Lead Well

Photo by Jesus Loves Austin on Unsplash If you’ve been doing small groups in your kids service for any length of time, you may be asking what is the best way to split the kids up? Do we do it by grade? Gender? Favorite candy? Random? The truth is there is no perfect answer and depending on the size of your ministry and how many kids show up per service the answer will be different. I’ve studied churches like Northpoint Community Church and Church of the Highlands and asked them what they do. In addition, I've spoken with several Orange Specialists on what are the best practices for small groups. Here’s what I’ve found.

Photo by  Tegan Mierle  on  Unsplash Milestones are a marker for how far we’ve gone and how much further we need to go. You can call them goals, or behaviors, or events, but they’re things that we celebrate as the people we minister to develop an authentic faith that lasts a lifetime. I track these milestones for each person, and they’re what I report and celebrate at volunteer and parent meetings. These are how I show that the ministry is successful and mean so much more than having a big event or a great service. I originally wrote and used these for my children’s ministry, but now that I’m working youth and adults, I can see how they also apply to these age groups as well. The biggest difference is that the older demographics may not be starting at square one, while kids most likely are.

Photo by Firmbee.com on Unsplash I’ve heard business entrepreneurs say that you have to know your numbers. The same is true with your ministry. How many attended this week? Last week? How many volunteers? First time guests? Baptisms? Small Groups? If you don’t track it, and by tracking, I mean write it down in a spreadsheet, you’re losing out on valuable information that can help you keep your ministry healthy and growing. I’ll admit I didn’t always do this. In fact, my first few years in ministry it was an afterthought. Sometimes, I would remember to count how many were in the room and tell my pastor, but I never wrote it down. Then after one Easter, my pastor came into staff meeting agitated. I could see it all over his face. He told us that we didn’t have as many show up for Easter as we did the year before. He counted the weekend as a failure. I was shocked at first and then began to wonder, how many did I have? How many last year? Or the year before? I had no Idea. I h

Photo by Glenn Carstens-Peters on Unsplash One of the biggest problems we have in ministry is getting the word out. There are a lot of different methods to tell our people about the events, ministry opportunities, and lessons coming up, and there is no silver bullet that every one will engage with.  My communication philosophy is not everyone will engage with every form of communication, but everyone will engage with some form of communication. Even though there is no perfect communication tool, one my favorite and most effective methods is writing a weekly email. Sending an email is just one part of my strategy for communication I outlined in this post , but I thought I’d dive a little deeper into the process and talk about how my strategy has changed since I originally wrote that post 3 years ago.

Baptism in water is an essential part of a Christian’s faith, and one of my favorite things to do. Working in Kidmin though, there are a lot of questions about kids being baptized. Can they be baptized? When are they old enough? How do you know if they’re ready? How do we partner with parents through this process? When I first started in Kidmin, I’d take any kid who raised their hand and said they wanted to be baptized. I would like to take the time to get to know them, but usually my evaluation was based on how long they’ve been coming to church. At my second church, we started spontaneous baptisms. This meant anyone who wanted to get baptized, could if they came to Welcome Booth during service. A person, usually a pastor, would talk with them for a few minutes to make sure they knew what they were doing, then get them all set up for baptism at the end of that morning's service. This is all well and good for adults, but one Sunday, I had a mom bring her three kids, ages 12, 8

Whether we want to admit it or not, a lot of ministry is events. Yes, we want people to know about Jesus and grow in their love for them, but how do we do that? Do we hold a class? Do we host a service? Do we put on a VBS or camp? If you think about it, all of these things are events. Oxford language dictionary defines events as “a planned public or social occasion.” This means just about everything we do in ministry is an event. Over my years in ministry, I’ve held literally hundreds of not thousands of events. The following are some things I do every time to make sure they are the best events possible.

In my last two posts I've talked about designing your shirts and ordering the right amount.  You can read those posts here: Designing your shirts Ordering the right amount Distribution The day is finally here. Your event is coming up and you now have several boxes full of your brand-spanking-new shirts. But how do you get them out to your people? How do you make sure they get the right sizes? What happens if they ordered the wrong size? If you’re going to sell them, how much should you charge? Do you have to keep inventory? It’s a lot to think about. There are no perfect systems out there, but these are some things I do to get them out to the right people at the right time, even if I’m selling them.