This is my second report on the book “Reaching a Generation for Christ” that I’m slowly reading through since it is a very long text book and I want to glean from it a number of ideas. You can read my first book report here and then come back and read about this one.
I found two key ideas from part 2 “Structures for Youth Ministry” that really stood out to me. Both ideas came from Mark H. Senter III eight axioms of youth ministry.
The first key idea that hit me was the overwhelming importance of adults involved in students lives. “The Christian discipleship of students will not take place without flesh and blood relationships,” is a very powerful thought from the first Axiom. Throughout the different Axioms this idea of relationships with adults are talked about. But another important thought about relationships stood out to me as well. This thought was that we as adults working with students must be careful not rely on our identity to be fulfilled through the students. Mr. Senter put it this way, “adults must be willing to release students when spiritual independence is necessary.”
The second key idea deals with the maturing of the of the youth leader which must happen by letting go slowly of different parts of the ministry to other people. Axiom 12 really talks through this and even shares a three stage process youth leaders must go through to mature and thus have their youth ministries mature. I think these stages are a good outline but there needs to be more meat to these stages to really impact the maturing process. I really like this thought, “As a youth worker grows, the focus of his or her ministry must change from primary ministry to secondary ministry or else the effectiveness of his or her efforts will be severely limited.”
There are two more sections in the book about models of youth ministry that were a good read but didn’t have anything really stand out to me on. I’ll keep reading through this book and see what other insights might jump out at me.
The first key idea that hit me was the overwhelming importance of adults involved in students lives. “The Christian discipleship of students will not take place without flesh and blood relationships,” is a very powerful thought from the first Axiom. Throughout the different Axioms this idea of relationships with adults are talked about. But another important thought about relationships stood out to me as well. This thought was that we as adults working with students must be careful not rely on our identity to be fulfilled through the students. Mr. Senter put it this way, “adults must be willing to release students when spiritual independence is necessary.”
The second key idea deals with the maturing of the of the youth leader which must happen by letting go slowly of different parts of the ministry to other people. Axiom 12 really talks through this and even shares a three stage process youth leaders must go through to mature and thus have their youth ministries mature. I think these stages are a good outline but there needs to be more meat to these stages to really impact the maturing process. I really like this thought, “As a youth worker grows, the focus of his or her ministry must change from primary ministry to secondary ministry or else the effectiveness of his or her efforts will be severely limited.”
There are two more sections in the book about models of youth ministry that were a good read but didn’t have anything really stand out to me on. I’ll keep reading through this book and see what other insights might jump out at me.
2 comments:
Good morning Pstor Mark,
I was just clued onto a book that I will be getting soon. It sounds very good. Yet very challenging. It's written by Pastor Voddie Baucham Jr. "What He Must Be....If he Wants to Marry My Daughter."
I have had the great pleasure of listening to a few of his sermons. This one stands out to me though. He was speaking at the Southern Baptist Convention Pastors Conference. One of the speakers had taken ill and Pastor Voddie was asked to step in and this is the message he gave.....
http://www.treasuringchrist.net/audio/baucham/gap.mp3
I hope you give it a listen and I would love to someday get together and discuss P. Voddie's book. Pastor Forstrom could also join us. What do you think?
Love ya Bro, Joe Meyer
Hey Joe,
Thx for the commenting and I would enjoy some time to talk with you about Pastor Voddie.
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