I am a senior pastor with a youth pastor serving in our church, and my goal is to hang on to her for as long as I can. I believe we support her well, we pay her a good salary and give her benefits with 4 weeks of vacation, and help with her continuing education. I try to make sure she is not worked to death, and shield her from unrealistic expectations from the church.

What else would you suggest? She has peers and friends that she contacts on a regular basis. Anything else?

I have been in Youth Work for about 10 years, and I’ve been at the same church for over 4 years.  I’ve seen a LOT of my peers come and go.  From my observations I see two reasons that cause a large majority of youth leaders to leave.  The first reason is the life phase of most youth leaders.  Most churches want to hire the cool young guy with the gotee, or the energetic young lady who draws the teenage girls in and dresses like the youth, except everything important is covered up.  Most of the folks their age change majors in college a half dozen times or so because they don’t really know what they are getting into.  These young adults only know they are called into ministry and simply gravitate toward what they are familiar with, where they feel most comfortable, or the only position they can obtain.  (let’s face it, no one would hire a 25 year old Senior Adults Ministry) Most college students I know want to do youth work, work with college students or be single ministers, if they are single, and young married ministers if they are married.  (I know very stereotypical but true to life) Most seminary students I know want to be seminary or Bible college profs or preachers.  All that to say, if you hire a person that doesn’t know what they want to be when they grow up and they don’t really understand what being a Youth leader means you will get high rates of turnover.  That is bad but it is typical of that age group.  Ask a person in business how high turnover is for younger workers who don’t like their job, even though they are good at it, or just want to try something else.

Second reason youth leaders leave relates to expectations of the ministry.  Some are unrealistic, some are ridiculous, and some ministries have opposing expectations.  Youth ministry is guided by the leadership of the church as well as the leadership of the parents.  A lot of times parents, committees, counsels, etc… have people on them with different, and at times disparate, philosophies of youth ministry.  Some want it safe at all costs to keep their kids from bad influences, others want it fun at all costs to keep kids interested, some want it relationship-based, others want it program-based, etc… They have different ideas about discipline or lack of, what activities are appropriate or not, and they hold these ideas with a degree of fervor that would make George Washington seem like a dispassionate patriot.  These expectations may be discussed in a philosophic way during the hiring process but most likely they aren’t truly revealed until after the contract is signed.  Many times these expectations come out during a crisis, when emotions are high.  The parties involved may not even realize they have these expectations, or feel so strongly about them until they see them violated.  Then, there is either an instantaneous explosion which results in a youth leader change or the murmurings continue until the youth leader feels no other option but moving on.

Either way it is not good.

I don’t see this trend changing any time in the near future, but hopefully as youth ministry becomes more mature, its leaders will as well.  And hopefully the church will feel the same way about youth ministry as youth leaders do.

I want to make sure that the expectations are realistic and healthy in my church for the youth pastor. But I also think we need to understand that in the lives of many of the people in our congregations their jobs have unrealisitc expectations place upon them. They are under pressure that is almost insane. And it seems normal to them, so they often try to pass along those same expectations to the church staff, especially the youth pastor. So part of my job is the be shield and reality check.

Mike, I have repeatedly tried to get my youth person to head off for the national retreat but they are not something she is interested in, she is also taking classes right now.

Jim,

You’ve accidentally hit on a pet peeve of mine - Youth ministry is not a stepping stone to other ministry.  I don’t believe that is what you are saying but I think it may be time for me to write on that.  I’ve hard too many people go into youth minsitry to get some experience and then go into “REAL” ministry.  I’ll reserve further comment until I write that article.

I’m sorry if you thought I criticized in that way - I was more criticizing the youth pastors who do it intentionally.  I knew (and thought I said) I knew that wasn’t what you were saying.  My apologies to you.  - - - You are correct that most move on thoguh I do know a few 50 year old youth ministers and on 63 year old youth minister.  It get increasingly harder to remain culurally relevant, draw upon your own experiences to minister.  But soem fo the keys can remain - a willingess to listen and value the young people - an ability to teach the Word in a life-changing relevant way.  And I do see the day where I may one day pastor a church instead of the youth - not because I’m “moving up” but because I’d end up doing a disservice to the youth should I stay.

Age is irrelevant. If the person loves God and loves students ... that’s youth ministry and part of being a youth minister. I know tons of 50s, 60s, 70s and even 80s mentors of youth who are youth ministers in their own rights. Even great Youth Ministers like Les Christie. I think we are throwing in the towel too soon.  In the book Youth Ministry that transforms ,the idea of youth ministers haivng more than 16yrs in youth ministry and even as they grew older related better to parents and had a more effective ministry was on the high end pg. 235-236.  Ever hear of a guy named Doug Fields who is fastly approaching 50? Mike Yaconelli who pastored a church and an inspiration to youthworkers before his untimely death was in his 60s. Then there are the 80 and 90 young ladies who just love on teens and bring the snacks.

I have problems at 47 that are similiar..I have the BRE but no one seems to be willing to give me a chance..Wow..I was disillusioned to find that there doesn’t seem to be a great need for workers as I thought there would be while I was in Bible College!

I am the one who wrote this - and I’ve sworn off church based youth ministry after the last one.  So many churches use it as a glorified excuse for babysitting and want to control every aspect of the ministry as if they were the ones trained and experienced.  They interview you as if they plan to give you the chance to succeed and then try to micromanage every aspect.  I’ll say no more except that when I worte this I was dead wrong.