this year?” is not enough of a game plan.) Instead, here’s what we suggest — identify the areas where your ministry needs an annual strategy. You already know your ministry needs a strategy for planning your year (that’s what this meeting is all about), but here are the other six things that need to be strategized:

• DISCIPLESHIP: This year, how will you strategically help students grow spiritually?
• TEACHING: This year, how will you teach students what they need to hear, when they need to hear it?
• WEEKLY ENVIRONMENT: This year, how will you keep your weekly environment fun and engaging?
• EVENTS: This year, how will you leverage special events to invest in students?
• VOLUNTEERS: This year, how will you recruit, train, and invest in your volunteer team?
• FAMILIES: This year, how will you engage, connect with, and serve parents and families?

Imagine the impact you’ll make this year if you strategically develop an annual calendar for all six of those areas! Not only will you be helping your group grow, you’ll be helping your entire ministry grow as well. Once you’ve got a plan, it’s time to think about the logistics.

4. PREPARE YOUR BOARD

This annual planning meeting is meant to be interactive and engaging! To do that, we suggest actually building a board together that helps you visualize everything you plan to do during the year.

We love using large (48” x 48”) color-coded creative boards for our annual calendar planning for a few reasons. First, it’s easy to see your entire year at a glance. Second, it’s easy to move things around once you’ve placed them on the board. And third, it’s a great way to visually map your entire ministry strategy — not just your calendar.

You can purchase a board like this or if you’re feeling crafty, you can make your own.

Once you’ve got the board, you’re going to want to establish a color code for your calendar cards. (If you’re using Grow Curriculum, you can print and cut the cards we’ve provided in your downloads. If you’re not, you can always purchase blank cards like these.)

Our color code looks like this:

• DISCIPLESHIP: Orange
• TEACHING: Red
• WEEKLY ENVIRONMENT: Yellow
• EVENTS: Green
• VOLUNTEERS: Blue
• FAMILIES: Pink

You’ll also want to keep some blank white cards handy for headers or unplanned additions to your calendar.

5. BUILD YOUR CALENDAR

Across the top of the board, place twelve white cards (one for each month of the year) and label them, beginning with the start of your school year or whatever month makes sense for you.

In case you need a reminder in the middle of your meeting, you might also want to create a color key at the top of the board to help you remember which color equals which category. Place small squares of each color at the top with the title of the category those colors represent.

6. DON’T FORGET THE FOOD

If you want people to stay engaged during this meeting, don’t forget to feed them! And caffeinate them too, while you’re at it.

Free PDF Resource

How to Do an Annual Planning Meeting for Your Youth Ministry

Optimize your ministry with our guide on Annual Planning Meetings—strategize for discipleship, events, and more!

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DURING THE MEETING

We suggest structuring your meeting (and filling in your annual calendar) in this order…

1. PLAN YOUR DISCIPLESHIP STRATEGY

Begin your meeting by talking about your big-picture discipleship strategy because, once your discipleship strategy is determined, you can strategically plan your teaching, weekly environment, and events to complement the timing of your discipleship efforts.

Break your year into four quarters, then assign one spiritual habit to each quarter. We assign Spend Time with Others to the fall, Use Your Gifts to the winter, Spend time with God to the spring, and Share Your Story to the summer.

If you want to understand the strategy behind why we placed those spiritual habits where we did, check out this article about our annual discipleship strategy.

2. PLAN YOUR TEACHING STRATEGY

Each year, it’s important to plan ahead the topics and Scripture you plan to cover. When we fail to plan ahead, we run the risk of missing big important ideas, teaching only the topics that interest us most, and failing to give teenagers a full and holistic view of God. So plan ahead! It’s important.

First, establish a bank of topics or books of the Bible that you want to cover and when you’d like to cover each of them. Once you know those topics, place them on the calendar in the months that make sense. If you need some extra guidance, check out this article about our annual teaching strategy.

When you’re deciding when to schedule each teaching topic, be sure to consider what else is happening that month, both in your church and in your students’ lives. You’ll be much more effective when you time your teaching topics to align with the experiences of a teenager and your overall church strategy.

When everything is on the board, you may want to spend some time as a team brainstorming ideas or specific themes for each of the series you plan to teach throughout the year.

