Tag Archives: the summit

the youth cartel, youth ministry, youth work

how The Summit is shaping up

1 Comment

i had this idea swimming around in my head for a couple years, of a youth ministry event that was totally different and unique. i imagined it as TED for youth workers. i even looked into making it an official TEDx event, but discovered that TED doesn’t allow events with religious connections.

so, once adam joined me at The Youth Cartel, we decided to take a risk and try this thing. we tweaked a few things from the TED format, to make the event more ideal for the sort of learning we hoped would occur. and The Summit has been a win. two years in atlanta, and now in our second year in nashville.

we’ve always said The Summit is not a training event. there are other youth ministry events with that goal. the goal of this event is to spark your imagination and instigate new thinking. we want the presenters and their content to be fodder for the holy spirit to get your stirred up, out of ruts, and into dreaming new dreams for your youth ministry. (these aims, by the way, are why we pull a thematic thread through the event, and why we have 45-minute ‘digging deeper’ dialogues after each main session.)

summit-2015-theme-squarethis year we’re making what we think is an awesome tweak, based on our theme of Elephants. we’re going to address “three elephants in the room of youth ministry.” The Summit always develops in a very organic way, with me having tons of conversations with people, exploring our theme(s) and getting input. this year that’s especially true since we have a curator for each session. so, for now, here are the descriptions of the sessions, with info about where we are in the planning.

NOTE: today is the early bird registration deadline. if you register by tonight, you save $40 on the individual and group rates. we really hope you’ll join us in nashville on november 6 and 7.

Session 1 (Friday Evening)
Elephant: Immaturity and Transition in Youth Ministry
Curator: April Diaz
April, along with other presenters, will guide us in an exploration of the awkward topic of our collective immaturity. While misaligned values and unspoken expectations are normally the cause of conflict, we youth workers often seem to have difficulty seeing our own contribution to the problems. Not knowing how to deal with conflict, we too often move on, only to repeat the pattern. Together, let’s look at the plank in our own eye.
other confirmed presenters:

  • Jen DeJong — Transitioning Well
  • Danny Kwon — The Surprising Benefits of Staying a Long Time

other likely presentations:

  • Why We Lie to Ourselves
  • Celebrating Youthfulness Without Being Immature
  • Being Professional Without Becoming a Suit

Session 2 (Saturday Morning)
Elephant: Evangelism and Apologetics
Curator: Dan Kimball
In an increasingly post-Christian world, how do we talk about Jesus and the gospel with those outside our youth room? While the age of pluralism has caused some to simply stop talking about Jesus and the gospel, others charge forward with 1980s approaches. Honestly, the issues are complex; and many of us find it easier to avoid altogether. Dan Kimball, along with other presenters, will bring a variety of perspectives and ideas to this Elephant in our collective room.
other confirmed presenters:

  • Brock Morgan — Bringing the Good News Back to Evangelism
  • Daniel White Hodge — Baptized in Dirty Water: Evangelism in Post-Civil Rights Era

other likely presentations:

  • Good News or Bad? Interpreting Lifeway vs. Pew Research
  • Beyond Conversion Theology: Toward a Postmodern Apologetic
  • The Bono Effect: The Shift from Evangelism to Justice

Session 3 (Saturday Afternoon)
Elephant: Ministry to LBGT Teenagers
Curator: Ginny Olson
We’re not out to change your theology (in either direction!). But let’s be honest enough to admit that we are not wildly succeeding at responding to and including gay teenagers (and those questioning their sexuality). And most of us will be totally lost when we have a transgender teen sign up for summer camp or a mission trip. We promise you: the presenters in this session will not all agree with each other. But our hope is that we’ll all learn and think in the midst of the dialogue about this massive youth ministry Elephant.
other confirmed presenters:

  • Daniel Merk-Benitez — Helping Your Church Be Proactive with LGBT Issues
  • Mark Oestreicher — Helping Parents of LGBT Teenagers
  • Justin Lee — Creating Safe Places (title not final)
  • Gemma Dunning — Love The Saint: how to pastorally support, love and encourage LGBT teens

other likely presentations:

  • What I’ve Learned and What We’ve Changed

Session 4 (Saturday Late Afternoon/Early Evening)
Focus: Elephants as Formation Instigators
Presenter: Jon Huckins
This last session is a chance for us to worship together and wrap up the day with a broader perspective. Jon Huckins is an accomplished guide in the arena of peacemaking; but we’ve asked him to apply those insights to how we address the Elephants that exists in our churches.

