Leaders Ahoy!

I need new youth leaders. Fresh young sailors, or grizzled sea-rats. I don’t care. Heck! I’d take a few soft cabin boys.

Back when I was just a kid in youth group, we called them “sponsors,” but around here, we call them “youth leaders.” And I like it that way. Aye. It gives more credibility to the role. More responsibility. You’re not just a warm body that ups the adult/student ratio. You’re a leader of youth. You lead youth in being disciples.

Anyway. I need youth leaders. But I have no idea how to get them.

It seems like every time I get a good idea of someone to be a youth leader, I take that idea to my senior pastor, and he tells me one of two things:

1. They would be great youth leaders, but they’re up to their eyeballs volunteering in other ministries.
2. They will be great youth leaders, but not for another year or so. They need time to mature.

I love my senior pastor. He’s a wonderful, wise, sagely mentor for me. In fact, he handed this ship over to me, as he was it’s last true captain. So I trust him completely when he tells me these things about potential youth leaders. The last thing I want is to steal good people from another ship, over-extend already overly-extended people, or get some immature disaster-waiting-to-happen Jonah on the crew. But I have to be honest, it’s getting frustrating. I mean, what am I supposed to do in the meantime?

How can I draw new leaders out? How can I generate buzz? Pique interest?

I don’t want to cry out in desperation to people, as my sage mentor wisely counseled me, “Remove the words ‘need’ ‘help’ and ‘desperate’ from your vocabulary, cabin boy.” No one wants to jump on board a sinking, burning, gunpowder-laden ship. Even the heroic Prince Eric jumped off of one of those.

But neither can the ship sail with a skeleton crew. And right now, our ship is no clipper; she’s far from sailing with a bone in her teeth. I feel like I’m constantly seeing the slack sails, and shouting “Man the oars!”

So what about the souls in our care right now?

The current crew feels the need. And the longer it takes to find more, the closer I come to another (yes another) mutiny.

It’s not all hopeless though. I am working on at least one new youth leader, and definitely have my eyes open (look lively!) for prospects all the time. I have other ideas up my sleeve, and the stars still shine at night to sail by, but it will take time for me to implement them in a seaworthy fashion.

I just wrote this entire post once, and for inexplicable reasons WordPress logged me out at some point, so when I hit “Publish” it took me to a login screen. Poof! Everything’s gone. This is my second attempt, and I think it’s better for it.

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