You are currently browsing the category archive for the ‘ten big ideas’ category.
Through partnership, individual groups have a chance to get “bigger” together. But through niche ministry, groups have a chance to target smaller pockets of students – with the hope of better impact among these pockets.
Yesterday, I mentioned several forms of niche ministry. But there are literally ONE BAJILLION possible niches on our campuses. Here’s the mathematical formula:
# of population segments of the campus tribe
multiplied by
all possible areas of student discipleship
That means we could build niche ministries focused on…
- sharing biblical financial principles… among business school students!
- one-on-one mentorship… with the officers of student organizations!
- writing daily devotionals… for sorority girls!
- discussing spirituality in the movies… with Arts majors!
- fighting for social justice… with pre-law students!
These may seem like pretty specific ideas, but if you think about it… there’s potential there, right?
Certainly, not all niche ministries will be this specific. But even a college ministry focused on worship gatherings or a ministry that only targets freshmen accomplishes something unusual. Getting specific – “going niche” – allows a ministry to go deeper rather than broader, building an expertise that might not be found in ministries with wider aims.
Many “niche ministries” might take this approach from the beginning of the ministry, as an individual or group feels called to a particular segment of students.
But niche ministry can also come about organically from within “classic” college ministries. This happens when ministries gain inroads with particular groups of students (or find opportunities in one spiritual area). So even though an established, “classic” college ministry might not abandon its general discipleship, they can still take advantage of any niche possibilities God might reveal.
I would love to see what would happen if numerous churches, campus-based ministries, and even individuals “adopted” segments of campuses they felt called to reach. I would also love to watch as others got super-serious about excelling in particular areas of discipling students.
Of course this practice, like so much in college ministry, is paralleled by some of our foreign missions work – as missionaries sometimes seek to reach particular segments of populations or to reach cultures through very particular avenues.
We’re getting close to finishing the “Big Idea” series that started back in late January, but these last two are particularly fun (for me, at least).
So here’s the ninth idea that could potentially transform your college ministry:
Think about niches.
I honestly believe this is one of the largest untapped growth areas for well-developed, larger college ministries to pursue. But at the same time, it’s also a perfect thing for “newly born” (or even prenatal) college ministries to consider, as well.
I use the term “niche ministry” to describe any ministry effort that targets either a particular segment of the population OR a particular area of Christian development. While those are different focuses, in each case a particular “slice” of the overall college ministry task is being pursued in a specific way.
One more key: Niche ministry can take place either within a larger ministry or as a stand-alone effort.
First, some examples of the first type of niche ministry (targeting a particular segment of the population):
- Fellowship of Christian Athletes
- a special, ongoing ministry to the fraternities and sororities
- Christian Medical & Dental Associations
- an International student outreach
- a staff member devoted to ministering to the ladies in your college ministry
- Christian Educators Association International
And now some examples of niche ministry efforts that target a particular area of Christian development:
- Navigators (usually focused primarily on disciplemaking)
- 24-7 prayer houses
- Passion Conferences
- Veritas Forum
- a “city-wide” college worship service
- a 4-week teaching series that your ministry hosts as a special, one-time, on-campus event
Has your ministry ever pursued a particular niche? Could it? Should it?
How much would change if college ministries were evaluated (in large part) on how well their students were doing five years from graduation?
The obvious caveats apply: students ultimately make their own choices, some will fall away no matter how well we do, etc.
And the obvious truth would quickly come to light: There’s no way we can give students enough “good stuff” to last for five years. (It’s that “If you give a man a fish…” idea.) What we can (hopefully) do is teach them to fish… teach them the importance of fishing… teach them why they must keep fishing for a lifetime… teach them why they have to work hard at fishing during the disruption of the Transition…
How much would change if we tracked how well our students were doing five years later?
As part of the series, I’ve been writing thoughts on helping people thrive when, from our perspective, they’re dead-and-gone. Because, of course, our former students are STILL ALIVE after college graduation… though I’m not sure we structure our ministries around that fact often enough.
(This topic in the series starts here.)
Here are some topics that might serve well in preparing students for that Transition. (Please add any others you find compelling!)
Some in this list might be perfect for last-semester teaching topics; others might require years’ worth of emphasis. The point is, each seems particularly useful for promoting continued growth as students enter the “young adult” world.
In no particular order, then, some topics that seem to be important for post-college Christians:
- God-centeredness (as opposed to self-centeredness or even people-centeredness)
- True community
- Facing trials well
- Spiritual disciplines (and why they matter)
- Money management
- Commitment
- Why theology matters
- A biblical understanding of “work”
- Making decisions
- Biblical churchmanship (including in churches that don’t cater to young adults well)
- Friendships in a post-college life
- Dating relationships in a post-college life
- Family relationships in a post-college life
- How to study the Bible
- How to find good answers to tough questions
- Finding / choosing a church
- Why and how we don’t “outgrow” a need for complete integrity / obedience
- Loving people
- The idea that God has a story for them to live, and college doesn’t have to be the “high point” of their lives
This is no brilliant list, but it still might get us all thinking about which – if any – of these themes our graduating seniors truly excel in.
