Getting Traineeships Going
By Pete Hughes
How do we help kids adjust to all the changes of moving to high school? Kids are going through a lot, but some churches sometimes miss the opportunities to help kids move from kids ministry (often on a Sunday morning) to a youth ministry (often on a Friday Night). Chris Jones and Annemarie Rivers from Youthworks help us think about this.
TOOL BOX:
Al James’ Workshop from Reach Australia National Conference
174 Kids Church to Youth Ministry with Maddie and Derek
CREDITS:
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TRANSCRIPT:
The following is an uncorrected transcript generated by a transcription service. Before quoting in print, please check the corresponding audio for accuracy.
Good day.I’m Pete Hughes and welcome to The One Thing, a podcast designed to give you one solid, practical tip for gospel centred ministry every week.
The One things brought to you by Reach Australia and we’d love to see thousands of healthy evangelistic and multiplying churches all over our country.And you know what makes a good evangelistic church?A great evangelist, the Unified Team and we have a great new programme out called the Team Development Programme.
Jump on the website, check it out.It is really a great, great programme and you will may well benefit from it.All right now, if you keep listening to the end of the podcast, if you endure a right right to the end, you’ll know that we always ask for suggestions and you’ve bought them.And the single biggest request that we’ve had is how do we help people transition from different demographics to others.
We’re going to be over the next few weeks, that’s what we’re going to be looking at.We’re going to be looking at how to move people from youth to young adults, from workers to retirees.There’s a whole bunch of different transitions that we’re looking at.But today we are looking at transitioning kids from kids ministry to youth ministry.
And today we have some guests with us from Youth Works.We’ve got Chris Jones, who I know is CJ but who is a youth ministry advisor, And I have Anne Marie Rivers, who is a kids worker.Sorry, kids Ministry advisor.I’ve got that right now, haven’t I?
Yeah.Welcome guys.Thanks Pete.Great to be here.Now we’re talking about life transitions and things like that.Have you guys been through a recent life transition?Well, yeah, my family married, got three kids.We’ve moved house recently, so that’s a bit of a transition, big up and change.
And our eldest son changed schools just over a year ago.So yeah, bunch of transitions going on.Yeah, yeah.Yeah, Yeah.Emory, have you been through any transitions of late or you things have been pretty stable in your life?Well one transition has been my eldest son has finished school so he’s actually at uni now and I still can’t believe I’m that old or that he is.
But it’s been a big transition, actually, to learning how to parent an adult.A young adult, isn’t it just yes, I know that feeling and I do feel for you in that whole thing, but.Thank you.Yeah.There are big transitions and there are big transitions to life.But for now you press play on another episode of the One Thing Helping kids transition to youth.
Today’s podcast is brought to you by Youth Works.Youth Works is a Christian, non for profit organisation based in Sydney.They seek to equip and empower every church to run effective youth and children’s ministries.They collaborate with local churches, schools and organisations to orientate young people for life in Christ.
Find out Morehead to youthworks.net and now back to the podcast.All right, the Bible doesn’t really think in terms of categories of youth ministry or kids ministry.It’s often kids and parents.
What should we be thinking about this?I mean, why should we be thinking about youth ministry and kids ministry at all?So, Joe.Yeah, it’s, it’s a really good question.And and you’re right, the Bible doesn’t talk about kids ministry or youth ministry.In the Bible, we just see the church, the the body of believers meeting together.
But what we do see there is actually the Bible speaks really clearly of young people being part of the body of Christ.And so we see that right throughout in the Old Testament.You know, passages like Deuteronomy 6 are really helpful for us in thinking about the importance of God’s people passing on their faith to the next generation.
And we we see that consistently throughout the Old Testament.And then in the New Testament, young people are very much considered as as part of the body of Christ.We see young people having having key roles.Timothy, for example, we, we don’t know he’s age, but he was a young person who had a significant position of leadership within the church.
And so young people are very much part of the body of Christ.And so the question then, I guess for us today is how do we, how do we best raise mature disciples of Jesus who are young people, right?We don’t want to wait until they’re old enough for that.
We actually want to want to start that process while while they are kids, while they are youth.And how do we best do that?Well, age appropriate, a developmentally appropriate ministry structures can actually help us to do that really well.But we also need to be careful there.
We need to be careful that when we do that in our churches, we’re not siloing off kids ministry or youth ministry as an end in themselves that that have somehow become really disconnected from from the rest of our ministry structures.And so I think I would want to say that that a really effective kids ministry or a really effective youth ministry is actually one that’s highly integrated with the bigger picture structures and and pathways of the whole church.
