You are currently browsing the category archive for the ‘assessment & strength’ category.
Last semester, I had the chance to help my church out on our Local and International Service team. And one of the things I really appreciate about those guys is that they have a major partnership bent. Even though our church is big and could do a lot of service activities on its own, instead our M.O. is partnering with those in our community (or overseas) who are already making an impact.
Clearly, lots of churches don’t take that same stance. But the truth is, lots of college ministries don’t, either. In our case, I believe there’s room for a lot more partnership in service activities – as well as other functions of our ministries.
How often do you consider questions like these?:
- Before we launch a Bible study for that sorority, do we know of any other ministries with students in that club?
- Instead of assuming nobody’s already reaching that dorm, have we tried to find out and maybe join them?
- We’ve thought about advertising to that nearby community college – is there a church that might want to help with that outreach?
- Are there any other secular clubs on campus that could partner with us for this campus-wide party?
- Before choosing a new service project, have we considered the ones the campus is already getting behind?
- Instead of having our five students with a passion for _____________ do that on their own, what if they joined forces with similar students from other ministries?
Believe me, I recognize there are sometimes great reasons NOT to partner. But I feel like we’re more often erring on the other side of things, on the side that needlessly recreates wheels and misses opportunities for a little extra unity. We have to be open to considering partnership often.
One more note – When it comes to partnering with other ministries, let me say this: I am by no means a naysayer when it comes to having multiple college ministries on a campus. I understand the role they serve, and I know there are real differences between groups. (It is a misunderstanding of biblical unity to declare that things shouldn’t be this way.) But the fact that there often should be multiple college ministries on one campus doesn’t mean that the next activity can’t be done in unison – whether it’s starting a niche ministry or holding a Service Day downtown.
—————————————————————————————
[Click to ask questions, comment, or see any comments on this post!]
On Monday, I wrote about one of the areas I feel is most lacking in the world of collegiate ministry: campus ministries that are built from the ground up with their individual campuses in mind.
There’s a difference, I said, in building contextually right from the beginning (“using contextual bricks,” in other words) versus building a ministry and only afterward making it more contextual (“using contextual paint”).
David Bartosik followed up that post with a question, though, and I wanted to flesh out a little better what this might mean. David said,
I don’t know if I completely catch what your throwing, pick up what you’re laying down…dont get me wrong, I am interested. I have a college on my heart even as you say this, but would love to hear more of what point you are trying to communicate.
[Are you] Meaning each campus has a particular flavor and you are asking what specifically are you doing to contextualize the gospel to that heart college?
My quick answer to David’s final question would be… Yes, but I’m not just talking about contextualizing the message – but contextualizing the methodology. And I’m not even really talking about “contextualizing” some methodology that already exists, but instead forming each method around the needs, specifics, and even eccentricities of that campus.
So I’m not simply encouraging us to make sure what we speak from the stage is contextual… because that presupposes both a stage and giving messages from it! Instead, I’m suggesting we could use many more college ministries that are built in response to loving a campus, getting to know the campus, and begging God’s wisdom for reaching it in very specific ways.
Does this mean that we need to start more slowly than we often do? Yes. Does it mean we need to put everything on the table from the very beginning, including things we would never, ever expect to consider optional? Absolutely. Does it mean we shouldn’t assume we’ll have a large group meeting, shouldn’t assume we’ll try to reach all the students, shouldn’t assume our ministry will look much like others in our national organization or denomination? Yeah… and we won’t assume anything else, either. We’ll come to know – and love – our campuses, and in the process we’ll discern the best ways to impact it.
There are lots of merits to the “standard forms” of college ministry, and in some cases they’ll be the most contextualized route we could take to reach students. But how we decide that – and how long we’re willing to take to discern this – makes all the difference here.
—————————————————————————————
[Click to ask questions, comment, or see any comments on this post!]
Simple (but possibly painful) assessment question for you:
How many of your activities this semester will be planned around clear, explicitly determined purposes?
When we realize just how much a standard college ministry actually does, it’s amazing:
- every weekly large group
- each and every small group meeting throughout a week
- every retreat
- every planned social event
- each leader’s meeting
- each staff meeting
- every service project
That’s an awful lot of events. Some are probably planned by you; some might be planned by volunteers or other staff; some might be planned by student leaders.
And so I ask the question another way: How often will the planners start by praying through and thinking through what – exactly – they’re meant to aim for, and only afterwards plan the retreat, the small group session, the music set, or the service project? Are your students doing this every time? Are you?
