Brandon Shanks {dot} com

Changing My Mind

Thoughts are powerful.  Everything began with a thought.  The creative thought of God (John 1).  Being made in His image, God has given us creative power though our thoughts.  The chair you sit in was first someone’s thought before you ever had the chance to buy it.  It’s color, it’s shape, all were ideas in someone’s mind.  Now, you are enjoying the end result of that initial thought.  Thoughts are powerful.  They shape the future. They change the world.

This is why it is so important that we have the right thinking as youth workers.  Our thoughts affect the next generation. 

Listen to what Paul said about the importance of our thinking:

Romans 12:2 (NLT)
Don't copy the behavior and customs of this world, but let God transform you into a new person by changing the way you think. Then you will know what God wants you to do, and you will know how good and pleasing and perfect his will really is.

The way that we are transformed is by changing the way that we think.  I feel that God is continually challenging and transforming my thinking.  Constantly renovating my mind; replacing old ways of thinking with new ways.  

This week, I want share with you some of the ways that God has challenged and is challenging my thinking in Student Ministry.   

But first a quesion:

How are some ways that God has been transforming your thinking?

I want to have the mind of Christ.  
I want God to change my mind. 

 

GUEST BLOG: Alan Robertson "Guarding Your Time"

Alan Robertson is a great friend and Student Pastor from Ruston, LA (Who recently got engaged! Congrats!).  I wanted to post this from his blog because it really made an impact on me!  We all have enough time to do what God has called us to do.  It is just so easy to let time slip away and not fulfill what God is calling us to do!  

You can read more from Alan here.

Time… (Cue Steve Miller – Fly Like An Eagle… Time keeps on slippin’ slippin’ slippin’…. into the future…)

Time is fleeting.

Time is often wasted because it is far too easily spent.

Time is money.

It is probably a far more valuable commodity in the long run.

Given the choice between an increase in my paycheck and an increase in the number of hours in a day I would be tempted to take the hours over the money. Provided of course I didn’t have to spend those extra hours working.

Time management is not my strong point. If you know me you perhaps chuckled to yourself when you saw the title of this blog. In fact the only the thing I may be worse at than time management is probably following directions. (Me and maps don’t exactly get along, and I’m a bit too stubborn to pay proper attention to a GPS.)

But what I have learned as of late is the importance of guarding my time.

Guarding time… I think that’s an interesting way to look at it.

Not just managing the 24 hours I have in a day, but guarding them.

It’s easy to create a schedule for your day. To put on paper the number of hours in a day that you need for work, study and play. But living by it is a different issue.

It’s like budgeting your money. If you took an hour you could probably have a rough budget on paper and have a decent idea of how much money you have, how much you need to survive, and where your money is currently going. You probably have a good idea of how much money you waste and how much you spend effectively.
The trick is taking the budget off the paper and putting it into action.

The same principle is in effect when it comes to time.

We (We being Me. I think I am hammering this one out for myself) have to learn not only how to budget our time, but to guard that time.

It’s not just about avoiding procrastination, but it certainly involves it. (I’ve checked Facebook and Twitter about 10 times since I sat down to write this)

It’s about structuring your day in such a way that you make the most effective use of your day.

For me I have learned that the most productive hours of my day are between 5 and 8 a.m. Now that was a pretty depressing realization considering the fact that most of my friends are available to hang out  later at night, and that in order to take advantage of my most productive hours I have to go to bed shortly after dark and wake up before the sun comes up.
It’s not easy, but I have learned that if I want to be at my most effective and my creative efforts to be more productive I need to guard those hours of my day.

