Category: Rural Ministry
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An Early Christmas Gift for SBC Pastors…
Christmas is coming, you are decorating the trees that are in your churches, hanging lights, and putting up the nativity set. We all know that there may be a lot of new faces (or ones we only see a couple times a year) at church on Christmas Sunday. Many churches go the extra mile with…
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The Kaskaskia Dragon and Youth Ministry…
One of the interesting things about my new position with NNYM is that I get to see some really wild things that are off the beaten path. One of these gems is the Kaskaskia Dragon. It is located off US 40 in Vandalia, Illinois. According to Roadside America, this creation was originally built for parades,…
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Is It Too Late?
The church is dying. Literally. I don’t have a plethora of stats to back this up, at least not on the rural level. I just use my own two eyes. It doesn’t take a rocket scientist (or a statistician) to see that rural churches are aging and younger people just aren’t stepping up to lead.…
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Staging…
A couple weeks ago, I announced that I was embarking on a new ministry adventure. There has been much preparation in the transition (and not all is complete, but we’re getting close). In all the preparation and training, I feel like the driver sitting behind the wheel of a top-fuel dragster, waiting for that little…
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A New Perspective on Budgets
So, I’ve been away from MinistryPlace.net for a while. It was sort of by choice. You see, I’ve had a lot of changes in the past few months. We had a new baby. I moved six hours away. I started my senior pastor position in Illinois. I began my work towards my second master’s degree.…
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A New Adventure…
I have exciting news. I have taken a position with National Network of Youth Ministries in the Great Lakes region. I will be serving as a Rural Ministry Specialist working with youth worker networks in Illinois and Western Indiana. This position involves resourcing and encouraging youth workers in both paid and volunteer roles. I will be seeking…
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A Simple Approach to Youth Ministry Budgets…
Its that time of the year again!! Time to start looking at next year’s budget. I know some of you are asking “what’s a budget?”, I will get into that in a future post. Preparing a budget seems to be a necessary evil of Youth Ministry, but here are a few things I did several…
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Just Stop It Already!…
“Why do we do this ministry every year?” “Well…kinda because we’ve always been the ones to do It?….” We have all had that conversation in our churches. There seems to be that one ministry in every church that is a sacred cow that happens every year only because it happened the year before. Many times,…
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Teen Devotion Ideas
One of the largest challenges in youth ministry is keeping students growing in their faith. One of the tools we have available to help in this area are daily devotions to help students think through having a daily time focused on prayer and God’s word. Here are some great resources available to help your students.…
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A Rural Church Millenial Story…
There was much to do over the release of the 2012 SBC Annual Church Profile statistics a few weeks ago. One of the most staggering stats was the fact that the SBC churches baptized very few or no Millennials or Youth in 2012 (the latest year we have statistics for…). I was unsure just exactly how to…
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What does See You At the Pole Look Like if you Homeschool?
See you at the pole is a basic staple in youth ministry, with its roots dating back to 1990. I was involved at our school’s events as early as 1993 as a freshman in high school. I have seen some great things happen in unified prayer at the local school. The mission of SYATP can…
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Poll: The Biggest Issue in Rural Youth Ministry is…
We are constantly working on new ideas and resources here at MinistryPlace.Net. One of the upcoming ideas involves a lot of feedback from our readers. We are taking a poll looking into the biggest issues of the Rural youth worker. Here are the rules. Vote for the issue that is the largest issue in your…