I honestly do believe that emphasizing college students’ Latter Transition could transform lots of college ministries. And like I wrote yesterday, that mindset can start very early, as we recognize that all college ministry really does have a huge preparation component – from the time freshmen enter until the time they graduate.
But of course, an overarching focus like that isn’t the only way we might work to help students transition. Good ol’ targeted discipleship for nearly-grads can provide key impact at a key time, too.
This can come in at least a few forms:
- A multi-week group study for your nearly-grads, probably in the spring semester. Maybe one teacher, or perhaps several different adults / DVD messages / etc. (But don’t forget to include those who might graduate in August or December! Or if your ministry is big enough, this could happen every semester.)
- Small group or one-on-one discipleship of nearly-grads. The discipler could be you or another leader who is out of school – or an adult community member could be even better!
- A Nearly-Grad Survival Guide. This can be something written in-house, it could be a collection of articles or books for “suggested reading,” one key book, audio messages, or something else. Hopefully one of these days we’ll have several books targeting this super-important period in people’s lives.
- Organizing “cohorts” of nearly-grads to connect with each other now and stay connected for some period after college ends. Even if these people “go their separate ways,” they can hold each other accountable, help each other think through the transition, and just be a familiar face or voice for awhile. Of course, those who plan to live in proximity, are going into similar fields, or have other similarities could be connected on purpose. Whatever.
What else you got?
As for possible teaching topics for these sorts of things, I’ll post my own “priority list” soon [here's that list].
When chatting about the Latter Transition, there’s something I have to keep in mind – something I haven’t always remembered when ministering to students myself.
It’s not our job to jam-pack spirituality into our college students in such a way that it “lasts” for several years beyond college. I think it’s easy for some of us (I’m included) to see college ministry as “our only chance,” and we’re tempted to cram our students so full of right-theology-right-practice-right-attitude-right-decisions-right-worldview-right-experiences-right-knowledge that they have all they need for long lives of Jesus-following.
We’re right to realize that we’re on the front lines. We’re right to realize that the stakes are quite high. But I’m wrong when I think God’s not a lifelong Shepherd, when I doubt His ability to grow students after they’ve left my care.
Instead of aiming for the Cram Method, our second option is to see much of our job as foundation-laying. Or we might think of college ministry as primarily a “transitioning” work altogether – transitioning people from adolescence to adulthood. Maybe not much more than that.
That way of thinking means a different kind of ministry in some cases. It means putting one question at or near the top of our priority list as we plan:
What will best prepare these students to keep growing for a lifetime?
Of course we want them to grow now, too. But these four years are a tiny amount of time compared with the rest of their lives (usually). So we have to make tough choices, at times doing things that are less attractive or messier or less enjoyable to choose preparation over present-usefulness. Every time we pick a teaching topic or a discipleship material or a ministry role, we are making a choice. Sometimes their (and our) current needs and wants will be the deciding factors. But hopefully not always.
Across our time with these students, what we provide them may be all (or most) of the discipling they get before graduation. If the “supplies” we have provided don’t springboard them toward flourishing and continuing to grow big and strong, then those supplies will sink with them.
Our students may even sink more under the weight!
Are we impacting students for four years of following Jesus… or forty?
The “Big Idea” series is now at number 8:
Help students transition from college.
This is yet another opportunity to transform our college ministries – by beginning to take the long view of student discipleship.
I would argue that our greatest aim should not be for our students to be awesome spiritual leaders by the time they get to their senior year. Our greatest goal should be for our present students to be awesome spiritual leaders when they’re senior adults.
Remember, in the last Big Idea post I suggested that youth ministers (and parents, etc.) have the primary responsibility for a successful transition to college. Just as a quarterback must be more “accurate” than a receiver, so those “throwing” college students into college have primary responsibility for how they land.
But before anyone gets mad about that – and before we college ministers get too comfortable – let me note that I’m fair in my logic. I have the exact same argument for the Latter Transition.
Except for the students themselves of course, we have the primary responsibility for helping students transition well from college to young adult life. Not young adult ministers, singles ministers, or new spouses(!). It’s our job. Not that others shouldn’t help; they should help, just as we college ministers should certainly invest in helping the transition to college.
But either we’re preparing them for the post-college leap – and for the years following the leap – or we’re not.
In many cases, we’re not. I’m guilty of that, too.
I’ll flesh this out more in the days to come. Feel free to add your thoughts along the way.
Continuing the “Big Idea” series on potentially transformative college ministry ideas, I arrive at #7:
Help students transition to college.
