I've noticed that there is an idea that has been going around churches. This idea is that youth ministry is this type of ministry that is only fun, that nothing ever really goes wrong, and all that youth pastors do is get weird haircuts and play games with kids. Granted, a lot of youth pastors have really strange haircuts that remind me of the kids off of The Rugrats, we do tend to have a lot of fun with our youth, and play a ton of games. But, that's definitely not how youth ministry plays out most of the time.
Youth ministry is by far one of the most difficult things that I have ever done. Let me give you a few examples of things that have happened in my youth ministry; I have had a kid hit another kid in the head with a stool, most of my youth's fathers are in jail, one of my youth's mother is in rehab, I've broken up fights, I've been hit, I've lost sleep, cops have pulled into the parking lot because of my youth, and I've had to kick kids out of the Wednesday night service. Youth ministry, or ministry in general is no walk in the park with a bunch of weird haircuts.
Don't get me wrong though! We have had wonderful times in my youth ministry too, I've seen kids that were far from the Lord come to Christ. One of my youth understand scripture better than I do sometimes, which I love. One of my fondest memories is when one of my youth asked another how he understands scripture so easily and he replied with; "How do you not understand? It's right there, all you have to do is read and pray!"
Ministry is hard, but its worth it. And we don't all have weird haircuts.
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