oh, and…

Pre-Summit Sessions (3-hour learning experiences during the day on friday — included in your registration. note that these are not necessarily connected to the event theme)

  • Dave Sippel — Sustainable Youth Ministry
  • Jake Kircher — Helping Teenagers Own Their Faith
  • Mike King — Theological Imagination and Spiritual Practices Among Elephants and Sacred Cows
  • John Huckins — Arming Teenagers to Wage Peace

(more Pre-Summit Sessions will be added)

seriously — this thing is very much shaping up to be a barnstorming, powerful, revolutionary time together. i had the youth pastor at a very large church (a guy with more than 50 paid youth workers under him — a guy who normally gets paid to go speak at events) email me the other day, writing, “I’m planning on coming to The Summit this year. The topics and line-up look SO GOOD and important!”

music, the youth cartel

Chris Tomlin’s new album — who wants a copy?

Leave a comment

loveranredtoday i’m listening to chris tomlin’s new album, Love Ran Red. (i just accidentally typed ‘love ran rad.’ and i suppose that’s true also, but wouldn’t have been as strong of an album name; so i applaud chris for not going with that.) clearly, the dude has a gift for writing singable songs, which results in chris’s songs being sung everywhere, probably more than just about any other modern worship artist. chris’s albums are lovely; but as a church worker, i think his greatest impact isn’t in how many people listen to his songs, but how many people sing his songs.

there are two versions of the new albums: 12 tracks on the standard version of the album, and 16 songs on the deluxe version.

and i have 3 copies of the deluxe edition (why does deluxe have an ‘e’ on the end of it, i ask you!?) to give away. here’s how we’re doing it this time (yup, i’m gonna milk this!): friday is the regular registration deadline for The Summit — the coolest youth ministry event ever, taking place in nashville in a week and a half. after friday night, the reg rates go into “late registration” mode, which adds something like thirty bucks or thereabouts. so, the next three people to register for The Summit win a delux(e) edition of chris’s new CD, mailed directly to you! i’ll post the winners here, so you’ll know if you get one or not (and i’ll contact the winners directly). let’s just call this a little nudge for those of you who are planning on attending The Summit, but hadn’t registered yet.

oh, and all of you should check out Love Ran Red (not ‘love ran rad’) here.

the youth cartel, youth ministry, youth work

The Summit website is live

Leave a comment

marketing-headertoday is a big day in Cartel-land. we’ve launched the website and opened registration for The Summit 2014. this is our third year of this truly unique youth ministry event that’s sort of like TED for youth workers.

what is it, you ask? is it pretty much the same as other youth ministry events, you ask?
HA, i say. and then, i stand aside and allow some of last year’s attendees to answer your questions:

The Summit inspires your passion, stirs your mind, and awakens raw and new thinking. You come away with excitement to take on a new challenge or a fresh creativity for the road that you are traveling.

The Summit challenges and sets the stage for a future of ministry that we are about to find ourselves immersed in. It is freeing to have a map and concept for the realities of future youth ministry.

The Summit deliberately provoked my imagination and ministry innovation. Loved it!

and one of my favorite quotes about last year:

The Summit is not a pep rally, group therapy, or a pissing contest of who’s better. It makes the assumption that youth workers are smart people who liked to be challenged and stretched mentally. Thank you. It’s nice to know that not everyone thinks what we do is for dumb-asses in skinny jeans (though skinny jeans were well represented).

here’s the way we describe it on the website:

A Creativity Sparker. An Idea Stirrer. An Insight Inviter.

That’s what The Summit is all about.

We’re all for practical training, but training is not really the focus of this event (there are other events that do that really well). Instead, The Summit is intentionally designed to stir your youth ministry imagination and assist you in discerning God’s leading for your wonderfully unique expression of youth ministry.

each year at The Summit, we pull a thematic thread through the whole event. this year’s theme:

Exploration

Doing youth ministry in church means we’re part of systems and history and expectations. Good or bad or indifferent, those forces can easily subjugate us into doing things the same way, year after year. But context changes; and teenagers change. Staying true to our calling beckons us to lace up our hiking boots and set off on an adventure of discernment, experimentation, and dreaming. Like adventurers climbing Mountains, diving into Seas, and reaching into Space, let’s lean into: Exploration.

