Welcome back to part two of the youth ministry roadmap, so I've never heard part one pause or rewind metric. Check out episode one of these ministry roadmap, which is all about the discovery phase of youth ministry so that you finish your roadmap from your friend. You've been a booster. I'm Zach. I'm buddy Chad. We're talking about what it looks like to find your situation and youth ministry and what questions and challenges you need to address to get unstuck from wherever you are and to the place maybe that you want to be. Phase one was discovery phase to that we'll talk about today is build and then phase three is develop. We'll talk about it in the next episode and an African develop its scale and then finally succeed. And the five phases of the roadmap are discover, build, develop, scale and succeed. And so today we're all talking all about what it means to build and youth ministry. And this is not just the physical building is not just we're going to build as big as possible, but there is a tuned process of what it means to build it. So the key question that we're going to start with an in width is what will it take to make my ministry viable? And so just like we talked about it, I've said before, whether you're new to a place and you're entering that past the first few months, the first year of your ministry, or if you've been somewhere for a while and are thinking about what it looks like to rebuild either all or part of your ministry, this is the phase where you're asking about viability, will it float? So we're going to use the boat metaphor a lot in this episode of building the ship as we're sailing it, but everything relates to is this going to float or is this going to sink because we want to build well so that later we can develop on top of it. So Chad Higgins take us away, help us know more about the situation or the phase, the building phase in youth ministry.
Speaker 2:Yeah. You know, I think when we think about the building phase, um, while everyone may not have the same language, I think for most youth ministers, we live mainly in this building phase and every once in awhile will lean over into the development phase and, and I think it's really important that we, um, we break this down and we look at this building phase. Now, if you're a brand new youth minister at a brand new place, and when I say brand new, I'm not talking like years of ministry. I mean like you, uh, maybe for you, you're brand new in that way, but you're brand new at a specific church, a new location. Um, you've already walked through this phase of discovery asking all these questions. You've gathered all of the questions together and now you begin this building phase. Or maybe for some of you you're not looking at your entire ministry in a building phase, but you're just looking
Speaker 1:at one specific area, right? That you're looking at your small group ministry or Your Parent Ministry and you're going, okay, we've asked the questions. How do we begin to build this into something that's actually like alive and happening and we can see it and touch it and all those because the whole thing, you have to build it before you can evaluate it and then develop it and that's one of the things we want to talk about his youth minister. We get it. We we, we are. We are shared experience and shared in story. We all love the taste of the new. We all love the first parts of things and that's why this phase is so exciting, but we are building with the idea of an end in mind. We are building with the hope that eventually whatever we're starting is at some level worth developing, which is why it's so key to do that discovery process and have some good questions answered so that we can begin. This phase is building phase which starts for us with the values generated from those questions. When you asked about the thing that was most favorite or most important or most successful, or the thing they never want to do again in the youth ministry, that was shaping, informing the values of that youth ministry. When you ask the senior pastor what is successful youth ministry and they gave you whatever that answer was, that is shaping the values related to the ways in which you will lead and shape this ministry, so take those answers and begin to discern, not, don't hear a lock in, don't hear mission trip here, them talk about the ways in which they want to hang out together. Here are the ways in which they want to serve their city or they want to travel and serve and see the rest of what God is doing in the world. Those are the values. A mission trip isn't the value. The value is we love to worship together. We love unplugged nights. We love to go on the hayride because we like having Saturdays together. You don't have to do the hayride forever, but what you do have to do is provide community outlets for these, for these young people to hang out together. So Chad, we've got a list of questions. We've got answers. We're beginning to kind of parse through and separate and discern and see these values. What do we do with it? I got, I got a list of things that sound important. I listened to all the students, the stakeholders, the parents, what are you now
