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13 Feb 2023

4 Tips for Encouraging your Parents

By Ronald|2023-02-13T10:06:50-08:00February 13th, 2023|Parents, Youth Ministry Hacks|4 Comments

I need to share a big mistake I’ve made as a youth pastor. I’ve been in ministry now for 19 years, 17 of which have been fully dedicated to student ministry and raising up the next generation of Christ followers and leaders. Over that time, I’ve led almost 1000 youth services, 28 retreats, and seen hundreds of teens making recorded decisions to follow Jesus and be baptized. It’s been a fun ride full of ups and downs. However, I would say for the first half of my career, I made a huge mistake that I want to share for you to learn from. If I had identified this mistake sooner, I’m confident I would have seen more fruit in the ministries I was leading and better longevity for students after they left high school. Are you ready? The mistake I made was not being intentional with the parents under my care.

Now, I know some of you might be thinking, “Big deal Theo – we are a youth ministry, not a family ministry. It’s okay! I’m sure you did great during your first half.” But hear me out… Youth ministry IS a family ministry whether we like it or not. We have these students for 1-3 hours a week. Parents have the students significantly longer than that. In fact, it took me about half of my ministry career to realize that a parent’s influence will remain in a student’s life long after my time with their student is done. So, I began a shift to connect and encourage the parents within my ministry. As a result, I saw more engaged families within our ministry. I saw better collaboration between our small group leaders and families. And yes, I even saw some families skipping certain sports activities so their students could attend Mid-Week youth group or our weekend retreats/camps. The following ideas are some tips and tricks for how you can encourage your parents:

Don’t be afraid of parents.

When I first started in ministry at the age of 18, I was terrified of parents. Yes, I was in college learning about youth ministry, but I was barely out of high school. I didn’t know how to talk to adults. I thought if parents had a conversation with me, they would realize I was flying by the seat of my pants and never bring their kids back! What I didn’t realize at the time was that most parents of middle or high school students knew they needed a village to help raise their teens. So, they were actively looking for anyone to partner with. In my later years of youth ministry, instead of hiding from parents deep within the facility, I started standing by the front door to greet parents as they picked up their few and chatted with them. Parents are nothing to be afraid of. In fact, they are eager to talk with anyone who cares about their students.

Find low-effort ways to encourage parents.

This could be a monthly e-mail. A bi-weekly social media post. A newsletter you had out at the beginning of the quarter. The goal of this particular connection point ISN’T to tell them about upcoming events. It isn’t to tell them about the mission trip fundraiser or the camp deadline that just passed. It’s just to connect and encourage your parents. Acknowledge the difficulties of raising teenagers in our current culture. Acknowledge the difficulties of parenting students in the age of Tik Tok and Google searches. Acknowledge that they are currently parenting during one of the most difficult times in human history to parent teens. Then tell them it’s okay that they are tired, that they don’t have all the answers, and that they feel overwhelmed. Let them know you see them. Equip them with an article or two that can help them understand the culture their students are in better. Then encourage them with one action they can do to spiritually influence their teens. I opted for a quarterly newsletter which we mailed out and physically handed out to students to give to parents. Getting physical communication is so rare these days. I felt like it stands out when you do get something.

Create Yearly rhythms for your whole ministry to encourage parents.

In my ministry, we started a 6th and 9th-grade parent event after church (two different days.) We went to the local pizza/arcade (think Dave and Busters or Main Event, but a little more run down cause we’re on a budget!) and treated students and parents to pizza and games. After the food, we dismissed the teens to go have fun and me and my leaders spent some time vision casting to these parents who were nervous about their student entering the next phase of life. We always did this in early summer, so we weren’t competing with school activities. It was also a GREAT way of plating our ministry flag in the family at the beginning of this new phase of life before school activities had a chance to fill up the space.

Another thing we did was just have a parent night in the fall. If you’ve never run a parent night before, check out this resource I created for youth ministries on COLEADER. If you are interested, it has everything you need to pull off a great parent night that will feel fruitful and fun, and help kick-start parent engagement.

Train your team to be specific.

Don’t be a superhero. You likely have a team of other people with you who love students. Don’t take the weight of trying to encourage every parent. Instead, train your team to look for specific things in the students they oversee and then pass that encouragement on to a parent. Raising teenagers is one of the hardest jobs in the world, and most parents are just trying their hardest to work a full-time job, care for their own mental health, and raise kids. From experience, I would say most parents don’t feel like they aren’t doing enough or don’t even know where to start. So when they get positive feedback that their mini-human did something selfless, it’s the best news a parent can get!