filling out the presenter line-up for this event is a year-long process. at this point, we have 10 of the 18 presenters locked in, plus two “session framers” (a storyteller and a theologian)–new roles this year. check out the current line-up here, and know that we’ll be adding to it in the months to come!

register early for $3.01! (sorta)

if you register yourself or your group this month (by june 1), we’re not only giving you special pricing, but we’re adding a whole combo platter of early reg perks:

Early Bird Price
$149 per person
$129 for groups of 3 or more

Perks
Pre-Summit Session of your choice – $40 value
Video of all sessions – $50 value (register by June 1)
Audio of all sessions – $25 value (register by July 1)
Good News in the Neighborhood –$25 value
Viva – Genesis – $5.99 value

That’s correct. If you register by June 1st we are giving you $145.99 in perks. So basically, it’s $3.01… which is absolutely hilarious and crazy.

hope you can join us!! as a wee appetizer, we released David Crowder’s talk from last year’s Summit yesterday (btw: David’s new album, Neon Steeple, started pre-selling on itunes this week).

books, the youth cartel, youth ministry, youth work

spend your budget!

1 Comment

wow — the fact that it’s only days from christmas doesn’t seem weird to me; but the fact that 2013 is days from ending, that’s wild to me (as it always is).

cartel storefront imageif you work in a church, this might not be the end of a budget cycle. but so many youth workers i know are in the final days of a 2013 church budget. and if that’s you, and you have a tiny stash o’ funds left, i’d like to suggest two good uses, all of which are also time-sensitive:

1. FREE SHIPPING in The Youth Cartel store on all orders of $25 or more, for the continental U.S., through tuesday, december 24 (christmas eve!). this is your chance for a win/win. we have way too much product in our “warehouse” (the shelves in adam’s garage). and, of course, you get the double-win of our awesome products AND free shipping. we’re seeing people use this opportunity to do a couple things:

  • place bulk orders on a single product (remember, any order of 20 or more copies of a single product gets a 35% discount anyhow!). yesterday, someone bought 20 copies of the “Parent Pack of Awesomeness” (all five books in the Parents Guide series). and someone else bought 40 copies of the Zombie Apocalypse Survival Guide for Teenagers, clearly getting ready for a retreat or a small group series or something.
  • or, quite a few have just used this to stock up on resources they’ve wondered about, but hadn’t gotten yet. i’m seeing lots of orders with 5 or 6 different titles, just 1 or 2 copies of each.

you don’t need a coupon or code for this deal. just have more than twenty-five bucks in your cart, and a continental U.S. address, and the shipping will automatically get cut. easy peasy, sugar-plum squeezy.

2. Event deposits. we’re offering the very best deal you can ever get on pre-registrations for our two national events, the Middle School Ministry Campference, and The Summit. in both cases, a $25 non-refundable, but fully transferable deposit now (before 2013 ends!), locks in the lowest rate, and we’ll invoice you for the balance at the end of next summer.

msmc-square-500

  • the Middle School Ministry Campference (here’s last year’s website) is a weekend-long tribal gathering for people who work with young teens. you learn a ton, but you’ll also have more fun and build more ministry friendships than any other youth ministry event you’ve ever attended (i am not exaggerating). the event is at SpringHill Camp in seymour, indiana (hour south of indy, hour north of louisville), october 10-12, 2014. and with this special pre-registration, you lock in an all-inclusive rate (really, accommodations and food included!) of $259 per person.

the-summit-black

  • The Summit (last year’s website) is like TED for youth workers, carefully crafted to spark your imagination and get you thinking in new ways. of this year’s event, Christy B wrote “The Summit left my mind full of new ideas to connect with my students and ways to engage them in their spiritual lives. Can’t wait for next year!” we’re moving the event to nashville for 2014. november 7 and 8. and with this special pre-registration, you lock in an almost absurd rate of $109! (seriously, that’s cheap)

 

both of those pre-reg deals end the second before ryan seacrest says “happy new year!”

church, the youth cartel, youth ministry, youth work

video from The Summit now available, PLUS Kid President creator Brad Montague on making things simple

Leave a comment

we almost didn’t get video from The Summit this year. we had a professional videographer all lined up, and he cancelled the day of the event in a rather not-so-professional-after-all way. luckily, my partner in The Youth Cartel is both a quick thinker and the owner of a very nice camera, and we had a friend there who was willing to “oversee” it.

