Small town, Big vision

I have served as a youth worker in small and rural towns for over 14 years. There is a lot I love about living in a small town. It is my roots, my heritage, and my life. I understand that not everyone who serves in small town churches grew up in a small town. There are some faith communities that assign their youth workers to churches with no input on the part of the youth worker. It is the same kind of culture shock that I would experience if I was called to work with students in New York City. I would have no foundation of experiences to work from. I will be the first to tell you that serving in a small town is not a calling without its challenges. But the stakes are still high, and the rewards are still great.

You have a great opportunity to build deep relationships. My friend Greg Stier (gregstier.org) often tells youth workers that Jesus was a youth worker with 11 teenagers, one messed up adult sponsor and one REALLY bad kid. All joking aside, I see that as a great pattern for ministry in a small town. Jesus had His twelve, and poured into three. Even in a small church, you are not going to connect on a deep level with every student. Listen to me, that is entirely alright, It is an unrealistic expectation to expect otherwise. (please listen to this, pastors and elders!). If you expect this, you are setting yourself up to fail. On the flip side, there are going to be students you connect with. Pour into those students. Equip your volunteers and adults in the church to also connect with students to build relationships with students in your ministry, so that no one "falls through the cracks".

You can significantly impact school campuses in a large way. If you went to a large city, and asked a youth worker if they would like to have a significant presence at every school campus in their city, they may look at you like you have three heads. Its not because you are crazy, but the logistics of a proposition in a city of even 60,000 is downright staggering. Drop a zero or two off the end of that number, and becomes very do-able with cooperation between a few churches in the community. I last served in a county of 18,000 people, and worked with three other youth workers, and we had a campus presence on all three school districts in our county, reaching 1200 students. It broadcasted church unity to the students, teachers, and administrators.

In some communities, churches still hold a place of "honor and respect". I grew up in the Midwest in the 80's and 90's. School activities on Wednesday nights? Never. Tournaments on Sundays? Unheard of. In our busy lives, that has slipped away in many of our cities. However, in many of our small and rural areas, there are still some communities that stand up and refuse to let all these other activities interfere with traditional church times. Even better, there are some churches that partner with the organizations and have a missional presence in the communities. Its a common occurrence in our region for churches to serve the varsity football or basketball team supper after practice on Thursday Nights. It is a win for the school and the churches. In many Midwestern small towns, pastoral staff at the local churches are treated with a level of respect rarely seen in our society.

I am here to cheer you on and pray for you. Regardless of your background, you can thrive in a small town student ministry. You can do this, but not alone. We are better together.

Brent Lacy is the Rural Ministry Specialist at NNYM in the Great Lakes Region. You can follow Brent on Twitter @brentlacydotcom or follow his blog at BrentLacy.com