That’s really helpful just to just to think that kids and youth, it’s about disciple making.Yeah.I think sometimes we just lose sight of that because the kids are off somewhere else or the youth are off on Friday nights and we’re just not seeing it.But it is actually an important part of disciple making.Now we we want to talk particularly about moving kids who particularly year six moving into high school and that that’s there’s there’s so many changes.
There’s the change of schooling, there’s a hormonal changes.Anne Marie put us in the shoes of a year six kid.What?What are all the changes that are taking place there?Well, yes, spot on.There is just so much going on there and I think one thing that’s worth remembering is just that every child is different.
And so kids will experience all of these changes at some point, but it will look different in each family and even birth order effects how how kids experience this change like moving from year six to year seven particularly is that because?
If they’ve got an older sibling, they’ve seen someone do that so they know what’s going to happen.Whereas if they’re the first born, I’m the first born, so I had to break the ice for everyone else.It’s just a bit harder for them.Is that what you mean?Yeah, that’s right.And I think it it’s both ways too.Like for that first born, it’s they’re the first ones doing it.
So unless they have cousins or other family friends that they’ve seen, but also the parents.So the parents haven’t done it before.And so you’ve got a different level of anxiety perhaps.You know, there’s always guilt in parenting.There’s a lot going on for parents as well As for kids.Yeah.And so like, like you mentioned, there’s the hormone changes, the changes in their body.
There’s also a lot going on in their brain.So it’s basically during these years, the brain just culls a whole lot and restructures a whole lot.And that just means things are really changing in the way they perceive the world, the way they experience things, what’s important to them.
And even it does in a sense feel like you’ve got a toddler again as they start high school, like you might remember when your kids are younger, they don’t necessarily eat everything in their lunch box during Kindi.And it’s the same in year seven actually.Oh really?
Send them to school and they come back with full lunch boxes because they’re so busy just processing and interacting and learning new interactions and doing new things and thinking new thoughts and meeting new people that they forget to eat.So it really is, in a sense another another stage of childhood that’s like the toddler years all over again.
And this generation they’ve got on top of everything else, they’re sort of part of that COVID generation, aren’t they?Because they were really only just starting primary.So although they were sort of early in school when COVID hit.And has that affected their social interactions, do you think?I think so, although it’s hard to pin that down to any specific data yet.
I’m sure we’ll have some as the years pass.But yeah, the kids in year six this year were in year two in 2020 during the first of the COVID lockdowns.And I think, I mean, the usual thing that we would think of is the social interactions.They’ve had less social interactions, less practise interacting with lots of different people.
And I think that is a big impact.But also they’ve had less time in church programmes, which impacts what we’re talking about today in terms of transition.So they’ve just had less their Sundays at church, less time in after school programmes, less holiday programmes.So in some cases that might mean like looking a little bit less connected or hopefully people have recovered from that, but you you just want to be a bit cautious and wonder about those things.
Yeah.Now you’ve mentioned, yeah, we are talking about the transition because I, I mean, one of the extra changes we’re putting on them on top of everything else is a transition in terms of programme.CJ, you’ve been around a couple of different churches, you’re an advisor.Have you?Do you, in your experience, do you think churches transition kids to youth Well?
Yeah, I, I think it’s a really mixed bag actually in, in our roles, Anne Marie and I, we, we get to see lots of different ministries in action, you know, right across Sydney and beyond.And, you know, different scales, different types of churches.And, and so in many ways, you know, as there are lots of different churches out there, there’s lots of different ways that that churches are thinking about these transitions from kids ministry to youth ministry.
I think our sense is that overall most churches are doing OK at this, but, but perhaps sometimes we’re, we’re just almost accidentally landing into that.I think often it happens a bit loosely or there’s good intentions perhaps, but often it’s not highly intentional.
Maybe there’s not the real deep thinking and planning about how to do it or or even why we’re actually doing these things.It becomes a bit more pragmatic and kind of administrative in the way we do that.I think what what we’ve noticed is that in churches where there’s one person who who overseas kind of the whole of kids and youth ministry, when that’s one person that more naturally tends to be that the churches that that do better in this regard.
That might be the smaller churches where it was just one person overseeing that kind of whole Gindi through the year 12 age group.Or on the other end, the, the much larger churches that maybe have someone employed, as you know, the next generation pastor who broadly overseas all of the kids ministry, youth ministry programmes that might be happening and he’s able to bring, I guess one thinking to what’s going on there.
They’re the churches that are often doing better in this regard.Sometimes it’s more the the mid sized churches that maybe have someone employed in, in the kids ministry space, someone in else in the youth ministry space where there’s a bit of a, a disconnect there.Sometimes a bit of a misalignment in the thinking between right, here’s what happens in kids ministry, here’s our philosophy of ministry, here’s our practises.
And then someone else thinking about those same kind of things for youth ministry, maybe there’s, there’s not a lot always discussion or alignment there on those things.And, and so I think actually, regardless of how many people are looking after your kids and youth ministry programmes, whether that’s one or two people, I think it just highlights the the importance of actually a whole church staff team, all those ministry leaders being on the same page, being in alignment with, with thinking about kids and youth ministry and particularly those transitions between the two.
I think, yeah, I was going to say, I think that’s why transitions is such a tricky kind of thing because if you’re a kids minister, you’re focused on the kids.If your youth, you focus on the youth.It’s the crossover that becomes an issue in those mid sized churches.Whose responsibility do you think it should be to sort of start the conversation?
Do you think is it the youth minister because he’s catching the person?Is it the kids minister because they’re sending them out?Who?Who should start that?Yeah, it’s, it’s a really good question.I think.I think, I mean, it can go either way.I think the important thing is actually just that that conversation happens.
And that’s sometimes the problem that that one person is waiting for the other to take the lead on that when, when in actual fact that conversation just needs to happen, needs to be driven.Something that I’ve noticed and and experienced myself as well in ministry is churches that, that have really good junior leader training structures and, and pipelines there for, for high school as being trained up as leaders.
Actually, what we’ve noticed is that can have a really positive impact on these transitions because it means as as primary school kids are coming up into that high school age.If they’re then entering a youth Group, A high school programme, often there’s a relational buy in that’s made easier because they might know some of these high schools already because those high schools have been involved as their junior leaders in the kids ministry programme.
And so sometimes those kind of pipelines as well that we have set up in our church can, can have a really positive impact.OK now if a church doesn’t have a junior leader programme, you guys have great advice and help on how to run that.Yeah, absolutely.Come and come and talk to us at Youth Works.We’ve got some some great things we can offer there.
You go, there’s the infomercial for that one.All right, now let’s let’s get to the transitions.Emory, I want to ask you, there’s a certain transition where kids are coming out of youth ministry, sorry, out of kids ministry, not youth.They’re going into the youth ministry.How can churches help that transition when the kids are sort of finishing up, they’re moving away from the kids ministry.
What are some of the things that they can do that’ll be helpful?Yeah, it’s a big question.I think just to start with the basics, the first thing is to have a plan like as CJ said, you, you need to have those conversations and work it out together.The kids ministry leaders, the youth ministry leaders, any leaders involved need to sit down and work out what the pathway looks like.
And not just, Oh yes, they finished kids club and now they go to youth group.But actually a plan that’s got details and dates and specific information so that it can be really clear to everyone involved.And we’ll come back to what that might include in a moment.
But the next thing is to communicate the plan.And I think we underestimate the importance of this.It’s one thing to have a plan, and sometimes leaders do have a good plan.They’ve even worked it out, you know, within their leadership team.But they don’t tell anybody about it.So not just to other leaders, but the whole church should hear about this and care about it and be praying for it.
You want to be really intentional about talking to parents and to kids, so the kids need to know what’s coming up and that they’re going to be cared for.And this is not just a one off thing, but something that you would be talking about regularly through the kids programmes on Sunday mornings or on Friday afternoons or whenever your programme runs.
I actually heard about a kid in Year 6 from a church a few weeks ago where he didn’t know about youth group.For whatever reason, he was finishing.He hadn’t heard that there was such a thing as youth group at his church, and so he’d started to work out his own plan about what I was.
Going to do, yeah.So he’d started talking about to some others about oh, can I be a junior leader?When can I do that?How can I?Well, basically, what can I do so that I’m still connected to church?That’s the kind of kid you want, isn’t it?He just, he’s taking the initiative.Fantastic.That’s.Such a shame that he didn’t know, right?
Yeah.But it was so wonderful that he did.Yeah.But in most cases, that won’t happen.And so he’s his ministry leaders have now got the opportunity to go.You know what, actually, there’s so much more for you.There’s youth group.There’s people who care for you.Like there’s all these camps you can go to, these all these stuff you can be part of.
Like it doesn’t end when kids club ends at the end of year six or the end of year five.Yeah.I just want to pause there because actually is a big thing in that you’re when that communication moment, I mean, you just assume that people know, oh, there’s a youth ministry.But sometimes if you again, if you’re focused on the kids, you’re thinking about kids, you’re not actually communicating some of the things that they need to know about what’s going to happen with youth.
So there’s that moment of communication that can be a place where people have dropped the ball so.And I think that that happens particularly when it comes to youth ministry, because often our structures youth group happens on a Friday night.And so it is a little bit disconnected from perhaps what happens on a Sunday.
And so in some ways it might not be as as seen or visible to the rest of the church.And so, yeah, we need to make sure we’re communicating really clearly what what those programmes and structures are.Sure.All right.So Emery, you’ve talked about having a plan, communicating that plan and making sure the communication is really clear.Was there something else?
Yeah.And I think like we just said that that communication needs to be both formal and informal.So, you know, there might be a flyer, there might be an announcement at church, but it also needs to be that ongoing conversation about this is what’s coming up and the U 6 is going to be doing this next year and all those sorts of things.
But the third step, and CJ and I agree that this is really important, is just be following up individually with families.Like it’s very good to have a general pathway where we know generally where people are going and what they’ll be doing, but also recognise that there’s differences between families and different families might need different things.
And so we can make adaptations according to those needs, but only specifically.So we only find those things out through those conversations, talking to families in advance about what’s coming up and what might be the obstacles, what might be the problems.
And so we can actually prevent problems before they exist, before the kid drops off and doesn’t connect well into youth group.Do you, what do you think about the idea of also as the as the year sixes are coming up, I mean they lure some of them at school will do a graduation kind of thing.
Is there an idea of graduating them out of the kids programme?Is you got any thoughts on that?I think there is value in thinking about how to finish well and I think it’ll look very different in different contexts.And sometimes there’s like different things that people have tried more in the case of trying to keep the E sixes plugged in because they start to get itchy feet towards the end of the year often.
But again, how can they be serving?Like how can they be contributing and then acknowledging that contribution?Yeah, I think there would possibly be other options which I can’t.Think of yeah.And I, I think there’s real value in celebrating those moments of, you know, you’ve, you’ve come to the end of your time in this, in this group, in this programme, but you want to do that in a way that that doesn’t, that doesn’t feel like this is the end, right?
Sometimes when we celebrate and graduate, it feels like that’s the end of the line.And so we want to make sure that’s done in a way that helps them transition to that next thing, not just being an end marker.Yeah, Emery, I just want to come back to you just for one more thing in terms of the plan.
When do, when do people need to start thinking about how, when, when they start talking to say the E sixes about, hey, there’s going to be some changes coming up.Here’s by the way, there’s a youth ministry.You may not know that.When’s a good time of the year for them to start talking to the E Sixes?I actually think it should be just something that’s talked about all the time in a sense, in that informal sense, like probably even at the beginning of U-6 in terms of communicating to adults.
The thing is that kids will only think about what the pieces that we give them.So if they if they’ve never heard of it like that kid we were talking about earlier, like they can’t imagine.And so imagining what your future is like and what it will be is actually a big part of being prepared well for it and making that jump well.
So giving them like, again, we’re talking about the plan and what might be included in that plan.But things like having leaders visit the kids programme from the youth programme, if there’s junior leaders and getting them to talk about what youth group is like and why they enjoy it, things like that.So that they’ve got some kind of idea about what it’s like and why it’s going to be great for them and how it’s going to be the next step for them.
I think that’s really important.All right, CJ, can I get to you?We’ve, we’ve kind of talked a little bit about, you know, that’s preparing the U Sixes to move.Yeah.What about catching at the other end with the youth ministry?What are some of the things that churches can do to help the kids transition into youth?
Yeah.And, and in some ways, I mean, I guess this is what we’ve been saying, it’s actually not that different.There should be some of that consistency between your your kids ministry programme and your youth ministry programme.And so I think consistency is actually really important there.Hopefully in our churches there is a consistency in, in approach and philosophy and attitude towards kids ministry and youth ministry.
You know, things like expectations on, on who’s suitable for leadership, for example, you know, if, if our church would say this person’s not suitable as a youth leader, hopefully actually we’re consistent in saying, well, that also means they’re not suitable as a kids ministry leader.Sometimes that’s not always the case.So there needs to be alignment there between our our kids ministry and our youth ministry programmes.