Make it your mission to deliver this good news to parents as often as you can. If a leader notices a student do something positive worth sharing with a parent, help that leader connect with the parent. Find them after youth group. Search for their contact information on the church database and send them a letter, e-mail, or text (who calls anymore?). Getting specific positive feedback about a student can sustain a parent during the times they feel like they’re drowning in the uncharted sea of raising teenagers.

Theo Davis serves as the Multi-Site Youth Pastor at Restore Community Church in Kansas City, Missouri. He has worked in youth ministry for 16 years in a variety of settings which include church plants, rural churches, and mega-churches on the East Coast and now Midwest. He received his degree in Youth Ministry from Eastern University in 2008 and has continued to leverage his education with real-world experience. He and his wife Malia are huge gamers and named their kids after video game characters — Zelda & Shepherd (from The Legend of Zelda and the Mass Effect Series). Theo also loves action figures, and spends his spare time developing his musical and visual art talents. Follow him on Instagram @theo_davis

Need some resources to help encourage your parents? Check out these winners from DYM!

You probably didn’t go into youth ministry to focus on parents. In fact, sometimes we look at them as a hurdle to what we are trying to accomplish. Yet, there is no escaping the fact that they are an integral part of what we do and how we do it. Sometimes the best way to minister to your teens is by ministering to their parents. Allow these texts to serve as encouragement and coaching to them. Many of these are seasonal: first week of school, Thanksgiving, Christmas, Mothers’ Day, etc… Like a great DYM-product… it’s done for you. This is a great deal!

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Reflections for Parents is a prayer station experience designed specifically for parents. If you are looking for a way to connect with parents and earn their trust, provide a meaningful development opportunity, or an encouraging night out, this resource is for you.

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27 Jul 2017

The 4 Types of Students on Every Mission Trip

By Josh Griffin|2017-07-27T09:48:32-07:00July 27th, 2017|Parents, youth mission trips|2 Comments

Trying to teach your students to be missional? Helping them live out their faith both here at home or around the world? Good for you! Well, before your next mission trip – heed this warning – there are only 4 types of teenagers that go on mission trips. See if you can recognize them in their habitat:

NOTE: If you’re bold, you could even print out and frame this article, then attach individual names to where they belong with Post-It notes. You’re welcome in advance for this idea!

I’m Just There for the Instagram
Ah yes, the social media picture hunter. They will endlessly pursue the perfect picture of them laughing playfully, surrounded by kids of a different skin color, allowing the spotlight to literally be on them and not their mission. They potentially will contribute very little to the trip, but will take enough pictures to fill Throwback Thursdays for the next decade. #missiontrip #iwanttogoback

The Souvenir Hunter
This is a mission trip? I’m just here to bargain shop the street vendors. This student becomes an expert and bartering and tries to haggle with the airport barista at Starbucks™ on the way home, too. They have a list of people they need to shop for which absolutely consumes them and in some cases even brought an extra suitcase for their haul. Which is good because now they’ll have a chance to negotiate the extra bag fee at the airport check-in counter.

The “All in” Christian Kid
There’s an overzealous Christian kid on every youth group trip. He or she will bring their Bible in a protective case to everything and make other students feel guilty for not doing the same. They hold up the vans to pray over someone. Actually, now that I describe them, they don’t sound so bad after all. I wish I had a couple of these in my youth group. Why do all my students want to just take pictures and buy stuff?

The Kid Who Will Remember this Trip Forever Because of the Life Change They Experienced
OK, so we’re obviously having a bit of fun here. The prayer for all our students, even if they come just for the pictures or souvenirs or whatever their motivation is – is that they would experience life-change brought about by our Savior Jesus Christ. Mission trips local and global are a powerful tool in our ministry to students.

In fact, just recently my wife and I got to welcome our son home Austin in the airport and it was incredible. 1) He was SO embarrassed by our sign, 2) I’m SO thankful for people who believe in him and helped fund his trip. It WAS life-changing and one he’ll remember forever.

You can’t help but laugh inside just a little bit when you see a student going all in on pictures with their $5,000 DSLR Canon camera. In the slums. With gear that would make an aspiring wedding photographer jealous. Or when you see a student with 15 bags of souvenir shopping swag like this was a trip to the mall with a Back to School clearance sale.

Maybe even nudge them just a little bit if it’s too far over the top. But most of all, sit back and enjoy the fact that for many if not all of them – this is a defining trip for their worldview, their faith, their life. And you got to have a little part in leading them to that deeper place. Well done.

OK, now get those sticky notes and get cracking!