I’ve not mastered the art of waking up before the sun, but I am getting there. I still fail a lot of mornings. But guarding those hours is becoming a thing of extreme importance. Once I’m up and place a phone call to my girlfriend my phone is off until about 8am. I take my morning to exercise, have a focused time of prayer, read, study and do work.
Whether it is personal creative work (blogs, writing, etc) or work for LifePoint Church (various projects my pastor has asked me to work on or prepping lessons for our student ministry.) I am amazed at what I can get done when my phone is off and I am not checking my social networks. An added plus is very few people are on Facebook at 6am should I decide to sign on…

Guarding my time means I turn down opportunities to have fun on some evenings so that I can focus on my priorities during a time at which I can be more focused. While it is true I can pray, study or do creative work at any hour of the day I have learned that later hours are not near as effective. My mind has been dulled by the tasks of a full-time job and my energy is waning by the time I finally get around to it. I’m learning to guard my most effective hours and focus on priorities during that time.

How you guard your time is up to you. It may be about structuring your day in a more effective manner. It may be that you, like me, need to learn how to say “No” on occasion. Whether that is saying “No” to a chance to have fun or to a new responsibility or obligation. Perhaps you need to build practices and habits into your day that help you to guard your time better.

I do believe if we are going to be effective leaders and creative individuals we must learn what it means to guard our time.

You can read more from Alan here.

GUEST BLOG: Noah Watt "The Best Resource for Youth Workers"

This is a great post from my friend, and neighbor, Noah Watt!  Noah is doing a great job at LoneStar Pentecostal Church & Journey Student Ministries!  I am so glad to have him in Madisonville!

Check out his full blog here! 

As Student Pastors and Youth Workers we are constantly searching for more resources to enable us to further our ability to reach students.  We look for ideas, tips, what has worked, what hasn’t worked, how to build a team, how to grow our student ministries whether are 5 students or 50.  We continually search for new resources.

But I have found the ultimate resource.  The place that provides all those things listed in the previous paragraph and many many more and I’ve decided to share that resource with you.

Here it is Ladies and Gentlemen of the Student Ministry world….

The BEST resource for Student Ministry is:

Drum roll Please….

Other Youth Workers just like you.

The greatest and most untapped resource for student ministry is other Student Pastors.

I have read the articles, the books, and the magazines.  I have been to the conferences.  I have seen the websites.  And while I have learned something from each of the resources that I have been exposed to, the single resource that I have learned the most from is other Youth Workers.

I have learned what works and what doesn’t.  I have become familiar with the fact that other Student Pastors have struggled just like me, have dealt with issues like me, and have already seen God bring them through certain situations.  I have gleaned from every Youth Worker I have ever gotten the opportunity to communicate with and have found more valuable information from those Youth Pastors than I have from any single resource.

We are our most valuable resource.

The Backstage Project began a month ago with one goal in mind; to connect Student Pastors and Youth Workers to others to further communication and collaboration.  It is the single most goal of everything that happens with this site.  This site was never intended to be a place to come and read what Noah Watt  has to say about how to have a successful Student Ministry, but rather as a place to hear what is working in student ministries across the nation.

That being said, we MUST use our most valuable resource.  There are readers of this site from different states, districts, and stages of ministry.  There are full-time Student Pastors, bi-vocational ministers, new student pastors and veterans.  There are Student Pastors who are married, single, and married with children.  There are Youth Workers from big towns, small towns and everywhere in between.

The BEST resource in the world is reading this post right now.

So, in an effort to assist in connecting Youth Workers to each other, this is the plan:

If you are a youth worker and are willing to take a few minutes here and there to help other Student Pastors out and are willing to be contacted regarding questions that may arise for Youth Workers like you, then send the following in an email to [email protected]

NAME
EMAIL
LOCATION (City, ST)

And if you are a student pastor and have a question you would like submitted to other Youth Pastors to get their advice or opinions, Send your question, along with your name and location to [email protected]

This should only take you a few minutes, but the assistance you give to other Youth Workers could potentially be felt throughout eternity.

We are our own best resource…but only if we help each other.

Check out his full blog here! 

 

Found this picture...

 

I found this picture the other day from a couple years ago.  It is a photo of Tyler and Brittany teaching a Bible Study in the library of Central High School.  We have been talking about taking truth #VIRAL for the last two weeks at revolution.  Teaching some friends a Bible Study at school is an incredible way to take truth #VIRAL in your world.