3. PLAN YOUR WEEKLY ENVIRONMENT STRATEGY

When you begin to develop your teaching series in more detail, you may want to plan some interesting elements for your weekly environment (like special songs, activities, or experiences) to enhance that month’s topic. Your annual planning meeting probably isn’t the best place for too many details, though. For this meeting, you’re going to want to focus on the big picture and start planning your themes for the entire year.

Start by determining an engaging theme for each teaching series that complements what you’re teaching. Then, create an environment around it! Your theme can help tie all of your teaching, activities, visuals, and experiences together and complement the Bible stories and topics you’re sharing. The themes you choose for your teaching shouldn’t be random pairings of ideas (like emojis and the Gospels). Instead, your themes should directly complement your teaching in a way that makes the stories come alive and the principles take root.

Remember, we’re only focusing on the big picture here. At some point, though, you’ll want to set aside time to dive deeper into your themes and start planning through elements like room design, games, music, graphics, and more. Check out this article about our annual environment strategy for help planning the details of your weekly environment.

Once your themes are up on the board, take a look at all of together. You might realize…

• I don’t know if this theme will work with our group. Let’s swap it for something else.
• December is a special church-wide theme, so we should swap this out for something unique to our church.
• We can repurpose the supplies we purchase for March again in November!
• We have a few pretty similar themes in a row, so we should change one of them.

You can be a lot more efficient by planning your monthly themes a year at a time. Now take a break! You’ve earned it.

4. PLAN YOUR EVENTS STRATEGY

We’re fans of keeping your event strategy simple. You can make a bigger impact by doing fewer events with more strategy. Here’s our recommendation for keeping your event strategy simple: do one event each quarter (plus a mission experience and a summer camp if you’re doing youth ministry).

In the fall, we suggest doing an overnight event to kick off the school year and help teenagers build relationships with their peers and especially with their small groups. This aligns pretty nicely with the Spend Time with Others spiritual habit in our discipleship strategy.

In the winter, remember that families are busy and a little short on cash around the holidays, so do a simple, fun, and free event.

In the spring, when you’re focusing on the spiritual habit of Spending Time with God, take your teenagers on a weekend retreat and focus on discipleship.

And in the summer, remember that you’ve got a busy summer ahead of you (and so do families), so host a simple and fun event that gets teenagers out of the house and having a blast together. If you’re in youth ministry, follow that up with a summer camp and a missions experience, either locally or internationally.

You can check out this article about our annual event strategy to learn more.

5. PLAN YOUR VOLUNTEER STRATEGY

We’re convinced there are seven ways to invest in volunteers, and all seven of them need to be represented on your annual calendar. Maybe that sounds overwhelming at first, but it doesn’t have to be. Promise!

When planning your year of investment in volunteers, you’re going to need to consider volunteer events, meetings, discussion groups, one-on-one conversations, tools, communication, and celebration. You can read more about each of these and see our suggestions in this article about our annual volunteer strategy.

The point is this: have a strategy for investing in your volunteers. You’re not just a youth pastor. You’re your volunteers’ pastor, too.

6. PLAN YOUR FAMILY STRATEGY

You’re almost there! The very last thing you need to strategize in your annual planning meeting is the thing we youth pastors often seem to save until last: how you’ll engage parents and families.

When it comes to parents, we could all do a better job of engaging them. Like volunteers, we’re convinced the key to engaging and investing parents effectively is to plan an annual strategy in seven key ways: events, meetings, discussion groups, one-on-one conversations, tools, communication, and celebration. So finish your annual planning meeting by creating a plan for all seven of these areas. You can read more about each of these and see our suggestions in check out this article about our annual family strategy.

Whew. Okay. That’s it. Those are all of our suggestions on how to run an annual planning meeting for your ministry. Yes, it’s a lot to cover. Yes, it might take all day. But then you’re done for the whole year!

When you schedule an annual planning meeting, instead of just winging it every month (or every week), here’s what we’re pretty positive is going to happen:

• You’ll be a lot less stressed.
• You’ll never have to wonder what you’re doing next week.
• Your volunteers, parents, and students will be better cared for.
• Your lead pastor will say things like, “We have the best youth pastor ever!” (Probably.)
• You can take a nap once in a while.

And, most importantly, when you have an annual plan to make your vision, strategy, and systems all work together, you’ll make a much bigger impact. So let’s do this. We’ve got big, important, life-changing ministry to do. Let’s put a plan in place so we can make this year the most awesome year yet.

