The following is an article that I wrote for the youth ministry blog for my friends over at Youth Ministry 360:

Student leadership is an often overlooked but essential element to youth ministry.  This element is often neglected due to the time, energy, and investment involved versus the seemly small tangible pay off.  Student leadership, though the small part that it plays in most groups, is a key to building ownership in your student ministry.

At NorthPoint Community Church in Georgia, lead pastor, Andy Stanley, lays out the key, which I use to explain the idea of ownership and leadership to students.  He uses the analogy of a house to explain people’s levels of involvement in the church.

When people come into a house, the first room that they enter is the foyer.  In the foyer stage, people are probably visitors who are in a new place checking things out.  They are not sure if they are comfortable or if this is even somewhere they should be.  This category includes every visitor in your student ministry and maybe even some of your newer students.  These students are going to “the youth group down the road.”

The next stage, according to Andy Stanley, is the living room.  In this stage, people begin to feel comfortable in the environment.  They have checked the church out and have decided it is a place where they are willing to spend some time.  This is the stage where most of your students are.  “The youth group down the road” has become “the youth group which I attend.”  This is a crucial step in creating an environment where students want to be.

Most student ministries stay in the living room stage and do not ever get to the final stage of the kitchen.  In this stage, students become part of the family and as part of the family they have roles and responsibilities as part of the youth group.  In this final stage, “the youth group I attend” becomes “my youth group.”  This stage is bridged through student leadership where students take ownership in the ministry.

How do you build a student leadership team?

Enlist Students to Be in Leadership

From my experience, the best leaders will not be the first to volunteer.  Many students with leadership potential are already serving as leaders in many different areas and may be hesitant to sign up for something else.  The same students that serve in leadership at the church where I serve are also leaders in athletics, Fellowship of Christian Athletes, and First Priority clubs at school.  They are not just leading in these areas logistically but are stepping up as spiritual leaders in the arenas where they have influence.

I have found that it works best to enlist student leaders.  If you are in a church where you are the lone youth worker, look around you for students who are stepping up and showing leadership potential.  If you are in a larger church with a ministry team, incorporate your ministry team in leadership decisions.  I have found it helpful to let your leadership team be your primary people to select student leaders because they know students that you may not have had as much interaction with and they also serve as a buffer to the charge of the youth leader “playing favorites” in selecting a leadership team.

Explain the Cost and Responsibility of Leadership

According to Andy Stanley, “Leadership is a stewardship.  It is temporary, and you are accountable.”  This quote hangs on the wall in my office so that I am reminded of it every time I walk out of my door to minister.  Students must also understand that leadership comes with a cost and they are responsible to God and others for how they lead.

In order to present the cost and responsibility of leadership to students, I gather them for the first student leadership team meeting of the year and present a leadership covenant.  This is a single page document that each student takes home and prays over before signing.  This document underscores the importance of prayer, Bible study, modeling Christian character, developing spiritual gifts, and witnessing.  These are all essential elements to leading other students well.  After the first meeting, students are given an opportunity to step away if God is not leading them to serve.

Explore Students’ Spiritual Gifts

Serving as a leader is not going to look the same for every student.  Just as you, as the youth leader, have certain strengths and weaknesses, your students do as well.  Many students, however, have a hard time on their own defining these strengths and weaknesses.  This is why student leadership forms an important role in developing students through personal growth and discipleship.

As students learn their strengths and weaknesses, they will grow as individuals.  This is why student leadership often does not have immediate, tangible results.  As youth leaders, we will never know the impact that we have had on a student with regard to their growth both spiritually and in leadership.

Empower Students to Serve

Empowering students to serve is the final step in developing student leaders.  This is a phase that many youth leaders struggle with because at this point some level of control and responsibility must be given over to students.  This can be a messy but rewarding process.

It is important in this process to create spaces for students to serve based on their spiritual gifts.  In doing this, we allow students to play to their strengths and to have success in leadership endeavors.  Setting students up for success is essential in helping students be willing to step out and lead in the future.

Through this process, the connection of ownership occurs.  The movement from “the youth group down the street” to “the youth group which I attend” to “my youth group” is accomplished while encouraging, teaching, and empowering students to lead.

