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Think Small
Many of you might look at the title of this article and say, “Think small? Don’t you mean think big?” In our culture today, even in the culture of the church, it is more common to think big than to think small. Many times when people hear the word small, they cast it in a…
Read MoreOpEd: The Constitution is for everyone. Education should be too.
Our city has a crisis that goes far beyond where congregations gather on weekends. Let’s redirect the city’s energies into partnerships that advance our children. By Fernando Cabrera and Jeremy Del Rio Our city has a crisis that goes far beyond where congregations gather on weekends. Forty percent of New York City high school students…
Read MoreDave Gibbons – Present/Future of the Church
Join Dave Gibbons in his talk about the Present/Future state of the Church, given at RELOAD Lab Bay Area on Feb. 2012 Listen to Audio Recording or download MP3: [audio:https://uywi.org/wp-content/uploads/2012/02/2012-02-20_PresentFuture_Dave_Gibbons.mp3|titles=2012-02-20_PresentFuture_Dave_Gibbons]
Read MoreEmbrace the Mess: Why Youth Must Lead Now (Part 2)
Opportunity Not “me.” I wasn’t going to make this happen. We. Raw, gritty, spiritually immature street kids included, and whoever else wanted to help. We were going to have to lead this effort. Together. Not everyone from that initial meeting rose to the challenge. But thirteen of them did, ages 14-22. Most were struggling high…
Read MoreWhat’s Next for Seniors?
“It is only as we develop others that we permanently succeed.” – Harvey S. Firestone Every youth pastor understands the challenge they face when students finally become seniors. They seem to unplug. They complain that the programming is “too young” for them. There are very few programs they want to connect to. Let’s face it,…
Read MoreEmbrace the Mess: Why Youth Must Lead Now (Part 1)
Many of the Generation Xcel co-founders with the Summer 1999 interns “And a child shall lead them.” – Isaiah 11:6 “You see things and say, ‘Why?’ But I dream things that never were and say, ‘Why not?’” George Bernard Shaw It felt like a mutiny. As an official youth group, we were still young, not…
Read MoreGoing Deep
Over this past winter, as we were teaching our students, we noticed that an increased amount of them were approaching our staff with questions about water baptism. Some just had questions about the purpose of water baptism, while others who had a solid understanding of the nature of baptism showed an intense desire to be…
Read MoreWhy Loving Young People is like City Living
Greetings from Brooklyn, New York, the most populous borough in New York City. Birthplace of Jay-Z and the integration of Major League Baseball. And site of the largest battle of the Revolutionary War. If Brooklyn were its own city, it would be the fourth largest in America. My name is Jeremy Del Rio and I’m an addict — if you can call young people an addiction. …
Read MoreGoing Global – Part 2
In Part 1, we learned that the mission of every youth ministry must have a global perspective. We must create opportunities for the students to get their hands dirty, so to speak, and get involved in meeting the needs of the world around them. I am the youth pastor for Velocity, the youth ministry program…
Read MoreConfessions of a Hypocrite Youth Pastor, Part 2
(Continued from Part 1.) Salvation visited me in the person of a homeless runaway who forced me to confront my tendency, even as a youth pastor, to live for myself instead of those around me. My tendency to gravitate to people, places, and partners that could add value to my ministry. To pursue relationships for…
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