Brazilian Youth Workers, Part 2

Here is part of the Q & A I had with youth leaders across the southern states of Brazil..

Name a couple of early leadership lessons that still impact you today.

First, I’m not God. Second, if I’m going to make it long term in ministry, I better get good at feeding myself spiritually.

Both of these lessons came at a great price – the price of failure. We meet students with huge needs and voids in their life – lack of a family, mom, dad, emotional or physical abuse, great hurt and needs – and part of what makes us good is that empathy and desire to meet those needs, to help. The danger is stepping in over our heads and thinking WE are going to make the difference.

They need Jesus more than anything else. They need that personal connection with Him because He is the only one that will heal completely, restore completely. If I step in and all of a sudden I am the hero – then I’m taking the place of God and it might be so subtle of a change that I don’t notice it until it is too late. So a student becomes more dependent on us than God or more in love with us than Jesus. Dangerous place to be for both them and us.

Eventually, we minister out of the overflow of who we are and what God is doing inside us. And if we aren’t consistently learning and feeding ourselves spiritually – there will be a crash.

If you are just starting out a student ministry, what’s the first thing you suggest doing?

Start with finding a couple of other people that are as crazy about students as you are. Then do life with them, grow with them and start investing in students. Size of group doesn’t matter at this point (if ever) but it’s the pattern of life on life discipleship that you want to learn and start reproducing in your workers.

Give students access to your life so they can see and hear and taste and touch Jesus in your everyday life.

How do you find volunteers

Pray like crazy. And start being observant. Teens are great at recruiting their own volunteers. Just watch what adults your students talk to and hang out with during church events or school events. What parents or mentors seem to attract students?

Get specific when you ask for volunteers. Have a task that is measurable for first time volunteers — like setting up this space, providing these resources, doing this certain job. Start this way and as they get ‘infected’ with the student ministry, they’ll move into deeper areas of serving.

Our culture is so sexual and there is this over-emphasis on physical beauty. The girls dress so provocatively – almost every media outlet uses sex to sell – how do we combat this? How do we speak to our students about this?

Tough question, one we face in the States as well. Amy and Lisa spoke to this question better than I did. I talked about ‘taking them to the crash site.’ In other words, walk the students to the inevitable conclusion of where their actions are taking them. Not a bad answer but Amy and Lisa’s answer was better.

They said — keep taking your students to the Word as to the kind of man/woman God wants them to be. Keep pushing a God-centered identity and being accountable to that. Mileage may vary but only a heart captured by God is going to be able to withstand the world’s temptation.

Youth ministry and youth workers have very little respect in our culture. How do lead in that kind of context? How do you deal with parents and students who won’t respect or follow leadership?

This was another tough question. After swapping war stories, I shared with them the passage God seemed to laser in my heart this last year and half as a new lead pastor — Philippians 2 — the whole chapter but here is the focal point for me happens in verses 3- 7:

Do nothing out of selfish ambition or vain conceit, but in humility consider others better than yourselves. Each of you should look not only to your own interests, but also to the interests of others.

Your attitude should be the same as that of Christ Jesus: Who, being in very nature God, did not consider equality with God something to be grasped, but made himself nothing, taking the very nature of a servant…

I’m not sure if there is any magic pill we can take to make others follow us or give us respect. The best thing I think to do is make sure every decision I make is because Jesus told me to do it. Nothing out of selfish-ambition. Having a team that is sold out to the vision will help discern what those decisions are but as leaders we have to make sure that we do what we do because it’s God-directed.

Talking With Brazillian Youth Workers, Part 1

One of the highlights of the trips for me had to be the opportunity to sit with over 20 youth workers from all over Rio Grande de Sol, Brazil. Most churches are very small and Catholicism & Spiritism still dominates the culture. Think Voodoo mixed with patron saints. We were told that most folks go to mass on Saturday morning then to their seance on Saturday night.

Here’s a quick list of the challenges they face:

* There are two kinds of Christianity competing in this culture. The “God wants you rich so do these things in order to secure his blessing” kind and those that stress the grace of God and Jesus death and resurrection. They are struggling hard to emphasize the Gospel and the grace of God, not man’s attempt to make God happy.

* So many churches fight against teens and children, fearing change.

* There are little to no student ministry resources in Portuguese.

* Churches are small and poor. Many times the Senior Pastor is the only paid staff of a church.

* Volunteers who run student ministries suffer from discouragement as there is no infrastructure of support for youth workers. There is also very little training for youth workers.

* Student culture is highly SEXUAL. Lot’s contributing factors to this – Brazilian teens can’t get a job until they are 18, school is only in session for half a day, and there are no sports or clubs for teens to get involved in after school. There is a lot of free time for students to do whatever they want with little to no accountability. Workers said they feel completely overwhelmed by sexuality in the culture – and it is everywhere – music, movies, fashion.

* Parent involvement is next to nothing in most churches. This has two huge negative side-effects for the churches. There is a very small pool of people to find volunteers. Whatever “good” the church does has to compete and stand against the 6 days, 22 hours they are away from church.

* Southern Brazil is called the Missionary Cemetery. The average lifespan of a Christian missionary in the area is 18 to 24 months.

All of these factors are what pushed Thomas Schneider to start Palavra da Vida Sul 20 years ago. Over the years, he’s developed a long-term strategy and team to help churches and communities in reaching teenagers with the clear message of the Gospel. Their Bible Club ministry is designed to train leaders how to teach the Scriptures to teens in a systematic way as well as providing Portuguese resources to churches for student ministry. Some of these Bible Clubs stand alone in communities where there is no evangelical presence, many of them partner with local churches as their student ministry. Their camp ministry and sports tourneys are opportunities for churches and these Bible Clubs to bring lost students to an environment where they can hear the gospel clearly.

As I listened to these youth workers talk about their struggles, so many of them were just like the ones we face in the States. Lack of parent involvement, the constant sexual pull of the culture, church cultures that seem to fight against teens instead of for them.

When I see what Thomas and PVSul is doing to help churches, I know I’m a part of something very special and unique in this culture. They are the pioneers right now, emphasizing to local churches the importance of life on life discipleship and engagement in the teenage world.

Tomorrow, Part 2. The Question & Answer session with these leaders.