so here we go, just a month later, with a little editing magic from adam. 18 videos, all in a TED style. our theme this year was ALL, loosely riffing on the shema (love the lord your god with all your heart, soul, mind and strength). seriously, it’s very rare that you can find a collection of short (the shortest is just over 8 minutes, but most are 12 – 15) videos that will challenge you to think in new ways about youth ministry. use them for training and discussion at your church; or just watch them for your own development. as we said at the beginning of the live event, the real intent of The Summit is not to get you to DO what these presenters suggest, per se. the real intent is that the holy spirit would use these to help you dream new dreams.

so, you can buy the whole lot of ’em for fifty bucks. this year they’re on vimeo pro, which gives you the option of downloading (for use with a team or something) or streaming (quicker, for your own viewing). you can also buy one session’s videos for twenty five bucks, or an individual video for ten. click here to buy.

Session 1: Soul

  • Bryan Loritts (The Anchor of Your Soul)
  • Lem Usita (Identity Formation and Youth Workers)
  • Holly Rankin Zaher (Dancing with Faith and Doubt)
  • Paul Martin (What Playing Guitar Taught Me About YM)
  • Nkiru Okafor (The Dark Night of the Soul)
  • Luke MacDonald (Going All In)

Session 2: Mind

  • Bethany Stolle (Design and Co-Creation)
  • Crystal Kirgiss (Changing Views of YM Throughout History)
  • David Crowder (The Process of Creativity)
  • Michelle Benzinger (Beauty Will Save the World)
  • Carlos Cedeño (Giving Your Ministry Away)
  • Annie Lockhart (Imagination as the Starting Point of YM)

Session 3: Strength

  • Brad Montegue (Making Things Simple Without Being Simplistic)
  • Christy Lang (Bible Interpretation: Starting With Teeenagers’ Interpretation)
  • Jeffrey Wallace (Redefining Urban as a Survival Mindset)
  • Theresa Mazza (Re-Imagining Yourself as a Youthworker-at-Large)
  • Mark DeVries (A Modest Response to the Death of YM)

Session 4: Heart

  • Mark Oestreicher (Choosing the Unchosen and Unloved)

and to give you a little taste of these babies, here’s brad montague’s talk on “making things simple without being simplistic.” brad is the creator of the Kid President videos that have been so viral over the last year or two. he gets hundreds (thousands?) of speaking requests from every sector of society, and he accepts very few of them. so we were truly honored to have him join us. watch and enjoy!

and, speaking of The Summit, we’re officially moving to nashville for next fall. dates are november 7 and 8. of course, there are LOTS more details to come, but we have a super-special “use up the dregs of your 2013 youth ministry budget” deal right now: a $25 deposit locks in the lowest rate of $109/person. we’ll invoice you for the balance in late summer of 2014. these deposits are non-refundable, but fully transferable. click here to go for it!

church, the youth cartel, youth ministry, youth work

super awesome videos from dan stevers (with prizes!)

1 Comment

more than two years ago, i blogged about my church’s uh-maze-ing video guy, dan stevers. the guy’s creativity blows my mind. but he’s also a deeply good guy, with an amazing heart for ministry. in fact, he stepped out in faith this year and stepped down from his paid role to focus more on creating video content for the global church (many of his videos are available now in spanish, chinese, and other languages). dan is also passing along what he’s learned: there’s a whole collection of free tutorials on his site.

i’ve just rarely seen such high quality work — with a HUGE variety: mini-movies, comedy, animated scripture, sermon themes. heck: i dare ya to click through to his site, watch one video, and not watch a second. it’s almost impossible (sort of like pringles).

because i believe in dan and the quality of his work, and think there are enough youth workers who could use his stuff, i want to do a little give-away contest dealio.

and i’m going big on this one: gonna give out THREE prizes, worth a total of $123!

one person will win a license for this amazing video about identity, normally 17 bucks (seriously — so good for youth ministry):

Identity from DanStevers.com on Vimeo.

another person will win a license for dan’s best-selling mini-movie, change the world, also normally 17 bucks. (you can click through to watch a preview)

then one lucky winner gets this motherload: dan’s bestsellers collection (as he says, “all killer, no filler”), which is normally 89 bucks.

and, here’s how i’m going to give these away. i know there are a TON of you who are planning on coming to The Summit or the Middle School Ministry Campference, and just haven’t bothered to register yet. i know, because you’ve told me! so: the next three people who register for either of those events win these prizes (first one gets the bestsellers collection, and the next two get the single videos). i get emails from our reg systen when someone registers, so i’ll know who you are! but you’ll have to act quickly.

