Hybrid Ministry

By Nick ClasonBusiness Religion & Spirituality Christianity Technology Marketing

Hybrid Ministry episodes

December 28, 2023 Episode 077: 💪 Get More Done: Time Management for Youth Pastors
⚡ [FREE] Social Media Mastery Awaits! Get Your Hands on Our Free One-Month Ebook ⚡
📅 "1 Month Done for You Social Media Posting Tool"
https://hybrid-ministry-40060036.hubspotpagebuilder.com/free-hybrid-ministry-e-book
☝️ONE-CLICK SOLUTION FOR REELS & SHORTS
OPUS FOR AI SHORTS & REELS
https://www.opus.pro/?via=a5d361
2024 [FREE] Youth Ministry Masterclass on YouTube:
https://www.youtube.com/@clasonnick
========================================
DESCRIPTION
🥱 Are you tired?
🫠 Overwhelmed?
🏁 Even if you’re not, don’t you just feel like the rat race of church ministry never ends?
🕥 Don't let time slip through your fingers; start streamlining your schedule today to make the most of every minute you invest in your ministry and the lives of young people.
💪 Prepare to be empowered, motivated, and equipped to take your time management skills to the next level. By implementing the strategies shared in this video, you'll be well on your way to becoming a more organized, efficient, and impactful youth pastor.
⚡ If you're ready to take charge of your time and elevate your ministry to new heights, hit that play button and let "The Ultimate Guide to Time Management for Youth Pastors" be your guiding light.
Subscribe to our channel and don't miss any more videos from the 2024 Youth Ministry Masterclass FREE on YouTube
========================================
🆓 FREEBIES 🆓
📅 "1 Month Done for You Social Media Posting Tool"
https://hybrid-ministry-40060036.hubspotpagebuilder.com/free-hybrid-ministry-e-book
🎅 "The Ultimate (and FREE!) Christmas Party Gude"
GUIDE: https://hybrid-ministry-40060036.hubspotpagebuilder.com/christmas-party-run-sheet
PRACTICAL YM TIPS: https://www.youtube.com/@practicalyouthministrytips
🍩 "FREE World's Greatest Donut Event Guide"
GUIDE: https://hybrid-ministry-40060036.hubspotpagebuilder.com/worlds-greatest-donut
😨 "Have I already Ruined my TikTok Account?"
https://www.hybridministry.xyz/articles/ebook
📹 "Adobe Premiere Pro Presets for Animating Layers"
https://share.hsforms.com/1VL1oWwWwQ82PLwsPFkPITgnumis
========================================
🛠️TOOLS
Some of the below links are affilate links in which we do recieve a small commission based on your purchase or use of products
//BEST DYM RESOURCES
https://www.hybridministry.xyz/articles/dym
OPUS.PRO FOR AI SHORTS & REELS
https://www.opus.pro/?via=a5d361
//YOUTUBE STARTER KIT FOR UNDER $100
https://www.hybridministry.xyz/articles/youtubestarterkit
AUTO POD
https://autopod.lemonsqueezy.com?aff=MX7Vv
TRY REV.COM FOR TRANSCRIBING
https://rev.pxf.io/R5nDOa
👉 STAY CONNECTED WITH NICK
YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@clasonnick
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/hybridministry/
TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@clasonnick
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/HybridMinistry
Website: https://www.hybridministry.xyz
📓SHOWNOTES
//SHOWNOTES & TRANSCRIPTS
http://www.hybridministry.xyz/077
//YOUTUBE VIDEO
https://youtu.be/xlS1kWcQBS8
//94% OF BORN AGAIN CHRISTIANS
https://amotherfarfromhome.com/94-of-christians-were-saved-before-18-years-of-age/
//MY YOUTH MIN BY YM360
https://myyouthmin.com/
//DOWNLOADYOUTHMINISTRY
https://www.downloadyouthministry.com/search?q=Nick+Clason&search-button=&lang=null
Technique #1: Make a list
//MICROSOFT TO-DO
https://to-do.office.com/tasks/
//TODOIST
https://todoist.com/
//ANY.DO
https://www.any.do/en
Technique#2: Calendaring
//GOOGLE CALENDAR
http://calendar.google.com
Technique #3: Make appointments with yourself
//CALENDLY.COM
https://calendly.com/
Technique #4: Schedule your relationships
//CALENDLY.COM
https://calendly.com/
Technique #5: Delegate, Automate or Eliminate
//DOWNLOAD YOUTH MINISTRY (DYM)
http://www.downloadyouthministry.com
~psst... these are my 9 favorite DYM products!
https://www.hybridministry.xyz/articles/dym
//CANVA PRO
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=g0FQWvKjP_E&t=15s
//MY FREE EBOOK
https://hybrid-ministry-40060036.hubspotpagebuilder.com/free-hybrid-ministry-e-book
🕰️TIMECODES
00:00-02:21 Get More Done
02:21-04:57 The 3 Core Tenets of Time Management
04:57-07:15 Technique #1: Make a list
07:15-08:48 Technique #2: Calendaring
08:48-11:18 Technique #3: Make appointments with yourself
11:18-13:06 Technique #4: Schedule your relationships
13:06-15:25 Technique #5: Delegate, Automate or Eliminiate
15:25-16:04 Avoid Sacrificing your Family on the Altar of Youth Ministry
16:04-17:44 Hack 1: Evenings Count Double
17:44-18:11 Hack 2: Take Advantage of Slower Seasons
18:11-19:24 Hack 3: Take Advantage of your job's flexibility
✍️TRANSCRIPT
Try Transcribing for Yourself at Rev.Com
http://www.rev.pxf.io/R5nDOa
Nick Clason (00:01):
Time management for youth pastors? Is it even possible? I mean, think about it. It's like you and I, I'm a youth pastor too. We have multiple jobs. We have pastors, we have executive pastors, we have parents, we have stepparents, we have spouses, our own spouses, we have our children, we have our youth kids that we're trying to minister to. We have the youth leaders. It's like we're answering to so many different people. It can feel so confusing. Who do we try to make happy? Who do we try to cater to? And at the end of the day, how do we make sense of any of this? Because the reality is we have the most important job in the world. Think about it, a hundred years from now, no one's going to care what kind of whipped cream you bought at Walmart for the hot cocoa bar for the upcoming Christmas party, but a hundred years from now, what matters?
Nick Clason (00:50):
What hangs in the balance is the lives and souls of these students, and you've probably heard it before, 94% of born again Christians have made a decision to follow Jesus before the age of 18. I know that that stat alone is the reason why I do what I do. And in this episode we're going to talk about the pillars of time management, what you need to understand from kind of like a philosophical standpoint. Then we're going to chat through the Surefire framework, and then finally, I'm going to give you three hacks to avoid sacrificing your family on the altar of your job. And here's why this is important and here's why I can even talk about this right now. I am currently offering a two-part video series to YM 360 once per month. I'm writing a weekly teaching series for them. I'm also doing weekly YouTube videos right here on this channel.
Nick Clason (01:39):
I'm posting two times daily on social media. I have my very own free ebook, which I'm following that exact strategy for myself on this channel as well as in my student ministry. You can download a copy of that for free link in the show notes. I try to create a weekly game for download youth ministry, and by the way, I have a real job as a youth pastor as well. My boss asked me, do you just never sleep? Do you work all the weekends? How do you get it all done? The reality is I follow these techniques and I want to encourage you to subscribe because we are dropping. This is part one of the 2024 on-Demand Youth Pastor Masterclass, time management. Welcome to the Hybrid Ministry Show. Okay, so there are three kind of core tenets, philosophical things that you actually to understand when it comes to time management.
Nick Clason (02:29):
These aren't tips, these aren't tactics. These are things that you have to understand first and these have to inform the tips and the tactics. No amount of tips, no amount of tactics will be helpful to you if you don't understand these things. So core tenant number one is that you are 100% responsible for your time and again, like I said at the top, it may not feel that way. It may feel like you have multiple different bosses and that is true. The reality is you are going to be answering to different people and there are going to be times where they are going to dictate
Nick Clason (02:58):
What do, but at the end of the day, your boss is not flushing out your 40, 45, 50, 55 hour a week schedule. He's just not or she's just not. You are responsible for your time 100%. So you understand that basis. You can then operate out of that. If you are waiting for someone to tell you what to do, then this time management thing is going to just be fleeting and you're not going to be able to get any of this stuff done because you're going to be playing the victim mentality as opposed to taking agency and control for your time. Core tenant number two is this is your overwhelmed. The reason that you may feel overwhelmed, have anxiety, not know what to do, be confused about which task to tackle. It comes from this. It comes from the fact that you have no direction. We're going to get to more about that in a second, but that lack of direction, you need direction.
Nick Clason (03:52):
That direction is what helps give your brain clarity, focus and the ability to just crush tasks on what comes next and get things done. Number three, not all time is created equal. Here's an example. I'm a morning person. You give me two hours in the morning from like 6:00 AM to 8:00 AM I can crush just about any youth sermon. It will be good, it will be coherent, it will make sense, but if you give me that same block of time from 3:00 PM to say 5:00 PM I'm toast. I'm not getting the same amount of work done. You need to know what your key hours are, the hours that you can get the most amount of optimal thinking time done so that you can knock things out. Now let's move on. If we understand those things that you're in charge of your time that you're overwhelmed comes from the fact that you may not have any direction.
Nick Clason (04:41):
And then number three, not all time is created equal with those as the core tenants, with those as the philosophy. Let's build on that and let's get really practical, really hands-on and some things that you can implement in your time management skills in your workweek today. So technique number one is start with a list. I know it sounds basic and you're like, bro, we're on the hybrid ministry show. I thought you're going to give me some bougie next level digital tool. Sure, grab a list that's digital if that's what you want to do. That's what I do. I use Microsoft to do. I hate Microsoft. It used to be called Wonderlist and I use it because it has the ability to be shared. So my wife and I do our groceries on it, but then Microsoft took it over and I still use it, but it's a digital list.
Nick Clason (05:27):
I can use it on my phone, I can use it on a computer. You can use anything. I mean you can use the notes app in your phone. You can use a Daytimer. You can write it down physically with paper, but make a list of everything you have to do and get specific. For example, if you say Plain Wednesday night, yes, you have to do that. You're a youth pastor, that's part of your job. But what goes into planning Wednesday night? That's not very specific because specifically you to write a lesson, you need to send the leader email. You need to schedule your tech team. You need to schedule your greeters, you need to plan the worship set. You need to play in the game. You need to set up chairs. You need to set up the cafe, make sure that the cafe is stocked.
Nick Clason (06:10):
You need to make announcement slides. You need to post a social to remind people about Wednesday and to crush social, you should grab my 100% completely free ebook. It's right down here, link in the description, but nonetheless, you see that, right? You see how Wednesday night planning versus all this other stuff. You see how that is an example of a good to-do list versus a bad to-Do list. Again, if you're like, I know I need to get done with Wednesday, break it all apart. List down every single thing you need to do because you know this as well as I do that as a youth pastor, that's not your only job because in addition to planning Wednesday, maybe you have to plan Sunday and all the little elements that go within that, maybe you have to meet with a volunteer. You need to grab coffee with the student.
Nick Clason (06:55):
You need to have a check-in with your senior pastor. You need to fill in the blank. You know what you have to do, and that's the problem. Not only do we have multiple different jobs, not only do we have multiple different kind of fighters that we might feel like we have to put out, but we also have multiple different focuses in our time. So get them all on paper. That's step one. Step two, calendar. If you are not using a calendar, and once again this is the hybrid ministry show, you got to figure out what works for you, but your calendar needs to dictate what you're doing not only beforehand, but also then you can look back and see how well am I keeping these things if I give myself or you give yourself one hour to craft your Wednesday night, but you have all those tasks to do and it takes you a full day, then you can go back next week and be like, all I'm going to need more hours than one to get ready for Wednesday night.
Nick Clason (07:49):
You can use your calendar to go back and audit how much time it actually takes. You don't shortchange yourself. And that's one of the keys. One of the reasons we get overwhelmed is we try and cram too many things into our calendar and it's just not humanly possible. So look ahead on your calendar, but also look back on your calendar and whatever you do integrate your work and your personal, it's one of the ways that you don't sacrifice your family on the altar of ministry. You don't have to have a calendar that's work and personal together. But when big major things that your personal and family calendar need to be aware of or vice versa, put those things in there, right? If you have a child's doctor appointment during the day, during the weekday when doctor's offices are only open, put it in there so that no one schedules a meeting with you.
Nick Clason (08:38):
No one sees you're out of office, that you're not available, that you are available when you're really not. So make sure that those things talk and communicate with each other. The second, third thing, I'm sorry, third thing, make appointments with yourself. A lot of times people calendar when there's an appointment. I have a meeting with my senior pastor that's on my calendar from nine to 10:00 AM Okay, well, when are you going to write your sermon? Well, just whenever I'm not in that. If you get a notice or a text message from someone and they say, Hey, I want to meet with you, then you can say, Hey, I am available from this time to this time. Because what we often do is pull open our calendar and see a bunch of blank space and be like, I'm free all day. What that's doing is when you're giving someone else control of your calendar, they're going to take whatever time works best for them as opposed to whatever time works best for you.
Nick Clason (09:30):
And so if they take morning sometime between six and 8:00 AM let's say they go to work and they want that morning appointment, well, for me, that's going to eat into my prep time and I'm not going to say no, I'm not going to decline meeting with them, but I am going to drive and dictate and point to where I am most available. I like to do lunches because I can get my work done in the morning and then I have an opportunity for lunch. And if a person's only available for breakfast, then I might have one breakfast slot per week where I will allow someone into there as opposed to let that be prep time. But you can use things like calendly.com and you can give that to people for them to book times with you. And so as long as your calendar is up to date, you've made appointments with other people and you've made appointments with yourself, then now other people can slide into those things.
Nick Clason (10:22):
It is okay to tell somebody no that you're not available to meet with them, not because you don't want to, but because you're busy, but because you've made an appointment with yourself. And then as you're blocking out your calendar, you need to figure out what works best for you, but you need to leave either 60 to 70% margin unscheduled time, and you can block it. You can put it in a calendar, but you can call it margin. You can call it buffer, you can call it reach ahead time. You can call whatever you want to call it. But one of the reasons that we get stressed out is that we schedule ourselves with no margin at all. And so if plan Wednesday night is supposed to take six hours and it takes seven and it eats into the next task that's supposed to come after in the seventh hour, we start to get overwhelmed.
Nick Clason (11:12):
But if we leave a little bit of space, we can leave some of that flex time. We can allow interruptions and we can allow people. Number four, make sure that you do in fact schedule your relationships. Don't just make your calendar, task, task test, test, test, test task, right? Relationships often are the things that feel like interruptions, but if you can account for them, if you have space for them, listen, here's the fact you're probably in youth ministry because you're a relational person. You probably prefer relationships over tasks. I'm more of a task guy. I like prefer tasks over relationships. So you need to figure out your zone and what works for you. But for me, what works for me is I need to relationships. I need to grab lunch with leaders. All right? So a couple of times a week, I got lunch in there for leaders.
Nick Clason (11:58):
I got lunch in there for students. I got space in there after school for students, whatever the case might be, but know where you're going to slide those things in. And again, if you leave that margin, then you can account for the interruptions. If you work on a little bit slightly bigger staff, I know I do. There'll be people, especially people I work with who pop into my office, have conversations. Those can feel frustrating and those can feel like interruptions. But the fact is, if I don't schedule my calendar my week at a hundred percent tasks, then when someone comes in, I can stop. I can pause, I can be present, I can get back to my tasks when that conversation's over and when they are ready to move on. So schedule time for those things. And like I said, a tool that you can use hybridize, this thing is Calendly.
Nick Clason (12:40):
It is a great way, especially if you're like, Hey, I want to grab lunch with you here. Grab a slot here that works for you. Then you take all of that back and forth out like, what about Thursday at six? No, it doesn't work. How about Wednesday at two? No, no, I got appointment. Then you go back and forth, back and forth. You can just be like, Hey, want to grab lunch? Sure, here's what I have available. They book it, boom, you're done. And then they slide right in to your calendar. And then the fifth and final thing in this framework is I stole this from Michael Hyatt and he's the productivity king and guru, but delegate and automate every single thing that you can. He actually challenges you to delegate, automate, and then terminate. So is there anything in your to-do list that you can just be done doing altogether?
Nick Clason (13:30):
Additionally, let's go back to our good example from earlier. Plan Wednesday night, write a lesson that might be a you and you only task, but every single thing else, check this out. Send the leader email. You could probably hand that off to a high level admin, maybe a volunteer, maybe even an intern. Schedule the tech team. Well, that should be the tech leader's job. If you don't have a tech leader, enlist a tech leader and then make that the tech leader's job. How about scheduling the greeters? Well let that be your greeter team lead's job and then planning the worship set. You can hand that off to a worship leader. If you don't have a paid worship leader, you can get a volunteer worship leader that you trust to plan the worship set maybe for a while they run it by you, but then you officially hand that off onto their plate planning the game.
Nick Clason (14:16):
Well, you can hand that off to a high level student who you even want to host. You can let them grab games off of DYM, give them your password, and then boom, they're off and running. What about setting up chairs? Well, that can be your student work crew who comes in once a week and maybe you're giving your student work crew a discount on camp this summer to come in and set up chairs. How about setting up the cafe? You can hand that off to your admin, maybe a cafe. Volunteer team leader. What about making the announcement slides? Hand a student, your Canva Pro password, link to that right here at the top of the video and give them the keys to making your announcement slides. What about posting to social media to remind people about it? Give that job to your students and grab my free ebook so that you are not just posting announcements, but you're posting them in a fun, relevant and witty way.
Nick Clason (15:06):
You see, that's the thing. You can delegate all of that. And so in that list, all you're doing is you are preparing the lesson, but all these other delegations, you have to set those up. They take time. It will take more time to set those up on the front side, but once it gets up and running, you will be a task master. Inevitably part of the job in youth ministry because it's relationships based and because we do our ministry when other people are not at work, when other people are not at school, you and I are going to have moments where youth ministry invades elements of being a dad, of being a family person of relationship with your wife. So how do you avoid sacrificing your family on the altar of ministry? Well, here's three principles and three ideas that I personally live by and that I try to implement in my ministry to help me.
Nick Clason (16:03):
The first one is this is keep in mind that evenings count double. I remember one time a pastor was like, well, if you work on Wednesday night, just don't work Wednesday morning. And that's true, and I'm going to give you that hack here in just a minute as well. However, a Wednesday morning time at home, which I record this podcast every single Wednesday morning, super early in the morning, as soon as I'm done, I'm going to go hang with my family, drive my kids to school, and then hang out with my wife and my youngest who's going to be home. But when I'm not home tonight because of programming, they would rather me be home in the evening. I would rather me be home in the evening, evening hours, count, double. So use your evening hours that you inevitably have to use. You have to use evening hours, but use them sparingly and don't be so quick to give them up.
Nick Clason (16:51):
Be very, very measured in your evening hours. One of the rules of life that me and my wife stumbled into haphazardly because we were giving up way too many evening hours early on in our marriage, was no more than three evenings out per week. We like to be home. You figure out what works best for you, but there's seven nights a week. We can be out three. The other four, we want to be home more than we're out. And that includes youth ministry that included our own personal grow group together as a couple. And then one other thing. And so if someone would ask us like, Hey, do you guys want to get together? We would look at our calendar and for like, well, we're already full this week. We would kick 'em to the next week or something like that, but we knew our limit.
Nick Clason (17:35):
So know your limit. If you're out every single evening and you're just trying to make up for that by being home in the morning, just remember that those count double. The second thing is this, take advantage of slower seasons. Okay? The fact is, Christmas season may be a busy hefty season for your church, especially your worship team, your tech team, your worship leaders, people setting up the stage. But for student ministry, it's often a little slower. So take advantage of that because the reality is those people are not going to be at summer camp, come June when you are and you're away from your family. And so budget for those things and lean into the different rhythms of life. And the third thing is take advantage of the fact that your job has flexibility. You might have work from home capabilities. I know I try to work from home a lot of Thursdays, which is a nice thing that I get to do or I can even do when my kids are at school lunch or breakfast dates with my wife.
Nick Clason (18:27):
It's cheaper. Don't have to pay for a babysitter, don't have to bring our kids with us. And also, I can comp my Wednesday mornings because I'm going to be working late on Wednesday night, or I might comp a Thursday morning if I work a full day, like a full 12 hour day on Wednesday because of programming. I may come in a little bit late on Thursday. And the fact is, you can make some of those things up. You are responsible for your time, so take advantage of those things. Get approval, make sure your supervisor's okay with it, but take advantage of the flexibility that you have because the thing is this, healthy leaders lead healthy ministries, and we're going to talk about that in the very next episode, which is going to be up here on the screen talking about how to grow your youth ministry, which is one of the things that your boss wants, and probably you want not just for vanity metrics, but also because you want to make an impact on the kingdom of God. So as always, don't forget we're making digital discipleship easy, accessible and possible. Stay hybrid, my friend.
20 min
December 21, 2023 Episode 076: ✅ 7 Part Youth Group Checklist
🔥 [FREE] Social Media Mastery Awaits! Get Your Hands on Our Free One-Month Ebook 🔥
📅 "1 Month Done for You Social Media Posting Tool"
https://hybrid-ministry-40060036.hubspotpagebuilder.com/free-hybrid-ministry-e-book
☝️ONE-CLICK SOLUTION FOR REELS & SHORTS
OPUS FOR AI SHORTS & REELS
https://www.opus.pro/?via=a5d361
========================================
DESCRIPTION
👋 Welcome to our YouTube channel & podcast!