Speaker 2:once we have this foundation of our vision, mission strategy, right? That is very much a part of this building phase and it would be the first part of every single youth ministers building phase, right? If you're new somewhere, do not begin to build anything, right? I know that there are going to be Wednesday nights, right? That we're doing and all those kinds of stuff. Sure. Before we can lay out all this, but before you really start to like root down into something and go, all right, this is who we are and this is what we're about. Make sure that you have a strong foundation of that because as you get further down the road, specifically in our next phase, and you start evaluating and really looking at what you do and find tuning and make it even better, um, you've got to know what you're about, right? Who Your people are and the vision that God has given you, delete them forward. And so that's, that's for sure. Step one for everyone. But there are these six things that I want to walk us through that I believe that are a part of every single building phase, whether it's from the ground up as a new student ministry or this is just one specific area. The first part that I want to talk about is the plan, right? We have gathered the information in your mind. You begin to work out the plan of what it looked like. You know, oftentimes like we've heard this sayings, right? If, you know, if you're only given like two hours to cut down a tree, right? Spin like, you know, an hour, 45 sharpening. Yes. Right? Um, and, and I think that it's important that during this planning process that we look at it that way, right? That we take a lot of time for ourself. We, you know, we're in our mastermind groups with youth ministry booster, with other ministers that we're talking through these big plans, we're getting feedback, we're hearing advised, we're reading all those kinds of stuff that we're beginning to come up with a plan that's really thought out and will really, really a lot of the details right. And we have a lot of those questions answered. Um, because that's going to be really good for us as we move forward that we don't just walk into a room and go, hey, we should do this right? And somebody goes, oh yeah, we can't do that. We don't have the space. And then you're going, oh yeah, we really don't have the space. Right? And so being able to plan that out, lay it out for yourself first and foremost, and to be able to go, okay, what does this look like? What do we need to do? So once we have that plan figured out, the next phase that will walk into is
Speaker 1:ride it out. All right, and I know you're lying. I don't lie writing things out. I got it all up here in the noodle. Got It all in the realm of the decks up here, but here's what riding it out does. It commits you to it at a higher level. If you're just thinking of it and spitting it out and saying it, then you begin to like move and Dart. Writing it down makes you commit to it at a certain level. It also does this, it's shareable and so what you've written down, you can email to one of the people that are on that prayer team from your hiring committee. You can share it with your mastermind at booster so that they can begin to give you some feedback because if it's written down, people can review it and they can give you meaningful feedback instead of just, hmm, that sounds okay.
Speaker 2:Yeah. The other big thing that it does when we, when we write it down, is we're able to give it to our senior pastor. Yes, we're able to it, to our stakeholders, all of those kinds of things and here's what it communicates from the get go. This is serious. It's well thought out. It's professional. It's super easy to shoot down what seems to be a spur of the moment ideas when someone hands you a really well put together like a pdf document that has like color on it, right? And graphs and things like that. Old Page. Dude, I'm just telling you right now, you can put a pie graph on anything. It doesn't even have to relate to anything. People are like, there's a pie graph. Yep. One hundred percent. Pretty good, right? I'm in, but if we ride it out, right, we get it on paper one. It's going to help us through the planning process of that. Okay, so what, what are we actually writing down chat. So that's one of the things I hear you talking about values. You talk about the plan. So if I'm going to walk in with this multipage document to my senior executive pastor or to email it off to my stakeholder team that had been praying for me, what all do I need to include? Yeah, so the biggest things that you're going to be including in this writing down of your plan, is this just a basic overview, right? Hey, here is what we're wanting to do. Here is why we're wanting to do it. Here's how it fits with our vision. Those are the big things that we want to write down, right? We're communicating from the base of our vision, mission, strategy of the why, why we're answering that question, but then we're communicating why this is important and what it looks like in that document. You're going to want it. You're going to want to walk through a lot of the logistical kind of impacts, right? And and so clear those out. A lot of the questions think through before you ever walk into that office and hand it to your senior pastor. What are going to be the questions my senior pastor's going to answer it? Ask how much is it going to cost? Alright, the, I need to write that down. Here's what I think it's going to cost. Where's it going to be a. I think we can do this in the gym. I'm going to write it. It's going to be on the gym. We're going to use the gym on Thursday nights from 7:00. I've already looked at the calendar. There's nothing happening on Thursday nights. Seven o'clock in the gym, right? It's going to work. All of those kinds of things. And so we lay all of that out. We lay out the plan in that process and I would even begin to write out, um, the, the plan of action leading up to the event as well, right? Or the program that we're starting, or even the whole new ministry that we talked through. Okay. Not only is, this is what we're gonna we're trying to build, here's the process that we're walking through up towards that specific dates are crucial in this writing down process, right? Here's our launch date for this, here's this team meeting, here's this team meeting. That way when you give it to someone, you're not having to go, hey, yeah, I'll text you when the meeting is right. All of that's already thought out. They can begin to plan for it. You've thought ahead of schedule and your.