Here are some links to Bible Studies/Tracts that you can teach to/share with friends at school:

A place prepared for you

If God is so good...

The Baptism of the Holy Spirit

Why So Many Religions

What's With Baptism?

What did the Apostles say about salvation?

Take a chance.  You never know what will happen if you share the Gospel with your friends!  That's VIRAL!!!

 

The 40 Year Student Ministry

Yesterday another Student Pastor that I follow asked a question on twitter that really captivated me.  He asked, "How do we as Youth/Student Pastors determine the success of a Youth/Student ministry?"

Wow!  Great question.

What is a WIN for us that work with students? 

So many things came to mind about what defines success for student ministry.  However, I don't think the true success of student ministry can fully be measured TODAY.  Wait a minute, I understand that there are things that we MUST look at like numbers, student facilities, involvement, cool praise bands, students receiving the Holy Ghost, students baptized in Jesus Name, community involvement, just to name a few.  All these are great and vital today.  We can't be satisfied with complacency. We have to move forward.  The task demands it.

But what I can't get off my mind is, "What good is all that if in 40 years these students that I am working with are not still in the church?" 

The true win is students that become fully functional members in the body of Jesus Christ.  The true win will be when you see students that grew up to raise their families in the church.  You say, "I don't think we have control over that."  However, we can put things in students that will help them stand the test of time.

We have to change our perspective from 4 to 40! From "What can I do to impact students for the 4 years they are in High School?" to, "What can I put inside students that will last 40 years?"

I tell the students at revolution that I am not preaching to them at age 16 with a girlfriend that you have been going with for two months.  I am preaching to the 22 year old college student that is making decisions far away from your parents and loved ones.  I am preaching to the 40 year old Dad with three kids a wife and a dog.  Is that adult still serving God.

Questions?
What are we putting in students?
Are we teaching things that are doctrinally sound and in alignment with our Senior Pastor and church?
Is our preaching/teaching a well balanced? this book is great for that.
Are we teaching students rebellion by our actions?
Am I teaching students how to be a Godly husband/wife through my example?
Am I opening opportunities for students to be involved in leadership in student ministry and/or other parts of the larger church?

"God, help us, by your Spirit, to instill in the hearts of students something that will cause them to be in your kingdom all the days of their lives."

Help us to have a 40 year student ministry.

I would love to hear some of your thoughts about what success looks in student ministry.

Exist or Live?

“To live is the rarest 

thing in the world. 

Most people exist, 

that is all.” 

—Oscar Wilde

ht: brad cooper

Addicted to Comfort

A couple years ago in a business management class I had a unique experience. We had a guest speaker in class. He was a local business owner with a not so unique story. He had started a business years ago and seen success. He told us of the struggles that he had starting the company and how he had overcome many obstacles. He told about how he had had steady business for the past couple years. It was an encouraging story of someone with a vision who had done a good thing.

However, the entire time that he was talking I was wondering to myself what his next move was. I was wondering if he was going to step out again and take some big risks so that he could experience another season of growth. So at the end when he opened the floor for questions I asked him if he had plans on expanding the business.

What he said stuck with me. He said that he did not really have any plans for expanding. He said that his business was at a good manageable state. He said that if he grew he would not have time to take long vacations and play a lot of golf. He said that he was perfectly content just maintaining what he had.

I thought to myself that it is easy to get that way in the church. We many times become very COMFORTABLE with the way things are and have no desire to take RISKS so that we can grow. I recently heard a quote that said, "If you want to reach those that no one is reaching, you must do what no one else is doing." That means change.

I know in my own life I am not addicted to nicotine, alcohol, or drugs. But at times I do think I am ADDICTED TO COMFORT! That may work for a business man selling goods, but that must never happen to a Christian that has a mission from Jesus to take the good news to the ENDS OF THE EARTH!

What are some COMFORT ZONES that you need to step out of in your life? What are some things that you are holding on that is hindering growth in your life and in the lives of others.