✅ In this comprehensive video, we reveal the key to planning effective and engaging social events for your youth group. From icebreakers and team-building activities to creative theme ideas and logistical tips, we've got you covered.
👐 Discover how to foster a sense of community, encourage meaningful connections, and create a safe and inclusive environment for all participants.
YouthGroup #Checklist #EssentialSteps #SuccessfulGathering #YouthMinistry #Youth #Christianity #Church #Community #Leadership #Inspirational #Motivation #Encouragement #Teamwork #FunActivities #Icebreakers #Bonding #Faithbuilding #Engagement #Unity
========================================
🆓 FREEBIES 🆓
📅 "1 Month Done for You Social Media Posting Tool"
https://hybrid-ministry-40060036.hubspotpagebuilder.com/free-hybrid-ministry-e-book
🎅 "The Ultimate (and FREE!) Christmas Party Gude"
GUIDE: https://hybrid-ministry-40060036.hubspotpagebuilder.com/christmas-party-run-sheet
PRACTICAL YM TIPS: https://www.youtube.com/@practicalyouthministrytips
🍩 "FREE World's Greatest Donut Event Guide"
GUIDE: https://hybrid-ministry-40060036.hubspotpagebuilder.com/worlds-greatest-donut
😨 "Have I already Ruined my TikTok Account?"
https://www.hybridministry.xyz/articles/ebook
📹 "Adobe Premiere Pro Presets for Animating Layers"
https://share.hsforms.com/1VL1oWwWwQ82PLwsPFkPITgnumis
========================================
🛠️TOOLS
Some of the below links are affilate links in which we do recieve a small commission based on your purchase or use of products
//YOUTUBE STARTER KIT FOR UNDER $100
https://www.hybridministry.xyz/articles/youtubestarterkit
AUTO POD
https://autopod.lemonsqueezy.com?aff=MX7Vv
TRY REV.COM FOR TRANSCRIBING
https://rev.pxf.io/R5nDOa
OPUS.PRO FOR AI SHORTS & REELS
https://www.opus.pro/?via=a5d361
👉 STAY CONNECTED WITH NICK
YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@clasonnick
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/hybridministry/
TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@clasonnick
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/HybridMinistry
Website: https://www.hybridministry.xyz
📓SHOWNOTES
//SHOWNOTES & TRANSCRIPTS
http://www.hybridministry.xyz/076
//YOUTUBE VIDEO
https://youtu.be/4s-vOknIaQI
#1 PLANNING
//BASECAMP
https://basecamp.com/
//PLANNING CENTER SERVICES
https://services.planningcenteronline.com/
//GOOGLE DRIVE/DOCS
https://drive.google.com
https://https://docs.google.com/
#2 COMMUNICATE
//SOCIAL MEDIA MAGIC IN YOUR HANDS
https://hybrid-ministry-40060036.hubspotpagebuilder.com/free-hybrid-ministry-e-book
#3 GAMES
//DIVE INTO THRILLING GAMES:
https://youtu.be/OiBjI9dMxu8?si=YIVFdYh-6KM8nySP
//SEAMLESS BLENDING: THE ULTIMATE HYBIRD EVENT
EPISODE: https://youtu.be/5ryhkIRyDb4?si=qV6v3-ORrgcmLLtZ
GUIDE: https://hybrid-ministry-40060036.hubspotpagebuilder.com/worlds-greatest-donut
//9 BEST DYM RESOURCES
https://www.hybridministry.xyz/articles/dym
#4 SNACKS
#5 PREACHING & TEACHING
//TEACHING TO A TIKTOK GENERATION
https://youtu.be/iIgEtxPLGBg?si=7tQYGGyW7kCKq9KS
#6 SMALL GROUPS
//SAMPLE SMALL GROUP GUIDE
https://www.dropbox.com/scl/fi/okmirbzzu6avn0o5knrj3/08_13_2023_RuinSchool_GroupGuide_Week1.pdf?rlkey=ozs2lmz1ewxmehwn89fnqj1u7&dl=0
#7 FOLLOW UP
//ENGAGE WITH STUDENTS DURING THE WEEK
https://hybrid-ministry-40060036.hubspotpagebuilder.com/free-hybrid-ministry-e-book
//OPUS.PRO
https://youtu.be/TiW4ooQpAvo?si=Ayp7-8W4_QWawi3G
https://www.opus.pro/?via=a5d361
🕰️TIMECODES
00:00-00:44 7 Part Youth Group Checklist
00:44-02:50 1) Always Be Planning
02:50-04:36 2) Communication
04:36-05:47 3) Games
05:47-07:37 4) Snacks
07:37-08:55 5) Preaching & Teaching
08:55-10:09 6) Small Groups
10:09-11:35 7) Follow-Up
✍️TRANSCRIPT
Try Transcribing for Yourself at Rev.Com
http://www.rev.pxf.io/R5nDOa
Nick Clason (00:00):
Are you a youth pastor, a youth ministry leader, looking to make your gatherings of people your physical gatherings more intricate and maybe even make 'em a little bit more exciting? How do you plan a surefire amazing event? And furthermore, what do you do to hybridize it? Right? My entire strategy in this podcast is to help you take not just your in-person gatherings, but also your digital presence, social media website, and meld those two together so that you can truly have a hybrid ministry. If that's what you're looking for, you're in luck because that is what we're going to be talking about in this episode today. This is the Hybrid Ministry Show, and we have a seven step framework for the Ultimate Youth Group gathering. Let's get going. Number one is you need to be planning. Listen, I am a 13 year youth ministry veteran, and I have learned that the hard way over my time in ministry, there have been so many times where I've been caught at an event without any plan whatsoever, and I am forced to pivot in the moment.
Nick Clason (01:00):
So it's not only helped me get a little bit more nimble on my feet, but also it's forced me to realize the importance of planning. So there are a couple of really good tools. One that works really well for us in our space is a project management tool called Base Camp. It's quite expensive, but if your church has the budget for it, I recommend at least looking into it, and I'm sure they have a free trial version that you can check out if that's something you're interested in. Also, planning Center online, it's what most people use, especially musicians and such for services and for musicians and disseminating music and stuff like that. But that's a great place to communicate with your tech person, with anyone else that's going to be on stage about what the plan is, what the game is. And so I use that every single week to just let everybody know what is to be expected and what's going to be happening in the actual program of the event.
Nick Clason (01:48):
Event. And then also just free Google Docs. It's a shared space. If you're in a meeting, everyone can have the same Google Doc up. You don't have to have a whiteboard, you don't have to be in some conference room. You can do it via Zoom. But Google Docs and Google Drive are both great docs for word processing, but Google Drive for file sharing and file storage, and you can link things via Google Docs, but you can use Base Camp. You can use Planning center services. You can use Google, Google Drive. You can use those to your advantage to get ahead to think ahead about what is going to happen in your youth ministry space. And hey, if you're watching this video and you've found value so far, please consider liking subscribing, maybe even sharing with the friend, because it's really important that it helps us out a lot, not for us and the accolades, but for the message of hybrid ministry to get out to the world because we believe that teenagers need the gospel and speaking this digital language, this hybrid ministry is their language that they're used to in this world. So please help us out by liking, subscribing, and sharing. Tip number two is communication. Get the word out. You've done the planning. Now people need to know, and I have this
Nick Clason (02:58):
Completely free ebook about how to utilize and use social media in your space. Link down below in the description, go check it out. But I believe that social media can be a form of communication as long as you're not just posting boring, rote, standard static graphics, right? If you use it to the way that social media is meant to be used, one of entertainment, one of fun, short form, vertical based video, I will help you with all of those things in this video. But as you're communicating, you need to be thinking on three different tracks. As a youth pastor, student, parent leader, there really are three audiences that you're communicating with. How are you getting the message out to your students? How are you getting the message out to your parents? And then how are you getting the message out to your leaders? And then a fourth kind of pro tip, bonus tip is also over here, the staff that you work with.
Nick Clason (03:51):
And some of those might cross. Some parents might be leaders, some staff might be parents and all that type of stuff, but those are your three main audiences. I believe that's one of the reasons that youth pastors struggle so much with communication is because you may feel as though you have adequately communicated it, and thus you have to your students. But do all the parents know or is the staff aware of how you're going to be using a different space in the building and then they find you over there and in the kids area because you told the students you're going to be there, but you didn't let the other people on staff know. And so you may have some more conflict with that. So as you're communicating any sort of event that, especially if it's out of cycle, be asking yourself, how do the students know?
Nick Clason (04:33):
How do the leaders know? How do the parents know? Another thing is games. We did a deep dive on games in this playlist over here called Exploring New Digital Frontiers, and we talked about where did games come from and why is it a part of youth ministry? I also gave some ideas. Another one of my favorite episodes that we did was me debriefing an event we did called The World's Greatest Donut. We had tons of games for it, but it was also an amazing hybrid event. And finally, I have a link in the show notes to some of my DYM favorite games. I've created several resources that are on Download Youth ministry, and they are dirt cheap, 5, 6, 7 bucks. If you don't have a membership, even cheaper if you do. So go check some of those out. I love the game. Emoji Phraseology. I love the game. GIF Flashback, and I love the Game Visual, Variance, Voyage. Those are just a few, but I have several on there. But games are an amazing way to up the level of engagement in your space. Fun is the language of teenagers, and so speak it, get them laughing, get them competing, get them having fun together in your gathering. Another really key element to think about is snacks. I had a meeting with a group of leaders last year, and I invited my wife
Nick Clason (05:56):
To come be one of the other leaders meeting with these student leaders, I should say, and I asked her, I said, Hey, what's one thing I could do to level this meeting up? What she said, have snacks. When do you go to somebody's house and they don't offer you something to eat or something to drink? Almost never, right? And the same is true in student ministry. Snacks help kind of bring that energy level down a little bit, not energy level, but bring that insecurity level down a little bit. People, their walls are down a little bit. They're willing to engage, come across the table a little bit more when their snacks. I know it sounds crazy. I know it sounds simple. It might even be a budget buster, but maybe consider opening a cafe where people can purchase snacks, maybe put cheap things out. And one thing I've done before is if you do have a cafe, we gave popcorn away for free, but that drove people back to the cafe to buy the drinks.
Nick Clason (06:51):
There's a reason that bars put peanuts and pretzels out at the table for free because it forces people to buy their drinks. Hey, if you didn't know this, this episode or this channel has a website hybridministry.xyz in every single episode, this is episode. So if you went to hybridministry.xyz slash 0 7 6, we have for you a thing that we do for every single episode. We've done it since episode one, completely free transcripts. That's one of the things that we pay for out of our pocket to serve you and the listener. So if you are listening on a run and you want to go back and hear this, or if you're watching this and you want to take notes, you can go to the website and download a completely free transcript so that you can see everything that we are talking about. Now, element number five of a successful youth gathering is preaching and teaching.
Nick Clason (07:45):
Like I said, we just did an exploring new digital frontiers, and we did a whole episode on how to teach to a TikTok generation. Previously. This generation on websites and social media have an attention span of 8.25 seconds, which is less than the human pet goldfish, right? So how do you teach to a generation like that? How do you keep things interesting while still presenting the meaningful, purposeful, and important truth of the Bible and the truth from God's word? We dove into that. We also gave some ideas about hybrid message enhancements. Things like you version events, things like websites, things like QR codes, things that can just help take the message beyond just the physical meeting space, but you can offer it and extend it and put it in front of your students on social media, on their devices that they're using throughout the rest of the week, but communicate to them then accurately and effectively in the moment using some of these tips and tricks that we talked about in that episode.
Nick Clason (08:48):
But teaching and preaching is a vitally important part to youth ministry gatherings. Number six, small groups. You may not have small groups in your space, so if you don't, then find a way to let students digest the message a little bit. If you don't have small groups in your space or you have it another night of the week, consider maybe having your students sit around tables. And then you could do a more like master teacher style thing where you teach for a little bit and then you toss out a couple of questions to the tables to let the students interact. Gen Z does not want to be a consumer. They want to be a contributor. So find a way to let your students voices be heard. Find a way to let them talk about it. Maybe you do have small groups for the last 30 minutes in your student ministry gatherings.
Nick Clason (09:37):
Have a guide. I'll right here on the screen, you can see the way that we have our guides set up. We have before, during, and after and after, is aimed at our leaders being pastoral to our students. The before is sort of their prep work with the versus and the big ideas. And then during are the questions that we want them to be asking to lead our students from a silly sort of like drop the water level moment, like, hey, some icebreaker type stuff down all the way to some serious things and ending with the group's ending in prayer.
Nick Clason (10:10):
And finally, when your event's over, number seven, what are you going to do about follow-up? What is your ongoing strategy to stay in front of students throughout the week? Because if you have an hour meeting, but you don't ever get to a spot where you are engaging with them in their real life, what about Thursday morning when they wake up after youth group? What about Monday morning when they're on their way to school and they're on the school bus? Why should they think about the things of God that you were talking about last night or yesterday? Why should they care about those things? Which is one of the reasons I think hybrid ministry is so important, and I have this completely free ebook to help you reach and engage the students in their space to engage with the other hours in the week beyond just your program time.
Nick Clason (10:54):
It's not just physical, it's not just digital, it is hybrid. And so in that ebook, we also point people to a completely free resource called opus.pro. It will help you clip your messages up into small, short form bite-size videos. But what I want to know is that I want to help you guys understand the importance of gatherings and how you can take the physical gathering, how you can take your digital moments, how you can meld those two. Hope you found this video helpful. On the screen is the next video. Be sure to click that. Be sure to subscribe because we at hybrid ministry are making digital discipleship easy, possible and accessible. So as always, and don't forget, stay hybrid.
12 min
December 14, 2023 Episode 075: 🤑 Digital Discipleship on a Dime: 5 Budget Friendly Tips
🔥SURE FIRE RESOURCES TO LEVEL UP YOUR SOCIAL MEDIA GAME 🔥
📅 "1 Month Done for You Social Media Posting Tool"
https://hybrid-ministry-40060036.hubspotpagebuilder.com/free-hybrid-ministry-e-book
☝️ONE-CLICK SOLUTION FOR REELS & SHORTS
OPUS FOR AI SHORTS & REELS
https://www.opus.pro/?via=a5d361
========================================
DESCRIPTION
👋 Welcome to our YouTube channel & podcast!
🤑 Are you looking to create impactful digital discipleship resources without breaking the bank? Look no further! In this video, we present 5 budget-friendly tips that will help you craft effective resources for your online community.
digitaldiscipleship #budgetfriendlytips #onadime #youtubetips #digitalministry #christiancontent #churchmedia #faithtech #christianvlogger #technologymatters #christianinfluencers #digitaloutreach #ministrytech #faithonabudget #discipleshipmatters #christiancreators #technologytips #churchcommunication #contentcreationtips #faithonadime #digitalmission
========================================
🆓 FREEBIES 🆓
📅 "1 Month Done for You Social Media Posting Tool"
https://hybrid-ministry-40060036.hubspotpagebuilder.com/free-hybrid-ministry-e-book
🎅 "The Ultimate (and FREE!) Christmas Party Gude"
GUIDE: https://hybrid-ministry-40060036.hubspotpagebuilder.com/christmas-party-run-sheet
PRACTICAL YM TIPS: https://www.youtube.com/@practicalyouthministrytips
🍩 "FREE World's Greatest Donut Event Guide"
GUIDE: https://hybrid-ministry-40060036.hubspotpagebuilder.com/worlds-greatest-donut
😨 "Have I already Ruined my TikTok Account?"
https://www.hybridministry.xyz/articles/ebook
📹 "Adobe Premiere Pro Presets for Animating Layers"
https://share.hsforms.com/1VL1oWwWwQ82PLwsPFkPITgnumis
========================================
🛠️TOOLS
Some of the below links are affilate links in which we do recieve a small commission based on your purchase or use of products
//YOUTUBE STARTER KIT FOR UNDER $100
https://www.hybridministry.xyz/articles/youtubestarterkit
AUTO POD
https://autopod.lemonsqueezy.com?aff=MX7Vv
TRY REV.COM FOR TRANSCRIBING
https://rev.pxf.io/R5nDOa
OPUS.PRO FOR AI SHORTS & REELS
https://www.opus.pro/?via=a5d361
👉 STAY CONNECTED WITH NICK
YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@clasonnick
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/hybridministry/
TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@clasonnick
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/HybridMinistry
Website: https://www.hybridministry.xyz
📓SHOWNOTES
//SHOWNOTES & TRANSCRIPTS
http://www.hybridministry.xyz/075
//YOUTUBE VIDEO
https://youtu.be/WiosrLIifdA
#1 USE FREE STUFF FIRST
//CANVA
https://youtu.be/g0FQWvKjP_E?si=VW1l2akc9PXTLztT
//HYBRID MESSAGE ENHANCEMENT
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iIgEtxPLGBg&t=44s
//YOUVERSION LIVE EVENTS
https://my.bible.com/events
//QR CODES
https://www.qr-code-generator.com/
//FREE EBOOK
https://hybrid-ministry-40060036.hubspotpagebuilder.com/free-hybrid-ministry-e-book
#2 PRE-FILM YOUR MESSAGES
//PRE-FILM YOUR MESSAGES:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SDxepdu4iiM
//YOUTUBE GEAR FOR UNDER $100
https://www.hybridministry.xyz/articles/youtubestarterkit
//OPUS.PRO
https://www.opus.pro/?via=a5d361
#3 DON'T REINVENT THE WHEEL
//CAPCUT
https://www.capcut.com/
//OPUS.PRO
https://www.opus.pro/?via=a5d361
#4 USE SOCIAL MEDIA
//FREE EBOOK
https://hybrid-ministry-40060036.hubspotpagebuilder.com/free-hybrid-ministry-e-book
#5 UTILIZE HYBRID EVENTS
//WORLD'S GREATEST DONUT EVENT GUIDE
https://hybrid-ministry-40060036.hubspotpagebuilder.com/worlds-greatest-donut
🕰️TIMECODES
00:00-00:19 Budget Friendly Digital Discipleship Tools
00:19-02:00 Use Free Stuff First!
02:00-03:36 Pre-Film Your Messages for YouTube
03:36-04:36 Don't Reinvent the Wheel!
04:36-07:10 Social Media
07:10-08:05 Utilize Hybrid Events
✍️TRANSCRIPT
Try Transcribing for Yourself at Rev.Com
rev.pxf.io/R5nDOa
Nick Clason (00:00):
Well, hey everyone. Welcome back to our channel. We're going to be exploring five budget friendly tips to help you create hybrid resources. Hybrid is when you're not just focusing on the digital aspect of your ministry, not just focusing on the in-person aspect of your ministry, but a melding together of the two. So let's waste no time and dive right in To tip number one, which is use free stuff first. I have all kinds of links in the description under this, but we had an episode where we talked about Canva. Canva will give every church and nonprofit a free pro account. So if you're looking for good graphics, Canva is the best option I believe for that. Another one of my favorite hybrid options is the U version Bible app, and specifically when you're preaching messages, which we just dropped an episode a couple episodes ago about message enhancement, U version events is a place where you can send people to take digital notes, to take next steps to read Bible plans on their own.
Nick Clason (00:58):
Another one of my all time favorite resources is the Humble QR code. It had a resurgence during covid, but it is a great way when people are in your space to have them scan something and then go ahead and take a next step all based digitally. And hey, listen, I also have a completely free ebook, and this is free for you. It's 40 done for you ideas to help you engage with social media in a custom way. There are a lot of social media programs, resources and graphics out there, but this resource will help you, your volunteers, your students, be the faces and the heroes and those people on your social media platforms. So download that, check it out. We'd love to have you take a look at it. And hey, if you are getting value so far out of this video, I'd love to encourage you to like, subscribe, maybe leave a rating, maybe share it with a friend.
Nick Clason (01:49):
All of those things really incredibly help not only us get the message out, but more importantly help people understand the mission behind this hybrid experience. Let's move on to tip number two. Tip number two is pre film your messages. Now, I have a video linked right here at the top of the screen called What Every Youth Ministry Needs to Do, and it is my full student ministry recommended strategy. Most churches in America have live streaming capabilities, but most youth ministries do not. If you do them, by all means, you should be live streaming your messages and posting them to YouTube. But in the event that you don't, I recommend sitting down direct to camera and having a pre-filed message moment. You can create a little bit of a set. You can put some plants on screen just like I am right here. You can use a microphone like this. You can use just a little shotgun microphone, and you can do it for less than a hundred dollars. I have a link to that complete blog in my show notes as well. But it's things like a little phone tripod, a little shotgun microphone, and maybe a little ring light just to help get your lighting up a little bit.
Nick Clason (02:58):
And boom, you are off to the races. Not only is it going to help you engage with a digital presence on a platform like YouTube, and it's also going to give you the ability to clip those long form clips down to shorter vertical based ones that you can post. I have a link to a free resource called Opus Pro. Link to that in the show notes, a little also teaser on what's coming next. And then finally, it gives you a chance as youth pastor to practice and hear your message before you deliver it live in the room. So pre film your messages, create a presence for you and your youth ministry on YouTube. Tip number three is don't reinvent the wheel, which that's the tip, right? Once you've recorded those videos, sat down direct to camera, either a real camera or a phone or whatever, edit it a little bit.
Nick Clason (03:48):
You don't have to. You can use a free editor like iMovie, movie maker Canva, a cap cut, not Canva, cap cut, but then drop that long form video into a free AI video, short form creator and I have a link. You can try it out. It's called Opus Pro. It's down in my description, and it will AI generate the best hooks, the best, most relevant places. It can put captions on the screen. It can also give you a little preview of the text of what the video is about so that when someone's dropping into the middle of a long form sermon, they're not confused about what's going on, but use the tools to your advantage. And Opus Pro is free for several hours of recording, and then it's a very nominal feat to keep using it after that, after the first part of the year.