Speaker 1:You're prepared for where you're going because it helps inform, right? That this is both a vision and a strategy. It's not just the big idea that you had like hits you in the shower one morning or late one night over coffee, but you you've actually thought through this is a meaningful direction for both what our students and our church and what we as a staff and then what we see as kind of the future picture. This is what we value, this is where we want to go, and then also this is what it's gonna take to get there. That's the strategy statement, and so there's a process to even implementing those kinds of strategies statements and having those kinds of meetings on the agenda as part of this kind of packet that you put together. Having it written out both again, shareable makes it real, and then also holds you accountable that, oh, I really did say those things.
Speaker 2:The next part of this building phase is this casting the vision. All right, up until this point, all you've done is planning for yourself. Write it down, and now you're going to begin to cast this vision. Now, the process and who we cast the vision to is very, very, very important that we go in the correct order. Alright, I've seen far too many people begin to cast vision with their group first, right? Right, right. And then all your people that are the closest to you are finding out information when everyone else is right and what's going to end up happening is this. You're going to share this great big idea with your large group or your entire church and those people are going to begin to talk. Well, not every one of them. We're going to talk to you. They're going to talk to each other and they're going to go to the person that they feel is most connected to your student ministry and they're going to ask them and they've just heard about it as well. So as you cast vision, I want you to think through that. Who do I need to share this with first and what's the progression of how do we communicate what's happening and where we're going. The first person that I would recommend you, you, uh, begin to cast vision to is your senior pastor or your leadership above you, right? That, that's the very first person that you lay out your plan to and you go, Hey, what do you think of this? Does this fit where we're going as a whole, as a church? Because if he says no, then that's where it stops. Right? And so from that point on, you began to bring in your leadership team, your key students, um, and, and on out, depending on the size of the project and what you're building and all those kinds of things, you know, some things don't take as big a vision casting some takes a, a lot of time to do that. But we want to do that well and we want to get everybody to understand the why and where we're going because the big that we're wanting to communicate and vision, here is where we're going. It's so easy when people don't understand the why to get caught up on the small details. Hear me in this. It's so easy, right? To talk about how dumb the lock in is or how much we hate this event. But when people understand the why behind it, right, then they can grab onto that and not just the particulars of the events. Right? So we communicate the vision. Well, the next thing that we do is I think where often times youth ministers start the process as we get to work.
Speaker 1:Yeah, right? We just get an idea and we go, well, what is that again? We are proponents of building the ship as you, as you sail it, but you've got to at least have the deck done before you float and sometimes we get caught up in just trying to stay busy and do the work and get stuff done that we didn't put in the right paces. Listen, before you paint the youth room, that brand new, bright yellow color or before your rename a bunch of things and print a bunch of tee shirts, give it some thought, give it some vision, help lay it out to other folks are bought into it because they want to help contribute and support it. So, but okay, yeah, we've done all the right things, we've done it. Unleash us, get to work. What are we doing when we get to work?