As you may have picked up from previous posts, some key assumptions underlie my discussion of the “Transitions” topic:
- Unsuccessful assimilation of Christian high school kids into collegiate spiritual community is one of the biggest problems facing college ministry
- This issue is not primarily the responsibility of college ministers, but of those impacting high school students (parents, youth pastors, pastors, etc.)
- But college ministers can still help this happen – and happen better
- I think helping this happen could radically transform both students’ lives and our own ministries
This is a topic I’ve talked about before, but I certainly think it’s important enough to include in this Big Idea series. So instead of rehashing, here’s an annotated list that might be helpful for reading (my thoughts, at least) about this vital topic:
70% of Church Kids Don’t Stick Around: Penned right before my big trip, this describes a key study that details just how big a problem “Transitions” is.
At the Hinge: An argument for getting involved with college students before they’re college students.
Fish Transish: Multiple ideas for helping new students transition, for application by college ministers or to pass on to your local friendly youth ministry peeps.
January is for Seniors?: Connecting with high school seniors before they’re college students.
Helping Fish Transish: A possible teaching series for preparing new college students.
Three Ways Recruitment is Ministry: Why our recruitment actually helps students transition well.
5 Ways College Ministers Can Cheat: Five ways to be involved with high school students to help prepare them for college.
Summer Students and the Awkward Dovetail: Various thoughts for churches working with home-grown students in the summertime.
Low-Hanging Grease: Why working on Transitions helps people care more about college ministry in general.
Orientation (A Reflection): An essay reminding us just how important successful transition is.
Of course, the final key in bewaring unhealthy ministry is to make sure our ministry is healthy, too.
I Timothy 4 is an excellent chapter for anybody leading college students, particularly as it challenges us to, “Keep a close watch on yourself and on the teaching” (I Tim. 4:16 ESV).
Apparently Martin Luther described the human race as similar to a drunk on a horse – falling off on one side, then getting back up simply to fall off on the other side. We can pretty easily stumble somewhat off-center in our personal lives, and we can pretty easily head off-track in our ministries, too.
And maybe you haven’t noticed, but we don’t have as many safeguards as many ministers do.
Pastors have adult believers in their audiences, many of whom might have been Christians longer than the pastor has been alive! Sometimes seminary profs are sitting out there in the congregation, or other ministers, or former pastors. Plus staff members at the church and some deacons or elders or both. Even the pastor’s spouse and kids are out there!
So if a pastor says something weird or initiates some program that is less-than-wise, it has a fairly good chance of being checked before things go awry.
Youth and children’s ministers have parents around, parachurch ministries have supporters and the public, and anyone else who works with adults at least has true adults in their flock.
But not us. Some of us have spouses, but other than that, we don’t always have many people with the “wisdom of years” to help keep us healthy. Even when we do have bosses, we still can be rather ignored over here in our “college ministry corner.” (Be thankful if you do have some adults in your situation!)
All this means that we could err, and it might be a long time before that problem was checked. Not always. But sometimes.
But that potential for unhealthy ministry is a particular problem when we’re leading young, impressionable, sometimes-hurting, often-needy college students. All those good reasons for college ministry – this is a “make it or break it” time of life, so many key decisions are made during this time, this period sets the stage for the rest of life – can work the other way, too. Even a little mud in the spring at this stage – in the “hinge” moment called “college” – can cause years’ worth of problems.
To say it plain, we college ministers could pretty easily mess people up for a long time. Fear and trembling is a healthy response to the precariousness of our beautiful task. Let’s be careful out there.
Yesterday, I discussed the need to guard our students from unhealthy ministry… and I started with the most obvious enemy: actual cults.
But simply unbalanced or otherwise unhealthy college ministries can be nearly as harmful as cults, yet they are much harder to spot. And from what I’ve seen and heard around the country, campuses are filled with present examples and recent stories of the harm caused by such ministries.
While this is no perfect list, here are five issues that have led to unhealthy college ministry:
- Unbalanced teachings springing from otherwise orthodox positions
- Unhealthy or unbecoming ministry methods
- Overemphasis on single spiritual disciplines or areas of discipleship
- Authoritarian leadership or unhealthy devotion to ministry leaders
- Isolationist ideas, in which certain ministries or methods are held to be the truly “right way”
Please remember, when I first presented this series at a college ministers’ conference, I had been asked to provide a sort of “top ten” list of ideas college ministers should consider, based on everything I’ve seen around the U.S. So I wouldn’t be bringing this up if I didn’t think it was a really important concern and an actual, widespread problem.
While I don’t believe cults and other unhealthy ministries are running rampant on America’s campuses, I do believe that many campuses are affected by “unhealth” in one way or another. And the even bigger problem is that things can go from bad to worse on a single campus easily within one school year.
So unless we’re helping check problematic ministry teachings, methods, and leaders, we run a pretty scary risk.
Recent Comments