Nick Clason (04:36):
Tip number four, use social media. Now, listen, I know sometimes in the youth ministry space, in the church world, social media gets a little bit of a bad rap, and the fact is, there are bad things out there, and so everyone needs to manage it to their own standards, and they need to practice their own walk of holiness in social media. But social media is a completely free tool that you and I have the ability to get on there and borrow space. And it's already where majority of our students are spending their time. In fact, 95% of teenagers admit to using YouTube. My kids are seven and five and they watch YouTube. It is just a part of the fabric of what we do, so be on those platforms. And the good news is that social media, short form, vertical based video is still king, and you can do that on all four platforms, YouTube, Facebook, Instagram, and TikTok. Facebook's iffy if you want to use it, but it's really easy to link it to your Instagram account, and so therefore you can just kind of get a two for one on that one. But use social media, and once again, like I said, free ebook will help you get started on that. It will take the film, your messages strategy, and then the clips from that along with some other fun content. And boom, you're off to the races. Listen, I posted a video,
Nick Clason (05:56):
One of favorite styles not too long ago. We draft things, and so it's like one person makes a pick when another person makes a pick and one person makes a pick, another person makes a pick, and it was called Drafting Blue Characters. And I had my boss, Darren do it, and he's colorblind, and it was really hilarious because he actually picked Vision, the red guy from Avengers, that's his number two pick, but that on Instagram got something like 13,000 views, and it wasn't a serious clip, right? But we gained a lot of followers and got a lot of engagement on our account as a result of that. So then now hopefully those people who have engaged with our account at that level on a more fun level will then also pay attention to some of the sermon clips that we post, which I posted one recently, and it got over a thousand, 2000 views.
Nick Clason (06:42):
And then hopefully if they're engaging with that, then maybe they'll take a next step from there over to our YouTube channel to watch a full message. And then once they're on, they're encouraged, promoted to click the link down the description to take some sort of next step to let us know what their next step might be. You see, that's why I do the silly to narrow it down to the serious, to narrow it down to the long form, to narrow it down to them taking a next step where we can engage with them in a relationship with Jesus. Tip number five is utilize hybrid events. I have a link in the description again for a free event guide of one. I just did. I posted episode not too long ago called The World's Greatest Donut. It is one of my all time favorite hybrid events.
Nick Clason (07:26):
It utilizes outreach, it utilizes games, and it utilizes social media to create a perfect hybrid event for you, your church, and your student ministry. But it's just a great opportunity to lean into the hybridness, not just digital, not just physical of your student ministry and of your space. Well, everyone, I hope that these five tips were helpful for you to create amazing digital discipleship, amazing hybrid moments in your student ministry. We are here to help make hybrid easy, to make discipleship more accessible for your students. Won't click the link right here on the screen to watch the next video, but we will talk with you next time.
9 min
December 05, 2023 Episode 074: 🎅 The Ultimate (and FREE!) Youth Ministry Christmas Party Guide
🔥SURE FIRE RESOURCES TO LEVEL UP YOUR YOUTH MINISTRY 🔥
📅 "1 Month Done for You Social Media Posting Tool"
https://hybrid-ministry-40060036.hubspotpagebuilder.com/free-hybrid-ministry-e-book
🎅 "The Ultimate (and FREE!) Christmas Party Gude"
GUIDE: https://hybrid-ministry-40060036.hubspotpagebuilder.com/christmas-party-run-sheet
PRACTICAL YM TIPS: https://www.youtube.com/@practicalyouthministrytips
☝️ONE-CLICK SOLUTION FOR REELS & SHORTS
OPUS FOR AI SHORTS & REELS
https://www.opus.pro/?via=a5d361
========================================
DESCRIPTION
👋 Welcome to the ultimate Youth Ministry Christmas Party Guide! In this video, we are here to help you spread joy and jingle bells with our fantastic party ideas, all while staying within your budget because it's completely FREE! 🎅🎉🔔
🔗 In this special collaboration episode we are working together with Erik "w/a K" Williams and his YouTube Channel "Practical Youth Minsitry Tips." Because two are better than one, we put our heads together and created the Ultimate Christmas party!
Go Follow Erik's YouTube channel: https://www.youtube.com/@practicalyouthministrytips
========================================
🆓 FREEBIES 🆓
📅 "1 Month Done for You Social Media Posting Tool"
https://hybrid-ministry-40060036.hubspotpagebuilder.com/free-hybrid-ministry-e-book
😨 "Have I already Ruined my TikTok Account?"
https://www.hybridministry.xyz/articles/ebook
📹 "Adobe Premiere Pro Presets for Animating Layers"
https://share.hsforms.com/1VL1oWwWwQ82PLwsPFkPITgnumis
========================================
🛠️TOOLS
Some of the below links are affilate links in which we do recieve a small commission based on your purchase or use of products
//YOUTUBE STARTER KIT FOR UNDER $100
https://www.hybridministry.xyz/articles/youtubestarterkit
AUTO POD
https://autopod.lemonsqueezy.com?aff=MX7Vv
TRY REV.COM FOR TRANSCRIBING
https://rev.pxf.io/R5nDOa
OPUS.PRO FOR AI SHORTS & REELS
https://www.opus.pro/?via=a5d361
👉 STAY CONNECTED
YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@clasonnick
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/hybridministry/
TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@clasonnick
Website: https://www.hybridministry.xyz
📓SHOWNOTES
//SHOWNOTES & TRANSCRIPTS
http://www.hybridministry.xyz/074
🎅 "The Ultimate (and FREE!) Christmas Party Gude"
GUIDE: https://hybrid-ministry-40060036.hubspotpagebuilder.com/christmas-party-run-sheet
PRACTICAL YM TIPS: https://www.youtube.com/@practicalyouthministrytips
//Full YouTube Video
https://youtu.be/ZvGJHkwDe0w?si=Jj25Sapo8xk-Xqb-
//YM360 CLAW MACHINE
https://youthministry360.com/products/claw-machine
//4K DOWNLOADER
https://www.downloadyouthministry.com/p/the-student-ministry-bracket-of-epic-things/games-3974.html
//EMOJI PHRASEOLOGY VOLUMES ON DYM
https://www.downloadyouthministry.com/search?q=emoji+phraseology&search-button=&lang=null
🕰️TIMECODES
00:00-01:10 Intro
01:10-04:34 Christmas Music before or After Thanksgiving?
04:34- 14:16 Setting up the atmosphere for maximum Student Ministry Impact
14:16-20:06 The Best Time to Do a Giveaway!
20:06-24:31 A FREE Game (link in description!)
24:31-28:09 Minute to Win It Christmas Games
28:09-31:07 When should you do active games in the scope of a youth ministry program?
31:0-7-37:47 The Best Youth Ministry White Elephant
37:47-40:38 The Controversial Decision of Including a Message during an Outreach Event
40:38-42:59 Another FREE Giveaway of Nick’s Best Selling Game!
42:59-47:06 Wrap Up the Christmas Party with a bang!
47:06-48:44 Go Follow Erik!
✍️TRANSCRIPT
Try Transcribing for Yourself at Rev.Com
rev.pxf.io/R5nDOa
Nick Clason (00:00):
What is up Friends In this episode, myself and a friend of mine, Eric with AK linked to his YouTube channel down below in the description, did a collaborative episode where we both put together a programming guide as well as a bunch of free resources. So in the link in the description will be a 90 minute Christmas Youth Ministry program event. Go grab it, go use it, whatever elements of it you can. We got graphics, we got games, we got the full run sheet, we got sidekick files from download, youth ministry, whatever you need. But don't forget, listen, the whole goal of this is I want you to have all the things that you need to make an amazing Christmas event. After this, we are going to dive into a little bit more of a explainer episode where we talk through the vision and the strategy and the reasons why we set the events up the way that we do. Make sure you like, make sure you subscribe. Hit the notification bell so that you know about other episodes like this that are going to drop. We're also, no doubt going to offer tons of free stuff. Don't forget, and as always, stay hybrid. Enjoy the episode.
Nick Clason (01:10):
Well, what's up everybody? Welcome to this kind of collaborative show. I'm Nick Clayson, this is Eric, and we wanted to give you guys a completely done for you Christmas event and so we're going to talk through that, but before we do, we got to get really important business out of the way. Eric, what is the best Christmas movie in your estimation?
Erik "w/a k" Williams (01:33):
So I love Christmas and I'm nothing Christmas before the day after Thanksgiving guy,
Nick Clason (01:40):
You're a holiday purist.
Erik "w/a k" Williams (01:42):
We battle about that because I'm like, Thanksgiving needs its time, right? Because I think it takes away some of the specialness that that's why Christmas songs, it's like a month and a few days. So the first movie we watch, it used to be Miracle on 34th Street, but now the first movie we watch is Elf.
Nick Clason (02:00):
Okay. Yeah.
Erik "w/a k" Williams (02:02):
Sometimes after Thanksgiving dinner, but usually in the morning after we watch the Macy's Day Thanksgiving parade.
Nick Clason (02:08):
Did you know that Elf is turning 20 this year?
Erik "w/a k" Williams (02:11):
Yes. I just saw that. I'm like 20 years Actually when I saw that post I was like, I got to look that up. It was 2003.
Nick Clason (02:19):
I'm so old man. I was in middle school. I was in middle school.
Erik "w/a k" Williams (02:23):
I couldn't believe it.
Nick Clason (02:24):
Yeah, wild times.
Erik "w/a k" Williams (02:25):
Eight years maybe.
Nick Clason (02:28):
Yeah, elf. Yeah, elf was also a fave for sure, but one that my family always watched on Christmas Eve was jingle all the way. So the Turbo Man one, I just think it's so funny Arnold Schwarzenegger, it's a little niche and people don't get it and vibe with me as much on it, but I think it's hilarious. I think The Postman is super funny and in my family our stuff's already up. We've decorated day after Halloween, we were on it. We're already watching our little family Christmas movies, so we're the
Erik "w/a k" Williams (03:05):
Opposite of you. I joke California's against a law to play Christmas music before the day after Thanksgiving. People, are you serious? And then I just leave it. I don't answer.
Nick Clason (03:13):
Yeah, I look it up. People link in the show notes. Well, hey, we both each wherever you are. If you're on Eric's platform, mine, whatever, we have a free download and we got a few resources in there, a few graphics and also just a here's a Christmas event for you. So if you're anything like me, you maybe are like, oh snap Christmas is coming and it's time to get an event on the calendar. You don't need to think this is done for you. Literally plug and play everything from games, icebreakers, messages. But what we wanted to do in this episode was talk through a little bit, not just like here's the what, but a little bit more of the why. So we're going to put the run sheet, at least I will on screen so you guys can see it. But as we walk through it, let's just chat through the strategy. Why is this thing there? Why is that thing, whatever? So Eric, you took the first kind of rough draft of this, so why don't you share your philosophy of why things are set up the way they're set up on this?
Erik "w/a k" Williams (04:16):
Yeah, no, that's great. So I love having something to give me a guardrail of the here's what we're doing and then giving all of the, anybody who's involved in running the event give a copy of the run sheet so that everybody knows who's doing what and on there it says people, we don't have names on there. That's for you to put in there. We'll leave those things blank so you can place in who's doing what for each of those things. Then when the time comes for somebody to be up, they're ready. And one of the things I think is really important, the person who is the host for the specific thing should also have somebody who brings out whether it's the table with the game on it or the prizes or whatever it is, so that they don't have to worry about that all they're doing is worrying about their job of running that segment of the evening. And I think one of the
Nick Clason (05:12):
Things, lemme stop you right there on that. Do you have volunteers do that? Do you have people as a member of the production team, like I'm talking Carrie, the supplies and props out to the table. How have you navigated that in your time of being a youth pastor?
Erik "w/a k" Williams (05:29):
So a couple of different ways. One for sure volunteers. We do a volunteer meeting every month and we do three things in this. This is like side note, but we do encouragement, we do training and we do planning. And so the encouragement's usually wrapped around a meal. Then the training is whatever the topic is that we want to help them to equip them to be better at volunteers and then planning. So when we do the planning for the Christmas party, we will talk about all of the things that we're going to do. That's where we brainstorm ideas, we put that together, that's where we decide who's going to be the host for the game and then who's bringing the table out. I love doing minute to win it games. So there's somebody who needs to come and bring that table out and then take it off. So I've had volunteers do it, we've had student leadership students do that, and then in those times where there's been a production team, I give that to whoever's overproduction to take care of worrying about those things. So the people who are doing the actual segment just worry about their part.
Nick Clason (06:36):
Yeah, that's good. So in practicality, you may have your Christmas or your December meeting, I'm sorry, earlier right than two, three weeks earlier. Do people remember that? Do you have another touch base night of how does that work?
Erik "w/a k" Williams (06:53):
Yeah, so we'll have a touch base. Usually it'll be, we typically will do our midweek is where we do our event. So on Sunday we'll do a 15 minute connect after church, Hey, here's a touch base, be there. I try to have all of volunteers in hour early because students tend to show up about a half hour before an event starts. Even though we say doors open at this time, they're there at least a half hour early
Nick Clason (07:19):
Volunteers and you're always kids locked out, right?
Erik "w/a k" Williams (07:20):
Exactly. Try to have them ready beforehand and we do a quick, okay, here's our queue, here's our queue, here's our queue. This is where all the things are. I've laid them all out for them and some volunteers aren't working and have the ability to come in at any time of day, grab those leaders and say, Hey, can you come in four hours early and help me set up all the tables? All the everything. So
Nick Clason (07:47):
Yeah, love it. So then let's dive into it then. So right off the bat we have the element is pre-service. We need some Spotify playlists, so we got that in there clickable. You guys can go ahead and grab it. Tell me what you're trying to create in this environment. What are we looking for here?
Erik "w/a k" Williams (08:07):
So in this spot, what I want is for it to feel Christmassy, right? Like build excitement. There's Christmas music playing in the background. Sometimes on the screens I'll have for the earlier portion of the pre-service, I'll have a Christmas movie. Now I'm really careful with Christmas movies or any movies for that matter because I show something that maybe I'm not showing the moment that there is something that could tend to be inappropriate or whatever.
Nick Clason (08:39):
But
Erik "w/a k" Williams (08:39):
I'm really careful because students will go home and go, Hey, we watch this at church, can we watch it at home? And then they watch it at home and there's this moment I'm like, oh, I didn't even think about that moment. So I'm really careful, but sometimes I have that in the background and then I love doing a hot cocoa bar during pre-session and not during the event. I mean they can go back, but the event is so packed with stuff like taking a 20 minute break to go create hot cocoa, feels like I've got all these things I want to do, but now we're doing this. So that kind of builds this atmosphere of like, okay, not only is there music, there's a movie on the background, but I can make hot cocoa and I've got all sorts of fun stuff that chocolate spoons and whipped cream and sprinkles and all that stuff. I think it builds something to the feel of what that night's going to be and I think building an environment, a feeling to an environment is important.
Nick Clason (09:40):
One of my favorite hacks to steal from the name of your show is I like doing a pre-roll that has announcements and this is for Christmas party. I made just something a little bit different, but just on an ongoing regular basis and as opposed to a lot of times you'll see you can go on DYM and get millions of five minute countdowns. I don't like playing a five minute countdown. What I actually like to do is to just take a five minute timer and put it over top of my looping announcements because at our church we do that in big service where a five minute countdown comes on, all the looping announcements now are gone. So only people that showed up early enough to see them, they're the people that already know what's going on anyway. It's the people that are walking in late or as it's about to start that still need it. So that's one of my favorite pre-service hacks, pre-service countdowns, but you can do whatever you guys want. Like we said, there's a million different options out there. DYM you can grab for just a few bucks, Christmas countdowns, whatever. So anything else before we get to our welcome and our host on stage and just talking through what we want out of them,
Erik "w/a k" Williams (10:54):
We can see that on the run sheet under people like greeters, check in, first time guest team, put your friendliest people. I think this should be for every time you meet, put your friendliest people at the doors, right? Students and adults, get them there. High fiving students, I think that's really important that they're smiling, they're dressed in their Christmas gear and it's because when somebody comes for the first time, they're not necessarily mentally going through a checklist, but without even knowing it, they're going through a checklist. Do I like what I'm seeing? Do I feel invited? Do I feel welcome? Does it feel fun? And if I had a volunteer one time actually, I was volunteering at this church and they had a volunteer that was like Mr. Grumpy Pants, super nice guy, discipleship, all that, but for front he'd be sarcastic like, oh, glad you finally came back. I'm like, you don't want that guy at the front, put that guy back, have him sell snacks or whatever. But yeah,
Nick Clason (12:01):
That's not the
Erik "w/a k" Williams (12:01):
Guy. But then the first time guest team, having somebody that's getting their information, this is for another episode, but giving them a gift bag at the end of the night that has some of your information in there or whatever and is charge of follow-up. Their role is to make that first time guest. If they're not coming with a friend, somebody they just showed up, they get them connected to somebody in their grade. I think that's super, super important. Again, it's all about environment, making an environment that's friendly and welcoming. Atmosphere.
Nick Clason (12:37):
Yeah, I mean just listen, think about it. If you go to someone's house a couple of weeks ago we went to a neighbor's house for Halloween before trick or treating and they weren't ready. They're getting stuff cooked up in the kitchen and creating everything for the gathering of people. That's one environment versus I was just telling you before we hit record, we're in a summit. Our church has a bunch of church planters, so they bring people from all across the world here one time a year and that's going on right now on the other side of our campus. And every time I've walked in there, they've had a gift bag for me or this giant box of swag that I just walked over here with. They thought about us. They thought about the fact that we were going to be there. So compare Halloween when it's kind of frantic and the house is still kind of messy and they're getting ready versus a gift bag and people there at the doors to greet you. Those are both real things and real parties that happened, but one makes you feel like a million bucks and one makes you feel like you're mildly inconvenient for being there. So you know how that typically
Erik "w/a k" Williams (13:53):
Feels. Typically when you invite somebody into your home, you're greeting them at the door and then you're engaged in conversation during the whole time you're together and you greet them at the door, you see them out. You actually often will go outside and wave to them as they drive away. I think we should take that and employ that into our ministries.
Nick Clason (14:13):
Yeah. Yeah. Hospitality a hundred percent. So all right, sweet. So have awesome greeters crush it. Also, like you said, this is another episode for another day, but capture people's information and do something about it. Follow up with them, have a gift bag, send 'em a postcard, send 'em a text, whatever the case might be, but have some sort of intentional follow up strategy. Again, we won't dive into that in the Christmas episode, so now we're at the welcome. What are you envisioning as you put this run sheet together happening at the welcome of this Christmas?
Erik "w/a k" Williams (14:51):
So at the welcome, again, you want to put friendly faces, enthusiastic people, whether it's you or I like having, if you have the ability, if you have the leadership, if you get enough people to have one guy and one girl leading, just something about that balance I think is really good. And being able to feed off each other instead of just being one person. It can't happen all the time, I get that. But if you have the ability, even if it's a student that's being a counterpart, I think is really important. And then immediately do a giveaway and DYM, if you're DYM person and you have sidekick, you can also get sidekicks separately if you don't want to pay the full 25 bucks a month or whatever it is.
Nick Clason (15:37):
But which side note, neither of us get any sort of kickback from this, but it is worth it. It is.
Erik "w/a k" Williams (15:44):
Somehow they're like, yeah, we don't do affiliate programs. They're like, okay, it's worth asking. Yeah, we don't get anything but their sidekick, they have this name generator where you plug into names of students as they check in, you get their names and then you put it and it'll go through, you'll see your name and then you just have somebody yell, stop, and then they click stop and that person wins. You can also do it with raffle if you want to where you have two of the same number, they keep one, you put one in the bucket or whatever. That works as well. But I like the idea of giving something away in the first few minutes because
Nick Clason (16:18):
It's like off the top,
Erik "w/a k" Williams (16:20):
I can win something right now. And those who came late miss out on some of that stuff and they're like, oh, maybe I'll think about the future,
Nick Clason (16:28):
Which, here's the hack, right? So in our context, I had the lady who oversees our database, which is what's a LinkedIn with our check-in system. So she created a search for me. So anytime anyone checks in within the last day, it'll give me their name. So as opposed, right to me, getting a full mailing list of all of our students and putting their names in People Picker, then it's like, oh, that guy's not here. He didn't come. Right? That's kind of a wmp wmp moment. When you get an actual dynamic list, which most check-in systems, whether you're using CCB or the Rock or Rome or whatever, will have some way for you to run a report that you can get an actual dynamic list of the students there or just grab a super volunteer who takes the spreadsheet. But if you're doing it off the top, like you said Eric, you got to think through that ahead of time.
Nick Clason (17:26):
Who's going to grab this sheet? How many minutes before it actually starts? If it's a few minutes before it starts, you're still probably going to miss a few kids who are checking in after you input the names or whatever. But being able to produce that right off the top, I think also shows a level of just polish and professionalism and also like, Hey, we thought about you being here. We got a plan to give something away and it's right now and look at how we were able to get it in this computer, which the kids don't think about it, but if it doesn't work or if it's janky or if you're waiting until the end because you're waiting for all the names, they may notice that they're probably not going to notice like, wow, how'd they get all these names in here? Kids, kids don't usually pay attention to stuff like that, but it does communicate something. It's
Erik "w/a k" Williams (18:10):
Funny you say that. They don't really pay attention to that, but when it's missing, when parents pick up their kids, they ask two questions, how was it tonight? And did you have fun? Yeah. Now if they're coming from a Sunday morning or a service, it's like, how was it and what'd you learn? But the fun part, they're going to talk about whether they have fun. I saw my name, I didn't win, but they may actually talk about that. I know that I've watched Doug and Josh from Download Youth Ministry have done giveaways live on screen, and I've seen my name come up across because mine stands out. I always put with AK Eric with AK in there, but we see our names even if it's just it's super fast. Here's another hack. If you don't want to download that, if you don't want to pay for that wheel of names, dot com is a freebie now it's got some advertisements around it or whatever, but it's just a website and you can plug in people's names and you can shuffle it and all that stuff. It's free. And I've used that a few times over the years as well. Super, super simple and really easy.