Speaker 2:Yeah, so depending on, depending on your project, depending on what you're working on, this is going to mean a whole slew of different things, right? There is no way that in this small little podcast that we're ever going to cover what this work looks like for us. Um, but along the way, right, it's, it's the, I mean it's the sweat equity, right? If we, if we're trying to launch this Wednesday night program then, and we've got a plan, it's been written out, we've cast the vision for it. This is the actual writing of the talk, pulling the band together, pain the walls, getting the projector. Yeah. It is all of those things, right? And that oftentimes is the reoccurring thing for us specifically. If this is a program or an event that's ongoing, right? Then this is going to be continually like this work in progress, that we're always coming back to the work, right? We're building it, it's happening over and over and over again. And, and here's what I want you to hear. I'm really, really clearly, right? As we walk through this process, that the development phase that's next, if we're not evaluating, right, we will always stay in this work process, right? It may change, it may look different through the years. That doesn't mean we're developing it, right? All that means is we're rebuilding something different and so we'll get into this work process. It's going to look different whether you're talking big project, small project, whatever that looks like, but you're in that working phase of this building project. So we've cast the vision, we've got to work, we've built it, it's ready to go. We've ironed out all the little details that we've put things on the calendar
Speaker 1:near. We plan things in advance. If we're wise, we'll tap into some great resources. Maybe there are events coming up that we don't have to plan all of it for and we can jump on board. We can add those to the calendar. Maybe there's some things that had already been planned that we can just go with for awhile because listed we don't have to rebuild everything from the ground up. Uh, this is a chance to bring in some really great curriculum. We're big fans of what stuff you can use has dealt with grow because that helps to, again, we're trying to build the ship as we sail and having some other folks kind of pad that to pave that pathway is really important. And so if you don't have some of these key tools to bring in, bring them in. Again, we are trying to make your ministry viable because if it's not viable, we can't refine and develop it, so we're just trying to get that hard work done so we can get to that next phase, so whatever it tanks, paint the wall named the youth group, build the pallet wall or the chrome wall or the linen wall or the whatever you're going to do, but get this stuff pulled together and make it viable. Make it happening so then we can begin moving into the other stuff. Once you've done a lot of that work chat, I'm excited for the next one. We got a bunch of stuff done. Then I'll put together.
Speaker 2:This is a really key piece and we don't always do this, but we need to do what we launch a ship fly. Yes, we actually have a launch and this. This can be an exciting part of the process. I think this is part of once we've cast the vision, we've done the work to get it ready. Then we have the excitement around the launch, right? Our students are excited and are leaders or assignment we can. We can get some momentum going in launches like this and a lot of times it will put in a lot of work and we've put it on a calendar somewhere and we've hit it in some like announcements on Sunday morning. Right? Like prepare for your launch, make it big, make it exciting. All of those kinds of things that your people are going, hey, something's happening. Right? Well because here's the thing is the
Speaker 1:danger, right? And for so many of our youth ministry friends that are living in this building phase, the thing about a launch is it puts a mile marker or a milestone in what you were doing because yes, ministry friend there is always more work to do and much of the work is always incremental, but sometimes we need to drop a pin and be like, you know what? This August, next January, in three weeks we are counting down to something happening. Whether it's the name change or the new program or the new small group or middle school or high school ministry, we
Speaker 2:need to set some markers so it doesn't always just feel like the churn because if we actually launched something even more exciting than the launch that you can promo and do and blow up big as you get to do the next thing. And this is what Chad Higgins is so good at reminding you about because this is the thing that we never do. And if, especially if you're building and you're living in the incremental phase that feels like a chore and you never do this. So Chad give us the gift of the last important piece of building. We celebrate. We have party. So yeah. Um, you know, because once, once we've built it, once we've launched it, it's important that we celebrate and I think when we begin to celebrate with our leaders, with our students, and this would be my encouragement to you, even if you launch something and it feels like it falls flat on its face, right? If we walked through the building phase correctly, right?
Speaker 3:We cast vision,
Speaker 2:we got other people on board during that vision casting. They walked with us through the work process, right? People were painting walls with this, right? They were the TNF recurring. We're showing up, working together. There was a work day. There were other. There were adults that don't even volunteer on Sunday, helping out then. Then we celebrate that. Right? We understand, hey, what happened where, where do we go from here? Part of the celebration process to you, I think allows us to reflect and the reflection part is where we will walk into our very next phase. Yes. As we begin to talk about how do we develop it further, right? And so, um, don't miss the opportunity to celebrate with your team, to celebrate with your students, what's happening in your student ministry and his great cool journey that God has you on. So there it is. Phase two. What does it mean to build or rebuild or be building in youth ministry? Again, the question is what will it take to make this in my ministry or my ministry viable? Because once it's viable and we're celebrating, the thing that we're doing will begin to evaluate, and for those that evaluate, there's a real good chance that we could start developing the thing that we built for that episode. We'll have to wait until the next one, phase three, develop. Until then, this has been faced too.
Speaker 4:Build.