In Cast of Characters: Common People in the Hands of an Uncommon God, Max Lucado presents twenty-two stories of amazing faith from scripture.  Lucado’s ability to take stories from scripture and make them come alive in today’s context is the main appeal of the book.  The stories of David, Lazarus, Paul, and many other beloved Bible figures are presented with a focus on the power of God using ordinary people.  The people who many Christians have looked upon as saints and perfect people who have been used by God are brought back down into the context of the ordinary through Lucado’s book.  The people that Bible readers admire should not be admired because of the things that they have done, but rather they should be seen as ordinary people who were empowered and used mightily by God.  Lucado is intentional to remind his readers that God is the hero of the story, but He is a gracious hero in that He decides to use ordinary people in His plan.  In his typical style, Lucado places profound theological insights in a narrative which is easily accessible to his readers.  This is an inspiring book that encourages readers to allow God to work greatly through them despite being ordinary people.

The Jesus Manifesto by Leonard Sweet and Frank Viola stands as a call to the church to restore the person of Christ to the center of our churches, lives, and ministries.  I cannot think of a more timely topic to be addressed in the American church.  Sweet and Viola do an excellent job of addressing the need for a refocus on the person of Christ in the church and the beauty of Christ, which is clearly seen in scripture.  The final chapter of the book clearly explains the authors’ views on the topic and the goal of the book by stating:

“But if the truth be told, we have been handed a shrink-wrapped Jesus.  Christ has become our once-a-week Mascot.  We rally around Him on Sunday mornings, selfishly reaching for all we can get from Him – goodies and gifts, all for us.  Then we push Him off to the sidelines the rest of the week.  But the game has never been about us; it has always been about Him.  The gospel that’s so often preached today lacks a revelation of Jesus Christ.  The contemporary gospel boils down to a fire-insurance policy, a Santa Claus God, or a performance-based religion.  As long as we stay on that plane, we’ll never see or comprehend the staggering enormity of our Lord.”

I constantly found myself challenged throughout the book.  I would greatly encourage anyone to read this challenging book that seeks to put Christ back in His rightful place – at the center of everything.

About this time last May, I was on a plane headed to East Asia to serve the Lord doing mission work.  One of the towns that we were in was a large city that had little knowledge of the gospel.  One day, we went to a model display of the city to pray that God would open doors in that city so that people could be drawn to Christ.  This week, I was looking through my journal from the trip and came across one of the reflections that I had while praying over the city:

“Satan blinds [city name] with darkness that blocks out the Light while Satan blinds the United States with religion that is used as a weaker substitute for the Light because the Light is too strong and radical to fit within the American dream.”

May the Light of the gospel shine in both the darkness of East Asia and in the darkness of America’s cultural religion.

When we come to the Christmas season, we are met with many things to do.  Our lives tend to immediately get busy and hurried in the midst of all of the presents, parties, and other things that make this season so loved by many.  But before we get lost in the craziness of the season, let us take a look back to the beginnings of this holiday.

The Gospel of John begins with a great picture of Christmas.  He gives this picture of Jesus (who he calls the Word) being the Creator, Sustainer, and Giver of life.  He shows us a great and powerful God, and then he says “the Word became flesh and dwelt among us” (John 1: 14a ESV).  That is the center of what Christmas is about.  The Creator of the world, the Author of life, the Originator of all beauty, the Sustainer of all came down into our world.  This loving God was willing to come down into our world which is scarred with the pains of grief, crying out with hurts, and full of sin and corruption.  The holy God of the universe stepped down into our pain and world to redeem us from it.  He came from His home in Glory to make a way through His own suffering and death to bring us to Glory and to restore fellowship with us.

This Redeemer, however, did not come on the scene as many would expect.  The lightning did not flash, the earth did not shake, and the angels did not belt out a joyful noise.  No the God of the universe came as a baby, and He was “wrapped in swaddling clothes, and laid in a manger, because there was no room in the inn” (Luke 2:7b ESV).  God comes on the scene and is given no kingly treatment.  The God of the universe should have at least been given a room in the inn, but instead He is born in an animal food trough.   Jesus Christ comes to redeem His people and everyone seems to miss it.  The writer of John says it this way: “The true light which enlightens everyone, was coming into the world.  He was in the world and the world was made through Him, yet the world did not know Him.  He came to His own and His own people did not receive Him” (John 1: 9-11 ESV).  He came to bring light into the darkness of our world, and we missed Him.