Nick Clason (19:25):
Yeah, something about hype, something about fun and something about giveaway, whatever it is. The first five minutes, we're keeping it light. We're letting 'em know we thought about 'em and now we're moving on into actual stuff, actual content. Is there anything else we missed with the welcome before we move
Erik "w/a k" Williams (19:43):
On? If you've got an announcement you want to hit, I would do that at the end of the time as well. So that's where they'll remember it, but you want to invite them. I love inviting people from a party to a party like, Hey, it's next month or fall, winter retreats coming, it's in January, whatever. Give those cards out at the end, but talk about it in the front end. So then we're jumping into our first game,
Nick Clason (20:09):
Which
Erik "w/a k" Williams (20:10):
You've got some games you're giving free to our viewers today.
Nick Clason (20:15):
Yeah, absolutely. So two different games. I'm going to be giving away both of them on DYM for a few bucks, but for you, if you click the link in the download free, free for you, whichever one of our videos you're clicking on this first one here is called Who or What is on the screen. So think catchphrase, right? It's literally like there's a clue and a timer and you have to get it figured out. You can do this however many different ways you want. You can pull up a contestant, which if you wanted to do name picker again to grab a few contestants, you can do that. Sometimes I like to let a game, another game, create my contestants. So I might do some sort of trivia game or first person to answer this question, first person to bring me this thing because they do that, they're a contestant or whatever.
Nick Clason (21:05):
You can get a contestant on stage. You can also just in our environment, we do tables. I'm a huge fan of round tables, and so that would be a way that you could play this game where every table you're playing this game, and so anyway, counts down 3, 2, 1, boom. Something shows up on the screen and you got to countdown timer and one person has to try and guess what is on the screen, who or what is on the screen? That's the whole point of the game. And here's a little pro tip. If it's getting boring or if it's getting, people are getting it quickly, you can kind of build in. If you use pro presenter, you can make the time go quicker. So you can play that 1.5 or two times speed to increase the difficulty as you get to the end, which is another one of my favorite ways to build a game, start it off with a couple softballs, and then at the end crank up the difficulty so that it's borderline impossible. I hate when you get to the end of the game and everyone got all 10 questions or is super boring, super easy. So I'm always trying to go from easy to difficult. So one way to even take it up, another level is in your pre-programming or in putting in the computer, you can make the speed go quicker, make it more challenging, make it more difficult. The last few questions. So
Nick Clason (22:24):
Super fun game.
Erik "w/a k" Williams (22:24):
There's a number of ways I like the idea of giving away a prize, and it could be to one student. If you're bringing a couple of people up front and the person who gets the most, I also like what you said, having tables and having that at each table. You can make it simple. Then if they get it right, they get a candy cane
Nick Clason (22:42):
Easy.
Erik "w/a k" Williams (22:43):
But if you're just having a few upfront, there's a number of ways I use a spin that wheel thing for giveaways from Sidekick on DYM, or you can also use the wheel of names. There's a great resource on YM 360 that it's the claw machine and it grabs. You can get students' heads, but you can also do prizes. Yeah, it's awesome.
Nick Clason (23:08):
Yeah,
Erik "w/a k" Williams (23:09):
There's lots of ways you can give away prizes, but if it is at tables, you can just do can canes, and that's cheap,
Nick Clason (23:14):
All kinds of different ways to adapt it, but it's a Christmas based kind of guessing game, and the strategy behind it is let's get kids laughing, let's get kids interacting. Let's not make it about what's upfront, or even if it is, it's fun upfront, not pay attention upfront. Get these kids, and I heard someone once say, fun is the currency of teenagers, so let's lock into that and just create some fun moments. And then beyond that, I would say too, Nick,
Erik "w/a k" Williams (23:46):
Oh, go ahead. Kind of a pro tip. If it feels like it's dragging, you don't have to do all of the questions.
Nick Clason (23:53):
Yes, bro. I can't tell you the last time I did all of the questions. In any game, I am out of that thing faster than you can think. And it's not speed, right? I'm not done with it in two minutes. If you got good hosts, they're feeling it out. They're playing off the crowd, they're pulling people up, they're kicking people off, and they can get through five questions in 10, 15 minutes as opposed to just, all right, next one. All right, next one. All right, next one. That's very rote. That's very boring. So you got to know how to make the screen game kind of come to life.
Erik "w/a k" Williams (24:27):
Yeah.
Erik "w/a k" Williams (24:29):
Alright, next on the list, we put down minute to win it games, and if you don't know what that is, just go on YouTube and search minute to win it. Christmas games, you're going to get a bevy of games. I mean one of my favorites is where you, I forget the name of it, but you take a tissue box, pull out all the tissues, and then you put jingle bells inside, you put bells inside of it and then poke a hole to use a, what's the word for Christmas wrap? But you put a ribbon, thank you. Oh yeah,
Nick Clason (25:03):
Yeah. Use
Erik "w/a k" Williams (25:04):
Ribbon as the rope that goes around, you tie it around your waist and then it's shaking. You're just kind of jumping and shaking, trying first want to get the jingle bells out of their box wins.
Erik "w/a k" Williams (25:14):
So those kind of games you can also download on YouTube. You can download the explainer videos or you can make your own videos, but the ones that are don't double the efforts don't go way out. But if you want to and you want your leaders, your volunteers, whatever, to put together an explainer video that's super short and quick, great. And you don't have to have the videos, but that is a simple, just go download them and be things. And I would do three. Sometimes I mix them throughout the night. Okay, we're going to do another minute to win it. Video or game.
Nick Clason (25:50):
Yeah, so you could even look at this run sheet and so it says 15 minutes minute to win it game. You could do a minute to win it game, get the winner and then let them play who or what is on the screen. And that's how we're saying you can weave this in. You don't have to do it exactly as written. Eric, how are you getting videos off of YouTube? What's your hack for that? We all need to figure that out.
Erik "w/a k" Williams (26:16):
Yeah, I've used a lot of different websites over the years and the thing that's been most frustrating as I've searched for websites is usually some Russian thing that ends up having pictures or videos that I don't want in my eyes. And your pastor walks in going, what are you doing? I'm just downloading a YouTube
Nick Clason (26:38):
Video. I'm getting ready for the Christmas party.
Erik "w/a k" Williams (26:42):
So I found this app, it's called four K Downloader and it's free. There's a paid version. I don't know what the paid version does for you, but I did discover that it has a download limit. Maybe that's what it is on the free version per day, but I want to say it's like 50 50 downloads per day. I was downloading songs for songs that I already own but couldn't use through the iPad app that I had for our Halloween event fall festival event. Anyhow, basically you copy the link and then you click the plus button inside a four K downloader and then it says, do you want to download it at 10 87 23 60? I don't know why you would download it at 360, but maybe you want to, but you can also extract audio, just straight audio and which is what I did for our fall festival event. But then it gives you, there's no watermarks or anything, so it's easy. And I don't know what the advertisement like it's for upgrade and I think that's the only advertisement on the little box that you get.
Nick Clason (27:51):
Well, we'll put the link to that in the show notes if you want to go grab that. It's always a good hack. We're always trying to figure out how to get videos into our presentation softwares. So at this point now, if you look at the run sheet, we go from a couple of stager screen-based type games to an active game. So what is your Eric philosophy in going from seated games to an active game?
Erik "w/a k" Williams (28:13):
So that's great question. If you're just constantly doing screen games, it's all screen games. That means everybody's sitting most of the time and maybe now you can use screen games to be active. This is a hack that I love doing with trivia games. So trivia games has typically four answers. You put them in corners, answer A is in one corner, answer B is another corner, C and D, and then they have to move to that corner. They maybe give them five seconds or 10 seconds. You can drop that, the countdown or whatever onto it, but they have to be in their spot, no standing one foot one the other.
Erik "w/a k" Williams (28:58):
And then if you're wrong, you sit down. I love that version of the game. It makes it go quicker. You typically don't do all the questions, but the idea of some watching, not every student wants to play. Some just want to sit and watch. And I've come to a place where I don't force students to play games because everybody's not me. And so I brought, I want to be up. Yeah, take me. We were just at this couple's weekend away and there was a comedy show. We thought it was a murder mystery, but it was a comedy show, but they invited people up on stage to participate in this game and I was like, hands up. That's not everybody. My wife's not going up there. I know tons of students who are not going to raise their hands and quite frankly don't want to go do the active stuff, and that's okay. And I remind my volunteers, we're not forcing students to play games if they just want to sit and watch and engage, they might actually still be having fun. But I think having a variety of types of games I think is really important. Getting them moving, getting them active. It helps the brain to go, oh, something new, something new, something new. I'm not sitting bored and zoning out.
Nick Clason (30:12):
Yeah, I remember one time I had a student say, because we did a lot of screen games and just this era that we were in, I was in I guess, and she was like, I don't have fun coming to church. We do a lot of either or games. I don't have fun coming to church and just walking to one side of the room or the other. I want to play dodgeball and throw a ball at your head. That's what this girl was saying to this girl, right? Because you often think like, oh, the girl's name man, I want to play the active games. This girl is like, no, I want to do something. So I always want to try and tap into that too for students because a lot of times we maybe default to something thinking that they don't want to do the active and get sweaty game and that just might not be the case. So this is a good time, especially in this scope to divvy it up, right? We've been sitting now for 25, 30 minutes, let's get 'em moving. So it's great. Then we're moving to a white elephant gift exchange. So how are you, I guess another conversation, communication. Are we communicating from the get-go that this is a white elephant gift exchange that they have to bring that? Absolutely. What about kids who don't have one? How do you account for all that
Erik "w/a k" Williams (31:20):
Type of stuff? Yeah, so all promotions, cards, texts, Instagram videos, any promotion is going to include white elephant gift exchange. Now, I learned on the office, they called it Yankee Swap, but I've never called it that, but I make that almost the central thing to the event and make it the big deal, and I am like, don't go out and spend 2050 bucks at the store. Find something in your garage or your closet. Make it funny. Make it something that somebody would be surprised that they got that, but there's also going to be those in there that people want to steal, right? Because oh, I really wanted that, or somebody else is like, you wanted that? Are you kidding me? But that also because I know some students are going to show up because they were invited or they forgot or whatever and they didn't know there was a white elephant gift exchange. I got a bunch of extras wrapped ready to go based on how many gifts are under the tree and how many students we have in the room.
Nick Clason (32:27):
Yep, that's great. I was actually just thinking how many of us as youth pastors have a closet full of junk that we have a supply for thing that we have used before are thinking to ourselves, we will use again one day. I mean right now I'm looking at a University of Texas blanket that we bought over a year ago. I don't know why I have that in here. I'd give it to someone, right? That's the whole point. You can kind of go shopping for your students in your youth closet and have some wet elephant gifts sitting. There's always going to be people who forget. So it's great. Love it. How do you play then?
Erik "w/a k" Williams (33:02):
I think I've had a couple of issues where we've had too many students and it's just going to take forever. So if that's the case, you kind of know you can have a rough guess as to how many students are going to show up to an event based on the history. Our Christmas event this past year was the biggest thing we'd done since I got there. So I'm glad I planned ahead for more than what I was thinking that was normally coming. Yeah, that's great. But I've had a guy's Christmas tree and a girl's Christmas tree. If you're a larger ministry, do it with small groups and if there's student's obviously going to show up that are visitors a first time guests, they don't have a small group leader, but go with a student that they came with. So maybe you have your volunteers who are leading small groups, go put your gift if you know it's with somebody, if you're just showing up and you're not with anybody, just choose somebody that you can go to and that's where you'll do your white health and gift exchange.
Nick Clason (34:09):
Yeah, that's good. And you got to probably think through and account for that piece too. At the welcome, as people are coming in, they're going to be walking with gifts, especially guests. You're going to want to be capturing their information, but you also, if they didn't know about the white elephant gif, don't make 'em feel awkward. Have something for 'em, all that type of stuff.
Erik "w/a k" Williams (34:27):
Nick, I'm just literally just thinking this, I need to lock this down. I'll have to watch this video back because I've always told them to put their white elephant gift by the tree right away. But you said something, I'm like, have them hold onto it until you start the event and maybe there's a certain point then, okay, this is how many students we've got. It's going to be better to do all one tree or guys and girls, or let's do small groups. We've prepared for whatever it is in the moment. And then you have them at one point maybe right after the welcome or whatever put
Nick Clason (35:03):
Their, yeah, you can adjust. I was telling, I have a resident, he's a year long resident. I was telling him a story. I used to be a youth pastor and I didn't know if I would have 15 kids show up or four. And so I was always having to think on two tracks of any game I planned. How will this game go if there's 15 kids in the room, how will this game go if there's four kids in the room? And so that really helped me early on, come up with good contingency plans and the ability to adapt and pivot on the fly. You know what I'm saying? And so that's great. You can prep for all sorts of things, but then in the moment you can feel it out and you've done this before, so what's going to work best? So be prepared, but also be flexible at the same time.
Erik "w/a k" Williams (35:50):
So that's great. There's one other thing I want to add to this game that changed the game for me because you have them like, well, should I steal or should I, hold on. There's that. That's the piece I think that takes the longest the
Nick Clason (36:08):
Decision.
Erik "w/a k" Williams (36:09):
Yeah. I was at Kohl's and I think it was the day of our event and it changed how I did the what? Elephant gift exchange. Nice. I found this dye that had different things on it and we'll put a link in the show notes, but it was like keep trade or steal and trade. I'm forgetting one word, but I think trade was with something that's under the tree. So they get a gift and then they roll the dye or they roll the dye first, whatever, but everybody rolled the dye, so you might have something, but the one I had, I can't find anywhere else. So the link that I have is just the keep trader steal one had was passed to the person three down from you or something like that. So added another element, but that kept things going. Everybody got a chance to roll and it was like you didn't have control over and make sure the rules are listed out ahead of time. If your rule is something's stolen two times and it's frozen, and the last person who goes gets to steal, even if it's frozen, make those rules ahead of time because somebody's going to get angry if they think you're making up the rules as you go.
Erik "w/a k" Williams (37:30):
And
Nick Clason (37:30):
The last thing you want in an event like this is for a kid to leave angry. You want it to be fun, especially, you probably want to have an outreach flare to it. You don't want that kid to leave mad. So help yourself out, have those rules up posted. So all right, now we're moving into a message. So talk about your philosophy of having a message in an outreach event. I know some people be like, no, no message. Just fun. What are you thinking with something like this?
Erik "w/a k" Williams (37:59):
I used to have the thought process of let's just have them have a fun experience at church and then they'll come back because they had that fun experience.
Nick Clason (38:09):
I was like, they'll be so captivated by the fun. They got to come back
Erik "w/a k" Williams (38:13):
Because a lot of people like their mentality about church if they don't go to church is like, it's not good. It's not fun, it's boring. Why would I want to be there? And then they show up and they have a good time. They're like, oh, that's the hook. But I've had since, and this is just my personal philosophy, since I've seen lots of students who didn't come back and I'm like, I had the chance to tell them about Jesus and I didn't. And I'm not saying it's wrong to not do it, but for me, my personal philosophy, I've got a handful of students in this place that may not come to church ever again. If I can tell them about Jesus, I
Nick Clason (38:48):
Want to do that, why wouldn't I? Yeah, absolutely. It's great. So message one that you've done before, include it in here, grab it, adapt it, contextualize it, make it yours. You gave it 10 minutes. And then we're also going to include some response cards, and so they're blank response cards. You may even have some yourself. Use those if that works. If not, grab these and then we made enough space on there. You can just drop your logo on them so that it doesn't look like something you downloaded off the internet. Make 'em custom making mirrors. We want you to win in your context. That's the whole goal. So message, anything I'm leaving on the table message or response card wise that you feel like is worth talking about?
Erik "w/a k" Williams (39:33):
I think on the response card, be ready. Have your volunteers ready to hand 'em out to everybody as well as maybe those golf pencils that are cheap, like bulk.
Nick Clason (39:40):
Yeah, that's good.
Erik "w/a k" Williams (39:40):
And have, even if they've been coming forever, have everybody fill one out because one of the things on there says, I said yes to Jesus or made a decision for Christ tonight for the first time. I've already made this decision. Nobody feels uncomfortable filling out that paper, filling it out, and you're going to capture some who maybe didn't raise their hands or however you do it. I think that's really important.
Nick Clason (40:05):
Yeah, I like having just something on there even too. It's like, thanks for this event so everyone can fill something out and not be like, yeah, I wasn't ready to fill anything out. Then of course, I've had the kid, the church kid, their dad's on staff and they're like, I got nothing out of this event. Thanks, man.
Erik "w/a k" Williams (40:26):
Did you have fun?
Nick Clason (40:28):
All right, so then now we're going to pivot. We're almost done. So we got one more game. This is another game, including one of my bestsellers. It's called Emoji Phraseology Christmas edition. It's Christmas movies, Christmas songs, Christmas phrases spelled out from emojis. All the emojis come in at you animated. So it's fun, it's upbeat. It's one of my favorites. You can play it however you want. You can do contestants, you can do keep track of your answers at your table. You can just do it for fun. There's really no wrong way to do it. It's just have fun with it. And I also included, if you run out of time, one of my favorite ways to use it is on social media. So I included the social media version as well. So whether you want to include this in your run sheet or not is one of my favorite ways to hybridize and keep your ministry going on beyond just your program moments. So you can include the vertical graphics on your social media as well, but it's just a fun, the whole point of it is to laugh and to be goofy with emojis.
Erik "w/a k" Williams (41:31):
And I'm just telling you, Nick, it's so well done. For those of you watching right now, this should easily be a $25 game because it's got vertical video. It's got vertical. I'm doing this for vertical, vertical, vertical, vertical videos, vertical stills, landscape videos and stills and so many different ways you can do, I think there's a countdown video included with it, right?
Nick Clason (41:55):
Yeah. If you want to just put it on, you don't want to play it, but you just want something fun for people to pay attention to as they go. The
Erik "w/a k" Williams (42:03):
Graphics are amazing. Animation's amazing. It's so good, so, so good this morning myself, and it was like, oh, this is good.
Nick Clason (42:12):
Another next level thing I've done with it is I've given a phone with just the folder of the stills to a student, and then I walk around and I film him as he asks people to guess the emojis. And so then I, I'm watching, it's almost, it's like taskmaster, like Mr. B style. You can take that and make it like TikTok and you can edit. I've used my actual source files with the animations, but I've also gotten lazy and just taken the video and then just use the TikTok editor and put the emojis on the screen so that the people watching it see the emojis that the person's trying to guess. So that's another next level way. I got literally every season you could imagine of this game over at DYM. So I'll drop a few links to those in the show notes, but use this one for the Christmas party. It's one of my faves. And now we're at the finish line. We're ready to wrap it up. So you have wrap up giveaway. Let's talk just a minute. What's your thought process in that? What are you trying to do with the last five minutes
Erik "w/a k" Williams (43:12):
Here? Yeah, so coming out of the message, I think it was important to do something fun. Again. Sometimes you feel like, oh, it's over now, but it's not over. So that's intentional. The message being short is intentional. Doing that game and then just a final, like we were talking about, when you're welcomed into a home, people walk you out. It's the same kind of feel like, hey, it's the end of the night. That's where you want to hit your announcements again. And then you hand out cards as they walk out, if you've got an event or camp or whatever coming up that you can give to them. Maybe it's your calendar. Maybe you've created a calendar for the January through March or whatever. Give something in their hands. Maybe it's the first time guests get the bag as they walk out, but this is the wrap up announce. Thank them for coming. Make them know that you are really glad that they were there. And then maybe you've got a big giveaway. This is a great time to do that. Big giveaway. It's kind of the buildup of the night, even though the central part is kind the white elephant, white elephant
Nick Clason (44:17):
Gift exchange.
Erik "w/a k" Williams (44:19):
But if you get a big prize you want to give away, you can also use that in your promotion. The end of the night. This is the last we're going to do. We're going to give
Nick Clason (44:26):
Away air pods or an Xbox. I mean, even if it's something cheaper, like a $25 Chick-fil-A gift card
Erik "w/a k" Williams (44:33):
Can never go wrong with Chick-fil-A and for those of you who live away from that, I'm sorry.
Nick Clason (44:38):
That's rough. Yeah, another hack gift card. Amazon people love Amazon gift card. It's basically like money. You can get everything on Amazon. So we wrapped
Erik "w/a k" Williams (44:47):
It up. Then I do a prayer and thank it from coming. And then I have kind of the welcome team greeters standing at the door, high fiving as they go out and handing out cards.
Nick Clason (44:58):
That's great. That's great. You can always throw a twist in here too. If you wanted to do a ugly Christmas sweater version of this, give away a prize for the ugliest Christmas sweater, all kinds of twists. You could also make it dress up. I had a church I worked at that they told me, they're like, this is a hill. We will fight, bleed, and die on, but we will do a dress up event for Christmas. And so it was a gala, bro. I wore a tie and I hated it, but it was always our number one most highly attended event for the year. So I was like, I can't argue this, man. If this is what you guys are going to bring your friends to, great. Well, we will do a gala. So
Erik "w/a k" Williams (45:36):
Can another hack two would be plan four or five extra games.
Nick Clason (45:43):
Yeah, have 'em in your back pocket.