Though God can certainly bear fruit from all sorts of poorly planned methods (and does all the time), our participation with Him as co-laborers demands seeking His thoughts on the front end, not just seeking His blessing on the back end.
So how well does your count – the actual number – of events that will be planned with the end in mind correspond with that reality?
(For more on this, you can definitely read my series on Backwards College Ministry.)
—————————————————————————————
[Click to ask questions, comment, or see any comments on this post!]
After all my travels and explorations and conversations, one of the clearest conclusions is that we don’t have nearly enough college ministries that have been built – from the ground up – with their particular campus in mind.
Many, many of us are good at slapping some coats of Contextualization on our already-built ministries, ministries composed of bricks from various sources. If we spend time loving one campus long enough, we might occasionally do some minor renovations that involve Contextualization more heavily, adding a wing or modifying a previously incongruous room to match better the campus we love.
But there’s not a lot of evidence of campus ministries designed with their own campus in mind more than any other influence. This sort of ministry would be composed of local bricks, nearly every decision affected by the campus tribe in which it finds itself. These college ministries are inherently contextual rather than simply growing to fit (somewhat) the field they’re in over time.
Of course, a large number of college ministries are still doing amazing work on their campuses. The lack of ground-up contextualization hasn’t kept them from bearing exciting, enormous fruit. But what more might we accomplish?
—————————————————————————————
[Click to ask questions, comment, or see any comments on this post!]
There’s a big difference between the campus ministry with leaders who simply aren’t Learners… and the campus ministry with leaders who actively, regularly learn from others about the work of collegiate ministry.
They will have a better impact. They will better fulfill their ministry. They will create a far better ministry over time, in ways both obvious and non-obvious.
But I’ll go one step further today.
There’s a big difference between the college ministry that looks at other ministries mainly to learn what to do… and the college ministry that discerns what it should do, in its context, and then finds other ministries to learn how to do those things better.
Of course other ministries will always (and should always) give us new ideas for the what. But far too often we find the bulk of our methods in either:
- large, successful college ministries
- our own experiences in college ministries
- or the “ways it’s usually done” in our organization or denomination
The more your methods have arisen from your context and your audience – while regularly looking for others’ wisdom on how to use those methods best – the better you’ll impact. As I’ve noted lots of other times, I think the panorama of college ministries is far, far too homogenous for such diverse mission fields as ours.
—————————————————————————————
[Click to ask questions, comment, or see any comments on this post!]
It seems to me that true Hospitality is characterized by – among other things – a recognition of all, not just many.
When I’m thinking about Hospitality (in college ministry, churches, or otherwise), it helps me to consider how the perfect party host handles her soirees. Does she aim to host the bulk of her crowd, or all of her crowd?
I think she considers the All.
That doesn’t mean she acts the same to all (in fact, Hospitality recognizes that people need to be treated differently). And she doesn’t give in to every single expectation of each person, either.
But she thinks of all, she acknowledges all, she does what she can to host everyone at the party.
I would never say that a college ministry needs to (necessarily) target all students, cater equally to all students, or involve all students in the same way. But it seems to me… I think… that a Hospitable college ministry will indeed consider all students who make their way into it, for a day or a semester or longer.
—————————————————————————————
[Click to ask questions, comment, or see any comments on this post!]
For the third post about Hospitality in College Ministry, I wanted to introduce one test you can do right now to assess how well you’re “hosting” the students in you college ministry in an ongoing way.
Here’s the question: How well do leaders in your ministry know the students who attend?
The way you answer this will depend on the size of your ministry. In big ministries, the college minister can’t be expected to know each of the students. But the question is whether they are known – whether by the one (and only) college minister in a small ministry or by your large network of staff, volunteers, and student leaders.
So if all those in leadership took a quiz – about students’ majors, their years in school, their hopes for the future, what they’ll be doing next summer, how they came to Christ, if they’ve come to Christ, what they struggle with, what they’re good at, and on and on – how well would you be able to answer those things about the students in your ministry?
Knowing people and being hospitable toward them are wrapped up together. By being hospitable in the first place, you create time and space to get to know people. But as you get to know them better, you’re able to host them better and better, too.
I don’t know that there’s any good shortcut here, nor can we ever get anywhere near where we’d like to be with this. But if the thought of being quizzed on what you know about your college students makes you cringe… then maybe working on Hospitality is a good aim for this new year.