8 Nov 2016

GUEST POST: Partnering with Parents

By Josh Griffin|2016-11-08T11:59:32-08:00November 8th, 2016|Parents|0 Comments

Derry is the Student Ministries Pastor at Nappanee Missionary Church and a DYM author. We released 9 of his resources on the site that are specifically geared toward partnering with parents. You can buy all 9 (valued at $50) for a ridiculously cheap $25 in our Parents Superpack.

Partnering with parents… we use this phrase a lot

In our ministry we have historically talked a lot about the importance of partnering with parents. You probably do too, but what do we mean when we say it?

Partnership can take up a lot of forms. For example, consider this fictional man:
Bob Lahblaw is a married lawyer who works in at a major firm and gets together with a college friend 3 times at the gym to work out.

In that short sentence I’ve hit 3 different “partnerships” that are vastly different.
1. As a married man, Bob’s spouse is a partner.
2. In the law firm, he has business partners.
3. In the gym, he has a workout partner.

Can you imagine if Bob started approaching his workout partner in the same way he approached his business partner? Or what if he took the same attitude toward his spouse that he did his workout partner? It wouldn’t be long before Bob would be bankrupt and divorced, right?

Here’s the point. We can say we want to partner with parents, but what does that look like?

In our ministry, we’ve taken some time to do a little DTP (Define The Partnership) so parents are clear in what we are there for AND we can stay on mission. Here are a three core biblical values we are holding to our partnership:

1. Our partnership will be rooted in the GOD THINGS over the GOOD THINGS. In the same way Paul talks to the church in Philippi about their “partnership in the gospel,” the parents of your ministry need a partner who is laser-focused on the spiritual development of their kids. Be that partner! There are a lot of people partnering with parents to develop students academically, athletically, etc. Although some of these teachers and coaches may be Christians, there are limitations on what they can do as well as other motives to the investment. We care about one thing… students encountering an authentic relationship with God. Keep that in mind and make it known!

2. Our partnership puts us in a support role. Deuteronomy 6:4-8 makes a clear statement that parents are to be the primary spiritual authority and investors in their kids’ lives. We are there to support them in their efforts. As we keep this in mind, we may find ourselves stepping back a little when there is a clash of philosophies with parents. As we communicate it with parents, they are reminded that you are not the spiritual dry cleaner left in charge to “straighten their kids out.”

3. The Partnership Model: We are Aaron and Hur to their Moses. Exodus 17 tells this bazaar story of the Israelites fighting the Amalekites. In the battle, the Israelites were winning as long as Moses’ arms stayed in the air with his staff in hand. In order to keep his arms in the air when he got weary, Aaron and Hur came on each side of him and held his arms up. You and I are to be the Aaron and Hur to the parents of our team. When they are growing weary, we can come alongside them through prayer, affirmation and encouragement. Outside of promotion, this is where use social media, texting and email the most.

We also want to equip and empower parents as we partner with them, but the above three are the ones we have sought to focus on and clarify to parents.

Is it time for you to have a “Define the Partnership” in your ministry?

8 Nov 2016

Help! I’m Overreacting to My Teen All of the Time

By Josh Griffin|2016-11-07T19:59:20-08:00November 8th, 2016|Parents|1 Comment

Parents! Don’t make the critical mistake of exploding on your teens all of the time. This is a quick way to establish huge walls with them. While sometimes they certainly do things that warrant a good old freak out, under normal circumstances they should be few and far between.

I’ve done youth work for more than 20 years and am in the thick of raising teenagers of my own right now. Here are 3 simple, guiding principles I hope will help guide you in the future. I’ll be back with a specific article in the near future to unpack each of them, too:

Nudge often. Coach sometimes. Explode rarely.

Nudge often
Your teens need nudging more than anything. A nudge can be a recognition of something or someone good – literally a little kick under the table or slight elbow to increase attention. You hear a particular good point in a movie, give them a budge. They’re about to take a big leap of faith, give them a little nudge. See an example of a good friend or a particularly bad friend? Help them see it more clearly with a little nudge. Effective parents have scores of moments like this throughout the week. These are beautiful, simple moments that make a huge difference while the teenagers hardly notice they are being parented.

Coach sometimes
There’s nothing better than a great coaching moment – these are longer interactions than the quick nudge, where you unpack the behavior that was unacceptable or identify something that was noticed. You coach them to get their homework in even though they’ll get zero points because it builds good will with the teacher. You push them to stick out the cross country season because it teaches them to finish what they start. These type of interactions happen weekly, but be careful they don’t happen too frequently or they could easily degrade into lectures and stump speeches.