Erik "w/a k" Williams (45:45):
Yeah, you never know. And be ready to cut stuff too. We made this for a 90 minute event. Maybe you have a two hour event, maybe your white elephant gift exchange was done in 10 minutes and you're like, oh, man, we got lots. Always have extra games. And let your leaders who are leading those games know that they may or may not play the game and not to feel like,
Nick Clason (46:11):
Yeah, that's good.
Nick Clason (46:13):
And I would just say our program, we allot 90 minutes, but we would probably shave some of this so it's not all in the auditorium the whole time. We have a game room and stuff like that. Kids like to go play nine square and eat at the cafe and those types of things. And so we may program it for closer to 60 and then give ourselves 30 minutes, a few minutes on the front side and then the rest of that on the backside. So these are a bunch of ideas. You can certainly plug and play and just about every asset that you'll need is available in the download. If not, take it, tweak it, adapt it, spread it out over all of December, whatever you choose to do. But our goal is that Christmas is a busy time for churches and youth pastors. So we want to help out, give you something in this kind of fun mashup, collab episodes. So any parting final words, Eric, as we go?
Erik "w/a k" Williams (47:05):
Yeah, I would say for if you're watching on my channel, if you have not subscribed to Nick, Nick, Nick, like I said earlier in the beginning, this hybrid ministry concept of what are we doing here and online, moving back and forth with those things is so good, much younger than me. So smart with technology in ways that I'm still, I've been trying to learn most of my life, but I'm trying to catch up to his stuff is so good. So Nick, I just appreciate what you're doing. So we'll have the link on there, click subscribe, and you're not going to be disappointed with the stuff that he's putting out.
Nick Clason (47:44):
And listen, same back to you. And listen, also, apologies, I think I just subscribed to you for the first time this morning. So I was like, why can I find him in my subscriptions tab? So apologies, that's on me. But yeah, Eric's stuff, I see all your stuff. I just apparently wasn't subscribed to it. So now I am. You should be too Great practical stuff. And this probably isn't the end of partnerships together, so we're just getting this ball rolling.
Erik "w/a k" Williams (48:12):
If you've got a game that you're like, this is a killer game for us that we do every year, it just hits, would you put that in the comments below? I always want to learn more stuff. I I'm about steal, steal, steal, steal, grab whatever I can to add to what I'm doing. We'd love that.
Nick Clason (48:31):
Yeah, absolutely. Absolutely. So man, Eric, appreciate your time. Everyone else, as you're downloading this blessings on you. Hope you have an amazing Christmas party with it and we we'll talk next time.
Erik "w/a k" Williams (48:43):
See ya!
49 min
November 30, 2023 Episode 073: 🧑‍🚀 New Frontiers in Digital Discipleship for the Church: Shepherding 🐑
🔥SURE FIRE RESOURCES TO LEVEL UP YOUR SOCIAL MEDIA GAME 🔥
📅 "1 Month Done for You Social Media Posting Tool"
https://hybrid-ministry-40060036.hubspotpagebuilder.com/free-hybrid-ministry-e-book
☝️ONE-CLICK SOLUTION FOR REELS & SHORTS
OPUS FOR AI SHORTS & REELS
https://www.opus.pro/?via=a5d361
🧑‍🚀 EXPLORING NEW FRONTIERS PLAYLIST
Exploring The New Way to Approach Ministry, Full Playlist
https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLngXlSr64YaLQ3UpL1HRb3FFtEu-7S1XZ
========================================
DESCRIPTION
👋 Welcome to our YouTube channel & podcast!
🧑‍🚀 In this playlist, we are exploring the 3 new digital frontiers for churches and youth ministry pastors and leaders.
🐑 Shepherding
It's not as sleek and sexy as Games and Message Enhancement, but it might ultimately be the key to unlocking true pastoral leadership and care.
And how do we do so in a new digital frontier and digital landscape?
We'll talk about it!
Be sure to go back and check out the last two videos where we discussed...
🎮Games
💬 Message Enhancement
https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLngXlSr64YaLQ3UpL1HRb3FFtEu-7S1XZ
So be sure to subscribe, so you don't miss a thing!
Shepherding #PastoralCare #DigitalFrontier
========================================
🆓 FREEBIES 🆓
📅 "1 Month Done for You Social Media Posting Tool"
https://hybrid-ministry-40060036.hubspotpagebuilder.com/free-hybrid-ministry-e-book
🍩 "FREE World's Greatest Donut Event Guide"
GUIDE: https://hybrid-ministry-40060036.hubspotpagebuilder.com/worlds-greatest-donut
😨 "Have I already Ruined my TikTok Account?"
https://www.hybridministry.xyz/articles/ebook
📹 "Adobe Premiere Pro Presets for Animating Layers"
https://share.hsforms.com/1VL1oWwWwQ82PLwsPFkPITgnumis
========================================
🛠️TOOLS
Some of the below links are affilate links in which we do recieve a small commission based on your purchase or use of products
//YOUTUBE STARTER KIT FOR UNDER $100
https://www.hybridministry.xyz/articles/youtubestarterkit
AUTO POD
https://autopod.lemonsqueezy.com?aff=MX7Vv
TRY REV.COM FOR TRANSCRIBING
https://rev.pxf.io/R5nDOa
OPUS.PRO FOR AI SHORTS & REELS
https://www.opus.pro/?via=a5d361
👉 STAY CONNECTED WITH NICK
YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@clasonnick
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/hybridministry/
TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@clasonnick
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/HybridMinistry
Website: https://www.hybridministry.xyz
📓SHOWNOTES
//SHOWNOTES & TRANSCRIPTS
http://www.hybridministry.xyz/073
//YOUTUBE VIDEO
https://youtu.be/yFa8UjlDigs
//YOUTH PASTOR FACEBOOK GROUPS
https://www.facebook.com/groups/DYMCommunity
https://www.facebook.com/groups/2204527836
//PLANNING CENTER PEOPLE
https://www.planningcenter.com/people
//GROW NUMBERS
https://growcurriculum.org/numbers/
//FLASHCARDS APP
https://apps.apple.com/us/app/flash-cards-go-flashcards/id1257862568
🕰️TIMECODES
00:00-01:28 Shepherding and Pastoral Care is the secret sauce to communicating God's love
01:28-04:18 Why Hybrid and Shepherding are surprising linked
04:18-09:19 Digital Shepherding Hack #1
09:19-12:00 Digital Shepherding Hack #2
12:00-13:53 Digital Shepherding Hack #3
13:53-16:40 Digital Shepherding Bonus Hack #1 & #2
✍️TRANSCRIPT
Try Transcribing for Yourself at Rev.Com
rev.pxf.io/R5nDOa
Nick Clason (00:00):
Pastoring, shepherding, caring for people. It's hard work. Let's just be honest. And in this third episode of this playlist, exploring New Digital Frontiers. In the last episode, we looked at games and then we looked at message enhancement. And now in this episode, the final installment of the playlist, we're going to be looking at pastoral care. I get it, it's not the fun, it's not the sexy, it's not the social media, but pastoral care is really the secret sauce. It is the warmth that what brings people back to your church. So how do you as a pastor, church leader, ministry leader, or maybe even just a small group leader, care for your people? But how do you use technology and hybrid ministry to make it easier, more efficient, and create a more inviting and warm atmosphere around you and your group and your church? In this episode, we're going to look at three ideas that you can start using immediately in your ministry to care for people well.
Nick Clason (01:11):
And beyond that, I have a tool that I think every church needs to use. And finally, make sure you stick around to the end of the video because we are going to give you two bonus tips, and I think the bonus tips might be worth the price of admission. Welcome to the Hybrid Ministry Show. Well, everyone, welcome to the Hybrid Ministry Show. My name is Nick Clayson. I am a youth pastor, currently situated and located in the DFW Dallas-Fort Worth, area Y hybrid ministry. What I mean by hybrid is not just physical, not just digital, but a melding of the two, a hybrid experience between your physical and your digital. It's using technology to lean into the already in-person moment that is existing. And you and I know that pastoral care happens best, need a knee, eye to eye, maybe over a cup of coffee, but sometimes you're not physically with the person that you need to be with.
Nick Clason (02:06):
And so how do we meld the physical and the digital and bring it together to make it hybrid? And the reason I think this is important is because Gen Z and Gen Alpha are using their cell phone screen-based device more than any other screen-based device combined. And so the reality is cell phones aren't going anywhere, which is why I created this completely free ebook from scratch. It's going to give you 40 ideas a month's worth of social media that you can bring into your ministry and use in your social media. But here's why this plan is different than all the other plans. First of all, it's free, and second of all, it's recyclable and reproducible. And third, it is you and your students and your leaders on camera. It's not just a bunch of static roped, stoic graphics. And here's the thing, I think in this playlist, the shepherding idea, this might be the easiest of all the other ideas to understand more than games, maybe even more than teaching enhancement.
Nick Clason (03:07):
But some of the ideas I'm going to give you, you're going to be like, yeah, that's obvious. That's dumb, and I get it. But I do have two bonus ideas that I think are pretty next level that you're probably not thinking of. They're not revolutionary, they're not some super secret face scanning app that's going to help you be more caring of the people in your space. But they are just a little bit more outside of the box because I think that the ideas I have for you, you maybe haven't heard of or even haven't tried. But hey, before we dive in, I would love to encourage you for a like and a subscribe. Those two things are completely free for you, and they would mean the world to us because really, I do want you to be the best pastor possible to your students, to your church, to the people that God's entrusted to you.
Nick Clason (03:51):
And if you like, you subscribe, you're going to help get this message out to other people as well as not miss other ideas that we have coming your way that's really just going to help come alongside and help you be the best pastor, ministry leader or small group leader possible for you, for your students and for the people that God has entrusted into your care. So without any further fanfare, let's dive into three hybrid ministry ideas for shepherding and four K. So as we explore new digital frontiers and games, as we explore new digital frontiers and message enhancement, those things are a little bit more outside the box, a little bit more revolutionary, a little bit more, you got to kind of think and maybe squint your eyes and tilt your head and be like, okay, I see how you could incorporate that. But what I'm about to share with you are things that I think are pretty standard in most churches.
Nick Clason (04:43):
And so the first hybrid idea, the first hybrid tool, the first digital tool, and again, you might even as I say this, you can be like, well, yeah, okay, it is a church management software. And listen, I get it right. It is about the most basic thing. Most churches in America have One, you got Church Community Builder, you got Planning Center, you got the Rock, you got ACS through rum, through ACS. There are a lot of different options. Comment below what your church is using as a church management software, but here's what I want to let you know is if you're in a church like me, when I first started, we didn't do church management softwares. Our church management software was this small little tool called Excel. And if you're in a church that doesn't do church management softwares, and I get it, the median sized church in America is 75 people.
Nick Clason (05:39):
And so that's what the majority of churches around America, that's the size that most of them are. And so there may be a world where a church management software is not a defacto element to what you're doing. There are a couple of tools out there I want to share with you, links down below in the description that are actually free. So if your student ministry is 25 and under, there's a grow resource curriculum company by Kenny and l. Theirs is completely free. If you have under 25 people in your ministry, free forever under 25. And so what it does is it helps you with check-ins, sign in, and just keeping track of who's been there in the weeks to come. And that's part of pastoral care, right? Knowing who's been there so that you can reach out to those who haven't been there. Another option that's completely free, and it's free no matter the size is Planning Center people.
Nick Clason (06:40):
Now Planning Center is made famous through their services app, which is what musicians and bands would send their other band members, music song, song charts, lyrics, things for people to practice. They could assign you different positions like you're on drums this week, you're on bass this week. And then Planning Center started to dabble in other areas and other elements. And so Planning Center people is amazing and it links really well with services, planning Center Services, the module, but also events and registration and a calendaring and giving. I was in a church that didn't have a church management software. And then we finally did come around to a church management software and we went in on Planning Center. The downside of Planning Center is this, it's expensive. The upside of Planning Center is frankly, I've used all the ones I mentioned earlier, the Rock, ACS Realm, CCB Church, community Builder and Planning Center.
Nick Clason (07:39):
And Planning Center was my favorite by far. Hands down is also the most expensive, and so you just need to know that. But planning Center people is not expensive. It's all the other elements to make it kind of work together so that giving works together and that registration works together and that services works together, all linking in with people. But Planning Center People is completely free. If you want to do Check-in, it's another module that costs more money, but both of those are free Grow numbers under 25 and Planning Center people Free Forever links below in the description to check those out. But what they do is they just help you keep track of your people, their information addresses, emails, phone numbers. And as a youth pastor, youth ministry leader, one of the things I think that Covid did was it brought back some of the more old school ways to do pastoral care.
Nick Clason (08:31):
Right now, as a youth pastor send so many handwritten notes, and the way that I use that and the way that I use my church management software is I look the person up, I get their address, I write them a note and I mail it to 'em. The reality is I couldn't do that without that tool. And so again, it might seem basic, but the first idea I have for you is use and utilize your church management software. Now, if you already have one, you don't have to get it set up. You have maybe an admin who's keeping track of those things. That's great. That just gives you more access and more ability to help care for the people that God has entrusted to. So get creative, think outside the box. How else can you lean in and utilize your church management software to your advantage?
Nick Clason (09:21):
Hybrid idea number two that I have for you is text messaging. And again, I get it, you're like, dude, are you serious? That's so basic. But I just want to let you know when we had a death in the family last year, about a year ago at this point, and I was on my way driving a thousand miles from here back to our hometown, I got countless amounts of text messaging, countless amounts of phone calls from people who wanted to just offer care and support and love and text messaging is a really simple way that, think about it. Before the advent and invention of the cell phone, you had to be physically in a room with someone to offer care, and you should still do that, right? This is hybrid. That's not throwing out the in-person, but that's saying, Hey, I know this thing about you because of our in-person relationship.
Nick Clason (10:18):
I know this thing about you because of our in-person relationship. However, what I also know about you is that you're going through something difficult. And while I can't be with you right now, I can lean into the digital expression of our relationship, a cell phone, and I can text you and say, Hey, man, praying for you. It's so simple and I don't know about you, but for me, that means just as much as getting flowers or getting a meal sent to my home or even getting a handwritten note, frankly, I don't need some grand expression of shepherding or pastoral care. I just need to know that someone is there for me. Like I've told you, and in the intro, I'm in Texas, but I've been a youth pastor in Chicago. I've been a youth pastor in Cincinnati, Ohio. I've been a youth pastor in Dayton, Ohio, and still to this day, I keep up with students of mine.
Nick Clason (11:09):
We have the world's longest Snapchat streak, and I definitely don't recommend that you Snapchat your students. But what I have done is some of my students who've graduated and have volunteered for me at camps and retreats in the past as graduated seniors and students now, I keep up with them and we talk and it's an everyday thing on the Snapchat streak. So sometimes we don't talk about anything, but I know when they're getting new jobs, we talk about the Bengals because that's their favorite team. We talk about their dad who's having procedures and surgeries. That is one way that I just keep up in the lives of students that are no longer in youth ministry. They're in their twenties now, but I still have a relationship with them because of what my cell phone. So don't overlook the power of what your cell phone can do for you and how it can help you care for the people that God has entrusted to.
Nick Clason (11:59):
You have idea number three, and I'll say this, this may not be the best youth ministry friendly idea, but Facebook groups, it isn't. If it isn't helpful for you and your youth ministry and your students, it can still be helpful for you and your youth ministry and your students' parents. And so create community, create a place where conversation can happen. I think sometimes it's a little difficult to do. I think sometimes it feels more like an announcement billboard thing, but some of the best groups, some of my best experiences on Facebook are in a group dynamic and in a group setting. For example, the Download Youth Ministry community Facebook group, the Youth Pastors Only Facebook group by Ymm 360. I'll link both of those down below in the description. If you're not, are any in them, check it out because honestly, it's people who are like, Hey, what do you guys do for Halloween?
Nick Clason (12:52):
What do you guys do for a harvest party? What do you guys do for a Christmas party? What are your Christmas leader idea gifts? How are you guys using chat GPT in your ministry to help you out? It's just a open source area for youth pastors to have a conversation. I wish that our Facebook groups could be an open source place for our parents to have a conversation about raising teenagers, because raising teenagers is hard, and there should be a place where the church is both the safest place to do it and where other parents can come alongside and give helpful tips, tricks, and hacks. And so I think that that can be a great place to not only help people just with tips, tricks and hacks, but also provide pastoral care because you can reach out and be like, Hey, and then this is going to put some ownership on the person, but if they're going through something, they might offer a prayer request.
Nick Clason (13:43):
And then if you're in that group, you are aware of something going on, which then you can go to your church management system, get their phone number and text them, and boom, which use all three of 'em. The two ideas I have for you that you're probably not thinking of are your personal intercessory, pastoral prayer for your people is probably the secret sauce to you shepherding your people well. And so maybe for you, you just have a vibrant prayer life. But one of the things I know is that most people I talk to, prayer is always an area they're wanting to grow in. I know it's an area that I'm always looking and wanting to grow in. And so one of my favorite apps is the YouVersion Bible app, and they have a prayer section. You can just log your prayers. And so maybe that can be a place where you can pray for the students in which God has entrusted to you, and you can break 'em up into categories.
Nick Clason (14:42):
So you can have your own kind of prayer list. You can have maybe a gratitude list or something, but you could also have an intercessory prayer for your students list, and you just list them out by name and you just pray for your students by name. And that's going to be one of the most impactful ways for you to have a heart that grows with care and compassion and empathy for your students in which God has entrusted into your care. But maybe you just need a tool to help you organize your thoughts, to stay on track and to not forget things. The other idea I have for you is an app called Flashcard Go, and you can download it in the app store. Full disclosure, I've never used it. It's also an iPhone app, not an iPhone guy. But if I was thinking if it's customizable to the way that I believe, they are telling me it's customizable.
Nick Clason (15:28):
What if you put faces of your students on flashcards and you could swipe through and see a picture of your student? Be like, got to pray for Gabe. Swipe through. Got to pray for Cameron, his relationship with his girlfriend right now, school. Got to pray for Caleb. Everything he's going through, the wrestling lady is having about faith. Got to pray for Megan. Megan, who's struggling with this, this, and this that could help you. Again, similar to the prayer app, filter your thoughts and pray for your students and pray for your students. Because here's the deal, we're in a new age. We're in the digital era, and some of the good things about physical gatherings aren't going anywhere. But how can you bring about the digital to enhance your physical ministry and make a difference both through games, through message enhancement and not through shepherding? Because I believe that every youth ministry needs to stop ignoring digital ministry. And that's the next video that's going to be linked here on the screen. Take a look at that because we're trying to make digital discipleship easy and accessible. So as always, stay hybrid
17 min
November 23, 2023 Episode 072: 🧑‍🚀 New Frontiers in Digital Discipleship for the Church: Message Enhancement 💬
🔥SURE FIRE RESOURCES TO LEVEL UP YOUR SOCIAL MEDIA GAME 🔥
📅 "1 Month Done for You Social Media Posting Tool"
https://hybrid-ministry-40060036.hubspotpagebuilder.com/free-hybrid-ministry-e-book
☝️ONE-CLICK SOLUTION FOR REELS & SHORTS
OPUS FOR AI SHORTS & REELS
https://www.opus.pro/?via=a5d361
🧑‍🚀 EXPLORING NEW FRONTIERS PLAYLIST
Exploring The New Way to Approach Ministry, Full Playlist
https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLngXlSr64YaLQ3UpL1HRb3FFtEu-7S1XZ
========================================
DESCRIPTION
Preaching, Teaching and Youth Ministry
It’s part of what we do in the church.
You’ve also heard that this generation, according to crossrivertherapy.com has an attention span of just 8.25 seconds. Which is 4.25 seconds LESS than we experienced in the year 2000.
Famously, that’s less than a goldfish
But teaching and preaching the Bible, is not only an integral part of youth ministry, but learning the Bible is important to the discipleship and developmental process, not only in teenagers, but in anyone who claims to follow Jesus Christ as their savior.
So how do we take the Hybrid approach to teaching and preaching.
Hybrid is not just your physical gathering
But not ignoring it in favor of your digital experience, either.
It’s both.
In this episode we’ll explore the how to preach and teach to a TikTok Generation.
What we’re up against.
What we can learn from culture
And finally, 3 Hybrid Solutions you can implement THIS Wednesday night.
churchattendance #hiddentruth #unveiling #2023 #church #truth #revelation #faith #spirituality #religion #worship #community #christianity #belief #sunday #sacred #divine #belief #sermon #christian
========================================
🆓 FREEBIES 🆓
📅 "1 Month Done for You Social Media Posting Tool"
https://hybrid-ministry-40060036.hubspotpagebuilder.com/free-hybrid-ministry-e-book
😨 "Have I already Ruined my TikTok Account?"
https://www.hybridministry.xyz/articles/ebook
📹 "Adobe Premiere Pro Presets for Animating Layers"
https://share.hsforms.com/1VL1oWwWwQ82PLwsPFkPITgnumis
========================================
🛠️TOOLS
Some of the below links are affilate links in which we do recieve a small commission based on your purchase or use of products
//YOUTUBE STARTER KIT FOR UNDER $100
https://www.hybridministry.xyz/articles/youtubestarterkit
AUTO POD
https://autopod.lemonsqueezy.com?aff=MX7Vv
TRY REV.COM FOR TRANSCRIBING
https://rev.pxf.io/R5nDOa
OPUS.PRO FOR AI SHORTS & REELS
https://www.opus.pro/?via=a5d361
👉 STAY CONNECTED WITH NICK
YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@clasonnick
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/hybridministry/
TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@clasonnick
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/HybridMinistry
Website: https://www.hybridministry.xyz
📓SHOWNOTES
//SHOWNOTES & TRANSCRIPTS
http://www.hybridministry.xyz/072
//View all the Charts and Graphs via YouTube
https://youtu.be/iIgEtxPLGBg
//Mr. Beast on YouTube
https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCX6OQ3DkcsbYNE6H8uQQuVA
//Alex Hormozi
https://www.youtube.com/@AlexHormozi
//Steven Furtick
https://www.youtube.com/@stevenfurtick
//Research on Attention Spans
https://www.crossrivertherapy.com/average-human-attention-span
https://journals.physiology.org/doi/pdf/10.1152/advan.00109.2016
//My Youth Min by Ym360
https://myyouthmin.com/
//The Learning Triangle
https://www.educationcorner.com/the-learning-pyramid.html
//Solution #1
https://sidekick.tv/
//Solution #2
https://my.bible.com/events
//Solution #3
https://hybrid-ministry-40060036.hubspotpagebuilder.com/free-hybrid-ministry-e-book
https://www.hybridministry.xyz/articles/youtubestarterkit
🕰️TIMECODES
00:00-01:36 Preaching to the Generation with the Shortest Attention Span in History
01:36-03:33 Teaching, Preaching and Hybrid Ministry is vital to the next generation
03:33-11:15 Teaching to a TikTok Generation
11:15-15:46 What can youth pastors learn from culture?