And, hey, whether you decide to use Grow Curriculum and Strategy or not, we hope you steal this strategy! But if you do want to check out Grow Curriculum, you won’t just get the strategy. You’ll get every resource you need for the entire year — not just curriculum that you can teach, but everything for discipleship, weekly environments, events, volunteers, and families too.

Cool? Cool.

Now get planning!

Free PDF Resource

How to Do an Annual Planning Meeting for Your Youth Ministry

Optimize your ministry with our guide on Annual Planning Meetings—strategize for discipleship, events, and more!

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Do you ever need a moment to recharge your passion for ministry? There are these moments in ministry when we feel like we could use some inspiration and connection with people who really get us. You can talk with your lead pastor about some things, and you can talk with your team about others, but there’s something special about connecting with another youth pastor who can say, “I know exactly what you mean.”

That’s the great thing about youth ministry conferences. They get you into a room with people who have similar experiences, questions, and concerns. At a youth ministry conference, you get a chance to.

• Share (and receive) knowledge.
• Discover new resources and strategies.
• Network with other ministry leaders.
• Grow closer to God!

Plus, you get to do all of that without worrying whether your room full of teenagers will start pulling pranks in the middle of the service. Youth ministry conferences give you the space to focus on your growth as a leader, a pastor, and a follower of Jesus.

Plus, a conference is a great place for you to train as a team! Youth ministry conferences are a great place to gather with key members of your volunteer team. When your team attends a youth ministry conference, you can…

• Attend breakouts together.
• Refresh your vision and mission for your ministry.
• Discover and apply new strategies to reach teens and their families.
• Invest in your relationships and build your community.

It might sound like a dream, but it’s completely within your reach! And if you’re looking for new ideas for how to lead, train, and cultivate relationships with your volunteers, check out our volunteer strategy here. It’s yours to steal!

Finding the right conference for you and your team might feel like an overwhelming challenge, but we’re here to help! When you’re picking the right conference for you and your team, there are two really important things to consider…

• LOCATION: Is this conference in person or online? In-person conferences have the benefit of helping you connect face-to-face with other ministry leaders. Online conferences are more accessible and allow you to gather your team together at a lower cost. Plus, you don’t need to worry about transportation or lodging.
• COST: Youth ministry conferences can vary in cost, but that doesn’t make them any less valuable. Remember to think about your budget and any fundraising you may need to take on to help you and your team attend. If this is your first time attending a youth ministry conference, then consider starting with something less expensive—or even free—to help your team (and senior leadership) discover the value of these types of church leader conferences.

To help you with your search for the perfect youth ministry conference for you and your team, we’ve put together this list of five different youth ministry conferences happening in 2024. We hope it helps you invest in yourself, your team, and your ministry in a new way!

Free PDF Resources

Top 5 Youth Ministry Conferences to Attend This Year

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NATIONAL CHILDREN’S & YOUTH MINISTRIES CONFERENCE

The National Children’s & Youth Ministries (NCYM) conference is a four-day, in-person conference to help train children’s and youth pastors across the country. At NCYM, you’ll learn new skills and strategies for working with kids and teenagers, develop your own relationship with God, and build new relationships. Find out more about the National Children’s & Youth Ministries conference here.

CIY YOUTH MINISTRY SUMMIT

This three-day, in-person retreat is hosted by CIY to help youth pastors connect with other youth pastors, hear practical and inspiring ideas, discuss youth ministry strategies, and leave them feeling refreshed and ready to dive into another year of youth ministry. Find out more about the CIY Youth Ministry Summit here.

SMALL CHURCH MINISTRY

Small Church Ministry offers free, quarterly, online conferences each year. These one-day conferences look to help smaller churches connect with ministry leaders and pastors of other small churches, hear from others who understand the value of small churches, and connect with small church leaders as they build relationships that move beyond the conference. Find out more about the Small Church Ministry conferences here.

WOMEN IN YOUTH MINISTRY

This three-day conference takes place in-person and online. Designed specifically for women serving kids, families, and teenagers, the Women in Youth Ministry conference provides leadership training and helpful resources for women leading the next generation through their unique experiences. Find out more about the Women in Youth Ministry Conference here.

