I had one kid.
That was it.
After all of that prep work,
all of that advertising,
all of that anticipation,
Only One Kid Showed Up!
Have you been there before?
Maybe not that bad,
but I'm sure you've felt that all too common anxiety:
"No one is showing up for this amazing Youth Event I've planned."
I talked to this one colleague who had 5 kids from her Confirmation Class of 10 signed up to go on a field trip to visit a local mosque on a Saturday. She was beside herself. She felt hopeless. She would say things like, "No one is coming," and "I feel so lost," and "what am I doing wrong, are there better ways to advertise?"
My answer is that it's not the method of advertising; it's the story we tell about ourselves.
Are we a half-glass full or half-glass empty church?
When we look at 5 kids out of 10, we can look at that as a literal failure.
That's 50%, which is literally failing.
And that is most often the story we tell.
Or, we can look at that as 5 kids,
5 kids in this over-scheduled, church-is-not-a-priority culture,
5 kids spending an entire Saturday at a church event.
That's not 5 kids coming to paintball on a Saturday.
That's not 5 kids coming to a pool party on a Saturday.
That's 5 kids dedicating their entire Saturday to interfaith learning.
If that isn't a win, I don't know what is.
Now, as for our personal feelings as ministers, we should totally feel frustrated that we didn't get half of our class out.
We should always strive to improve participation and challenge ourselves to do better.
We will never be able to improve if we are not honest about our program's short-comings.
But that's not the story you share with the rest of the world.
To the rest of the world, you talk about what a success it was.
Because the story we tell becomes a self-fulfilling prophesy.
If we keep talking about our groups (even to ourselves) as if they are failing,
they will continue to fail.
No one wants to join a sinking ship.
If we talk about the vibrant, growing, life-giving ministry we provide,
we will be a vibrant, growing, life-giving ministry.
Think about professional baseball.
In the Major Leagues, players are played unimaginable amounts of money to hit less than 30% of the pitches thrown their way.
30% makes you a superstar.
30% in most other contexts is failing.
But the story they tell is that 30% is superhuman.
Thus, 30% makes you a millionaire superstar.
So I say it again,
If we keep talking about our groups (even to ourselves) as if they are failing,
they will continue to fail.
If we talk about the vibrant, growing, life-giving ministry we provide,
we will be a vibrant, growing, life-giving ministry.
In the same way, we have the choice to build our programs off of a sense of inadequacy or a sense of success.
Most often, it's better to build off of what works than to dwell on the things for which you have no control.
That's why I always remind myself leading up to any event,
plan to have 3-4 kids drop out last minute and 3-4 kids add on last minute.
Even with the extremely successful and popular program I run now,
I still struggle with that anxiety of "will this work? will anyone show up?"
Even just now, writing this post, I debated using the word "extremely" in describing my Youth Group.
I was going to change it to "moderately successful," because I didn't want to sound to braggy.
Then I realized I was doing the exact opposite of the advice I was giving.
I've been trained all my life that the Christian attitude is one of modesty and humility.
And so I was worried about falsely aggrandizing the level of success of my ministry.
But who wants to be part of something that is moderately successful?
When I have control over the story of my Youth Group,
why would I choose to undersell myself and my church?
5 kids on a Saturday is a success.
Even one kid on a Sunday evening is a success.
And here's how:
When I started my current call, I made a promise to myself to follow the advice of my previous post,
to see the potential success in every experience, to not blame myself for things that didn't work how I wanted them to work.
Instead of kicking myself the entire night, instead of apologizing to that kid who showed up for what could have been,
I decided to make the most of what was.
We sat. We talked. She doodled.
I let her plug her iPod into the speakers
and blast whatever music she wanted to share with me.
We talked about nothing of consequence.
A few days later, her mother called me just to say
that our one-on-one Youth Group night was
the most meaningful night of church this kid had ever had.
This kid,
who would not have considered herself much of a churchy kind of person,
and probably still doesn't,
went onto become one of my core Youth Groupers,
and one of the kids who has made it possible for us to get 50 kids at an event.
And I know for a fact it was in large part due to that supposedly "failed" Youth Group event.
On top of that, I learned a valuable lesson about not scheduling major events on a 3-day weekend when the Giants are in the play-offs.
When I was a lowly intern minister preaching my last sermon at a church in downtown Boston,
I was really struggling to find the right words.
Nothing felt right about the sermon.
As we gathered to process into the church, my senior minister saw me frantically scribbling notes in the margins,
slashing out paragraphs, sweating bricks, trying to fix it in the last few seconds I had.
She put her hand on my shoulder and said, "It is what is. Now go preach it like you mean it."
So don't be so hard on yourself.
Hold yourself to high standards,
but when you feel like you failed,
try to look for what worked,
and build off of that.
And when the moment comes,
and only one kid shows up,
make the most of it.
Preach it like you mean it.
Because it might just be
the most meaningful night of church
that kid has ever had.
