In this episode Chad interview Chelsea Peddecord and the insights fly! Youth pastor hear the words of truth from one of your own because this short interview is very potent!
Chelsea Peddecord grew up in Rockwall, TX and fell in love with youth ministry due to her own awesome youth ministry experience! She did her undergraduate studies at Oklahoma State University and studied Sociology with an emphasis on Social Services. Chelsea is the high school pastor at Highland Park United Methodist Church in Dallas, TX. This year she will finish up her Masters of Theological Studies at SMU, pony up! Talk to her about Hogwarts, dogs, your enneagram number, the book of Leviticus, or Oklahoma State football.
Follow Chelsea On Twitter
Free Entry For Your Chance To Win $500 of prizes for a year!
Contribute To The Conversation About #WomenInYM
Key Takeaway: Start with humility not arrogance. You will have less resentment for what decisions get made.
In this episode Chad interview Chelsea Peddecord and the insights fly! Youth pastor hear the words of truth from one of your own because this short interview is very potent!
Chelsea Peddecord grew up in Rockwall, TX and fell in love with youth ministry due to her own awesome youth ministry experience! She did her undergraduate studies at Oklahoma State University and studied Sociology with an emphasis on Social Services. Chelsea is the high school pastor at Highland Park United Methodist Church in Dallas, TX. This year she will finish up her Masters of Theological Studies at SMU, pony up! Talk to her about Hogwarts, dogs, your enneagram number, the book of Leviticus, or Oklahoma State football.
Follow Chelsea On Twitter
Free Entry For Your Chance To Win $500 of prizes for a year!
Contribute To The Conversation About #WomenInYM
Key Takeaway: Start with humility not arrogance. You will have less resentment for what decisions get made.
Hey everybody, welcome to episode 56 of the Youth Ministry booster podcast. This is our 10th installment in our Hashtag women and why m series. It's our month long emphasis for the month of October as we celebrate and encourage women who are serving and leading in youth ministry, and I got to tell you, we've had nine amazing interviews already and we've got a power pack bunch more coming to you, but this one today, I was not ready for it. It's one of our shorter ones, but it is not without the surprise and the clarity and insight that the next 18 minutes is going to bring you. So let me tell you this with Chelsea peddicord has to say and share with you today is spot on. It is true that whatever phase in ministry you're in and what she drops, truth wise could not be more clear in so many ways for why you finished your booster exists and what we hope to offer you. The youth minister, there's a lot of places to get voices. There's a lot of folks that you probably have in your life that encouraged you, but if you do not have a group of fellow youth ministers that can speak with influence in your life but without authority, like if they are not the decision makers on your staff, but you could speak to them honestly enough that it's true and they hear you and they have enough influence in you that you might listen and reason and change. That is the difference maker. You need folks that will pray for you and challenge you, and that is youth ministry booster. We call them masterminds. You can call them peer groups or whatever else you need, but know that the heart of what we're about is this interview because we want every young, medium, season, and veteran you've ministered to. Know that there is a network that cares about you, is there for you, and we're here. I'll catch you back at the end. More details. Enjoy this interview with Chelsea peddicord alone. Welcome
Speaker 2:do youth ministry booster podcast. My name is Chad Higgins and I am very excited to be joining you again today and we are with Chelsea, Chelsea, tell us a little bit about yourself, where you're from, who you are, more in depth, all of those wonderful things that we want to know.
Speaker 3:Absolutely. Chad, thank you so much for having me. Uh, like he said, my name is Chelsea peddicord. I'm the pastor at Highland Park United Methodist Church here in Dallas, Texas. Love what I do. This is my fourth school year, you know, and youth pastors. We talk in school year's not regular years. Right. So it's been a really sweet time in my ministry, getting to few students who I saw as freshmen now becoming seniors and kind of walking that full high school journey with um, um, in my last year of seminary, excited to start sleeping again after may not be doing full time school and full time work. Did my Undergrad in sociology at Oklahoma state. I'm originally from the Dallas area, so it was nice kind of going away for a few years and then coming back. I really love this city and have a heart for the community. I am pastoring
Speaker 2:just a few years ago and so Columbus Day. Fair enough. How do you think we're going to do this season? I got to be honest with you. My wife and I are both alumni. I guess that we already started. I guess we have to keep going. I think you'll be fine. I think you'll be fine. I'm going to turn the other cheek. Don't worry. I appreciate that. What a, what? A very Jesus' life thing. Alright, so Chelsea, tell me, tell me about like how you got into student ministry from Oklahoma state. You're doing seminary now? Where are you doing your seminary work at? Smu, so very nice. So how are you, how'd you get into involved in student ministry?
