The "I Think I'm Going to Puke" Moment of Disicpleship With Students

Your hand reaches over the top, desperately trying to find a hold.  To the right, to the left, and then finally you find a sliver of an edge that you can grab.  Holding onto that fraction of an inch, you pull and push and get just enough of your body up over the ledge that your weight isn't on your exhausted legs anymore.  That's when it hits you, laying there on your stomach, your feet dangling out in space, trying to catch your breath; you've made it!  All of that work, all of that stress, the uncertainty of it all finally comes together as you top out on the climb.  Deep down, no matter how many times you may or may not have done this before, you know somethings changed inside of you.  As cliche as it sounds, you know that you won't ever be exactly the same as you were before.  There is a new piece to who you are. 

No matter how many times I've went rock climbing, topping out always produces the same feelings in me.   When you get to the top of the rock face and hoist yourself up and over, it's just such excitement, pride, relief, hope, and honest joy.  If you've never done it, I know it sounds hokey and made up, but it's not.  It's an amazing experience.

As I've taken students climbing over the years, I've learned to recognize when a student decides they are going to finish the climb or not.  There is a place, usually around 50-60% of the way up the rock face, that you can tell if they are going to give in to the fear, exhaustion, and uncertainty and come down, or if they are going to push through all of it and make it all the way up.  I'm not sure how to describe it, but there is this point where all of the encouragement from below, all of the instruction before they started, all of the thoughts they had going into it fade, and they simply decide this is something worth doing.  This is something worth finishing.  They will pay the price and see this through.  It becomes THEIR climb, THEIR challenge to finish.  So they do.

In our discussion on the five levels of spiritual growth on the pyramid, the fifth one is the level of Leaders Producing New Leaders.  It's the idea of a student who has moved through the relationships, evangelism, beginning discipleship, and advanced discipleship and then decides to pour all of that into someone else.  It's the last level for students on the chart, so it's the smallest, with the fewest students, and it's almost impossible to program and create.  We can set up relational events (level 1) where students get to know each other.  We can build the gospel (level 2) into times so students hear it clearly.  We can provide clearly regimented Bible training and skills classes (level 3).  We can even create service opportunities  (level 4) for kids.  But this level is a bit different.  For this one to really work, a student has to make that decision.  They have followed Jesus up this rock face, but now they have to decide for themselves if they are going to move forward to the last level or not.  Many don't.  Some do.  It's between them and Him much more than with us as their youth leaders. 

For students who do, it means they turn around to their peers and begin looking for people to build relationships  (level 1) with, and prayerfully considering who they can walk through the five levels with.  It's the very essence of discipleship.  That's why we make it the goal of the process.  We want to make disciples who make disciples.  It's Biblical (Matthew 28:19,20 among many other verses) and it resolves this issue of how many students we "lose" at graduation.

But it's largely beyond our control.  We program towards it, and model it.  It is up to our students, in that period of stress and uncertainty, to decide if they will keep climbing or not.

I'd love to hear your thoughts on all of this.  Please contact me or post a comment below.

How Being a Gym Rat Makes You Holy - Advanced Discipleship in Youth Ministry

In the past couple of years, I've become one of those guys who goes to the gym multiple times a week.  I hit my late 30's, was out of shape, and didn't like it.  But it took a doc telling me I had to go if I didn't want to come in and see him all the time to get me motivated.  I don't go to be studly (I'm a 40 year old dad, after all).  I don't go because I love it.  I go because it's what I need to do to be healthy, and live life in a way that works.

What's funny is that before I went regularly, I would talk about being healthy and in shape.  I was active at a basic level, ate okay, and thought I was alright.  I wasn't.  It began to show.  So, I learned how to go on a regular basis, and over time, it's made a huge difference in a ton of places in my life.

When we talk about discipleship with students, there are some similarities for us to understand as leaders.  If a person is going to grow spiritually, the beginning pieces of discipleship are necessary.  We talked about those in the discussion on level 3.  (You can read it here.)  Bible study, prayer, and other disciplines have to be there.  But they are not enough, they aren't the end.  We have to go farther if we want to continue to grow and live like we are designed to.

Helping students engage in acts of service, finding out what it means to sacrifice, to forgive, to love, and to do these things in the way Christ teaches us to, that is what we call Advanced Discipleship on our pyramid.  It's Level 4.  We intentionally create opportunities for students to serve weekly, monthly, quarterly, and annually in different areas, in different ways.  We mentor students and help them learn to forgive those who don't ask for forgiveness, to serve those who may not be expecting to be served, to love those who may believe they are beyond being loved.  When we help students do these things intentionally, we help them move from talking about being in shape spiritually to putting some training to it.  Much like working out on a consistent basis, it begins to shape them when they take it on as part of their lifestyle.  It also prepares them for life after high school, to live out their faith and continue growing when all of the camps, retreats, and lock-ins are done.

It takes planning on our part.  Remember, by the very design of the pyramid, you will have less students at this level than any of the previous three.  You might be talking about small numbers by the time you get to level four.  Don't try to pull all of your students here.  Also, your programming should reflect this pyramid as well.  If you are doing all service projects, and doing them with the goal of having every student serving as an act of advanced discipleship, you're missing the point. 

It's interesting that today, students from all levels are interested in service.  We have found that service projects can actually be effective at any level on the pyramid.  We use them to involve new students, we use them as evangelism TO the students serving, and on up the chain as well.  So, we need to be very direct in why we are setting up a service project.  What is our goal, and who are we trying to reach with it?  How will we know if it succeeds or not?

Level four is tough because it often takes a bit of work and resources to do well, and often reaches less students.  It is crucial though, as we try to help students become disciples.

I'd love to hear what you are doing for advanced discipleship with your students.

A Plan for Ministry - 5 Steps

Everyone has a different approach to how to organize youth ministry, and that is a beautiful thing.  Willow Creek runs off the 5 G's, Saddleback has the purposes, Northpoint has the C's.  I love them all, and learn from them all.

We have a system that is pretty basic, but it works for me.  We work off of a 5 level pyramid.  So, yes, we run a pyramid scheme for our youth group.  We're changing our name to AmWay Jr/Sr High next fall.  Anyway, it looks like this:

 

We use each of these five levels to discuss where a student is in their growth, where we are doing well in ministry, what programs are we running, which programs should we add or let go of, what does the future of the ministry look like, and more.  Over the next few days, we'll walk through each level and discuss what each one is.  Tomorrow, we'll start with Level 1 - Relationships.