This Christmas in the midst of all of our trees, Santas, gifts, families, Christmas parties, and dinners will we miss Jesus?  It is very easy in during the busy holiday season for us to forget what is important.  Jesus wants a relationship with you this Christmas season.  He wants to spend some time with you this Christmas.  The question is “Will you be like the wise men and shepherds and seek Him, or will you miss Jesus this Christmas?

In Fearless, Max Lucado brings to life Jesus’ teachings on fear throughout the gospels.  The is a timely book considering our current cultural fears raging from economic to health to political fears.  Lucado does a biblical job of addressing fears not using the popular techniques of self-help and prosperity preachers who take advantage of people’s fears and believe in the power of positive thinking to overcome your fears.  Instead, Lucado addresses our fears by pointing us to Jesus Christ who is the centerpiece of our faith.  In Jesus, we find a God who is not foreign to our fears and who does not sit idly by in our times of fear.  Lucado, through the vehicle of the gospels, paints a picture of a Jesus who not only understands our fears but who wants to be the peace in the midst of our storm.  The chapters in this book address different storms that Jesus desires to be our peace in the middle of.  These storms include: the fear of not mattering, the fear of disappointing God, the fear of running out, the fear of not protecting my kids, the fear of overwhelming challenges, the fear of worst-case scenarios, the fear of violence, the fear of the coming winter, the fear of life’s final moments, the fear of what’s next, the fear that God is not real, the fear of global calamity, and the fear of God getting out of my box.  The most amazing part of this book is the fact that after addressing all of the potential earthly fears that Lucado addresses in this book he brings us to see that a healthy fear of God as God brings all of these fears into proper perspective.  If God is God and He is on the throne, our fears look as large as they really are because we see them from an eternal perspective.  A God-sized view of God is the ultimate comfort in the midst of fear.  God is sovereign and He is good despite how ever dark our fears may look.  Lucado does an excellent job of bringing this powerful scriptural truth to life to encourage his readers to not fear!

The following is a blog post from Ed Stetzer that I thought would be worth passing along:

Cathy Grossman and USAToday writes about christian accountability groups. You can read the whole article here.

It begins with:

Does the Capitol Hill house on C Street — home to several congressmen although it eludes property taxes by being listed as a church — give prayer “accountability” groups a bad name? Should elected officials seek God in secrecy while hiding sins from public scrutiny?

The fact that such a group exists in Washington, D.C., combined with recent news about participants, makes it national news.

She explains what these groups are all about:

But millions of men and women belong to small prayer and accountability groups where they read and discuss Scripture together and hold each other to truthful living in God’s name. Remember Promise Keepers, the men’s group that hit a popularity peak in the 90′s? It stressed accountability groups heavily and even if PK no longer packs stadiums for rallies, many of those small groups continue to enriching lives.

The question that Cathy address deals with secrecy in such groups and the honesty required. I explained, “Accountability groups are only as good as the truthfulness of their participants.”

Cathy linked to my blog on accountability groups and questions. That blog is here. The USAToday story is here.

Here is the blog to which the story refers:

These lists are from Cultivating a Life for God (Church Smart Resources 1999 pp.125-131).

Typically, these questions are asked in groups of 2-3, are specific to men or women, meets regularly, and hold each other accountable.

John Wesley’s Small Group Questions:

1. Am I consciously or unconsciously creating the impression that I am better than I am? In other words, am I a hypocrite? 2. Am I honest in all my acts and words, or do I exaggerate?