GROWCON24

We have a conference of our own for you! GrowCon24 is a free, two-day conference hosted entirely online from January 18-19, 2024. Day one will focus on kids’ ministry, while day two will focus on youth ministry. Over the course of these two days, you’ll receive practical ministry training and hear helpful tips in these key areas of ministry…

• Discipleship
• Teaching
• Volunteers
• Families
• Environments
• Events
• Annual Planning

Plus, you’ll have a chance to win some great prizes and giveaways just for attending! For more information on how to register for GrowCon24, head here.

There you have it! Five different youth ministry conferences you can attend in 2024. Whether you attend in-person or online, youth ministry conferences can provide so many great tools and resources to help you continue to be an awesome youth leader.

Free PDF Resources

Top 5 Youth Ministry Conferences to Attend This Year

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Have you ever been told you need a “strategy” for your youth ministry? You do need a strategy, but sometimes, when people talk about their ministry “strategy,” they’re not talking about strategy at all. Instead, they’re talking about…

• A goal they want to reach.
• A dream or vision they have.
• A philosophy about how things should be done.
• A set of values they believe are important.

All of these things are important! But they’re not strategies. Your goals, dreams, visions, philosophies, and values help you decide where your youth ministry is going, but your strategy tells you how to get there.

So, what’s an example of a ministry strategy that really is a strategy? We’re so glad you asked! Because we developed one — and you can steal it! For free!

If you’re familiar with Grow Curriculum & Annual Strategy, some things in this post might sound familiar to you. That’s because everything we do in Grow Students Curriculum is based on the strategy we’re about to break down for you! But don’t worry if you’ve never used Grow Students in your ministry before. You can still steal our strategy! Take the ideas you find helpful, ignore the parts that don’t quite fit your context, and combine them with the unique language, vision, and strategy of your church.

Now, let’s get started!

Free PDF Resource

A Complete Youth Ministry Strategy from Grow Curriculum

Empower your youth group with Grow's strategy for spiritual growth and community. Free, actionable plans for a thriving ministry.

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THE GROW STRATEGY

We picked the name “Grow” for a simple reason: because we want to see you, the teenagers you lead, and your ministry all grow! And we’re not just talking about numerical growth. We’re talking about growing closer to Jesus, growing deeper and healthier relationships, and building a ministry that’s growing healthier all the time (and not just growing bigger).

But remember, a strategy is more than just a goal — it’s a plan to help you reach your goal. That’s why the Grow strategy is a practical, customizable, and very doable plan to help your youth ministry grow in a healthy way.

To do that, the Grow Strategy is a complete annual plan in seven areas of ministry: discipleship, teaching, environments, events, volunteers, families, and even your annual planning. So, let’s take a look at all seven, one at a time!

1. DISCIPLESHIP

Discipleship isn’t about taking a teenager through a specific class or workbook. It isn’t about learning, memorizing, or winning Bible trivia competitions. Discipleship is when teenagers begin to put their faith into practice. It doesn’t always look the same for every person, and it can be a little messy sometimes. But even though discipleship isn’t a one-size-fits-all program, that doesn’t mean we can’t put a strategy around it.

To help teenagers grow spiritually, the Grow strategy focuses on helping to build four specific spiritual habits:

• SPEND TIME WITH GOD: Spending time with God is about helping kids and teenagers develop personal spiritual disciplines. It can look like opening the Bible, talking with God through prayer, discovering how they best connect with God through worship, and whatever else helps them connect with God personally. When they spend time with God, their faith grows!
• SPEND TIME WITH OTHERS: This spiritual habit is about helping kids and teenagers grow in godly relationships with others. We can do this within our churches through small groups and mentoring relationships. But we can also do this by encouraging kids and teenagers to develop healthy relationships with others in their families, schools, and communities. Through godly relationships, their faith can grow!
• USE YOUR GIFTS: It’s so important for kids and teenagers to discover how God made them and who God made them to be. As they begin to discover how God uniquely created them, we get to help them use their unique gifts to love God and serve others. When they use their gifts, their faith grows!
• SHARE YOUR STORY: Kids and teenagers need to learn how to have conversations about who God is and what God is doing in their lives. Sharing their stories of faith isn’t just something they should do when speaking into a microphone or sharing a testimony. Faith should become a regular, ongoing, go-to topic of conversation for kids and teenagers. When they share their stories, their faith grows!

So, what makes this a strategy? These ideas about discipleship only become a discipleship strategy when you put them on your ministry calendar in a way that’s actionable! Here’s how we do that with Grow.

