The thing is, by saying thank you a lot to the people who invest in you the most... it’ll spread like wildfire. A spirit of thanksgiving starts with you!

Which of these people, with encouragement and training, could step into a new and different role in the ministry you lead? Who can you help discover a gift, or a calling?  How can God use you to show His purpose and passion to the people in your flock?

While you’re having tremendous fun together, be intentional about finding a time and place to step aside together and pray.  Here’s one example of a way to raise awareness of people around you at a theme park; of course, there are loads of ways to adapt this to your group’s personality.  As always, please offer your ideas too!

Before your group scatters into the park, give them this instruction:  as you stand in line, ride the rides, and enjoy feeling like you’re about to hurl, look around you at the other people who are here today.  Do you see people who are lonely, or hurting, or in some sort of need?  Do you see frustrated children or parents?  I’m just asking that you keep your eyes open to what’s going on with the people around you.

At [time] we’re going to take a break to eat and get out of the sun for a short time.  Be prepared to tell about your people observations, and we’re going to take a little time to pray for the folks you saw.

Jesus took the disciples aside to pray in the midst of the ordinary.  Help your students know what it is to be a disciple by developing their eye for opportunities all around them, and leading them aside to pray.

Be willing to “call an audible” during events. Adjust and flex based on what is happening as opposed to getting upset about your plan not working perfectly.

By focusing on the “main thing” (relationships) you will get to the goal (reaching and teaching students about Jesus) with a lot less frustration. Just think of all the extra energy you’d have!

If you’re new to the concept, start here with Lifehacker’s Beginner’s Guide to Mind Mapping Meetings.  There are also two handy mind mapping tools on the web.  MindMeister can process your email into mind maps, and has lots of nifty options for attaching task information, notes and more.  Text2MindMap is a web-based tool that turns your input into a down-loadable image (like the mind map with this post, click for larger version) you can use in lots of ways to share and follow the plan.

Are you using mind mapping in your ministry?  Share your tools and tricks in the comments.

As you’re loading the vehicles for your next trip, give each van or car an index card with your name and number at the top, and a pen to record the name and cell number of all the occupants.

It will only take a moment for leaders to double-check the contacts, and it could save a lot of time if plans change or someone comes up missing at check-in time (because that never happens).

Marriage is a higher calling than being a youth minister, youth director, youth pastor.  In fact, the adjective ‘youth’ could just as easily be left off, while the nouns could be replaced with any profession or vocation.  If you are called to marriage, it is a higher calling than any other work you can do.

Keeping marriage in it’s proper place, giving it the right investment of yourself is key to having the kind of marriage that gives you a support and foundation for your relationships to others.  This includes those you shepherd.  You can be an example to others in your sphere of influence including students, young marrieds, parents, and co-workers.

A few ways to demonstrate the priority of your marriage:

• When you are with your spouse, be fully present.  Yes, in ministry emergencies happen, but stuff you didn’t make time for in the office isn’t a pastoral emergency, it’s poor time management.
• Take your days off and vacations and invest in your relationship with your spouse.  Retreat days together, vacations ‘just the two of you’ are important when you’re spending weeks at a time with others for ministry.  Brining your spouse along on a mission trip isn’t what I’m talking about!
• Block out a time every week for a date, put it on your calendar and make it non-negotiable when you’re planning other events and meetings.  That’s not to say never change it, simply make sure it always happens weekly.

What are your ways of keeping your marriage strong in the hectic life of ministry?

I believe He has laid out for us guidelines as ministers in how to live our lives. If you do not make time for yourself you burn out and become very short fused with people. If you don’t make time for your family your marriage, if not ruined ,becomes very rocky and your relationship with your children becomes estranged. How do we find this simple balance? I have not been doing full-time ministry long at all. But I know and see the freedom I have. I am not married and not tied down in a relationship. I have the freedom to work 24/6 (one of those is totally for me and no one else). I can run a mile a minute for 6 days… become exhausted and finally be able to rest on that seventh day. It’s not a normal spiritually prescribed day though. For me it is Thursday. I try not to do any church related work. I just sit and read and enjoy the day. Maybe a visit to Belfast to look at stuff I don’t have money for.

But here comes the issue…how strongly do you fight for your day of rest? The past two Thursdays I have lost the entirety of rest in that I have had meetings and things that I had to attend. I did way the option of being stubborn and not going but decided some give is ok from time to time. This as well we see from Christ. When He heads off for Tarsus and the woman comes to Him asking if He will heal her child. He had gone  away to be alone and again His ministry had caught Him. He had a decision to make. And He did what was called of Him in the moment.

Rest is something we don’t take very seriously at all. A marvelous book to read is The Sabbath by Joshua Heschel. He gives great reasons for rest in today’s everyday world.

But what happens when our ministry continues to ask so much of us? I do believe that we must stand our ground even when it upsets someone or gets them very angry with you. I had a woman the other day ask me if I would think about joining with the other youth worker and take over the Drop-in Center for the street kids. My response was NO! I don’t need to think about it. What made me answer very quickly is that she made the very loving statement I believe God wanted me to ask you and mention it to you. I had already thought about it and been praying for about a month now about it…and KNEW that right now He doesn’t want me to take that on. She was shocked that I told her no.  It was almost as if I had insulted her and her family deeply. She asked why and I just simply told her that I know God is calling me to build the church foundation and youth in my church for this year and help in the capacity of growth with the community. To add the weight of Drop in leader would be more weight that would take away from the ministry and reason I have been called here.

So here is the question - how much is too much for us in ministry? How big of a work load is too much to handle? How much time we spend is a good, safe, responsible, God given amount of time? When and how do we know when we are to give that extra nothing that we don’t have to serve even longer? What are some of your thoughts? I am learning still and pretty ambitious and strong willed. But wonder from those of you with more experience when do you say yes and no to the questions that do push us beyond what we have been called and asked to do?

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