3. Do I confidentially pass onto another what was told me in confidence?

4. Am I a slave to dress, friends, work , or habits?

5. Am I self-conscious, self-pitying, or self-justifying?

6. Did the Bible live in me today?

7. Do I give it time to speak to me everyday?

8. Am I enjoying prayer?

9. When did I last speak to someone about my faith?

10. Do I pray about the money I spend?

11. Do I get to bed on time and get up on time?

12. Do I disobey God in anything?

13. Do I insist upon doing something about which my conscience is uneasy?

14. Am I defeated in any part of my life?

15. Am I jealous, impure, critical, irritable, touchy or distrustful?

16. How do I spend my spare time?

17. Am I proud?

18. Do I thank God that I am not as other people, especially as the Pharisee who despised the publican?

19. Is there anyone whom I fear, dislike, disown, criticize, hold resentment toward or disregard? If so, what am I going to do about it?

20. Do I grumble and complain constantly?

21. Is Christ real to me?

Wesley’s Band Meeting Questions:

1. What known sins have you committed since our last meeting? 2. What temptations have you met with?

3. How were you delivered?

4. What have you thought, said, or done, of which you doubt whether it be sin or not?

5. Have you nothing you desire to keep secret?

Reference: John Wesley’s Class Meetings: a Model for Making Disciples, by D. Michael Henderson, Evangel Publishing House, 1997, pp. 118-9

Chuck Swindoll’s Pastoral Accountability Questions:

In his book, The Body, Chuck Colson lists the questions used by Chuck Swindoll.

1. Have you been with a woman anywhere this past week that might be seen as compromising? 2. Have any of your financial dealings lacked integrity?

3. Have you exposed yourself to any sexually explicit material?

4. Have you spent adequate time in Bible study and prayer?

5. Have you given priority time to your family?

6. Have you fulfilled the mandates of your calling?

7. Have you just lied to me?

Neil Cole:

1. What is the condition of your soul?

2. What sin do you need to confess?

3. What have you held back from God that you need to surrender?

4. Is there anything that has dampened your zeal for Christ?

5. Who have you talked with about Christ this week?

HT: Journey

The questions I use are from these cards from Church Multiplication Associates. I keep one in my Bible.

The ten questions are as follows:

1. Have you been a testimony this week to the greatness of Jesus Christ with both your words and actions? 2. Have you been exposed to sexually alluring material or allowed your mind to entertain inappropriate thoughts about someone who is not your spouse this week?

3. Have you lacked any integrity in your financial dealings this week, or coveted something that does not belong to you?

4. Have you been honoring, understanding and generous in your important relationships this past week?

5. Have you damaged another person by your words, either behind their back or face-to-face?

6. Have you given in to an addictive behavior this week? Explain.

7. Have you continued to remain angry toward another?

8. Have you secretly wished for another’s misfortune so that you might excel?

9. Did you finish your reading this week and hear from the Lord? What are you going to do about it?

10. Have you been completely honest with me?

Having recently returned from a mission trip to East Asia, I was really struck by the following devotional that I read last night from Dr. Calvin Miller’s Conversations with Jesus.  I hope that this will be encouraging to you as you seek to share your faith with others both on mission trips and in day to day life.  This is written as a response from Jesus to explain the words of Matthew 10: 14-15, which says: “And whoever does not receive you, nor heed your words, as you go out of that house or that city, shake off the dust from your feet.  Truly I say to you, it will be more tolerable for the land of Sodom and Gomorrah in the day of judgment, than for that city. ”

“Never forget the bottom line as you minister: You are not accountable for your success or failure in any human arena.  Nothing I have called you to do in my name in this world will be dissmissed as trivial in that world to which you are headed.  If you are rejected in your attempt to preach the truth, the truth that caused your rejection will not be judged by those who turn a deaf ear to your counsel.  Those who reject your words must themselves face the last tribunal.

So never despair over rejection.  I knew rejection firsthand.  I never despaired.  The greatest truths are regularly rejected.  You do not need to win any battle in the same moment you take up arms.  As I told my disciples as they began their preaching tour, if you are cast out of any city, do not try to barge back and compel anyone to listen. Just shake the dust off of your feet.  Why?  Because those who hear the truth need to remember that the truth of the gospel is not an option left up to human caprice.  The shaking of the dust from your feet will remind those who listen of their obligation to hear.

The gospel has always carried this double obligation.  It obligates the disciple to tell the message and the seeker to listen.  Pity the complacent witness who will not tell the saving story.  Pity the complacent seeker who will not hear of it.

