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Recently, YM360's Amy Howell was able to sit down with Dr. Allen Jackson, Senior Pastor at Dunwoody Baptist Church in Atlanta, GA. Dr. Jackson helped guide Amy and many others through some difficult times in their lives and was an instrumental voice in shaping Amy's call to ministry. Amy and Dr. Jackson spent some time talking about a variety of subjects. But the one that seemed to really stand out was an important thought about the perspective we take when ministering to our students.

Everyone wants to be proficient at their job. But how do you you know if what you're doing is working? While there are different metrics you can use, encouraging feedback from students is a tool many people overlook. Our friend Jamie Mullen, youth minister at LaBelle Haven Baptist Church, regularly seeks feedback from his students. We recently chatted with Jamie about this and other topics.

Maybe you’re a young youth worker just getting started. Maybe you’re a veteran youth worker who, for whatever reason, hasn’t had children. Maybe you’re somewhere in between. Whatever the case, there is a youth ministry truth that few people address: It can be hard talking to parents about their children when you don't have children yourself.

Graduation is always an exciting time in your youth ministries. There are so many mixed emotions. You're excited for your students; you're happy because they're happy. There are, however, another set of emotions we may feel at graduation, ones we don’t often stop and talk about. So let's talk about the "What If's" of youth ministry.

No matter what your title is - youth pastor, student minister, etc. - you are a disciple-maker. That is your calling, your task. And one of the primary things we do as disciple-makers is to facilitate encounters with God.

We create environments and interactions where students are brought into proximity with God, with the intent that He transforms them.

Roger Davis, YM360 President, has always had a heart for missions. He takes his family on mission trips, he gives leadership to YM360, but also, he provides leadership to one of our partner organizations, Servant Life. As a long time participant in missions, Roger understands the power of mission trips. In our discussion, Roger and I mentioned a few reasons why short term missions are so vital in the spiritual formation of your students.

As you begin transitioning into the graduation season, what are you to do with your students who graduate? Your ministry with your graduating students does not have to stop just because they have transitioned out of your ministry. The relationship that you’ve built with these students, shouldn’t just disappear as soon as they walk across the stage. 

Jody recently sat down with YM360’s Jake Rasmussen at Southeast Conclave to talk a little about the book and the heart behind it. With incidents covering headlines for sexual misconduct and unreported issues in churches, Dr. Dean and Dr. Jackson had 16 different topics that kept rising to the surface in regards to risk management. Including things like Volunteers, Mandatory Reporting, and even things like Bullying and Making Money Matter.

Bubba Crowder, a long time friend of Roger Davis and YM360, is the founder and Director of Fund the Nations - 52 Threads, a company founded based on the Great Commission and with the intent of helping students and adopting parents to fundraise. Oh my does Bubba have a lot of experience with fundraising in youth ministry!

Andy Blanks, Co-Founder and Publisher for YM360, recently sat down with Angela and asked her how, in the midst of so much commitment, she and her husband managed to avoid burnout.

We wanted to suggest a few gift ideas to empower you to not only celebrate your graduating seniors as they transition out of your ministry but to create some meaning as you do so.

There's a lot we miss out on when we don't make Scripture memory a part of our ministries. This post challenges you to make this vital spiritual discipline a part of your youth ministry.

We’ve all been there: you're leading Bible study but you find yourself staring into a room full of mostly disengaged students. Here are three tips to help NOT find yourself here again.

Discouragement is something pretty much everyone in youth ministry experiences at one time or another. Here are three tips for dealing with discouragement.

In youth ministry, you can't get to where you're headed if you don't know where you want to go. That's why it's important to define what your goal is.

Basketball fever has swept through the YM360 offices as we approach the NCAA Tournament and you can join in on the action! Register for our tournament challenge and pick who you think will win it all this year.

Easter is fast approaching and we have one question: what are you doing in your Youth Ministry to build up excitement towards Good Friday and Easter Sunday?

Caleb and Joshua were steady when everyone else around them lost faith. There's a lot we can learn as youth workers from Caleb's example.

Learning to think about discipleship as a journey and not as a programmed hour on your calendar?

We hope that you'll join YM360 at the 2019 Youth Evangelism Conference presented by the Tennessee Baptist Mission Board. The YEC will be held at Municipal Auditorium in Nashville Tennessee on March 15th and 16th. For over 50 years, the mission of YEC has been laser-focused: YEC exists to clearly communicate the Gospel as we lift high the name of Jesus Christ.