Lead Us Not Into Temptation
How often are you avoiding the spiritual heartache & suffering that sin brings into your life? In this video, Gwen wants you to identify areas of temptation in your life, and she challenges you to proactively work against sin’s temporal draw.
Spiritual Advisory
Do you take precautions and protect yourself and your ministry spiritually? Gwen talks about the importance of always looking forward and remembering the battle is already won.
Small Things with Great Love
My primary goal is to lead others closer to Christ through building Christocentric relationships and loving them as Christ loved us. I strive to do this with my family, friends, coworkers, and in my ministry. I’d love to say that this can be seen in the big and small ways of each of my interactions […]
Don’t Clear the Backlog Just Yet
Coming Up For Air I sat down with a friend the other day. And, as we indulged in a hipster lunch in some gourmet coffee shop, he shared his plans to take a month off this summer. He is an excellent youth minister who has not come up for air in years. I was fascinated […]
Refilling Your Cup in Busy Times
Busy Summer can be (and most of the time, is) a busy time for youth ministers. Between camps, mission trips and conferences, it’s easy to finish the summer more exhausted than you began. It is vital to take care of yourself, allow the Lord pour into you, and take some time to rejuvenate. Whether you only have a […]
Panning for God
Summer Priorities
Hello and welcome to Beyond the Pew. Today we’re beginning a conversation on how to live out our faith during the summer time. So many of us see the summer time as a time where we can get away, as taking a break from life, and certainly summer time can be that. But sometimes we […]
Caught and Not Taught
Think back to last summer. I know for some of us ministers this might be impossible, but humor me for a moment. Yes, since then there have been countless events, meetings, and distractions. But think back to those first few months of planning for this ministry year. Scheduling topics for particular nights, looking through your curriculum, […]
Battling Burnout
When I was new into ministry I asked a priest if he had an advice for a new youth minister. “Take care of yourself,” he said. “You have to look out for yourself because no one else will.” I thought he might be exaggerating, after all I was working for a Church and anyone working […]
Taking A Lesson from C. S. Lewis
“I have no intention of explaining how the correspondence which I now offer to the public fell into my hands. There are two equal and opposite errors into which our race can fall about the devils. One is to disbelieve in their existence. The other is to believe, and to feel an excessive and unhealthy […]