Speaker 3:Yeah, so I grew up really youth ministry. My family was not super active in church but due to some health issues that my mother was having, my parents would be like, oh, what do we do with Chelsea? She's just 14 year old, let's just drop her off at the church and kind of go from there. Um, so I was super involved in my own youth ministry. Uh, even to this day, I say that the youth pastors I had growing up, uh, kind of were like parents to me. I really loved them and they really invested. In one year I decided I'm going to go on the African mission trip because good Christians go to Africa. Right. It's what you're supposed to do.
Speaker 2:So I went to Africa.
Speaker 3:I have, I know some people are called to be missionaries and they are fantastic at that. On my end, I'm kind of missing. I don't want to move here, you know, everyone after a mission trips, like when my heart is calling them to move to Africa, I was on the plane thinking I'm about ready to be back in Dallas. I didn't get it. Most of the missions trip was actually working in hospices in orphanages and little kids scare me. So that was hard. And then the hospice was very, very moving and very powerful. It taught me a lot about prayer, but the one thing we did that year and they never did it again was we taught sex ed in high school, so we're on the plane coming back from Africa and everyone's sharing their favorite part of the trip. Right. And every kid like, oh, I want to keep praying for the student I met at the orphanage and some kids, it's just our prayer that I witnessed in the hospital. And I'm sitting there and I'm like, teaching sex ed in high school was just my favorite thing. Am I the only one here? And I felt really crazy and really weird. I was the only one who enjoyed that. Everyone else thought it was awkward. Uh, so. So I kind of forgot about that, but later that year I got asked to serve and help with the middle school girls bibles, which I'd never done before. And I fell in love with it. I still talk to those girls today. They're a seniors at a and M and Texas tech. Um, and just started to see what it looks like to disciple and shepherd and love people. And my gifting was never going on missions and I'm getting to do a lot of those things that I think those Christians assume or what good Christians do, rather my passions more followed. Taking someone to coffee bean there when you got dumped at homecoming. I'm showing up at volleyball games and I started to sense online as I went into college. Um, I still wasn't accepting that I still wanted to, you know, make a ton of money, you know, as we all probably do at some point. And instead I ended up doing church internships and fell in love with preaching and even with the money meant anything aren't necessarily what make someone fall in love with God. But I think the big fun events with fog lights and weird pizza is what gets kids in the door to fall in love with God. I'm so over time I just fell in love with it. I saw my passions, lineup. I realized this is really fun. This is really special. And um, I think every youth pastor, you can attest from this, we learn so much more from our students than they learn from us. And so it's just been an incredible journey and incredible experience of falling in love with Youth Ministry, Student Ministry moments. Yeah. Gosh. From the good, the bad, the ugly. I'm probably one of my funnier ones was my first year at a HP EMC. I'm like, right out of college. I don't think they even realized how young I was when they hired me. And this girl, she's a senior now, she's a freshman. Her name's Maggie and we're tearing down this carnival on a mission trip. We did a community Carnival magazine. You want me to go unplug some of the inflatable. So I'm like, yeah, yeah, just do it. I'm not really paying attention. I'm like 21 years old at this point and Maggie and is standing in a puddle and while she's standing in the puddle, decides in her little freshmen brain to then unplug these inflatables. The girl gets electrocuted and I'm still. I'm super young. I don't know what to do. I'm like, oh my gosh. Electrocuted. It can freaking out. She's like my arm. I'm like, oh my gosh, Maggie. And I wish I wish chat. I can tell you that I immediately ran to my supervisor and was like, this child has been electrocuted on my watch, but it's like, how bad is it? Are you good? Are you good? And to this day we, she brings it up frequently that every mission trip we go on together, she gets really hurt in Costa Rica. She somehow busted her hand in a cement mixer. It's just always Maggie, you know, we all, we all have that one kid. Uh, so I have a collection of memories like that that are funny as well. I know, I know. Should I admit that I'm good with her family were for Duluth. I wish I could say I admitted it that day, but, but months down the road, maybe a year down the road is what it actually cut that she got electrocuted.
