Is the youth group your personal habitat?  Is it a display of your personality?  Do you allow personal comfort and natural pragmatic thinking to rule how you minister?  Are your actions an asset or a liability?  Youth leaders must follow the example of Paul who fleshed out a demonstration of the truth in his faithful daily ministry.

Reading:

• Acts 20:18-21
• Colossians 1:9—For this cause we also, since the day we heard it, do not cease to pray for you, and to desire that ye might be filled with the knowledge of his will in all wisdom and spiritual understanding.
• Acts 20:18—And when they were come to him, he said unto them, Ye know, from the first day that I came into Asia, after what manner I have been with you at all seasons.
• 2 Timothy 3:10—But thou hast fully known my doctrine, manner of life, purpose, faith, longsuffering, charity, patience.

Paul’s manner reflected his habits, because a habit is the foundation of one’s manner. And Paul’s habits reflected a changed life driven for the purpose of making Christ-like disciples.

What is a habit?  Definition:  a) a thing done often and hence, usually done easily; practice or custom, b) a pattern of action that is acquired and has become so automatic that it is difficult to break.

Habits That Help

Key Thought: You must evaluate your habits in youth leadership by recognizing and imitating nine of the Apostle Paul’s habits, which he practiced from the beginning of his ministry.

1. Habit of prayer—Beware of doing the physical work without the spiritual work.
2. Habit of humility—Beware of getting proud; humble yourself.
3. Habit of compassion—Beware of getting hardened and calloused.
4. Habit of endurance—Beware of allowing discomfort and fear to keep you from doing the work God has called you to.
5. Habit of generosity—Beware of hoarding resources. Beware of making quick indictments.
6. Habit of openness, transparency—Beware of being defensive.
7. Habit of teaching—Beware of losing your purpose and your students.

• Publicly
• Privately

8. Habit of longsuffering and patience—Beware of vindictiveness.
9. Habit of inclusiveness, of reaching out to all—Beware of getting comfortable. Keep the vision of the lost before your eyes.

Habits That Hinder

1. Have favorites. Let some things slide with the “good” kids and stick it to the “bad” ones.
2. Prepare messages at the last minute, and do not give God time to teach you the lesson personally.
3. Stay with pre-planned topics; leave no room for specific topics of need or interest.
4. Do not give any thought to curriculum or other teaching helps; do it all yourself.
5. Allow the teens to use the youth group participants as targets for their infatuations.
6. Encourage exclusive relationships in the teen group.
7. Select ministry teams by personal subjective standards; avoid clear qualifications and objective self-defining standards.
8. Evaluate your effectiveness by asking teens, “Did you have fun at that activity?”
9. Make sure all teen activities are always exciting and entertaining.
10. Be sure to have plenty of adult leadership, mainly for the preparation and clean-up of activities.
11. Never use parents as adult sponsors since the teens live with them all the time.
12. Compete with parents for the loyalty of their children.
13. Remind yourself continually that as a youth leader you have special insight that overrules parental insight and discretion with a teen.
14. Minimize your mistakes before the teens and be sure to justify what you have done, even if it was clearly a bad choice. You must not lose the respect of the teen group.
15. Be sure to make all the major decisions by yourself.
16. Plan one week at a time.
17. Cancellations are an effective way to do youth work and yet keep good family time.
18. Be sure to constantly push the limit; this makes for an exciting youth ministry.
19. Cancel an activity if only a few show up.
20. Be discouraged and speak about how much you are limited by a small youth group.
21. Make sure you keep activities highly competitive and be sure to compete with the teens every chance you get.
22. Always play to win.
23. Listen to all of the teens’ suggestions in order to keep up with the times.
24. Keep up with the latest innovations of the largest churches, no matter what you have to change.
25. Make sure everyone feels comfortable in the group.
26. Pick games which include a great deal of physical contact between the guys and girls; they seem to really respond to these.
27. Understand that teens are a class best left to themselves without the interference of other misunderstanding generations.
28. Do not bore the teens with too much Bible.
29. Remember that all good youth leaders run a little late; parents understand.
30. Rationalize why you do not have enough time to visit the teens.
31. Pray that teens will return since you just have not had the time to visit them.
32. Always encourage socialization among the teens; never separate teens from their buddies. (Pooled ignorance will pay off every time.)
33. Avoid dealing with tough problem situations: hope they will go away or the people will move away.
34. Remember your pastor is busy; do not bother him with policy changes.
35. Speak only to moms, as opposed to dads, about issues with their teens.
36. Focus on the ninety and nine and forget about the lost sheep since he was too stupid to stay in your flock anyway. (Ministry is not about pastoring people but about protecting yourself.)
37. Be a black sheep backer; the faithful do not need your attention—focus on the fringe.
38. Beware of delegating tasks to others since they might make a mistake.
39. Make the youth your own personal domain and be defensive of those who try to horn in.
40. Keep everything general in order to have an impact on the largest group.
41. Be willing to continually sacrifice your family’s time for the youth; the greater good is done with the larger number.
42. Do not run a new activity until you have taken a vote with the teens.
43. Minimize the roles of teens on activity function and planning.
44. Jump at your latest ideas. Keep things spontaneous; if you think too much, you may never do it.
45. Assume you will never have injuries. Plan for the activity, not the emergency.
46. Let the fear of any injury keep you from having challenging activities.
47. Trade motion for meditation.
48. Do not worry about keeping records; they’re just a waste of time.
49. Listen to those who enthusiastically praise your work, and ignore criticism.