Explode rarely
Often times the “go to” reaction of parents, a fiercely passionate parent has its place, but needs to be used rarely to remain effective and not characterize the parental style. My goal is that my teenager feels the urgency of the situation without a full on verbal brawl, but if it has to come to that I will go there. These are reserved moments, that must happen rarely, saved for those life-altering trajectory moments that deserve it.

Take a few minutes and thing about your default reaction. Do you notice those little moments, words or details and nudge often? When there needs to be a little more push, do you coach well? What consequences has the explosion caused in your family? What would you go back and change if you could?

Good stuff to think about as you live out the blessing of raising teenagers!

2 Nov 2016

GUEST POST: 3 Easy Tips for Being Awesome with Parents

By Josh Griffin|2016-11-02T05:23:18-07:00November 2nd, 2016|Parents|0 Comments

GUEST POST by DYM Author Eric Ferris

To this day I remain astonished that parents trusted me to take their kids on my first ever missions trip. I was 23 years old and they let me take their kids across the pond to England and Wales. As a father now with my own kids in middle school and high school, I appreciate what HUGE trust that was! I still think it was a little nuts.

I went to a Bible College to be trained in youth ministry. I really appreciate the training I received. As I look back, there was one class I wish I could have taken. A class on parents! Let’s face it, you’ve got be a lot older than the average youth pastor to have personal experience being the parent of a teenager. Even if you have your first kid at age 20, you’ll be at least 31 before that kid enters your youth ministry. How do you build a bridge to span the decade or two of age and experience gap between the average youth pastor and the parents in your church?

Here are a few golden tips I’ve picked up in the last 20+ years of youth ministry that have helped me build trust and rapport with parents. I’m not gonna lie, nothing replaces having your own kids in the youth ministry because being able to say “me too” to a parent is powerful. However, just because you don’t have kids of your own in the ministry doesn’t mean you can’t understand, encourage, and equip the parents in your church.

THREE EASY TIPS FOR BEING AWESOME WITH PARENTS (yeah…there’s more, but this is a great start!)

Be a Resource– I’ve heard youth pastors tell me that they avoid trying to help parents because they don’t have teenagers themselves. That’s an excuse likely based on insecurity or intimidation. Don’t cop out. You don’t have to have personal experience to be a resource. You likely know more than you think you do. Give yourself some credit! Plus, sometimes not being wrapped up in a situation emotionally (like most parents are because they love their kids) makes your objectivity helpful. Take time to listen to parents. You may not be able to give great advice, but anyone can listen. Here’s the tip: Identify your five “go to” parenting books to which you can refer parents. There’s lots of good ones out there. By doing so you’ll help parents, communicate care, and build trust.
Be on Time– Do you know what annoys me more than anything else as parent? Waiting in my car for my kids. When a coach says practice ends at 6:30p, they should end at 6:30p. When a band trip is supposed to return to the school at a certain time, they should be back at that time. Do I sound like a curmudgeon? I promise that this is how most parents feel waiting in the church parking lot. Parents are busy juggling the schedules of multiple humans in their house. You care for families when you don’t waste their time. Here’s the tip: Be militant about dismissing your programs on time and pad your trip schedule to have more time than you need to return to the church. Better to return early and the kids wait for the parents than vice versa. In the rare case that your trip is getting back late, get those kids on their phones to give parents a warning. There are likely dozens of GPS’s on that bus or in those vans, so you should be able to pinpoint an arrival time.
Be Clear– Great communication is not super-difficult, but it does take a few extra minutes of thought. You are doing great if your registration form, email, newsletter, or webpage has very clear info. Parents have to keep track of lots of stuff (and single parents have it even tougher). Parents need to know what (details) and why (purpose). If they are going to pay money and get it on the family calendar, you help them make choices by communicating exactly what an event is meant to accomplish (fun?, outreach?, discipleship?, etc). Work on being able to communicate the purpose of an event in one sentence. The clarity you gain is worth the extra effort and will likely make your event better too! Here’s the tip: Communicate far in advance (farther than you think necessary), communicate often (more often than you think necessary), and pound parents with communication the week leading up to a deadline. You know how that works…everyone signs up last minute, right? Parents will appreciate the extra communication as a deadline approaches, not resent it. Oh..and an extra bonus if you find a parent to edit your stuff so you get a parent perspective on your communication. If you‘re not a parent yourself, you may be surprised what FAQ’s parents will have.

Being awesome with parents makes you super-awesome with students. It’s not an age thing. It’s an intentionality thing. Want an easy way to get better? Check out the U<60 Parent Resources on DYM to equip yourself and encourage the parents in your church!