2. TEACHING

There are so many different ways to approach your teaching time for teenagers. There are countless models, structures, and formulas you can follow to teach the Bible in compelling and practical ways. But we like to think about teaching in terms of three questions the teenagers in your church are asking every time you or another speaker stands up to teach them something:

• WHAT? What are we talking about?
• SO WHAT? Why does it matter to God and to us?
• NOW WHAT? What should we do about what we just learned?

(If you’ve ever used Grow Students Curriculum, those three questions might be familiar. And if not, you can always try it for free, if you want!)

Now, when some people hear the word “teaching,” they automatically picture a “sermon.” But when you’re talking about teenagers, the truth is only a tiny percentage of young people learn best by listening to a sermon. Instead, other, more effective, and engaging ways exist to help teenagers learn, like…

• QUESTIONS AND POLLS give students the chance to share their opinions and thoughts.
• PERSONAL STORIES give them real-life examples of faith, doubt, and difficulties to learn from and remind them they’re not alone.
• IMAGES, VIDEOS, AND MUSIC engage their eyes and ears and help us capture their attention when it wanders.
• OBJECT LESSONS give concrete experiences to help them understand or remember abstract ideas.
• ACTIVITIES get them moving and interacting in ways that will help them remember what they’ve learned because they didn’t just hear it — they experienced it.
• MOMENTS OF REFLECTION give them a chance to sit quietly, write, think, or pray so they can process what is being taught.
• OPPORTUNITIES FOR RESPONSE give them a chance to do something about what they’ve learned, like make a commitment or choose a next step.
• DISCUSSION gives them an opportunity to have conversations with their peers and with trusted adults about what they’re learning — and it might just be the most important teaching method of all. For teenagers, the most effective discussion questions aren’t meant to review or summarize a lesson but to help them personalize and apply what they’ve learned. Teenagers learn best by processing out loud, asking questions, giving pushback, sharing opinions, listening, debating, and being involved in the learning process. This can only happen in a discussion.

But so far, we’ve only talked about how you teach. There’s also the question of your scope and sequence, which is what you’ll teach and when you’ll teach it. And that part of your strategy probably needs to be different depending on which age you’re teaching since kids, teenagers, and adults all have different needs and learn in different ways.

So, what makes this a strategy? These ideas about teaching only become a teaching strategy when you put them on your ministry calendar in a way that’s actionable! Here’s how we do that with Grow Students, and here’s how we do it with Grow Kids.

3. ENVIRONMENTS

Next, let’s talk about your weekly environments — the physical, emotional, and relational environments you’re creating each week. And yeah, we know this one might feel kind of silly or unimportant when compared to discipleship and teaching Scripture. But it’s actually essential! The environments we create are so important they can make or break whether or not teenagers receive the message we’re trying to share with them.

When you think of environments, you might immediately think about cool decorations, comfortable seating, or trendy music, but it’s so much bigger than that. It’s about creating environments that help everyone feel welcomed in your church and reinforce what you’re teaching.

For teenagers, that means focusing on having fun through games and humor, asking questions instead of making assumptions, explaining anything that feels like insider language or information, and acknowledging there are people in the room who may not be familiar with church or don’t yet believe.

So, what makes this a strategy? These ideas about your weekly environments only become an environment strategy when you put them on your ministry calendar in a way that’s actionable! Here’s how we do that with Grow.

4. EVENTS

Whether you love big ministry events or kind of dread them, there’s no denying a well-planned and strategic ministry event can make a big impact. But if we’re not careful, we can easily fill up our ministry calendars with more events than we need, which creates some problems.

• It adds to the chaos of families who are equally busy.
• It burns out our staff and volunteer teams, who are also pretty busy.
• It gives teenagers so many options that we’d probably only see them at a handful of things each year, resulting in lower participation in everything we do.
• It uses time, money, and resources on things that aren’t always strategic.

With so many options, we need a strategy to help us guide which events we’ll do and when which is why the Grow strategy is all about doing fewer events for a bigger impact. In ministry, we can’t do everything, but everything we do can be done with a clear purpose. When you boil it down, not just about participation but strategy. Even the most well-attended events can hinder our growth if we’re not using them to lead somewhere strategic.

So, what makes this a strategy? These ideas about events only become an events strategy when you put them on your ministry calendar in a way that’s actionable! Here’s how we do that with Grow.