As I was thinking about this story from college, it just reminded me again that THE KINGDOM MUST FORCEFULLY ADVANCE! We can't just be addicted to comfort!

Thinking About Joe

"Truthfully, most Christians would never think of inviting an unchurched person to their church. Just the thought of Joe (The guy who coaches the kids basketball team with you) coming to your church service makes you shudder. He wouldn't get it. Joe would make fun of the music. He wouldn't understand when is the right time to sit down or stand up. It would not make sense to Joe why you sit for an hour and listen to a guys who is boring talk about the Ark of the Covenant and the dimensions of the tabernacle. If Joe came to your church, you would never hear the end of it." -Quote from Pop Goes the Church by Tim Stevens.

It is so easy to just simply forget about the outsider! I have went to church my entire life, and the same church at that. I know the people, I know the way that we have events and services, I'm used to the style of music, and the way we go about it. And if you think about it, your story is probably the same. You have become very accustomed to what is done at your church. I know we get it...but what about JOE?

I want to challenge myself to look at church in an entirely different light. I want to look trough the eyes of Joe. The everyday person that lives in my city. The person that has never been to our church before. People who don't know what the words "Apostolic", "Shout Down", and "Glory Cloud" mean. What do I need to change about what I do and say that could make Jesus more understandable to Joe! I don't in any way mean demeaning or watering down the MESSAGE of the gospel. But the little things we do with Joe in mind to communicate the gospel in ways that he understands. What would embarrass Joe? What would excite Joe? What is bothering Joe? ect.

Our church does many things to connect to Joe. This week I want to personally ask myself, "What can I do to reach, love, and care for the people that I cross paths with every day.

I'm just thinking about Joe!

Link Class

Last Sunday we kicked off LINK CLASS for our High School students. It was crazy! We had such a good response from the students that came. What we do is have a 15-20 minute group teaching followed up by a time of breaking off into small groups which discuss that group teaching. We started a curriculum called RUT developed by the GYD that talks about getting out of spiritual ruts that we find ourselves in. Tyler Medina did a great job giving the teaching. He really connected to them and they were really into what was being taught. Watch out for those NINJAS!!! (You had to be there) In my link group students really opened up and spoke about some things that were weighing them down in their walk with God. I know during link we are going to see many lives of students changed forever. We call it link because we want to connect students to God and to each other.

If you were there...leave a comment about it.

Entourage

Tonight we had a youth staff meeting. Let me just say that I love youth staff meetings. Usually I am not just teeming over with excitement about meetings but I do love youth staff meetings. They are like part early church, part planning/brainstorming session. First we always get some good food then we break spiritual bread with a devotion. Tonight I talked about the scripture in Galatians chapter six when Paul talks about not being weary in doing good. It is so easy to get weary when we are busy working for God. However, the scripture tells us not to be weary because a harvest is coming if we do not give up.

After the time of devotion a question is asked that every staff member answers: How have you seen God moving in the lives of students lately at revolution? This question is my favorite part of the entire meeting. This is where it feels like the early church because it is so awesome to hear everyone talk about all the different things that they have seen God doing. Everyone comes with such a different perspective. We laugh, we cry, and we always come away encouraged about what God has been doing. Notice I do not ask what problems have you had at revolution lately. I don't ask what kids have you had to call down lately. We could talk about challenges all day, but if we focus on what God has been doing the challenges are no big deal because we know that God will take care of them. I think this is what the early church was like. They got together broke physical and spiritual bread and then testified about what God has been doing among them. There is something so real about when we begin to testify to each other in a group setting. Lastly we go over calendar stuff and do some brainstorming for new events and activities.

The team that God allows me to work with is amazing. I have so much respect for all of them. They all take time from their busy lives to serve. When we get together we have a great time. I know God has amazing things in store for us if we keep pursuing his purpose with abandon. Thanks revolution youth staff. Don't mess with the revolution entourage! I love you guys. I am honored to serve you.