“Get your priorities straight!”
In the youth ministry field, the battle between so-called Type A youth ministers and, well, not Type A youth ministers, has raged for decades. The former calls for structure and administration, and has little patience for the “I can’t sit at this desk for more than twenty minutes” or “I just need to be out doing real work” complaints of the latter. [I hear this struggle exists for the “real pastors” too, but the world revolves around youth ministry, right? ;) ]
In this article, Dan Haugh of emergingyouth.com writes for those youth leaders who have found themselves buried in paperwork or too wrapped up in administration. As a Type A person, I like organization and administration. I have an attendance spreadsheet, a student directory, a curriculum template, volunteer lists, calendars, plans, newsletters, and more on my desktop. In my view, good administration provides a good foundation for ministry. Haugh writes that we as youth ministers need to prioritize our time, valuing both relational ministry (including program time) and administration. He challenges the reader by claiming if more than half their time is spent on “busy work,” they need to reprioritize their time.
Prioritizing my time as a full-time youth minister and a full-time student has been a major challenge. I tend to create a week’s to-do list at the start of the week, and rate items by their urgency. I also challenge myself to build in relational time with students during the week.
Amy I appreciated this article and post because I am also a type A personality. I am probably am not to the extreme as others but I definitely lean more on the type A side. As I was reading your post and subsequent article I was reminded of something my youth pastor told me. It was his first year out of Bible college and he was in his first ministry position. He said that the first two months he would spend a couple of hours every day on the phone with his best friend from college and they would talk about how they did not know what to do while at the church. They had been trained how to do the organizational and planning tasks of ministry but not the relational side of ministry. It seems seminaries and undergraduate institutions do well at training ministers how to be type A, but they struggle with training pastors in how to be relational with their parishioners. It seems that the most relational pastors are the ones who it comes naturally too. So are seminaries and undergraduate institutions doing a disservice to those who struggle with relationships?
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