15:46-21:39 3 Immediate Hybrid Solutions
✍️TRANSCRIPT
Try Transcribing for Yourself at Rev.Com
rev.pxf.io/R5nDOa
Nick Clason (00:00):
Preaching teaching and youth ministry, they go together. It's just part of what we do. But what do you do when you're trying to preach and teach to the generation with the shortest attention span of only 8.25 seconds? Famously, you've heard it's less now than a goldfish down 4.5 seconds from the year 2000. And is there a way for us to digitally enhance through hybrid means the way in which people learn and listen to our teaching and our preaching now in this generation because teaching and preaching is not only an integral part of youth ministry, but it's an integral part of the way in which we disciple our students and help them understand the claims, values and teachings of Jesus. So how do we take this hybrid approach, not just digital, not just in person, but melding of the two together to increase awareness and to help bring about a better retention of our teaching and our preaching to our students.
Nick Clason (01:08):
In this episode, we will answer how to preach and teach to a tick talk generation and what we as communicators are up against. Additionally, we'll explore what we can learn from the culture that's around us. And finally, I want to offer for you three hybrid solutions to help engage and increase teaching and preaching and awareness in your context that you can implement tomorrow. Welcome to the Hybrid Ministry Show. Well, hey everyone. Welcome back to another edition of the Hybrid Ministry Show. I, as always am your host Nick Clason. I'm a 13 year youth ministry veteran now currently located in the DFW Dallas Fort Worth area. Excited to be with you. I've been teaching and preaching my entire career, but I've also been engaging with the importance of hybrid ministry. I've been aware of that and aware of the digital revolution ever since I started in youth ministry, which is why we have this playlist right here linked at the top of the screen that you're a part of as we are exploring new digital frontiers.
Nick Clason (02:12):
The last video was all about games and how we can implement hybrid into our games and into the fun in our youth ministries. And this episode is about enhancing the messages. So I hope that you'll stick around to the very end of the video because in addition to that, I have a sure surefire resource linked in the description below. That's not only going to help you win on social media and bring about your messages and all those things to your students and help bring that to them the other hours of your week, but it'll also help you have fun with them like we talked about in the last video. And so I want to encourage you to I you to subscribe. Those things are free for you and they mean a lot to me, and I want you to do that because we do drop resources, like I just mentioned, 40 done for you, an entire month's worth of social media, but not just a bunch of graphics.
Nick Clason (03:04):
This is you actually getting in front of the camera, getting in front of a video, using yourself, your students, your leaders, whoever you want to help change the game on your social media platform. And so those types of things are coming at you every single week. We'll drop a new episode every single Thursday, so like subscribe, can't wait to see on the other side, but hey, we are going to be diving into teaching to a TikTok generation. Let's explore that together. So famously, this generation has an attention span of 8.25 seconds. It said that that is less than the household goldfish. So I don't know if any of you guys have gold fishes or teenagers in your house, but if you do, your teenager has a shorter attention span than a goldfish. What is going on nowadays though is the short form video revolution ushered into us by TikTok during the pandemic has changed the way in which we engage with content online.
Nick Clason (04:07):
It just has our attention spans are getting shorter. The need and relevance for a really, really crucial opening section of your video is what is going to determine if someone sticks around in your video or if they're going to leave. In fact, I want to share with you three examples from three very different classes and creators and just like different pockets of YouTube, but all three very good, three people who know what they're doing on social media. And I want to point out to you, we're going to watch 'em right here live on screen. I want to react to how well their hook and how well their intro does. So the first one up is a Mr. Beast video. So let's check this out together.
Nick Clason (04:54):
Hundred million mankind, okay? He's just taught, he's just B roll. He's got Justin Timberlake on there. Whoa, got those waves with his editing's great all the way to this barely functioning house, more of a shed. Well, why does this house cost a dollar? Yeah, we get another storm. It's probably going to, he's already into the content now of his video. He's only 38 seconds in. It feels like the intro. It just seamlessly moves straight into the content. Mr. Beast is probably the best at the opening ones. This one is more of a entrepreneur guy, guru trying to help you win online. So let's check out his video. This is my most brutally honest advice to my, you beat 99% of people zoomed out without media advice to my younger self and
Nick Clason (05:57):
How I, you're going to lose sleep. You'll doubt whether it'll work. You'll stress. He's catering to the difficulty of what he does and what the people that follow him need to do. He's got B roll, he's got light transitions, all that type of stuff. Great. Now this one right here, this is Churchill from Elevation Steven S check this one out sitting on that you're not using today. That's not the beginning of his sermon, but it's the beginning of this video. Arrows, you should have taken everything God gave you kept striking until you saw it to. They edited it so that it started there at what they considered to be the most interesting part, artillery to be defeated. It was his lack of drive. The reason I want to show all of you that is that the first 30 seconds or less of every single one of those videos, all very different, but all very good.
Nick Clason (06:56):
Everyone who edited that video knew exactly what they were doing. So I actually have a video that I just released on a platform called My Youth Men, which is a membership tier of YM 360. You can check it out, link in the description for a seven day free trial. But the video is about discipling students and teenagers through the usage pitfalls and platforms with cell phones as opposed to a way, and I show you those videos because I want to say that's what we as communicators are up against. Your students are watching those for entertainment, for fun, even maybe for inspiration with a Steven Furtick. And then you and I get up as their youth pastor and we start teaching at them in all of our old seminary taught ways. I think as I said in my video, that there are new ways of doing it.
Nick Clason (07:51):
In fact, this is a educator's tool. It's going to be up here on the screen. If you're listening to the podcast, make sure that you hit the link in the show notes so you can see everything on YouTube with all of our video overlays and all of our things flying in. But this is called the knowledge pyramid, and there are two sections to it. There's the passive teaching methods and then there's the participatory teaching methods. And most of us in church are using the passive teaching methods and the percentages are broken down by the knowledge retention rate. So how well this style of teaching helps people retain that type of teaching. And so the lowest at 5% is lecture based style. You might think 8.25 seconds is low, but I'm just going to admit to you, I am bored after a lecture after only 8.25 seconds.
Nick Clason (08:42):
You have to be really killing it, and I have to be really interested in that form of content. In the lecture style pyramid, 10% of the retention rate is reading, 20% is audio visual. So that would be something like including slides and or video in your teaching. And then 30% is demonstration. That's of the passive teaching style methods. So all of those things are all things that you've been taught probably in seminary of how to teach someone and how to maintain relevance as you teach someone. But then it shifts and at 50% a discussion group, a participatory teaching method is where that learning retention rate jumps up to 50%. If someone practices what they've learned by doing it, it jumps to 75% and then if they teach others, it jumps to 90%. So in most cases, us as youth pastors, we push our students through passive teaching methods, and then finally we get them into a discussion group As a participatory teaching method, discussion group is the lowest of the participatory section of retention, and that is why you and I as we are teaching, we need to differ at what we're doing. Look at what Mr. Beast did, how he looked at all the different houses, right? And he kept it moving. He was only on each house for just a few seconds. He was moving, he was garnering interest, he was keeping you hooked. Even look at fur, he's on the floor with arrows in hand doing his thing. Yeah, it was lecture style, but there's visuals to it. And in our youth ministries, more often than not, we're going to push people in to small groups, which is a relevant and meaningful participatory teaching method.
Nick Clason (10:32):
And so as we know and look at the different teaching pyramid styles, here is my question, what do we do? How do we infuse and use hybrid to help increase the retention rates of the learnings? Because you know that the message that you're teaching matters. It's a truth of God. It's a truth from God's word, and it's been put on your heart by him, and you're trying to help share that message with the students in which God has entrusted to you in your student ministry. So what do you do about it? I think that there are a couple of clues that we can learn from culture, even from some of those YouTube videos that we watch. And so that's what we're going to check out in the next section. Neil Bradbury has a quote. The link to that article is in the show notes. He says, the eight second myth, as he classifies it for attention spans is actually more related to human behavior on websites and on social media and how many seconds the average person spends on a website before clicking away or navigating off of it.
Nick Clason (11:39):
So we have famously dubbed Generation Z and Gen Alpha subsequently as the generation with the tension span lower than a goldfish. And that's true as it relates to social media and Mr. Beast and Alex Har Zi, and even Steven Fer and Elevation, they're trying to capture people's attention on social media. So they do have to make that happen within eight seconds. And we are up against that, I would say, as communicators because that's how students are spending a majority of their time. Gen Z's using their cell phone more than any other screen-based device combined. However, I want to point something out that is a website statistic. And so while that is true of websites, the attention span is a little bit longer because eight seconds is incredibly short. And check this out. Over the last however many years, these are the top five grossing box office movies of all time.
Nick Clason (12:35):
So in 2009, avatar came out, and I think it's even been supplanted by itself for the re-release or something like that, but Avatar, the movie is two hours and 42 minutes. Avengers End Game came out in 2019. Shout out to my favorite movie. I love you. 3000. It is three hours in one minute. I was nervous going into Avengers end game. I was like, I might have to pee. What do I do if I have to pee? And I did. Titanic in 1992 was three hours and 14 minutes. Star Wars episode seven, two hours and 18 minutes, and an Avengers Infinity War, the prequel to end game 2018, two hours and 29 minutes long. Movies are still making money, they're still making them, and they're still releasing them. Also, shout out to Disney for owning four of the top five of those properties. All that to be said though, if it weren't lucrative and if it weren't making money, Disney and the other major motion picture companies in America wouldn't be making movies at that length.
Nick Clason (13:43):
So what does that mean for us? We got this eight second thing, but now we got movies that are going longer than three hours. How do we reconcile the difference between those two? My contention is this, if it's good, people will pay attention. It's that simple. And here's the reality. Most research, including Ted Talk and that organization say that a sweet spot for lectures is anywhere from 10 to 15 minutes. That's optimal. However, if it's moving, if it's keeping attention, if it's changing things up, even just going back and watching Mr. Beast intro video, how if it's moving and adapting, you can keep the attention of your audience. But here's a gut check. If Avatar and Endgame and Star Wars and Titanic are keeping people's attention, but you're losing them after only eight seconds, then the gut check moment for you and I as youth pastors might be, we might be more boring than we think we are.
Nick Clason (14:46):
In fact, I've been recording videos on this YouTube channel for six months, eight months now, and that's been a gut check moment for me. When certain videos get less views, I'll go back, I'll look at the analytics and I'll go and re-listen to it myself. And you know what? I'll notice, man, I'm boring, right? I have to learn how to be more captivating. I have to learn how to be more interesting. I have to learn how to keep and retain my audience longer throughout the duration of my videos. Not only is that true for me as a communicator via YouTube via video to y'all, but it's also true for me as a youth pastor. But going back and looking, watching those videos, which by the way, if you are not prerecording your messages or recording them at all to go back and look and learn, you are missing out on the easiest way to become better as a communicator.
Nick Clason (15:31):
But there's another hack and there's another little silver bullet that's going to slide in here because we are going to be exploring three hybrid ideas in this digital frontier to enhance our messages in the room. Let's check it out. So what are these hybrid ideas? Like I said, it's not just physical. It's not just digital, but it's a melding of the two. So in my mind, you're teaching live in the room, but you're putting things on their cell phone or putting resources on their cell phone for them to use later because they're taking their cell phone with them for the other 165 hours beyond just the one hour that you've been in your program. And most of us as youth pastors, we're not good enough to contend with cell phones. So instead of contending with them, using them, leaning into them, we just forced them to lock them away or get rid of them.
Nick Clason (16:20):
But one of my favorite solutions from my favorite people over at Download Youth Ministry is sidekick. Check it out, sidekick TV link in the show notes. I get zero kickback from this, but I'm a power user and they just released or they're going to release and listen. I may be letting the cat out of the bag a little bit, but they're going to be releasing a polling feature. So you can put a QR code on the screen, students can scan it, and they can vote live time, and you can show it live from the stage. And better yet, you can now control sidekick from your phone or your iPad if you don't have a tech person running back in the back. And so you can do live interactive types of things to interact with your in-person and letting them use the digital means in front of them.
Nick Clason (17:08):
So you can ask like, Hey, what is the best Thanksgiving food? Is it stuffing mashed potatoes, pumpkin pie, Turkey or ham? Let us know. Scan this QR code, and then you can get live results from your audience. You also, just like the learning pyramid showed, in addition to your lecture style, you need to be bringing visual aid with it. Use your screens, use your multimedia to your advantage. Use the things that are common to your students, like memes and tos. You can even pull out things like, Hey, show the most interesting photo from your last week in your camera roll. And one of my all time favorite ways to be hybrid is any sort of call to action, a camp, sign up, a discipleship, sign up. Even now, the sidekick voting thing use QR codes. They've had a resurgence since the pandemic, but people now can scan QR codes with just their camera app and their phone.
Nick Clason (18:02):
It will pull a link up and boom, you are off to the races. Use QR codes to your advantage. Use sidekick, use digital media, use your screens to interact and make things hybrid. The next idea that I have for you is you version events in our space, we call them digital notes. And so we link our YouVersion live events. If you didn't know, YouVersion is the Bible app made by Life church, but they have a events portion. And so what happens is if someone is in your church, it will pull geographically all the events that are live and they can get in there and there can be notes. Your main points scriptures you Additionally, my favorite reason for it is you can create call to action. So you can put your camp signup, you can put a Bible reading plan so they can be on the digital notes.
Nick Clason (19:01):
They can be taking notes in the space in your room as you're teaching, as you're preaching. And then at the end, you can be like, and hey, if you are learning right now and enjoying this message about prayer, but you want to grow even deeper into prayer, then I have a seven day prayer challenge plan linked in the you version, in the digital notes, whatever you want to call it. And kids can click it on their phone and write their sign up for a Bible reading plan. It's a way to help foster discipleship to lean into the hybrid, right? You taught something, but now by just having notes available to them on their phone, you can say, Hey, click accept, and start reading that plan. The third idea that I have for you is use YouTube and use social media. In fact, in the links down below, I have a couple of things, a less than $100 YouTube setup for you to start doing messages similar to this one right here where you're sitting direct to camera and posting your messages to YouTube.
Nick Clason (19:59):
If you have live streaming capabilities, then do that. But if you don't, as a youth pastor, I get it. I don't either sit down, prerecord your messages. In addition to that, you can use a service also linked in the description called Opus Pro to then take your long form and clip it into short form and give yourself a bunch of social media content for the week. And if you then need something to help fill in some of the other gaps, that's where my surefire resource, my ebook, my 40 done for you ideas comes in. And that message can live in perpetuity online as you help answer the specific faith questions of this next generation. It can be more than just for students who miss. It can be for parents to check it out. It can be for students who don't even go to your church.
Nick Clason (20:43):
It can be for students who go to your church to share messages with friends if they would never bring their friends to church, they can share a message on YouTube with their friends. And so those are my three ideas, sidekick in digital media, you versions, digital notes, and finally, utilize and use YouTube and social media to your advantage. The final piece of this playlist is we're going to be exploring and talking about how do we care for students in an ongoing type of way. We meet with them once a week, but then there's 167 hours. How can we, in a hybrid way care for the students pastorally in the ways in which God has entrusted to us? That video is linked right here on the screen. Make sure you check it out. We're making digital discipleship easy, possible and accessible. So as always, and don't forget, stay hybrid.
22 min
November 16, 2023 Episode 071: 🧑‍🚀 New Frontiers in Digital Discipleship for the Church: Youth Ministry Games 🎮
🔥SURE FIRE RESOURCES TO LEVEL UP YOUR SOCIAL MEDIA GAME 🔥
📅 "1 Month Done for You Social Media Posting Tool"
https://hybrid-ministry-40060036.hubspotpagebuilder.com/free-hybrid-ministry-e-book
☝️ONE-CLICK SOLUTION FOR REELS & SHORTS
OPUS FOR AI SHORTS & REELS
https://www.opus.pro/?via=a5d361
🧑‍🚀 EXPLORING NEW FRONTIERS PLAYLIST
Exploring The New Way to Approach Ministry, Full Playlist
https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLngXlSr64YaLQ3UpL1HRb3FFtEu-7S1XZ
========================================
DESCRIPTION
👋 Welcome to our YouTube channel & podcast!
🧑‍🚀 In this playlist, we are exploring the 3 new digital frontiers for churches and youth ministry pastors and leaders.
🎮 And in this video we're exploring the world of Youth Ministry Games and Fun!
What is different?
Where did games even come from in the first place?
And how should we adjust as we move forward into this new digital frontier?
In the subsequent videos we'll talk about
💬 Message Enhancement
🐑 Shepherding
So be sure to subscribe, so you don't miss a thing!
churchattendance #hiddentruth #unveiling #2023 #church #truth #revelation #faith #spirituality #religion #worship #community #christianity #belief #sunday #sacred #divine #belief #sermon #christian
========================================
🆓 FREEBIES 🆓
📅 "1 Month Done for You Social Media Posting Tool"
https://hybrid-ministry-40060036.hubspotpagebuilder.com/free-hybrid-ministry-e-book
😨 "Have I already Ruined my TikTok Account?"
https://www.hybridministry.xyz/articles/ebook
📹 "Adobe Premiere Pro Presets for Animating Layers"
https://share.hsforms.com/1VL1oWwWwQ82PLwsPFkPITgnumis
========================================
🛠️TOOLS
Some of the below links are affilate links in which we do recieve a small commission based on your purchase or use of products
//YOUTUBE STARTER KIT FOR UNDER $100
https://www.hybridministry.xyz/articles/youtubestarterkit
AUTO POD
https://autopod.lemonsqueezy.com?aff=MX7Vv
TRY REV.COM FOR TRANSCRIBING
https://rev.pxf.io/R5nDOa
OPUS.PRO FOR AI SHORTS & REELS
https://www.opus.pro/?via=a5d361
👉 STAY CONNECTED WITH NICK
YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@clasonnick
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/hybridministry/
TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@clasonnick
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/HybridMinistry
Website: https://www.hybridministry.xyz
📓SHOWNOTES
//SHOWNOTES & TRANSCRIPTS
http://www.hybridministry.xyz/071
//View all the Charts and Graphs via YouTube
https://youtu.be/OiBjI9dMxu8
//Rank 'Em
https://www.downloadyouthministry.com/p/rank-%27em---fall-edition/fall-8962.html
//Visual Variance Voyage
https://www.downloadyouthministry.com/p/visual-variance-voyage%3A-fall-edition/holiday-or-seasonal/fall-9043.html
//Adobe Photoshop & Premiere Crash Course
https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLngXlSr64YaKVpQBDSQV6Q9hFeXCptHSu
//Budget Friendly Design Options
https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLngXlSr64YaIdZ-RLm5uVVlHj46FKrMYw
//Emoji Phraseology Vol 1
https://www.downloadyouthministry.com/p/emoji-phraseology/social-media/instagram-6801.html
//Emoji Phraseology Camp Edition
https://www.downloadyouthministry.com/p/emoji-phraseology---camp-edition/games/sequels-8122.html
//Emoji Phraseology: Summer Edition
https://www.downloadyouthministry.com/p/emoji-phraseology---summer-edition/games/bundles-and-sequels-8088.html
//Emoji Phraseology: Easter Edition
https://www.downloadyouthministry.com/p/emoji-phraseology-easter-edition/games/pop-culture-6957.html
//Emoji Phraseology: Vol 2
https://www.downloadyouthministry.com/p/emoji-phraseology---vol-2/games/sequels-8640.html
//Emoji Phraseology: Halloween Edition
https://www.downloadyouthministry.com/p/emoji-phraseology---halloween-edition/fall/halloween-8320.html
//Emoji Phraseology: March Madness
https://www.downloadyouthministry.com/p/emoji-phraseology---madness-edition/spring/march-madness-8594.html
//Emoji Phraseology: 4th of July
https://www.downloadyouthministry.com/p/emoji-phraseology---patriotic-edition/summer/4th-of-july-8780.html
//Emoji Phraseology: St. Patrick's Day
https://www.downloadyouthministry.com/p/emoji-phraseology-shamrock-edition/games-6929.html
//Emoji Phraseology: Christmas Edition
https://www.downloadyouthministry.com/p/emoji-phraseology%3A-christmas-edition/christmas-games-8426.html
//Emoji Phraseology: Superhero Edition
https://www.downloadyouthministry.com/p/emoji-phraseology---superhero-edition/games/pop-culture-8827.html
//Emoji Phraseology: SuperBowl
https://www.downloadyouthministry.com/p/emoji-phraseology---big-game-edition/sports/football-8520.html
//Emoji Phraseology: Bible Story Edition
https://www.downloadyouthministry.com/p/emoji-phraseology---bible-story-edition/games/bible-based-8687.html
//Emoji Phraseology: Back 2 School
https://www.downloadyouthministry.com/p/emoji-phraseology---back-2-school-edition/fall/back-to-school-8900.html
//Emoji Phraseology: Valentine's Day
https://www.downloadyouthministry.com/p/emoji-phraseology%3A-love-edition---game-%26-social-media/games/humor-6855.html
🕰️TIMECODES
00:00-02:08 Exploring New Digital Frontiers in Youth Ministry
02:08-04:10 What is Hybrid Ministry?
