A Thankful Heart

I think often in our lives (or at least in my life), in the midst of a difficult or confusing situation, it is easy to overlook acts of kindness in our lives that should inspire thankfulness and to let our situations in life keep us from an attitude of gratefulness--toward others and toward God--that should mark us. Two situations in my life right now have caused me to realize this reality and have served to remind me how miserably I have failed to live with an attitude of thanksgiving regardless of my circumstances, especially over the course of the past year.

The first reminder of this comes due to the fact that I am finishing my current internship at International Baptist Church of Hong Kong this Sunday. Over the course of the year, I have received overwhelming support from the church in a number of different ways. People from the church have given me words of wisdom when I needed to hear them, they have bought me meals, they have invited me into their families (this one was especially nice on holidays), they have offered to help in various ways with the youth ministry, they have listened to my complaints (although my complaints often were often due more to my own immaturity than to anything which warranted complaining), and more. Throughout the course of the year, however, rather than rejoicing in the fact that I had such a loving and supportive church family, I have often found it much easier to complain that we didn't have more youth volunteers (a fact which is made even more ridiculous by my recent discovery that the method I most often employed of recruiting volunteers is probably the worst way to recruit volunteers possible), that our kids weren't more committed to our youth group, and that parents often place more priority on their children's academic life than on their spiritual life (this is a legitimate one, but it is part of Hong Kong culture that I need to learn to address properly rather than complain about if I want to be effective at reaching the youth here... But that's a whole different article). My lack of a proper attitude of thanksgiving became apparent to me this week when my pastor asked me to share a few words with my church this Sunday about my time at IBC, what I've learned over the past year, etc. As I sat down to prepare what I would say, I was reminded of the myriad things I had to be thankful for during my time at IBC and felt a deep conviction for the lack of thankfulness I have displayed compared with what I ought to have displayed.

The second reminder of my lack of thankfulness came due to the fact that I have a new friend who recently moved to Hong Kong. This friend's brother-in-law and sister were two of the people who helped make me feel welcome when I first arrived in Hong Kong, and since they are back in the States now, I figured I would do whatever possible to help make her transition to Hong Kong as smooth and comfortable as possible. I really haven't done too much, but for the small things I have done, she has been very thankful and appreciative. By seeing her thankfulness, I was reminded of the numerous times that her brother-in-law and sister went out of their way to make me feel welcome here. I know that I was very thankful for a lot of what they did for me, but I think that in the midst of the craziness of adjusting to a new job and a new city on the other side of the world, I often tended to think of their kindness as something I deserved rather than as a gift I didn't deserve (even if I did say "thank you" to them for the things they did). The way that this couple went out of their way to make me feel welcome in Hong Kong is way over and above what they had to do, and the level of thankfulness that I felt towards them was not anywhere near what it should have been.

Lord, give me a heart that sees that every good and perfect gift in my life has its ultimate root in You, and that each gift is the result of the great grace that You have shown me through Christ on the cross. Let me cultivate a spirit of thankfulness in my life, both toward You and toward those that You use as instruments to bring these gifts into my life. Amen.

Things I've Picked Up So Far

Well, I have begun my process of meetings and readings in researching for my new job. I still have a lot of preparation work left to do, but there are a few very important things I have picked up so far. Here are some of the highlights:

• Nobody has youth ministry entirely figured out. If they tell you they do, they are either lying or mistaken. There is no "one size fits all" plan for how to establish a ministry team, connect with youth, and disciple them in a lasting way. There are certain guidelines that often work as general rules, but in terms of a specific step-by-step process, each church has its own unique DNA that makes it impossible to impose a formula upon it.

• If you try to run the youth ministry by yourself and it has more than 12 kids, you will burn out. Volunteers are essential to a successful youth ministry.

• Volunteers are not babysitters. If you treat them like babysitters and don't let them be involved in helping with important parts of the ministry, you will 1) make them question whether what they are doing is important and whether their gifts would be better used somewhere else, and 2) end up running the ministry by yourself, which doesn't work.

• From talking with people in Hong Kong, it has been a general consensus that one on one time with kids is essential in order to connect with them, especially in Hong Kong. In Hong Kong, many kids are raised in such a way that people are concerned about their grades, their athletic abilities, and their musical abilities, but very few people are concerned about them as individuals. One person told me his ministry philosophy for working with youth in Hong Kong is, "To be known is to be loved, and to be loved is to be known." Basically, unless you are able to form a deep relationship with the kids where they feel that you truly know and understand them, they will view you as just another adult in their life who is trying to make them more marketable without actually caring about them as a person. Another Hong Kong youth worker told me it has been his experience that a 15 minute one-on-one conversation with a student in Hong Kong can have the same effect on that student as a conversation that would take a few hours anywhere else.

• Youth workers reaching kids is great, parents reaching their own kids is essential. For all the work I do with kids, I will end up having less than 5 hours a week of influence on almost all of them on average. Depending on schedules, a parent can get that much time with a kid in a night, and more on weekends. If the truths I am teaching the youth aren't being reinforced at home, they are much less likely to stick long-term.

• Just as a good pastor has to do in order to be effective in his city, a good youth worker must correctly identify the idols of the youth he or she wants to reach. It is much easier to point kids to Christ if we know what the biggest hindrance is that is keeping them from Him in the first place.

• While having a lot of kids in a youth ministry is great, we must be sure that we are ultimately drawing them to Christ, and not something else (and there are a lot of other things that we can--consciously or subconsciously--draw them to). One of my former youth leaders reminded me that "what you draw them with is what you will draw them to." Crazy and fun youth events are great, but they must not get in the way of our kids seeing and loving Christ. A school teacher in Hong Kong added the wise advice, "Foster a love for God's Word among the youth, not just a love for fun and fellowship." Fun and fellowship are great, but if they come at the expense of the youth knowing Christ, then they are a fatal distraction.

Hopefully, I will learn more as these meetings continue, but I think this is a good and very useful starting point.

Thoughts on Youth Ministry

Sorry I've been so inconsistent with the posts lately. My summer has been crazy. Hopefully things will begin to settle down for a while now and I should be able to post more consistently (at least for a while).

For those of you who haven't heard yet, I have gotten a new job that will start September 1 as a youth director in a recently started church plant called "Watermark Community Church"... which is also in Hong Kong. Actually, Watermark is new enough that it doesn't have a youth ministry yet, and my job for now is to get a youth ministry in place.

In preparation for my new job, I have become a student again. I have been reading books on youth ministry and mentoring, having conversations about youth ministry with different people, and praying about what the new ministry will look like. I am basically trying to get as wide a variety of views on youth ministry as possible so I can be aware of as wide a range of options as possible and make the wisest decision about which directions to move with Watermark's youth ministry.

I know that many of my readers here are/have been involved in youth ministry at various times in the past. Are there any books or articles you would say I have to read before starting the new job? Is there anyone I have to talk to in order to be fully informed? (Yes, Mrs. Costine, I have sent a message to Tim...) Is there anything I have to know about the job before beginning it? Any input would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks.