Junior High Pastor’s Summit Notes (Part Five)

 Mark Oestricher is the President of Youth Specialties and a career leader in Junior High Ministry. On a yearly basis, he and a group of influential full time junior high pastors gather for a summit on the state of junior high ministry. Below are his notes from the summit.
this year at our junior high pastors [...]

Radical Hospitality (Part Eleven: A View From The Front Lines)

This is Part 11 of the Spring Leadership Lesson Series: Radical Hospitality at National Community Church. As we lead our groups and ministries, we must strive to forcefully advance the Kingdom of God through strategic evangelism, exponential discipleship, and sacrificial service. Hospitality is on the front lines of such an advance.
Today, Heidi Scanlon gives us [...]

From The Ground Up: Introduction

Over the course of the next few months, I’m going to take the time to walk through some of the basics I believe are crucial to any junior high program. I don’t have all the answers but there are a couple of things I’ve had the opportunity to learn that I thought I would pass [...]

Radical Leadership (Part Ten: The Requirement Of Leadership)

This is Part 10 of the Spring Leadership Lesson Series: Radical Hospitality at National Community Church. As we lead our groups and ministries, we must strive to forcefully advance the Kingdom of God through strategic evangelism, exponential discipleship, and sacrificial service. Hospitality is on the front lines of such an advance.
In Paul’s first letter to [...]

Junior High Pastor’s Summit Notes (Part Four)

Mark Oestricher is the President of Youth Specialties and a career leader in Junior High Ministry. On a yearly basis, he and a group of influential full time junior high pastors gather for a summit on the state of junior high ministry. Below are his notes from the summit.
this year at our junior high pastors [...]

Why Do Some Ideas Survive And Others Die?

What makes an idea stick? Chip Heath and Dan Heath recently wrote a book entitled, “Made to Stick: Why Some Ideas Survive and Others Die”. During their research, they took at close look at hundreds of ideas and came up with six principles that they said they saw over and over again that made ideas [...]

Radical Hospitality (Part Nine: Adding Value To People)

This is Part 9 of the Spring Leadership Lesson Series: Radical Hospitality at National Community Church. As we lead our groups and ministries, we must strive to forcefully advance the Kingdom of God through strategic evangelism, exponential discipleship, and sacrificial service. Hospitality is on the front lines of such an advance.
Today, we will explore the [...]

Keeping It Simple

Scott Hodge over at The Orchard Church has a recent post where he talks about the value and importance of simplicity.  For them, what they call simplicity, to others might just be known as understanding your mission and picking and choosing things that will fulfill your mission while maintaining your values.  Here’s what he had [...]

The State Of Junior High Ministry

A couple of months ago Alan Mercer wrote a little blog about a new Barna Group Study.  Below is that blog entry.

George Barna has come out with another research study that says 61% of students who were involved in church youth ministries as teenagers have disengaged from the church during their 20’s. My question becomes [...]

Junior High Pastor’s Summit Notes (Part Three)

Mark Oestricher is the President of Youth Specialties and a career leader in Junior High Ministry. On a yearly basis, he and a group of influential full time junior high pastors gather for a summit on the state of junior high ministry. Below are his notes from the summit.
this year at our junior high pastors [...]