04:10-08:20 Why do we play games in Youth Ministry?
08:20-17:35 3 Hybrid Game Ideas you can use this week!
✍️TRANSCRIPT
Try Transcribing for Yourself at Rev.Com
rev.pxf.io/R5nDOa
Nick Clason (00:00):
Games and youth ministry, they go together like peanut butter and jelly, macaroni and cheese, Batman and Robin. But how can we as youth pastors or ministry leaders readjust the way in which we approach games and lean more into this digital space that we found ourselves in? Should we ignore it or should we find a way to capitalize on it? My approach and my mission for this podcast is to turn your ministry hybrid. How do we make your ministry hybrid, not just in person, not just digital, but a melding of the two. Does that mean that we should play more like cell phone based games, Kahoot games, zoom screen games? In this three part playlist, I want to give you the three new frontiers that we should be exploring as youth pastors, as youth ministry leaders into the digital space and frontier number one. Today. In this episode, we are going to be exploring the world of youth ministry and youth ministry games.
Nick Clason (01:02):
We're going to delve into the why and the philosophy of youth ministry and give you three games that you can adopt and take into your student ministry immediately today. All of this in effort as we are in this new digital frontier, this new digital space to effectively reach the students that God has placed in our trust with the message of hope and the mission of the gospel. We're also going to be exploring in this playlist how you can bring up your message enhancement in the hybrid world, and finally, how you can implement ongoing care, shepherding and relationships to the students that God has entrusted into you and your care in your student ministry. But let's dive further into this new frontier of digital discipleship through the means and avenues of games. Make sure also that you stick around to the very end because at the end I'm going to leave with you a one surefire resource that you can implement with multiple done for you game ideas and ways that you can hybridize your ministry.
Nick Clason (01:58):
And I have the ultimate hack that you can bring just about any game and turn it into a hybrid game. Welcome to the Hybrid Ministry Show. Well, hey everyone. Welcome to the Hybrid Ministry Show. I am Nick Clason, a 13 year youth ministry veteran, currently serving in the great state of Texas. And I want to let you know that I am on a mission, as I said in the intro, to help youth pastors usher themselves more and more into this digital age. And I want to make sure that we are keeping the integrity of our in-person gatherings while also offering more and more of an opportunity for our students to engage with us from a digital mindset and digital framework. And so what I actually have for you as a surefire link in the description, I have a ebook. I have created 40 a whole month's worth of posting strategy for you as a youth pastor implement the strategy that I'm currently using, the one that I've used to grow our YouTube account and our followership in our social media from zero to around 300 up to this point and just under a calendar year.
Nick Clason (03:03):
And it will give you ideas and games that you can use and implement that are turnkey right now that you can use. But they're custom. You and your students and your volunteers get to be the heroes on your youth ministry. It's not just a bunch of static on account of foreign kind of boring graphics. It's real faces, real human beings. If you put a little bit of work in, you can totally revolutionize your student ministry. And I also want to let you know that links right here at the top of this video is a link to a video, what I believe every youth ministry needs and why this is also important. It's basically the thesis for this entire podcast. Hey, and finally, I want to make sure that you like and subscribe to this episode because here's why we are going to be dropping more and more episodes, especially this one as we're exploring new frontiers of hybrid ministry in the next episodes to come.
Nick Clason (03:49):
And I want to make sure that you don't miss it and likes, honestly, they're free and they really, really help us out and they help us get this mission to more and more people. But let's explore before we dive into the actual nitty gritty of games and youth ministry, let's talk about the philosophy and even the history of youth ministry and youth ministry games. Where did games come from? Why do we do them? It seems like it's the rite of passage. Every single youth ministry needs games. You look at resources like YM 360, download, youth ministry, even old school back in the day group. They're all trying to help solve this problem of how can you have games and what do games look like and where can you best take care of supplying games for you and your students? And we have screen-based games and active games and digital games and hybrid games, and we're going to get into all of that.
Nick Clason (04:43):
But I wanted to take a step back and be like, where did this even come from? So back in the 18 hundreds when students were not going to school on a regular basis, they were working six days a week, they invented this idea of Sunday School to bring about an age graded focus for students and an age graded Bible study, one that was a little bit more relevant to them in their timeframe, a little bit more relevant to them in their age group. And so what they did was they created this breakdown by age and grade and gender even. And they started to create this school vibe where they would teach the Bible. Well then fast forward to the 1940s, churches were maybe not super relevant to reaching young people. And so these two organizations popped up right around the same time, young Life and youth for Christ.
Nick Clason (05:34):
And so they both came with the mindset with the entire goal is to reach young people, reach 'em for Christ, and help change them from the inside out and revolutionize them with the power of the gospel. And then finally in the 1970s, churches began to start to see a void of that because what they were doing was in Sunday school mode, they're having volunteers and parents kind of lead these groups, but they started to identify this need for pastors, for people who could come in and who could be specialists in this area for teenagers and for the young people in their churches because they saw what was going on with Youth for Christ and Young Life. And they wanted to also bring that and usher that into the local church. And so since about the 1970s and the Jesus Revolution time, shout out to that movie if you haven't seen it yet, but they're bringing about this young people, this place for young people to come and find belonging, meaning, and purpose.
Nick Clason (06:28):
So that's the history of youth ministry. But why games? So if you look over time, there's always an element of fun and something that will bring about a draw of a crowd. And so to get the maximum amount of people you might feed people, you might offer fun, you might offer warmth, you might offer a great environment or a good vibe. And the truth of matter is, is that games have always sort of been a staple in what we've done in youth ministry, so much so that I do think at some point we've gotten a little bit rote with them and they're benign, and we just do them without even thinking like, well, what's the game going to be? Well, why are we even doing games? What's the purpose? And so what I've seen in my 13 years of student ministry experience is that if you just do games for game's sake, it doesn't have much to offer.
Nick Clason (07:17):
But in my mind, the purpose of a game is to help speak the language of teenagers, which by the way is the entire reason why I have this ebook linked in the description below for you to become more hybrid and for you to become more digitally focused. Because I believe it's a way for us to speak the language better of our teenagers and teenagers, whether they want to admit it or not, they love fun. Fun is the currency of teenagers. Fun helps break down the walls of people who may or may not know why they're at your church or who God is, or they're exploring this faith thing for the very first time. And fun helps alleviate and reduce the tension out of the room why we do what we do. And so with that in mind, I want to give you three game ideas, three hybrid game ideas that you can take use and even download immediately with links in the description of this episode that you can use both on your social media in person, and better yet, maybe you can find a way to meld the two together.
Nick Clason (08:17):
So let's explore that in the next section. All right, so link below in the description are three games that I have in my Download Youth Ministry store right now, and they are fun ones that I like to use. But I also just want to let you know that in all of this, many of the things that I'm going to be suggesting to you are also linked in my completely free ebook. So if you don't want to go pay for it, you can come up with some of these ideas on your very own by just looking at my completely free ebook, which is 40 done for You Ideas to help you and your students and your volunteers become the heroes on your church's social media and in your church's digital presence. And listen, in my ebook, I'm going to give you just a little bit of a sneak peek and a little bit of a hack.
Nick Clason (09:01):
I recommend that you sit just like this direct to camera and present and preach your message ahead of time before you deliver it live into the room. You then use that to clip up, make short sermon clips. But if you aren't willing and don't have the time to do that, I do recommend the remainder of my strategy, which is having fun with your students and having fun with your leaders and having fun with maybe even other staff on camera and posting that to your social media because it's a way that you can interact and engage with something that's live and happening real and in the room, but you can also show that content out to the rest of the world, and if not the rest of the world, at least the rest of your church, the rest of your youth ministry, the parents that are connected to the students in your ministry.
Nick Clason (09:45):
And so three of these ideas are ideas that I have either detailed or outlined before, or ones that I've come up with since I released the ebook. So the first one is a game called Rank 'em, and there's two different ways to do it. I believe right now I have the fall version online on DYM and coming up soon, I should be having the Christmas version drop onto Download Youth Ministry. But Rank 'em is basically a, Hey, let your students take these five things and rank them one through five. Now, one of my favorite variations to that is what's called, and maybe you've seen it if you've been on TikTok or Reels, is the blind ranking thing, which is where different categories of things come in. So let's say you're doing
Nick Clason (10:24):
A blind ranking of a TV show, and I say The Office, and then you have to put it in one through five list. And so for me, if I got the office, I'd be like, well, that's one. But then if someone was like, fixer Upper with Chip and Joanna Gaines, I'd be like, man, I like that show a lot. Probably put it at three. I'm afraid to give away two. And then if someone's like, okay, Ted Lasso, I'll be like, oh, Ted Lasso so good. I want to put it at one, but I can't start putting the office there. So I guess I'll put it in at two. And then if someone was like the ugliest houses in America, I'd be like, okay, I can put that at five. I like it, but I want to reserve four for something. And then they said, the Mandalorian, I'd be like, all right, four.
Nick Clason (11:00):
And I'd be like, you know what? I don't hate that list. What do you think Office, Ted Lasso Fixer Upper Mandalorian houses in America. I'm okay with that list, right? But the point is, I didn't know what was coming next. That's the idea of a blind ranking. And so I have two versions in this actual game. Rank 'em where you can play live in the room with five things. You can do the one by one where they come in one at a time and you have to choose to rank 'em. I also have a social media version where you can take it and you can post it on your reels tos, YouTube shorts, and you can let students interact with it there and give their rankings. You can post it on YouTube story, or I'm sorry, Instagram stories if you don't have any of the other short kind of form platforms.
Nick Clason (11:39):
But you can use this. And again, if you get this game, I played this game in my context, live in the room a couple of weeks ago, and we only got to three questions. So what I did was, the way that I played it was I had myself and a co-host. And so the first one was me. They had to guess my rankings of these certain things at their tables together. And then how they did. Then we went to my co-host, they had to guess his rankings of the certain things, and then finally we switched that and they could rank them themselves. But the game has 10 questions, and so we only used three. So that leaves me seven more that I can use kind of sprinkled throughout on my socials throughout the rest of the week. Game idea number two is the visual variance voyage.
Nick Clason (12:20):
And because I'm a good Baptist, I like a good alliteration, but essentially it's a spot the difference game. And so if you get the widescreen version on DYM, I should have a fall version as well as a Christmas version coming out here soon. You have two graphics come in side by side, and you have to spot the difference. And listen, the best thing right now is that Adobe Photoshop, generative AI is letting you just add things to pictures kind of here and there. And it is a game changer for a game like this. By the way, if you want to level up your Photoshop skills, I have a link in the playlist to my Adobe editing and Photoshop. If that's something that you're interested, go check that out if you want a cheaper version. I also have link down there below Budget graphics for people who are looking to save time and money going through PowerPoint, Canva, Adobe Express and Instagram.
Nick Clason (13:04):
But in the visual variance voyage, you have two different pictures and you're just trying to identify what is different. But there's a timer on the screen and it's counting down. So you can play that live in your room, you can get contestants, you can play it in groups, you can play it at tables. But I also like that I have created a vertical based graphic that you can use, and you can then take those, and you can post those on Instagram stories or on shorts, whatever. And again, in both of these, rank 'em and in the visual variance voyage, if you don't want to use my canned graphics with a canned background, you can take the concept, right? You can take the two pictures and you can show them to somebody on a camera walking around your youth space like, Hey, spot the difference in less than 10 seconds.
Nick Clason (13:45):
Go. And then have them try to guess it, but you film them and you post that to your TikTok or to your YouTube short or whatever, and you can do just a simple picture and picture. Take my graphic that I've created and do a picture and picture with the video that you take of the person trying to guess. And so that's taking it to the next level where you take a game that you could just post a game in and of itself. But if you take that game and you film somebody trying to play it, then that's a whole nother level to it. Which leads me to my third option, which is my favorite option is emoji phraseology. I have just about any variant of season and game that you can think of. And basically what it is is you're trying to guess the emoji phrase, whether it's Christmas, whether it's fall, whether it's New Year's, whether it's February for Valentine's Day, whether it's St.
Nick Clason (14:28):
Patrick's. I mean, I literally have just about every season on download youth ministry, every single variation is linked down below in the show notes. But one of the favorite ways that I've done with this is I've just done one question by one question where we've gone up to people and we've asked them to guess, and then we've taken that graphic and they looked at it, and then I did a little picture and picture, or I actually put the actual icons on. I've done it where I did full editing and Adobe Premiere Pro with animations and sounds. And I've also done it where I just, in the TikTok editor, I just put the emojis on the screen and people had to try and guess and see what was playing. And so in all of those are games that you could play physically. Those are also games that you can play only digitally.
Nick Clason (15:10):
And my favorite is film other people playing those games and then post those out to your socials. One of the ones that was the biggest hit for the emoji was we went around and we did bible story emojis, and we asked different members of our staff and those, those were a massive hit, seeing other pastors and staff and senior pastors out there trying to guess those things on our socials. So here's the thing. The last way, the Ultimate Hack, I told you I was going to give you this ultimate hack. You can play just about any game, any game on download, youth ministry. It doesn't have to be one of my games. It can be any game that you find on there. It doesn't even have to have a phone-based formatting for it, but play any game. And then at the end of it, if it's a subjective based game where people are creating something, making a song, doing a lip sync, decorating a donut, whatever the case might be, take pictures of those things and then post them to social media and tell them that the vote is going to be what determines the winner.
Nick Clason (16:09):
And the voting is done on Instagram that does two things. It promotes your social media and it allows the students to be the judge, not just some random celebrity judge, not just you trying to pull something out of your hat at the last minute, right? Because Gen Z and Gen Alpha love to be publishers, they love to contribute to publishing the content, not just simply basic consumers being told what has happened to them. That is an older school, older industrial minded way of doing things. They want to know that their voice matters and that they actually even have a voice that you care about and that you want to listen to. And so that, I believe, is way number one, that you can wade into this exploring of a new frontier of how you can implement fun and games, not just in your room, not just online, but also in a hybrid way to help give students an opportunity to lean in and have their voice be heard in this hybrid way of doing things.
Nick Clason (16:59):
Which reminder is why I said in my ebook, I outline all the ways that you can flesh this out with posts twice a day for five days a week. You can scale it back if you don't have the bandwidth to do that, but whatever the case might be, I have millions of ideas in there from spiritual practice to fun, to your message content and ways that you can get that message out to spread the message of hope. So click the link for that down below in the description, and in the next video, we're going to be exploring how you can enhance your message and your ministry live in the room with hybrid versions. You're not going to want to miss it. Click that on the screen and we'll catch you on that side.
18 min
November 09, 2023 Episode 070: 📉 The Unveiling: The Actual Reason Church Attendance is Down in 2023 👇
🔥SURE FIRE RESOURCE TO LEVEL UP YOUR SOCIAL MEDIA GAME 🔥
📅 "1 Month Done for You Social Media Posting Tool"
https://hybrid-ministry-40060036.hubspotpagebuilder.com/free-hybrid-ministry-e-book
☝️ONE-CLICK SOLUTION FOR REELS & SHORTS
OPUS FOR AI SHORTS & REELS
https://www.opus.pro/?via=a5d361
========================================
DESCRIPTION
👋 Welcome to our YouTube channel & podcast!
🤔 In this thought-provoking video, we delve into the intriguing topic of church attendance in 2023. Join us as we unveil and uncover the hidden truth behind this phenomenon that has been shrouded in mystery.
🚸 Who is Generation Z? Who is Generation Alpha? And what are we doing to reach those students and people in our churches? Because before we know it, Gen Z is going to be the youngest demographic in our church. Where are they? And what is our church doing that's pushing them away?
⚖️ Generation Z is the most justice minded generation the world has ever seen. That should be a dream come true for church leaders? But it's seemed to throw more of a wrench in our plans, than become a strategic advantage to us. How can we respond in a more relvant way?
churchattendance #hiddentruth #unveiling #2023 #church #truth #revelation #faith #spirituality #religion #worship #community #christianity #belief #sunday #sacred #divine #belief #sermon #christian
========================================
🆓 FREEBIES 🆓
📅 "1 Month Done for You Social Media Posting Tool"
https://hybrid-ministry-40060036.hubspotpagebuilder.com/free-hybrid-ministry-e-book
😨 "Have I already Ruined my TikTok Account?"
https://www.hybridministry.xyz/articles/ebook
📹 "Adobe Premiere Pro Presets for Animating Layers"
https://share.hsforms.com/1VL1oWwWwQ82PLwsPFkPITgnumis
========================================
🛠️TOOLS
Some of the below links are affilate links in which we do recieve a small commission based on your purchase or use of products
//YOUTUBE STARTER KIT FOR UNDER $100
https://www.hybridministry.xyz/articles/youtubestarterkit
AUTO POD
https://autopod.lemonsqueezy.com?aff=MX7Vv
TRY REV.COM FOR TRANSCRIBING
https://rev.pxf.io/R5nDOa
OPUS.PRO FOR AI SHORTS & REELS
https://www.opus.pro/?via=a5d361
👉 STAY CONNECTED WITH NICK
YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@clasonnick
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/hybridministry/
TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@clasonnick
Website: https://www.hybridministry.xyz
📓SHOWNOTES
//SHOWNOTES & TRANSCRIPTS
http://www.hybridministry.xyz/070
//View all the Charts and Graphs via YouTube
https://youtu.be/t5mJyiUFUwo
//Pew Research Post-Pandemic Article
https://www.pewresearch.org/religion/2023/03/28/how-the-pandemic-has-affected-attendance-at-u-s-religious-services/#:~:text=This%20longitudinal%20analysis%20finds%20a
//Barna Info on Gen Z
https://shop.barna.com/collections/gen-z
//Deep Dive on Gen Alpha
https://youtu.be/7tVACJFlwpw?si=Iv8oKr4bcYc7Z4cG
//6 Questions About the Future of the Hybrid Church Experience
https://shop.barna.com/products/6-questions-about-the-future-of-the-hybrid-church-experience
🕰️TIMECODES
00:00-00:53 The Drastic Church Attendance Shift of 2023
00:53-02:50 The World is Changing, How should the church rethink ministry and attendance?
02:50-07:45 Exploring the Imperical Data from Pew Research & Barna
07:45-13:11 Why aren't younger people attending church the way we know it?
13:11-18:45 The Real Reason Church Attendance is Down in Younger Generations
✍️TRANSCRIPT
Try Transcribing for Yourself at Rev.Com
rev.pxf.io/R5nDOa
Nick Clason (00:00):
Have you ever wondered what happened to the faithful church attenders? Meaning when you compare this Pew research data from 2019 to 2023, you see that there is a massive dropoff in church attendance when you experience it personally as a youth ministry or church leader, just how big that loss can feel. I'm going to explore in this video the dirty little secret of church attendance for now and for the future, going on past 2023. I'm also going to share with you my anecdotal 13 year youth ministry experience, what I've noticed as a youth pastor, but then also somebody who just is a part of churches and what I've noticed about church attendance during that time. And finally, make sure that you stick around to the very end of this video because I'm going to share with you the one little thing that I think churches are doing that are surprisingly keeping away young people.
Nick Clason (00:52):
Welcome to the Hybrid Ministry Show. Well, hey everybody. Welcome back to another episode of the Hybrid Ministry Show. I, as always am your host, Nick Clason, a 13 year youth ministry veteran located in Dallas-Fort Worth area, and I am on a mission to help churches and youth ministries understand and embrace digital as a real form of church ministry and church discipleship. That's why we call it the Hybrid Ministry Show. It's not just physical, it's not just digital, but it's a melding of the two. In fact, I have a video where I talk about what every church youth ministry needs to be doing. It's linked right here at the top of the episode. If you want to check that out and explore my full basis philosophy and digital strategy, you can go ahead and do that. But for the rest of us, we're going to be exploring what church attendance looks like as far as trends and things are looking at for the future.
Nick Clason (01:44):
Because things are different. The world is changing, and because the world is changing, I do believe that churches not need to not drop the core things of their doctrine and their faith and their outlook. But what they do need to do is that they need to start rethinking and adapting how they're approaching church attendance and their people that are attending their church and how they can best serve them and best create disciples that are going to make an impact in this world. I also want to make sure that you hit a like button because listen, they're free. They cost you nothing, and they really do help a lot. And a subscribe would be even better. And here's why you want to subscribe because we actually dropped a surefire resource in a video not too long ago, 40 done for you ideas about how to reach the next generation, how to stay relevant by using digital. It's a free P D F that'll just give you ideas of how to explore and share the world of digital with your teenagers and the tenders. If you're interested in that, check it out. It'll be linked down below in the show notes. But let's dive in and explore this world of data between Pew Research and Barna. Let's go. Well, hey, everybody. As I said at the top of this episode, if you notice, pew Research is claiming that church attendance is simply down
Nick Clason (02:59):
The board. It's down in every single demographic. There's really only, interestingly, one demographic where church attendance from a post covid world is up, and that is with the religiously unaffiliated from 3% up to 4%, but otherwise, everybody else is down in church attendance. What's fascinating though is that recently Barna, and as I've mentioned multiple times, I'm a youth pastor, and so I took this Barna zoom discovery course on unpacking and understanding Gen Z and real fast before we dive into this conversation about Gen Z, what you need to know is that Generation Z is aging out of our student ministries, right? The youngest Gen Z demographic that we have is freshmen, maybe even sophomores in high school. The rest of our Gen Z are in our workforce. For example, I have a new resident, he's a college graduate, so he is in his first year post-college, he's Gen Z.