That was it.
After all of that prep work,
all of that advertising,
all of that anticipation,
Only One Kid Showed Up!
Have you been there before?
Maybe not that bad,
but I'm sure you've felt that all too common anxiety:
"No one is showing up for this amazing Youth Event I've planned."
I talked to this one colleague who had 5 kids from her Confirmation Class of 10 signed up to go on a field trip to visit a local mosque on a Saturday. She was beside herself. She felt hopeless. She would say things like, "No one is coming," and "I feel so lost," and "what am I doing wrong, are there better ways to advertise?"
My answer is that it's not the method of advertising; it's the story we tell about ourselves.
Are we a half-glass full or half-glass empty church?
When we look at 5 kids out of 10, we can look at that as a literal failure.
That's 50%, which is literally failing.
And that is most often the story we tell.
Or, we can look at that as 5 kids,
5 kids in this over-scheduled, church-is-not-a-priority culture,
5 kids spending an entire Saturday at a church event.
That's not 5 kids coming to paintball on a Saturday.
That's not 5 kids coming to a pool party on a Saturday.
That's 5 kids dedicating their entire Saturday to interfaith learning.
If that isn't a win, I don't know what is.
Now, as for our personal feelings as ministers, we should totally feel frustrated that we didn't get half of our class out.
We should always strive to improve participation and challenge ourselves to do better.
We will never be able to improve if we are not honest about our program's short-comings.
But that's not the story you share with the rest of the world.
To the rest of the world, you talk about what a success it was.
Because the story we tell becomes a self-fulfilling prophesy.
If we keep talking about our groups (even to ourselves) as if they are failing,
they will continue to fail.
No one wants to join a sinking ship.
If we talk about the vibrant, growing, life-giving ministry we provide,
we will be a vibrant, growing, life-giving ministry.
Think about professional baseball.
In the Major Leagues, players are played unimaginable amounts of money to hit less than 30% of the pitches thrown their way.
30% makes you a superstar.
30% in most other contexts is failing.
But the story they tell is that 30% is superhuman.
Thus, 30% makes you a millionaire superstar.
So I say it again,
If we keep talking about our groups (even to ourselves) as if they are failing,
they will continue to fail.
If we talk about the vibrant, growing, life-giving ministry we provide,
we will be a vibrant, growing, life-giving ministry.
In the same way, we have the choice to build our programs off of a sense of inadequacy or a sense of success.
Most often, it's better to build off of what works than to dwell on the things for which you have no control.
That's why I always remind myself leading up to any event,
plan to have 3-4 kids drop out last minute and 3-4 kids add on last minute.
Even with the extremely successful and popular program I run now,
I still struggle with that anxiety of "will this work? will anyone show up?"
Even just now, writing this post, I debated using the word "extremely" in describing my Youth Group.
I was going to change it to "moderately successful," because I didn't want to sound to braggy.
Then I realized I was doing the exact opposite of the advice I was giving.
I've been trained all my life that the Christian attitude is one of modesty and humility.
And so I was worried about falsely aggrandizing the level of success of my ministry.
But who wants to be part of something that is moderately successful?
When I have control over the story of my Youth Group,
why would I choose to undersell myself and my church?
5 kids on a Saturday is a success.
Even one kid on a Sunday evening is a success.
And here's how:
When I started my current call, I made a promise to myself to follow the advice of my previous post,
to see the potential success in every experience, to not blame myself for things that didn't work how I wanted them to work.
Instead of kicking myself the entire night, instead of apologizing to that kid who showed up for what could have been,
I decided to make the most of what was.
We sat. We talked. She doodled.
I let her plug her iPod into the speakers
and blast whatever music she wanted to share with me.
We talked about nothing of consequence.
A few days later, her mother called me just to say
that our one-on-one Youth Group night was
the most meaningful night of church this kid had ever had.
This kid,
who would not have considered herself much of a churchy kind of person,
and probably still doesn't,
went onto become one of my core Youth Groupers,
and one of the kids who has made it possible for us to get 50 kids at an event.
And I know for a fact it was in large part due to that supposedly "failed" Youth Group event.
On top of that, I learned a valuable lesson about not scheduling major events on a 3-day weekend when the Giants are in the play-offs.
When I was a lowly intern minister preaching my last sermon at a church in downtown Boston,
I was really struggling to find the right words.
Nothing felt right about the sermon.
As we gathered to process into the church, my senior minister saw me frantically scribbling notes in the margins,
slashing out paragraphs, sweating bricks, trying to fix it in the last few seconds I had.
She put her hand on my shoulder and said, "It is what is. Now go preach it like you mean it."
So don't be so hard on yourself.
Hold yourself to high standards,
but when you feel like you failed,
try to look for what worked,
and build off of that.
And when the moment comes,
and only one kid shows up,
make the most of it.
Preach it like you mean it.
Because it might just be
the most meaningful night of church
that kid has ever had.