and, whether or not you come to the MSMC or The Summit, check out dan’s amazing art, and think about the impact it could have in your ministry.

the youth cartel, youth ministry, youth work

three Summit bits of awesomeness

Leave a comment

Summit bit of awesomeness numero uno:

i think we’ve landed our 18th of 18 presenters. more on that very soon. now if i can just get uncle wally to respond so we have our official event uke player (the dude was sorta old, so i’m hoping he’s still alive!)…

Summit bit of awesomeness numero dos:

we released the video of ben chestnut’s uh-maze-ing talk from last year’s Summit into the wild this week. ben is the co-founder and CEO of mailchimp. seriously, this is a guy who would speak at TED or any other non-ministry event. but he likes adam (don’t we all?), so agreed to speak at our little event. he offers some brilliant insights. really, this is worth the dozen minutes it takes to watch about ten times over.

Ben Chestnut: Creating an Environment for Creativity and Empowerment

Summit bit of awesomeness numero tres:

this is awesome. we’re partnering with some awesome peeps to offer a youth ministry and marriage retreat in connection with The Summit (now you really have a chance to say, “hey, honey, let’s mount The Summit”!).

marriage retreat logo

here’s the scoop:

Youth ministry has a propensity to demand much of marriage, which at times can be difficult enough on it’s own. Yet many youth workers have even more of a tendency to project an image of the perfect Christian marriage, even though we have the same bumps and challenges as other couples. As Christian leaders, it is imperative that we learn to tend to the soul of our own marriages and families before coming alongside students and their parents to do the same. This 48-hour retreat is designed to help you do just that!

Organized and designed by REACH Youth New England, in partnership with WinShape Retreats (a foundation of Chick-fil-A) and sponsored by Simply Youth Ministry (SYM), the Youth Ministry and Marriage Retreat is designed to provide you quality relational time as a couple as well as innovative and interactive teaching and workshops to strengthen your marriage. You will also have the chance to intentionally connect with other youth workers and their spouses about marriage and ministry as the retreat is intentionally intimate and limited to only 16 couples.

The retreat will start Sunday November 10th at 12:00pm and wrap up Tuesday, November 12th at 10:00am and will take place at the beautiful Winshape Retreat Center in Rome, GA – a 26,000-acre wildlife preserve that sits in the foothills of the Appalachian Mountains, surrounded by a rolling wonderland of forests, meadows and streams. Two nights lodging, six meals, and programming are all included in this retreat. All of it a $700 per couple value… for only $100 PER COUPLE (if you register by October 1st) thanks to the generosity of WinShape and SYM!

A full schedule, and more details will be available soon.

MAKE IT A WEEKEND!

The Summit is offering couples who attend the Youth Ministry and Marriage Retreat our absolute craziest rate of just $159/couple for The Summit. Our hope is that you can attend together to The Summit on Friday and Saturday, get your imagination sparked and your heart charged up with youth ministry ideas… then go spend a few days together at this marriage retreat to spark and recharge your marriage. How fun is that?

How do I get this deal?

First, register for the Youth Ministry and Marriage Retreat.

Next, after you complete your registration you’ll get a special discount code for The Summit.

the youth cartel, youth ministry, youth work

a little help in making your decision about attending The Summit

Leave a comment

in case you missed this elsewhere yesterday:

should-i-attend-the-summit-flowchart

and, in case you missed this: the early bird pricing of $149 (or $129 each for groups of 3 or more) ends at MIDNIGHT TONIGHT! omigosh! don’t waste the widow’s mite, youth worker!

click here for magical goodness —-> X <---- go back, click there! magical goodness!

books, the youth cartel, youth ministry, youth work

April Diaz’s Summit talk, The Summit early bird deadline, and 3 freaking awesome books

2 Comments

seriously, sometimes there’s just so much awesome stuff happening around The Youth Cartel that i feel like i have to meter it out here on my blog. i’ve had people tell me that they feel like my blog is all promotional stuff these days. and that really bugs me, to be honest. i really try to write about whatever i’m stoked about, or whatever i’m thinking about, or whatever i’m ticked about. i don’t want to have this just be a marketing channel, but i get so stinking excited about sharing stuff with you that i’m pumped about.

so: i’ll just lump three or four cartel-y things into one blog post! the haters can skip reading and wait for me to get all ranty in another post.

