The Ultimate Survival Guide for Youth Ministers

It is probably true that a great many people doing youth ministry today didn't have such a great experience in their own adolescence. It has been theorized that quite likely most of the people in any helping profession are there, at least in part, to right some of the wrongs they experienced in their youth. They want to help others through a rough spot. Youth ministers are there to help adolescents and preadolescents through a very rough period of life. They want to help. This is certainly a worthy profession, and a worthy reason for engaging in it. But it has more than its fair share of snares and pitfalls, precisely because of the motivation for doing ministry and the target audience involved.

We need fences in the church. We need fences in youth ministry. Fences are boundaries, and boundaries mark limits. Boundaries proscribe where you can go with another in ministry and where you cannot. Boundaries are necessary. They do not minimize or limit ministry. They will limit where you go in a person's life, as well as where they go in yours. Boundaries provide safety. They acknowledge that you are not all things to all people, nor will you ever be, and furthermore, you don't want to be.