5. FAMILIES

Okay, so far, we’ve only talked about things that impact the teenagers in your church. But your ministry isn’t only for the young people in your care! It extends to their parents and families, too. Each person in your ministry belongs to a family and is being parented by at least one adult (and not always their biological parent).

There are two mistakes we tend to make when it comes to parents. We forget parents exist by trying to lead without ever engaging parents. And we get frustrated by parents for not doing what we want them to do. But what if we tried to reevaluate the assumptions we make about parents? What if we took a step back to consider the expectations we hold of parents?

Rather than always expecting parents to support our ministries, what if we focused on earning parents’ trust instead? It’s more challenging work, but it’s worth it! We can build that trust through…

• FAMILY EVENTS that provide value to parents and connects them with their kid, your church, or both.
• PARENT MEETINGS to create space for parents and guardians to learn more about a specific topic.
• PARENT DISCUSSION GROUPS where a small but diverse group of parents and guardians can connect to share stories and parenting tips with each other.
• PARENT CONVERSATIONS where your or other ministry leaders can connect with parents one-on-one to build a relationship, provide support, or give and receive feedback.
• PARENT COMMUNICATION to help you connect and share important information with families outside your weekly program.
• PARENT TOOLS and resources that help parents connect with both your ministry and their kids.
• PARENT CELEBRATIONS to honor and acknowledge parents for how they’re caring for the kids and teenagers they love.

So, what makes this a strategy? These ideas about investing in families only become a family strategy when you put them on your ministry calendar in a way that’s actionable! Here’s how we do that with Grow.

6. VOLUNTEERS

Volunteers are the backbone of any ministry. Whether you have one volunteer or one hundred volunteers (wouldn’t that be nice?), volunteers are essential. To help teenagers and your ministry grow, you’ll need to focus on the incredible people who give up their time to love and support the young people at your church. You can help remind volunteers they’re doing something that matters through…

• VOLUNTEER EVENTS that serve as a major opportunity to cast your vision for ministry.
• VOLUNTEER MEETINGS that give you the opportunity to teach volunteers about a specific topic.
• VOLUNTEER DISCUSSION GROUPS to gather the volunteers in small groups that serve in similar roles to share stories, ideas, and best practices with each other.
• VOLUNTEER CONVERSATIONS where ministry leaders can connect with volunteers one-on-one to build a relationship, provide support, or give and receive feedback.
• VOLUNTEER COMMUNICATION strategies to help you connect and share important information with volunteers outside of your weekly program.
• VOLUNTEER TOOLS and resources that help volunteers make their jobs happen.
• VOLUNTEER CELEBRATIONS to honor and acknowledge volunteers for what they’ve accomplished or who they are.

So, what makes this a strategy? These ideas about leading volunteers only become a volunteer strategy when you put them on your ministry calendar in a way that’s actionable! Here’s how we do that with Grow.

7. ANNUAL PLANNING

At first glance, #7 on this list might seem a little boring. Or it might seem like we’re just trying to add things to the list until we get to God’s favorite number. But hang in there because this one might be the most important part of this whole thing!

Like we’ve been saying (we’ve said it six times, at least), these ideas we’ve talked about only become a strategy when you put them on your ministry calendar in a way that’s actionable. That’s why we’ve made you a whole walkthrough video of how to take these ideas and put them on your ministry calendar. That’s how you go from an idea to a strategy.

So, the final step is to take these ideas we’ve talked about and put them on your calendar. If you do that, instead of just winging it every month (or every week), here’s what we think will happen:

• You’ll be less stressed.
• You’ll never have to wonder what you’re doing next week.
• Your volunteers, parents, and students will be better informed.
• Your lead pastor will say things like, “We have the best youth pastor ever!” (Maybe. Hopefully. Possibly.)
• You can take a nap once in a while.

But, most importantly, when you have an annual plan to turn your ideas and goals into a strategy, you’ll make a much bigger impact.

So whether you use Grow Students Curriculum or not, we hope you’ll steal our strategy! We developed it over lots of years of ministry, with input from lots of church leaders and lots of trial and error. Take it, tweak it, and make it your own. We really hope it helps you be just a little more awesome at what you do this year!

Free PDF Resource

A Complete Youth Ministry Strategy from Grow Curriculum

Empower your youth group with Grow's strategy for spiritual growth and community. Free, actionable plans for a thriving ministry.

Download Now