But in this double obligation, important as it is, you must never merely count your converts to measure your success.  Truth is its own reward.  Once you have told the truth, you have succeeded.  Telling the saving truth is your responsibility.  Doing the saving is mine. Counting converts in unnecessary.  It is an unworthy bottom line on earth and unessential in heaven.  So do not grow neurotic trying to become a savior yourself.  That is my title; I will do that work.  That should take quite a load off your mind.  You are only responsible for telling the truth.  So tell it.  If thousands are drawn to the faith, you will succeed.  If you die without a single convert and are crucified for telling the truth, you will still have succeeded.

In The Principle of the Path, Andy Stanley brings to life the key truth that your current direction in life will determine your destination.  This is what Stanley terms as “the principle of the path.”  This is an idea that in being a principle happens naturally as a result of our life decisions.  This is not something that we have a choice in whether or not it will happen.  Our current decisions, whether good or bad, leading toward our goals or straying away from our goals, or reflecting our convictions or denying our convictions, will determine our future destination in life.

This book does an excellent job of driving this simple yet profound point home to the reader.  Through Andy Stanley’s usual mix of biblical principles and practical, real life examples, the truth is seen illustrated both with positive effects and negative effects in the lives of real people.  The common misconception that “the principle of the path” confronts is that our intention will lead to our destination.  The problem that the principle points out is that action determines results not intention.

In the final chapter, Stanley addresses how to deal with the struggles that arise when we realize that our destination which we desired to achieve is unattainable.  For a biblical picture of dealing with this reality, Stanley turns to 2 Samuel 15 where David takes his army to face his son Absalom.  The passage finds David going to confront his rebellious son who wants to overthrow David.  The High Priest at the time, Zadok, prepares the Ark of the Covenant to go with David into battle.  This Ark going into battle signifies that the Lord is with the army carrying the Ark and is on that side of the conflict.  David approaches Zadok and refuses for the Ark to go with him.  David does not want to try to manipulate God to get David’s desires.  He wants to by faith trust God for God to do “whatever seems good to Him.”  This biblical truth of trusting God to do “whatever seems good to Him” is the driving point that causes our seemingly disappointing moments on the path of life to become moments where our uncertainty in our life’s direction drives us to a deeper trust in God who is certainly there.

The Principle of the Path is an encouraging book that challenges the reader to prepare for the future through the decisions made today.  It also stands as a reminder of the faithfulness of God to be there in the midst of the journey of life even if that journey is not going as you had planned for it to.

In Eyes Wide Open: See and Live the Real You, Jud Wilhite raises some very relevant questions which each Christian must come face to face with.  This is a book that is clearly written to an audience that is already Christ followers and seeks to engage them with the truth that bad theology leads to Christian living and thinking that is not biblical.

The book addresses four critical categories of issues where American Christians have a tendency to embrace bad theology.  These areas are theology about God, theology about ourselves and our position in Christ, theology of the process of change in becoming like Christ, and theology of mission.  Jud builds a logical argument throughout the book starting with a theology of God as the bases.

One of the most attractive parts of the book was the fact that the truths of scripture that were communicated in a clear and biblically sound way using both illustrations and personal testimonies of the people who Jud has had an opportunity to minister to.  The biblical passages were used clearly throughout the book.  The only annoying thing was that the references for the passages were not in the text of the book itself but were buried in the notes pages that corresponded to that chapter.

The section on a theology of change was the best segment of the book.  Jud highlighted that change into becoming more like Christ, also known as sanctification, is a life long process.  This section emphasized the importance of having somewhere to be real.  Somewhere to take off your Christian mask and to be yourself – struggles and all.  The importance of growing in Christ through the context of a local community of faith was also highlighted.  These are very important truths that the American church tends to not address.

The final section on being a missional person who influences culture was a great ending point for the book.  The Gospel should never stop with you or me.  We should always seek ways to embody and proclaim the grace of God through Jesus to the world around us.

Jud Wilhite’s new book,  Eyes Wide Open: See and Live the Real You, releases in stores today.  Make sure and grab a copy because it is well worth your time to be encouraged with the timeless truths from scripture. Embracing good theology strengthens both our relationship with Jesus Christ and empowers us to make a difference in the world.