When my wife and I were given the honor of overseeing the youth ministry here at New Covenant Church, we had the opportunity to go a conference called Youth Pastor Summit. The conference was hosted by an organization called Student Leadership University (SLU) and it was completely free……yes you read that correctly. AND ALL THE PEOPLE WHO WORK IN MINISTRY SAID……….AMEN, PRAISE THE LORD!!!
The entire conference was designed to provide youth pastors, leaders and all those who serve in youth ministry the opportunity to be poured in to and encouraged, it was incredible and we had a great time! The times of worship in the presence of God was incredible, the breakout sessions were inspirational and informational. The one thing that stuck out to me was the Vice President of SLU, Brent Crowe said this to start off the conference after his greeting:
“If you’re doing youth ministry alone…you’re doing it wrong.”
We had already discussed putting together a team but now we knew exactly where to start building the youth ministry. Then I started to think, you know there is not a single scripture that encourages us to do life by ourselves, let alone ministry. The bible is full of some of the greatest tag-teams of all time:
- Moses & Aaron
- Elijah & Elisha
- David & Jonathan
- Naomi & Ruth
- Paul & Timothy
I mean, the greatest to ever do ministry and THEE ONE we all should be emulating rolled 12 deep…… That’s TWELVE! Jesus had an entire squad with him as he changed the entire world! So, why do we think we can be a lone ranger??
The bible encourages us: “Two are better than one because they have a good return for their hard work. If either should fall, one can pick up the other. But how miserable are those who fall and don’t have a companion to help them up!” Ecclesiastes 4:9-10 Common English Bible (CEB)
Since then we are in our 2nd year of what we call the 212° Leadership Experience and while we still haven’t got all the kinks worked out yet, it was been fun to learn and grow with people who love God and want to see young people discover their identity and destiny in Christ. It isn’t perfect and any time you work with a group of people, there are going to be group dynamics that you have to work through. However, the beauty of a team working together is something that I know the Lord intended for us to experience on a daily basis. You can’t go it alone because honestly, you weren’t created to.
-Pastor Roger Sims Jr.
