"The youth are our future" is a statement I often hear when talking to church members. My thought is if they are your "future" have you ever took the opportunity to make sure that they are at least within the top 3 of your church's annual budget?
Quite often I am asked exactly what do you propose we do to make our youth a priority? I'm glad you asked. :)
Make sure they are an actual line item in the church's overall budget.
Within the budget that is allotted make sure that the youth also has their funds allocated for each activity.
This way each line item is purposed for actual activities that are carefully thought out and intentionally used.
Most of our churches give the youth department a lump sum of funds on the church's overall budget. Doing this gives no thought as to how the funds will be utilized or what the purpose of the funds will be. To combat this we should carefully think out what the vision is for the youth department. Carefully sit down with a youth-driven group and decide what conferences, or youth activities they will most likely participate in. Also during this process, your committee should think of names of qualified speakers gifted in youth ministry that could come in on special occasions to pour into your youth.
I am reminded that most of us are part of the whole 401k plan where you put up a percentage of your pay and your company matches the rest. But I do recall that this comes straight out of your check. This is something that you won't even see, it's invested "right off the top"! And we are ok with that because we know that it will be there when we retire. So since we believe that the youth are our future we should take the funds that will be needed for their yearly activities "right off the top"!
Pastor Jackson is available for training youth leaders and for youth conferences, please click the tab below for more info.