first: The Summit early bird deadline

you know about The Summit, right? TED for youth workers. imagination ignition. creativity jet fuel. the most diverse roster of provocative presenters who will melt your freaking mind. yup, that event. it’s in atlanta this coming november 8 and 9. but the early bird pricing of $149 for individuals and $129 each for groups of 3 or more ends friday night!

to give you a little appeteaser of the event, here’s april diaz’s fantastic presentation from last year’s event, called Re-Imagining the Role of the Youth Worker. we were so stoked about her talk that we asked her to expand it into a book, which she’s done, and we’ll be releasing that bad boy in early october (just in time for The Summit this year!).

second: pre-sale of The Picture Book Guide to Youth Ministry

9780985153601-3Da youth worker in louisiana named paul records contacted me about this fun and helpful book idea quite a long time ago. somewhere in the midst of our months-long email conversation, The Youth Cartel decided to start publishing books. and we decided to pick up paul’s book. it’s such a fun and solid approach to a book about priorities for volunteer and rookie youth workers. it’s a focus on being the youth worker god made you to be, rather than on having a particular skill set. really, the subtitle says it well: Simple Lessons on Reaching Teens, Sustaining Your Soul, and Avoiding Ministry Meltdowns. and paul created all these fun and goofy illustrations to go with it (which makes reading it really engaging). since it’s a picture book, we laid it out in a landscape design, like a children’s book.

this would be a perfect book to buy for all your new volunteers (and your old volunteers also!) as you approach a new school year. and with that in mind, we’re offering special pricing on bulk purchases.

the book is at the printer right now, and we expect to have it in stock by the end of the month. at that point, the pre-sale pricing will go away — so jump on this one now.

  • 5-9 copies – 15% off
  • 10-19 copies – 20% off
  • 20 or more copies – 35% off

you can download a sample here, by the way.

third: pre-sale of The Zombie Apocalypse Survival Guide for Teenagers

9780988741355-FRONTyup, leave it to The Youth Cartel and jonathan mckee to publish a youth devotional based on zombies. full disclosure: jonathan was way down the road of having this published by a much bigger publisher (“much bigger” isn’t saying much, in comparison to us!), but a honcho there pulled the plug, saying they couldn’t publish a book about zombies. but we will! and we are! jonathan creatively weaves a fiction (duh!) story, written by a teenage zombie apocalypse survivor, about the lessons he and his friends have learned about staying alive. at the end of each of the 27 short chapters, there’s a collection of reflection questions and a bible verse or two to get students thinking about wisdom (the subtitle of the book, by the way, is “27 Principles of Wisdom When You’re Running for Your Life!”).

just got an endorsement in from josh griffin, who wrote that this is “The most original student devotional I’ve ever read.”

this is a great book to give to teenagers; but really, it would be a blast to use in the context of a small group.

yup, we’ve got special pre-sale pricing:

  • 1-9 copies – Save $1 each
  • 10+ copies – Save $4.19 each (35% off retail)

sorry, we don’t have a sample yet (it’s still in final editorial, and should release in mid-august); but trust me, it’s awesome. everyone who has read it has loved it (including teenagers).

fourth, and finally: continued pre-sale of the Ignite Bible for Teens

Ignite - The Bible for Teensi was stoked to play a general editor role (meaning, i wrote a bunch, recruited other writers, edited their work, and gave lots of input on design and other elements) for this new NKJV bible intentionally created for middle schoolers.

just today, i got this fantastic endorsement from brooklyn lindsey (who really knows middle schoolers):

The Ignite Bible has a grit to it that I’ve not seen in other teen Bibles. The feel of the cover itself suggests that there’s a something resilient and eternal in your hands. I like that the hardiness found in it’s pages doesn’t lend to obscurity. Instead, carefully selected language paves clear pathways, instructing young readers in relevant topics–giving them biblical insight that helps them right where they are in their everyday life. My favorite feature: the short but super engaging book introductions, they were so good I read them all.

you can download the entire book of matthew as a sample here, so you can see both the content and the design.

and, yup: we have awesome pre-release pricing for a limited time. the softcover and hardcover are both $5 off retail, and if you order 10 or more copies, we’ll give you 30% off. seriously.

ok, there’s some of The Youth Cartel stuff i’m excited about. there’s plenty more; but that’s the time-sensitive stuff you needed to hear about!

