Steps to GOSPELIZE Your Weekly Youth Program

When I coach youth workers 1:1 or I’m at a youth leadership training I get this basic question in different ways, ”With only a limited amount of time weekly... How do you gospelize a youth service?”

With an average of 90 minutes for each youth service how can you get the most out of it?

1. Pray: Ask God to give you the strength to do the following steps.
2. Work backwards: Identify what you want to get out of the service. The unsaved to understand the gospel, the saved to decide to share the gospel with a friend, the ones sharing the gospel to choose to disciple other students OR get better at playing the latest youth game, lol.
3. Make it fit: If truly gospelizing your 90 minutes youth service is what you want then you’ll find that it comes with a cost. The cost made be cut out one more game in order to spend a bit more time explaining the gospel to the unsaved student, or using that time to speak to a saved student in or outside of small group time to see how you can help them deeper their walk with Christ.
4. Kill the cow: Identify the thing that is the furthest from your goal and kill the sacred cow! This is the thing that is standing between you and tightening the screws on gospelizing your ministry. BIG IDEA!!! If you want to keep the game then do the game before your 5 minute countdown. That way you get to do the game but it doesn't take time away from truly gospelizing your youth service.
5. Stay accountable: tell someone your goals and ask them each week if you made steps to get closer to the main goal and prove it to them. If you didn’t then you owe them an 8 count nugget from Chick-fil-a.
6. Commit: Stay gospelized and not institutionalized!
7. Pray again: The Lord will need to give you increasing strength, boldness and wisdom throughout this process. ​

I believe if you do this each week you will see a greater impact for the kingdom of God in your ministry.

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