—————————————————————————————
[Click to ask questions, comment, or see any comments on this post!]
And… we’re back!
Over my break, I’ve been working on a possible book – only this one’s not about college ministry, it’s about the weird, intriguing, magnificent time I spent visiting 165 weekend church services during my yearlong road trip. Yes, the main purposes of that trip – and by far most of the hours spent – were all about exploring American college ministry. But I’m kind of a church geek, so I took the chance to visit a jillion churches on the weekends. It was pretty stinkin’ interesting, to say the least.
Anyway… a real focus of that book is how churches think about hospitality toward visitors (whether newcomers or longtime attenders). And that’s something that needs to be thought about constantly within our field, Collegiate Ministry, too.
So since I’ve been mulling those sorts of thoughts, I figured I’d make a blog series out of them; the start of a semester or quarter is a great time to think about Hospitality anyway. And since this is the first entry, that’s actually what I wanted to ask: How much have you thought about hospitality lately?
Sure, I imagine you’ve got some “plays” designed to welcome guests, and you designed some other things (maybe awhile back) to make your Large Group Meeting fun and inviting. But when’s the last time you really thought about how well it was accomplishing those purposes – and all the other purposes that make up true “hospitality”? Can you even list out what a truly “hospitable” college ministry might look like in your context?
Or what about your small groups? Do the leaders there think regularly about hospitality?
Have you identified students and leaders within your ministry with the spiritual gift of Hospitality? What roles do they play in your ministry?
In the days to come, I’ll be looking closer at some of these areas – and I’m sure a few more, as well. But for today, I’d encourage you to ponder (and even pray about) what role Hospitality – as a disciplined, purposeful pursuit – has played in your campus ministry… and what role you want it to play in the future!
—————————————————————————————
[Click to ask questions, comment, or see any comments on this post!]
This idea popped up as a Fridea a couple of years ago, but it seemed fitting for the “Going for Broke” series. This series offers some rather drastic ideas – they won’t fit every campus ministry, but they’re still worth thinking about!
When the new semester comes around, what if you took a week off to let student leaders absolutely “run things” all week – whatever “things” happen to compose your ministry?
I think that idea’s self-explanatory enough, but here are some thoughts if you need ‘em:
- Leader qualifications still apply; students who wouldn’t shepherd other students when you’re present certainly shouldn’t while you’re absent.
- Your “absence” is a relative idea. Some of you might give students the reins but keep a present, watchful eye. Others may choose to step out completely – to “go for broke” – and simply be “on call” all week.
- Of course, it doesn’t have to be a full week OR you don’t have to be absent from everything. It’s your call.
- Of course, this could also be longer than a week. It’s your call.
- Be sure to prepare your students.
- Be sure to debrief your students when it’s all done.
- Prepare yourself: for a weird ministry week… and for a few great new methods that you’d never thought of.
Oh, and one more:
- Don’t smile too much at your students’ challenges, and repeat after me: this isn’t revenge, it’s discipleship!
As always, we start with purposes, not with a “cool idea” that we then make up “purposes” for. If this method doesn’t match what God desires to accomplish now in your students and in your ministry, shelve it; it might come in handy later on. If you do give this sort of thing a try, don’t forget that it won’t only disciple your students, but it will give you the chance to assess how well you’re raising them up. (Scary, huh?)
—————————————————————————————
[Click to ask questions, comment, or see any comments on this post!]
This’ll be the last post until Monday – enjoy your Thanksgiving (and your Break!).
I’ve written before that – in my humble opinion – it’s awkward for campus ministers to plan out an entire school year (teaching series, smaller events, spiritual emphases, small group materials, etc.). To predict in August (or June!) what students are going to need next March doesn’t reflect the realities of either our students or their campuses.
While a few things (like major events) might need to be given some major lead time, semester-by-semester (or quarter-by-quarter) planning makes far more sense in our field of ministry.
In any case, if you have already filled in the blanks for the Spring Semester, now is an excellent time to consider if each of those plans is still BEST. Planning out two semesters ahead isn’t too big a problem… IF you’re willing to (re)evaluate when the time comes. That time might just be now!
So that’s my encouragement for this week and the weeks to come! So I hope whatever you decided this summer about 2012 was done in pencil, not pen. Now’s your chance to respond to the new realities of your campus, to your new students (and changes in your old students), and to everything God has been doing in your college ministry.
—————————————————————————————
[Click to ask questions, comment, or see any comments on this post!]
Recent Comments