church, leadership, the youth cartel, youth ministry, youth work

my renewed commitment to diversity (one of the reasons i’m stoked about The Summit)

Leave a comment

annie lockhart croppedmost people reading this blog would already know that i co-lead a little pot-stirring youth ministry organization called The Youth Cartel. and most would know that one of our most focused chances to stir is our event The Summit. if you’re familiar with TED talks, then you have an idea of what this event is like: 18 carefully selected, unique and brilliant presenters bringing laser-focused 12 – 15 minute talks specifically designed to spark your youth ministry imagination. in the spirit of TED (and, very much in the spirit of the wonderful and fun little book, The Medici Effect), The Summit includes presenters you’ve mostly never heard of offering provocative ideas or suggestions or challenges or prophetic words that are intended to help you dream big dreams; new dreams, even.

there are 50 or 100 uniqunesses about this event that get me pumped about it. i’m not alone in that; and it’s not only because i’m hosting this baby. in fact, those reasons are probably why april diaz, a seasoned youth ministry veteran who’s been to her share of national youth ministry events wrote this about last year’s event:

The best “youth ministry” conference I’ve ever been to! The format was provocative. The content was challenging. The community high caliber. Just incredible.

BethanyStolle-headshot-croppedit’s why marti burger, the head of youth ministries for the evangelical covenant church (denomination), wrote:

Loved the variety of voices, the challenges, the opportunity to dream, vision and create new concepts moving forward. This isn’t a conference where you will walk away with something you can use on Wednesday but a chance to discern how to re-image ministry. Such a gift!

bryan lorittsso, yeah, i’m pumped. but there’s another reason.

a few months ago, my friend efrem smith shared an image on facebook that showed how little progress we seem to have made on reflecting the diversity of youth ministry leaders when it comes to the “stage” and “page.” in other words, we haven’t been intentional enough about finding and raising up both women and non-white youth workers. now: i’m a white dude. add to that: i turn 50 a week from friday — so in the youth ministry world, i easily qualify as an “old white guy.” i still have something to say, and i don’t want to be sidelined because of my skin color or age.

Christy Lang Hearlson Headshot 2012but i’ve really come to see that the church (particularly the evangelical wing of the church) doesn’t have much of a “farm team” system for raising up speakers and writers who aren’t white dudes. i wouldn’t be speaking and writing today, honestly, if i hadn’t given a whole lot of mediocre talks and written some “just ok” stuff when i was younger.

my interactions with efrem about that post (we had a fantastic four hour lunch, and a bunch of emails) convicted me that The Youth Cartel’s value of finding new voices simply must include those who are often marginalized. and in the spirit of The Summit, the best new thinking often comes from the margins. (i have also been reminded of my interactions with dr. soong-chan rah from north park university, who challenged me and mentored me years ago in this area.)

crystal kirgissi’ve had an interesting a-ha. when our criteria for finding presenters isn’t “who’s really well known? who will be good for our marketing efforts?” the process of finding diverse presenters who will bring significant contribution gets reframed. it’s still work. but it’s not an almost-impossible task.

as a result: while the topics planned for presentations at this year’s Summit have me totally stoked, the mix of presenters has me even more so.

holly rankin zaher-croppedwe currently have 14 of our 18 presenters locked in. there are only 5 white dudes in that mix (and only two of us — me and mark devries — would qualify as “old white dudes”). there are 6 women. there are 5 non-white presenters. we’re actively pursuing 5 more presenters this week (with the ideal of landing 4 of them), and those 5 include 3 women. those 5 include 3 people of color.

jeffrey wallacethis effort (and success!) is much more than some sort of a politically-correct marketing ploy. this is core to the DNA of The Youth Cartel. and it’s core to The Summit being an event where you still truly have your imagination sparked. and it’s why you won’t hear a bunch of ideas or thoughts that you’ve already heard in one variation or another sixteen times before.

it was a very happy moment for me at last year’s event when, as Anne Jackson was getting ready to go up on stage, she whispered to me, “i just realized that of the 6 presenters in this session, i’m the only white person!” yeah: and that session totally rocked it.

we hope you’ll join us at The Summit. but we also hope you’ll join us in looking to the margins. it’s pretty rare that fresh stuff comes from the middle.

lem usitatheresa mazza

(oh, and by the way: if you register for The Summit before June 1, you get a VERY sweet bonus. you call ALL the audio and video of this year’s event for FREE!)