On September 21, 2019, thousands of youth ministry volunteers will be better equipped to care for the students in ministries across North America—in a single morning—thanks to the over 175 churches who are opening their doors to host the National Day of Volunteer Youth Ministry! What a cool result of our DYM community working together.
We asked each of them why they chose to host this event… here are some of their responses:

I chose to be a host site because we are a small community, but many of our youth groups are very connected. We often have to go to the bigger cities around us to have access to these kinds of resources. I wanted to bring it into our town, so our kids that we can do things here, we don’t have to be big, to be used by God. I want to show the leaders that we care about them and value their time. I don’t want them to have to drive 30-40 minutes away to be poured into and empowered to be better. Before I committed to the cost of hosting, I did reach out to a few of the local youth pastors and asked them if I hosted would they be interested in joining us. Once they said yes, then I hit “submit”. Financially, I could have taken the cheaper route, but my leaders and our community are worth the investment. Looking forward to hosting and I hope we get to connect with other churches/leaders that we do not know yet. To increase our ability to network, connect, and encourage pastors/volunteers. United as one body, not a bunch of churches.  — Cory | Vancouver, WA

I’m hoping to make Sacramento a Hub for warm, healthy and vibrant youth ministry for years to come. — Benji | Sacramento, CA

I chose to be a host site because it’s just not feasible to bring my whole youth ministry team with me to an event like NYWC.  I hope this will be a great opportunity to get some practical training for my leaders as well as youth workers in our vicinity.  — Josh | Jackson, MI

I decided to become a host site because training volunteers is a passion of mine. I believe the better equipped our youth workers are the greater the impact we can make on our students and communities. The more we can help youth workers go from a mentality of chaperone to mentor or mini youth pastor the greater impact we will have on the depth of that student’s faith and the greater reach our ministry will have in the community.   I also wanted to host because I’m new to the area I serve and was hoping to use the National Day of Volunteer Youth Ministry Training to get to know some of the other churches in the area and hopefully develop a local youth network. — Adam | Allentown, PA

I’m hoping to have this day, not just train volunteers, but to help them realize how much they matter and how significant they are in the Kingdom of Jesus. We’re going to go out of our way to honor and affirm them for their commitment to love Jesus and love students. And as a bonus, we get a great day of training! We have so much confidence in the DYM team’s ability to help us train and build leaders. We’re grateful for the privilege to be a part of this. — Jim | El Dorado Springs, MO

It can cause major challenges to get our team trained and all on the same page. If we were to go somewhere, we would be fighting with conflicting schedules, travel plans, and not to mention cost. This day will give us a chance to have open conversations with our leaders and this will help us improve. We expect all of our leaders to be there (36 in all)! The opportunity is great, and if we have other churches join us, even better but even if we don’t we believe the hosting cost is worth pouring into our leadership team! — Zachery | Galesburg, IL

The students I serve have been entrusted to my care by God. If I’m going to entrust them to another adult, I’m going to take God’s trusting me with them seriously enough to make sure those adults are well trained and qualified, too. – Jeff | Kalamazoo, MI

 

See more about the National Day of Volunteer Youth Ministry Training, sign-up to host, and/or be notified when registration opens at https://trainmyvolunteers.com/