But what sometimes happens is that as as a young person transitions from being in kids ministry to youth ministry, sometimes it can be such a a hard shift that it almost feels like you’ve gone to a completely different church.Whereas it should actually feel like a natural progression.I think when we’re getting those transitions right, that will actually happen quite quite fluidly, quite organically, rather than feeling like, gosh, I’m in this new thing now that feels totally foreign to me and, and I don’t know what’s going on.
And I think one of my perhaps part of that is also the fact that all of these ministries should be disciple making ministries.Absolutely.And so, you know, I learned about God when I was at kids church.I’m learning about God while I’m in youth.Like the gospel actually becomes that consistent kind of thing that keeps, that’s right, everything grounded.
And so in that sense, our youth ministries really are just an extension of what’s been happening in kids ministry just as we progress up in in a more age appropriate, you know, developmentally appropriate way.I think the other thing to add to that, and I think you’re right spot on, of course, the gospel and the disciple making focus is, is the unifying factor, but it’s also how that’s experienced relationally.
So in our kids ministries, we want to make sure that we’re building those relationships of trust that kids feel connected and valued and safe and able to ask the hard questions.And that’s arguably even more important in youth because of the developmental stage they’re going through and the questioning.
And so like, how are the relationships building and how are they fostered across those different programmes and our kids coming in given the opportunity to build those, you know, relationships of trust either with their peers or with the leaders?
Yeah.And, and, and sometimes we can, we can help that by actually bringing some leaders through, either continuing them on as leaders into the youth ministry or, or at least I think what’s really helpful, you know, if you, if leaders aren’t following through up into youth group as as some churches do in that transition time, you know, a lot of churches will do, you know, the, the final term of the year or the final month.
Or increasingly a lot of churches are even doing, you know, back six months of the year, having some of that crossover point where maybe those kids ministry leaders come with the young people for that first few weeks into youth group, just to help that relational transition there, because relationship is, is so important.
And, and I think how do we help that, I guess on a receiving end from the youth ministry point of view, we’ve got to remember that youth ministry, well, all ministry in fact is, is relational.And so we need to treat this transition relationally, not just not just structurally or, or as an administrative thing that has to happen because the next year is rolling around.
So we really want to have that relational focus in how we think about these transitions.I think the other thing as well is there needs to be really good clarity in in how we’re doing that transition.We wanna be communicating to families, so to the parents, to the young people themselves, when this transition is gonna be happening, why this transition is happening and and how that’s gonna happen.
I think a question I get asked quite a bit in my role is well, when is the right time to transition?You know, do do we?Is year six the the top year in kids ministry or is it better to actually transition at the end of year five and have year six as the younger grade in youth group?
I don’t think there’s actually a right or wrong answer there.I think there’s there’s pros and cons both ways, right?That’s a really interesting one, isn’t it?Because then you’re actually cutting down the amount of change that the useless kid is going through, because that’s one less thing that they’re going through.That’s right.And that’s usually the the reason that churches do that, to reduce that transit number of transitions at the same time.
And, and I think there is benefits to that, but I don’t actually think there’s a right or wrong answer there.I think that’s really contextually dependent, but it is something that’s worth thinking through each church, you know, what’s going to be best in their in their circumstance.And so I think as as kids join youth group for the first time, we actually need to be really intentional in helping them do that.
Well, sometimes we just assume that they’re naturally going to plug in and that’s just going to happen.But actually we need to be really intentional, particularly on that relational aspect, as Emery said, helping them connect relationally with their peers and with their youth leaders.
Sure.OK, this is the one thing I’m gonna ask you the question.What’s the one thing that you think churches need to know about transitioning kids to youth ministry?Emory.Plan relationally.So planning’s really important relationships really important.
Make your plans thinking relationally.Yep, totally agree.Plan relationally.And, and I’m hearing communication.That’s right.Communication’s really key as well.So yes, OK, in the toolbox we’ve got, I want you to keep an eye out.We’ve got a seminar from Al James who did some workshop at our national conference that will be coming out soon.
We do have a previous episode that kind of touches a little bit into this from Derek and Maddie, episode 174.We’ll put that there.We’ll also put a link to the Youthworks website.So if you’ve got a particular question about the Junior Leaders programme, make sure you contact them.They are here to help you.
So take advantage of that resource.Emery, CJ Thanks for joining us.Thanks for having us, it’s been great.If you’ve got a topic you want us to cover, you want to just give us some feedback, we would love to hear from you.Make sure you email us at [email protected] dot AU.
Also want to say check out our new resource page.We’ve just had it updated.It looks fantastic.Give us some feedback on that.I’m Pete Hughes, chat soon.
