Ministry with Youth in Crisis is a comprehensive treatment of major adolescent crises related to life themes including self-identity, faith formation, family life, social relationships, sexuality, suicide, substance abuse, and eating disorders. The distinctiveness of this book is that it offers a fine blend of solid research, workable theory, and specific strategies for successfully ministering to and with youth in crisis. Furthermore, it emphasizes the caring and sensitive side of working effectively with adolescents experiencing both normal and extreme crisis situations. This volume, therefore, is both descriptive and prescriptive in nature, in that it describes the world teens live in and offers biblical responses for ministry.

"There's a kid in your youth ministry who hasn't somehow been affected by crisis. There's not a youth worker on the planer who won't benefit from the principles and practices in this book." -Kara Powell, Ph.D., Executive Director, Center for Youth and Family Ministry at Fuller Seminary Because when it comes to crisis, it's not a matter of if, but when Anyone who stays in youth ministry very long will encounter significant crises. Family break-ups, substance abuse, sexual assault, eating disorders, cutting, suicide, gun violence... But without proper and immediate care, crises like these cause years of emotional pain and spiritual scarring in students. Rich Van Pelt and Jim Hancock want to help you prevent that from happening. Through their experience and expertise, you'll learn how to: - Respond quickly and effectively to crisis - Balance legal, ethical, and spiritual outcomes - Forge preventive partnerships with parents, schools, and students - Bring healing when the damage is done When crises happen-and they will, ready or not-there are practical steps you can take. Van Pelt and Hancock provide field-tested advice and specific, biblically based guidance for each stage of crisis. Keep this book on hand as the go-to resource when you need it most.

Ministry with Youth in Crisis is a comprehensive treatment of major adolescent crises related to life themes including self-identity, faith formation, family life, social relationships, sexuality, suicide, substance abuse, and eating disorders. The distinctiveness of this book is that it offers a fine blend of solid research, workable theory, and specific strategies for successfully ministering to and with youth in crisis. Furthermore, it emphasizes the caring and sensitive side of working effectively with adolescents experiencing both normal and extreme crisis situations. This volume, therefore, is both descriptive and prescriptive in nature, in that it describes the world teens live in and offers biblical responses for ministry.

Choose your word for these times we're in: unprecedented, weird, challenging, exhausting. Each of them is true, of course. And youth workers everywhere are struggling to figure things out, wrestling with calling and expectations, experimenting and learning and holding onto hope.This book dives headfirst into that space with you, bringing the voices (and thinking) of 28 unique youth ministry practitioners-consider them as your own little band of partners.This book doesn't have all the answers. But it's a snapshot from the brilliant and resourceful tribe of youth workers that you're a part of. Between the lines, we hope you'll get a sense of God's Spirit whispering: Don't give up; you can do it!

Mark DeVries offers an approach that brings teens into one-to-one relationship with older Christians; involves the whole church family from singles to seniors; and frees pastors and leaders from worrying about attendance, budget and competition with other programs.

Unpacking Scripture in Youth Ministry focuses on how to teach and present the Bible in the lives of teenagers. Andrew Root argues that teens are constant interpreters – always asking the questions, who am I? and what do others think of me? – and so youth ministers must teach them to interpret the actions of God as revealed in the Bible. This view is different than teaching biblical knowledge – memory verses and Bible facts – and it’s different than teaching them to interpret the Bible themselves. Rather, they are to view the Bible as a tool for interpreting God’s actions and then respond with their own actions.

You're looking for a youth pastor. Again. What goes wrong? Why do youth ministries crumble? And what is the cost to students, parents, volunteers and church staff? Is a sustainable youth ministry possible, even after a youth pastor leaves? Youth ministry expert Mark DeVries knows the answer is yes, because he helps build sustainable youth minist...

What is youth ministry actually for? And does it have a future? Andrew Root, a leading scholar in youth ministry and practical theology, went on a one-year journey to answer these questions. In this book, Root weaves together an innovative first-person fictional narrative to diagnose the challenges facing the church today and to offer a new vision for youth ministry in the 21st century. Informed by interviews that Root conducted with parents, this book explores how parents' perspectives of what constitutes a good life are affecting youth ministry. In today's culture, youth ministry can't compete with sports, test prep, and the myriad other activities in which young people participate. Through a unique parable-style story, Root offers a new way to think about the purpose of youth ministry: not happiness, but joy. Joy is a sense of experiencing the good. For youth ministry to be about joy, it must move beyond the youth group model and rework the assumptions of how identity and happiness are imagined by parents in American society.

The questions our youth have are often the same ones that perplexed the great theologians. Andrew Root and Kenda Creasy Dean invite you to envision youth ministries full of practical theologians. Follow them into reflection on your own practice of theology, and learn how to share that theology through rich conversation and purposeful experience.

This is a primer on doing integration in Christian education, employing a complementary model.