Speaker 2:Yeah. Wow. Yeah. And let's keep power cords away from a standing bodies of water. I think that that's probably pretty solid information as well. You're not wrong. Chad, if you could, if you could go back outside, um, you know, safety advice that you would like first day of student ministry for you, what advice would you give
Speaker 3:are important. Thanks. I agree, but for me it's, don't be arrogant. I came into ministry even understanding how young and fresh I was, very arrogant and thinking that I already knew how to preach and I already understood how to write curriculum and relational ministry and went over it. I just assumed I knew that stuff. And you don't, you, you never fully do. I don't care if you've been in mastermind groups coaching and written your own and you're preaching it, all the big conferences when you are a pastor, you truly never stop learning. It was teenagers, especially teenagers in a sense are the same, but every generation of teenager is different. Every grade you have will be different and have their own identity. And I think as pastors sometimes we come in with some pride. I think we know how to run the show already and you don't probably have talent and passion and the Lord's going to use you. Um, but you don't have it all figured out and if I could go back and Redo those early years because there are very formative, but maybe come at it with or humility, I think I would have just started out my ministry in a much healthier way and also in the same bane had a lot less resentment towards decisions that I thought should have been made. I thought they should be made or certain situations should be handled how I thought they should be handled. You know, I wasn't trusting the people who had already who were before me, who had been ahead of me in ministry for young pastors.
Speaker 2:Do you feel like there's been moments in your ministry journey that have led you to want to give yourself that advice? Like do you have specific instances that that's true for you?
Speaker 3:Yeah, absolutely. I think a lot of those moments pop up. I think we all know that your weaknesses pop up when you don't want them to. Those weaknesses of pride popped up for me. A lot of those trauma situations. I didn't know how to pastor through the first rape I encountered. I didn't know how to really process through the first time I lost a student leave marks on you and if you're not willing to ask for help, if you're not willing to turn to people who've already done this before, um, it's gonna to be devastating and it's going to be really difficult. I mean, even if you don't look at maybe the trauma, but you look at the day to day things you're doing as a pastor, right? You think you got into the bag. I bet most people who listen to this podcast saying, my Wednesday night is what it needs to be. It is number one, like no one understands, like my ones that I found it. I got it. There have been times where I still have had students come up to me, well, why don't we ever talk about this or I don't, I didn't get your sermon. Or I think it's easy to compartmentalize and assume that, well, just that kid didn't get it or they don't like this, but we do it for these reasons because you're the one who read the youth ministry books, right? You're the one who knows your youth ministries, your students. It's not yours. It's not a youth pastor ministry. No. It's a student ministry and I think you learn over time how to engage with that humility a little bit more
Speaker 2:for somebody that's listening in the middle of that, right? Like this realization that, okay, this is maybe some l unhealthy area that I've led out of for awhile. What? What encouragement would you give that person
Speaker 3:find help, find resources and that doesn't mean just youth pastors. I have a lot of friends who were therapists and they have been so valuable to me as a youth pastor. I have friends who are teachers who are so valuable to me as a youth pastor and I think we sometimes feel like we can only talk to other youth pastors about what's going on in our ministry and that's not true. There are other people in this world who have solid advice too. That was really helpful and really good and really beneficial. You know, we all preach about the Kingdom of God and we preach about the body of Christ, but are we really living into that as youth pastors of the fact that it can't be just your giftings in your vision. It's a collective group effort to figure out what sermon style works best for your students to figure out does your students want the big flashy event or maybe they just want to spend time with you over ice cream. You kind of need everyone's voice and everyone chimed in and can be exhausting. I get that. Sometimes it's easier to just do what you want to do or may events. I would love to just run how Chelsea wants to run, but it can be dangerous to your ministry to function that way. So I'll give you know, getting back to your question to be more explicit. You're in that fog when you feel like it's just you. You're not. Maybe getting other advice would ask you to look for it and maybe on it, I hate it, but it's true. Maybe you don't trust the other ministers on your staff. Maybe you're new. Maybe you have some scars there. I know that happens frequently out into the community. Need a coach and a therapist. I want to network more than I think we realize.
Speaker 2:Yeah, absolutely. Great Advice. Chelsea. Thank you so much for joining us today. Love hearing your story. I believe that there are many other youth pastors will make connect with some of the same things that you're talking about and I hope that you're listening, that there may be a piece, some encouragement for you to get connected. Find those other people they can speak into your life and that you can also be a voice and there's. Thanks so much for listening to your ministry booster.
Speaker 3:Alright. Thanks so much. Y'All have a great day.
Speaker 1:There you go. That's our interview with Chelsea peddicord. I hope that you heard the things that she was saying. There is a lot of wisdom from that young lady for all of us in every phase and every season of youth ministry, you do not have the answers. You did not have it all figured out. You may have a lot of knowledge, but know a lot of things, but hear what she has to say. Your weakness pops up when you don't want them to, and we might have a better shot if we start with humility and not arrogance, but hear this, we all want to network more than we realize. We all need to admit and be honest enough and say that we need other voices speaking into what's going on so that we don't experience the shock of being in the wrong place and making the wrong decision. That's what you thought your booster is all about and we'd love for you to check it out. Links in the description below. Thanks for listening and we'll see you tomorrow.