Nick Clason (04:00):
And so the fact is Generation Z are young people now. They're not just the youth pastor's problems, they're the church's generation and demographic to understand, and that demographic, that generation, they're attending church even less and less than before. But what's fascinating is I think you'll find out, and as I'm going to talk about the end of this video, is that it's not for the reasons that you might think that they're not attending church. And so as you'll notice, pew research here on the screen has said that church attendance across the board is declining. And I believe that to be true. Okay? What's fascinating though is I do want to lean into the younger demographic. And so in 20 19, 20 4% of 18 to 29 year olds are attending church. Now, peer research claims that only 20% of them are currently attending church, but Barna said that Gen Z is opting out of religion altogether.
Nick Clason (04:52):
So 25% of them, which is the largest of all the other age brackets, if you're including millennials and Gen X and whatever and whatnot, 25% claim to be have no religious affiliation what so ever. That's the largest currently, and it's the largest I believe, in history. Also, what's more fascinating though, and what I really want to kind of dial into is that according to a recent study, they sent just a survey to a big group of Gen Z students, some church, some not, and all kind of the melding in between of their church experience. And it said that the top five words from a list that they were given to choose to describe a Gen Z person's faith were these growing, open, curious, exploring, and unsure. So we have this data from Pew that says Gen Z is not attending church, but then we have this data from Barna that says, the top five ways that they would describe their faith are growing, open, curious, exploring, and unsure.
Nick Clason (06:04):
And so we have these kind of two things that I think are juxtaposed to each other. I don't think either of the data is inaccurate. I still don't think people from Gen Z are attending church that often, and that's what I really want to dive into and explore. But meanwhile, they are all of these things. They are open, growing, curious, exploring. And so how do we lean into a generation that's open, curious, exploring? Meanwhile, furthermore, and also incredibly important about Gen Z is they're very justice minded and they very much care about the marginalized, those in certain pockets and parts of society that are being overlooked. So we as a church should be clamoring for a generation that cares about that, that wants to serve, that wants jump in and help people because that's what the church should be all about. And so we have that.
Nick Clason (06:56):
I also want to share this with you. This last piece of research data from Pew, it dives in just a little bit deeper. I think it's interesting to note we're not going to spend a lot of time on it. So if you're watching this, feel free to just screenshot this. If you're listening to a podcast, make sure you jump into the show notes or head over to YouTube. Go ahead and see this on screen. But the rates are declining, and this is just even more of the data fleshed out and unraveled a little bit deeper so that you can look at it and just see the breakdowns of Christian, Protestant, white, evangelical and all these things. But the consensus is that church attendance is down. So the question that I believe is worth experiencing and exploring is what in the world's going on? So I want to share with you some of my experiences here in the next section.
Nick Clason (07:44):
Check it out. So as I've said, I am a 13 year youth ministry veteran, married to my incredible wife, Amanda. I have two boys. I started as a youth pastor, my final year of college, Cedarville University in Ohio. Shout out, go yellow jackets. And I started working as a youth pastor making a hundred dollars a week at a church in Lebanon, Ohio. It was about a 45 minute drive away from where my college campus was, and I did that my last semester as a senior on campus at Cedarville. That job did extend past graduation, so I worked an entire year past graduation at that church. And then that church, they took a special offering to get me hired. They weren't during my time making budget. And so while they weren't making budget, the senior pastor at the end of it said, listen, man, I don't want to ask our church again for another special offering just simply for your position while the rest of our church is not making budget, so therefore I think it'll be best you left, or if you stayed, we'd love to have you stay, but you're going to have to take a pay cut slash not get paid at all.
Nick Clason (08:45):
And so I knew that my time at that church was done. I went on to another church about 45 minutes back north, closer to college and closer to home, frankly. And that was actually a great experience. I was there for five years. They didn't have a youth pastor before. And so when I started, there was like four kids. My last week on that job. We went to summer camp and we took 88 students to summer camp. And so experienced a lot of growth, numerically, experienced even more growth spiritually. But in both of those experiences, what was happening was my wife and I were looking around and we're like, where are our people? There weren't many people our age. Of course, when we started at the one church, we were in college. When we left the other church, we were 26, 27 years old and had a kid.
Nick Clason (09:31):
And all in that time, there was really never anybody our age. There were always a few. There are always going to be a few people in our age bracket and in our age demographic. But what I've noticed anecdotally is that I have always been in a no man's land spot in church staff. I don't say that to complain. I don't say that to make anybody feel bad, but my generation, I don't feel like attends church that well. And actually, my wife and I were talking about this the other day, and when we were at that church that we were at for five years, it was called University Baptist Church in Beauford Creek, Ohio. We were there for five years. And the problem was we were like, well, we're young, right? And everybody else was about 10 years older than us. Most of them had kids in my youth ministry or starting in my youth ministry that most of our friends were like 35 to 37 years old. They had kids in
Nick Clason (10:24):
Lower elementary school. And we were like, well, listen, nobody our age goes to church. That was kind of the thought, the widespread thought at that time. Young families, young, they're not going to church. They're not making it a priority, but once they have kids, they'll end up being in church, right? Well, now here I am 35 years old or 34 years old. I have kids the same age as those families that I did at that church a couple years ago. And I look around now and there's still that void. There's still that void. There's a little more of it. A, I'm here in the south b I work as youth pastor, and I work when everybody else is at church. So I may drop my kids off, but I'm not getting to know really any of the families, which is another conversation for another day.
Nick Clason (11:11):
And so there may be more of that than I'm even aware of. But as I look around on staff and things like that, look at some of the pools I'm in. There's not as many people my age just not. There's just a gap. And like I was saying, my wife and I, we were talking about it and we've always felt that. I'm like, well, when we get to that age, then it'll be there. And it just hasn't, it's always felt like there's been some sort of attendance void or community void from the, and we've been able to find community lean in. I mean, we have become friends with people of all different ages and types of backgrounds and stuff like that. So we're not looking for people to be identical to us. The thing, I think the tricky part in all of this is that as we were talking about this, she's like, well, if I look around at some of my friends in my family, they don't go to church that much either.
Nick Clason (12:04):
And so even though even some people we maybe went to Christian college with or whatever, they're just, they're not naturally attending church. There's something about church I think that my generation has an aversion to. And I think that that's what this data is bearing out is maybe not post covid church. TE is down maybe since 2019 to 2023. The older generation that did attend church has unfortunately passed away. And this younger generation, as they're waving up, it's not that they're not coming back to church, it's that they were never really there. And so they may claim to be Christians. And I think that that is the conundrum in and of itself. There may be claimed Christians, but they're not showing up at our churches. And so I have a thesis as a youth pastor, as a 13 year church staff veteran that I want to propose with you.
Nick Clason (13:01):
It's going to be controversial, and you may not even agree, but I have a thesis of why I think that this is happening. So let's check that out on the other side. So here's my thesis. I really do think that young people are interested in God, faith, spiritual things and spirituality. I really do. I think the Barna data bears that out. I think what they're uninterested in is the church current demands, expectations, and the ways that the church has been choosing to do things for years. And I think one of the things that I want to challenge churches, church leaders, even youth pastors who are in a second seat to maybe lead up, is to rethink tier two issues. And that's my hack in this video, rethink tier two issues, because I think we've made things like, now don't call me a heretic and turn this off, but just hear me out.
Nick Clason (13:58):
I think we've made things like the Sunday morning sermon, worship experience, a tier one issue when biblically, the impetus for gathering together is not around a lecture style message. It never was. The gathering was meant to be a family, meant to be a living, breathing organism. And at some point along the way, we've interjected this idea of a lecture style message, and we've made that the number one step in church. And we have a generation of young people that are looking for community belonging, acceptance, looking for a place to make a difference, and then we ask them as a church to come in and listen to us, tell them what to do for an hour. And then beyond that, if they want to go deeper, if they're really, really committed, if they really, really care, if they're really about this God stuff, then they'll give us even more of their time and they'll start serving.
Nick Clason (15:03):
And I just don't know that that's the best entry point in churches anymore. Again, don't call me a heretic. I love preaching and I love sermons, but I think that there are many, many ways to rethink that. In fact, Barna answered the six questions for the future of the hybrid church a couple years ago in the P D F ebook. I can link that in the show notes down below. But in that they asked, what are digital ways to do church? And it was offered things like small group confession, Bible study prayer. The number one thing that people voted that could be experienced digitally was the sermon. I love listening to sermons, but I love also listening to it When I'm on a run or when I'm driving or when I'm at the grocery store, I listen to things in my ears all day long so I can hear a sermon that exact same way.
Nick Clason (16:00):
But instead, the expectation is for someone to walk into a room, stare at the back of someone's head and listen to someone up on stage, talk for half an hour. What if we rethought that and flipped the entry point into a more robust community? Because in my experience, community is like sermon 2.0 or sermon adjacent. We had the sermon, and now that that's good and locked in, now let's explore other avenues for you to go to church. What if we rethought that as a tier two thing? Because what I know the church to be biblically and theologically is a place for believers to come together to gather, to worship God together and to be a family and a community. Hebrews 10, 24 and 25 spurring one another on toward love and good deeds, not giving up meeting together as some are in the habit of doing, but encouraging one another.
Nick Clason (16:58):
And I think if all we do is show up into a Sunday morning gathering and we have the hallway pleasantries and the coffee interactions, and then a 30 minute sermon, and then we go to brunch, I don't know that we really encouraged anybody. We can smile real nice, but at the end of the day, did that do anything? And I think that right there is the rub. I think that's the difference between a different generation, an older generation of church tenders and this new wave of church generations. And so if you're a youth pastor, you're on the front lines of this. And you may be a beneficiary of older families that have kids that are sending their kids to your student ministry, but are those kids actually connected to God in the church or are they connected to their parents who are coming through the church and then ultimately into your
Nick Clason (17:49):
Youth ministry? And so get to know them because while they may not be making the decisions right now as the people who are, they're not the schedule keepers. Mom and dads are the ones driving them, but get to know them, get to know what makes them tick, and will they stay connected and attached to the church and the mission overall. And so that's my thesis. I hope that you just give it a thought, think through what these tier two issues might look like and how you can readapt them in your church. But hey, I want to let you know that right here on the screen, like I said, I have this video helping you break down how to reach this next generation. And I have a ebook 40 done for you, ideas listed out in this video, TikTok versus Instagram versus YouTube. It'll pop up here on the screen. Hey, listen, we're trying to make digital discipleship easy and accessible, so don't forget, and as always, stay hybrid.
19 min
November 02, 2023 Episode 069: 🍩 Ultimate Youth Group Guide: Crush Games, Outreach & Social all in one! 🔥
🔥SURE FIRE RESOURCE TO LEVEL UP YOUR SOCIAL MEDIA GAME 🔥
📅 "1 Month Done for You Social Media Posting Tool"
https://hybrid-ministry-40060036.hubspotpagebuilder.com/free-hybrid-ministry-e-book
🍩 "FREE World's Greatest Donut Event Guide"
GUIDE: https://hybrid-ministry-40060036.hubspotpagebuilder.com/worlds-greatest-donut
DYM: https://www.downloadyouthministry.com/p/world%27s-greatest-donut/games/food-8745.html
☝️ONE-CLICK SOLUTION FOR REELS & SHORTS
OPUS FOR AI SHORTS & REELS
https://www.opus.pro/?via=a5d361
========================================
DESCRIPTION
👋 Welcome to the Ultimate Youth Group Guide! In this exciting video, we'll dive into the power of Crush Games, Outreach initiatives, and Social Events to empower and inspire the youth.🔥
🍩 Crush Games:
Engage your youth group with thrilling Games that will ignite their enthusiasm and foster healthy competition. From exhilarating challenges to team-building activities, our guide provides all the essential tips and game ideas to keep the energy high and the fun rolling.
🌍 Outreach Initiatives:
Make a lasting impact on your community through meaningful outreach initiatives. Discover effective strategies to help your youth group connect with and support those in need. By stepping outside their comfort zones, the youth will learn valuable lessons about compassion, empathy, and making a difference in the lives of others.
👥 Social Media Events:
Creating a sense of belonging and friendship within your youth group via social media! This will help Hybridize your Ministry from your in person gathering to your student ministry social media
========================================
🆓 FREEBIES 🆓
📅 "1 Month Done for You Social Media Posting Tool"
https://hybrid-ministry-40060036.hubspotpagebuilder.com/free-hybrid-ministry-e-book
😨 "Have I already Ruined my TikTok Account?"
https://www.hybridministry.xyz/articles/ebook
📹 "Adobe Premiere Pro Presets for Animating Layers"
https://share.hsforms.com/1VL1oWwWwQ82PLwsPFkPITgnumis
========================================
🛠️TOOLS
Some of the below links are affilate links in which we do recieve a small commission based on your purchase or use of products
//YOUTUBE STARTER KIT FOR UNDER $100
https://www.hybridministry.xyz/articles/youtubestarterkit
AUTO POD
https://autopod.lemonsqueezy.com?aff=MX7Vv
TRY REV.COM FOR TRANSCRIBING
https://rev.pxf.io/R5nDOa
OPUS.PRO FOR AI SHORTS & REELS
https://www.opus.pro/?via=a5d361
👉 STAY CONNECTED
YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@clasonnick
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/hybridministry/
TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@clasonnick
Website: https://www.hybridministry.xyz
📓SHOWNOTES
//SHOWNOTES & TRANSCRIPTS
http://www.hybridministry.xyz/069
🍩 "FREE World's Greatest Donut Event Guide"
GUIDE: https://hybrid-ministry-40060036.hubspotpagebuilder.com/worlds-greatest-donut
DYM: https://www.downloadyouthministry.com/p/world%27s-greatest-donut/games/food-8745.html
//Full YouTube Video
https://youtu.be/5ryhkIRyDb4
//STUDENT MINISTRY BRACKET OF EPIC THINGS
https://www.downloadyouthministry.com/p/the-student-ministry-bracket-of-epic-things/games-3974.html
//GAMEDAY FOOD BRACKET
https://www.downloadyouthministry.com/p/the-big-game-food-bracket/winter/the-big-game-8544.html
//DONUT SHOWDOWN GAME
https://www.downloadyouthministry.com/p/the-donut-showdown/games-4142.html
//FULL YOUTUBE STRATEGY
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SDxepdu4iiM
🕰️TIMECODES
00:00-01:45 The Best Hybrid Youth Ministry Event Out There!
01:45-09:30 The History of This Hybrid Ministry Event
09:30-17:42 Pre-Event Planning and Setup
17:42-28:21 The Debrief of the Event from Start to Finish
✍️TRANSCRIPT
Try Transcribing for Yourself at Rev.Com
rev.pxf.io/R5nDOa
Nick Clason (00:00):
Youth ministry games, social media outreach events, ah, there's just so much to do and if you're anything like me, you have layer upon layer upon layer of responsibility. You need to come up with an amazing and exciting game. You need to knock social media out of the park and you need an outreach event that is going to cater to your students friends and outsiders who are far from God and from the church. How do you prioritize? And then if you do do all those things, how do you not just give your family and your people that you love the scraps and the left over pieces of your energy? What if I told you that I had the ultimate event guide, one that's going to crush it with games, an amazing outreach experience, and it's going to lean into social media for your student ministry, all of that encapsulated in one event.
Nick Clason (00:55):
See, we actually just had an event that accomplished all those things, one with an incredible amount of games and an amazing in-room experience, one that gave students an amazing opportunity to invite their friends and it crushed on social media. Better yet, we had 23% of our attenders be first time or new students who joined us. And finally, not only do we increase engagement, but we also added new followers to our social media. It is honestly one of the best versions in my opinion, of a hybrid style event. And when I say hybrid event, it's more dynamic and it's more robust than just another Zoom Bible study. I know it sounds too good to be true, right? Well, let me show you. Welcome to the Hybrid Ministry Show in the ultimate Event guide. I came up with this idea probably in my second or third year of doing youth ministry, and now I am a 13 year youth ministry veteran.
Nick Clason (01:58):
So this idea dawned on me years and years and years and years ago, and one of the things that has honestly just been super clear to me all the way back to the beginning times of my time in student ministry is the fact that hybrid matters. And when I mean hybrid, I don't mean only focusing on your in-person. I don't mean only focusing on your digital. I mean taking those two things and creating a space for there to be opportunity to reach and connect with your people beyond the hour of programming that you have for your in-person service, which is actually the reason why I just dropped this video going to be up here on the screen. You can feel free to click that where we explore and talk about the future of church ministry, especially through the eyes and through the lens of digital and hybrid.
Nick Clason (02:41):
If you're interested, hop over into that. But about 10 years ago is when I had this idea for what I call a bracket, and I'm a huge March Madness fan, college basketball. I love the selection committees. And if you're not a sports fan, essentially what they do is they create rankings or seedings, so to speak. And so there are four regions and each region has a one seed. Each region has a two seed, each region has a three seed and so on down all the way down to 16, and then the one seed plays the 16 seed. Usually a pretty easy matchup only in the history of the NCAA tournament has one 16 seed upset, a one seed. The 15 plays the two, the 14 plays the three and so on and so forth. And they're in various spots. So the one 16 are up here and the two and the 15 are down here in the bracket so that eventually they wait until the very last chance for the one and the two to eventually play.
Nick Clason (03:34):
Then once all the teams get out of those brackets, that creates your final four one winner from each region they play in Final four matchup and then the winners of each side of that end up meeting in the middle in the championship. And so I was like, this would be fun to lean in to March Madness. And so I just created a bracket out of my head. I was like, let's do little Debbie hostess cakes, and then I put one of my student ministry leaders, shout out to Aaron Koontz back in Beaver Creek, Ohio, and I did one of our favorite events, dare to Share. I put Dare to Share in there, and so students would vote on a thing versus another thing, and it was so totally random, but I offered it just as an online thing. This is before I had an Instagram.
Nick Clason (04:17):
This is before Instagram even had the poll feature, but I kept doing this. The one time I submitted an option called a Bracket of Awesome Things to Download Youth Ministry. This was probably like eight, 10 years ago at this point. My number one seed was Chip and Johanna Gaines and just leaning into the hype that they had with the Fixer Upper and H G T V movement back then. But I just kept honing in and creating this. And I remember one time I made a Christmas movie bracket. I had become in charge at my last church of social media and I just threw it together. I was running out of ideas of things to post. I was in charge of something like two or three posts per day, multiple days per week. And I was like, let's do a bracket. And I launched it and I was on a team at that time of six or seven other youth pastors, staff members, and the team went nuts.
Nick Clason (05:12):
I made Elf the number one seed and then I made white Christmas the 16th seed, and I had some diehard white Christmas fans dropping the comment below what your favorite Christmas movie is, and if it's white Christmas, I'm sorry, you're wrong. It's terrible. But that being said, they were livid and they were mad at how I sourced it and how I came up with the seeding, which by the way, side note just was in my head and they wanted a redo. And so we launched this event called something about a serial bracket. I can't remember what we can't remember the exact name of what we called it, but we had back at that last church, we had a full YouTube show. So we set up SportsCenter style desks and anchors. We all wore jerseys and we did analysis and we kicked it over to sideline reporters and we announced the seatings.
Nick Clason (06:03):
We announced the matchups, and then while when that show launched live on YouTube, people could hop over to our Instagram and they could vote. And what happened was the senior leadership must not have had anything to announce that week, and so they announced our show that week. And so we were like, man, we need to turn this into something. At that time, it was Christmas break, we weren't meeting, so it was just going to live as a thing online on our YouTube channel, but because it got announced, we're like, we need to capitalize on this just a little bit more. And so we offered, and this is
Nick Clason (06:36):
In the height of Covid, so we're not doing a lot of in-person connection with other people. If we were, it had to be masked. I mean it was awful, but it was January just after Christmas 2021 and we're like, let's do a drive-in. Kids can come watch it on their phones. Or you know what? Actually maybe we bought big old screens that they could watch, and then we did a FM tuner thing. They could listen to it in their car radio. So I don't know, we probably had 10 to 20 cars show up, not a ton. And we bought so much serial, we went to Sam's and we looted that place and then it was like negative 10 degrees. And so me and my other leaders, we have giant coats on, we're walking car to car, passing out cereal, passing out milk. But that was the inception.
Nick Clason (07:28):
That was one of the inception points of this idea of a bracket. And what it does in my mind is it creates some sort of event around an in-person topic cereal. The one that I'm going to explain to you today is donuts and I like to kind of hone in. Yeah, that's what I've done over the years. I've honed in on a specific topic. We've also done this with drinks like World's greatest drink, world's greatest donut cereal madness. This coming march, we're planning on doing a potato one called Starch Madness. And so it creates that event, but the reason I like it is that it marries your social media because all the voting happens online
Nick Clason (08:04):
With an in-person event. It is the ultimate style hybrid event in my opinion. And I know that I've had people who are like, when you mean hybrid, what are you talking about? And they just think we're just talking about Zoom groups and it's more than that. And so we hosted this event at our church. Like I said in the intro, we had 23% newcomers, we had multiple new people added to following us on social media, and it's creating some sort of hype and some sort of buzz around our student ministry. There are so many benefits and values to it. And so what I want to do is honestly just walk you through the pre-planning, the actual event. I'm going to share with you the planning center document of it, and then give you just kind of a recap about why it's valuable, why we're going to keep doing it, and how you can take something like that and adapt it into your student and social ministry.
Nick Clason (08:52):
If so far you've found this episode helpful, though alike would cost you nothing and would really mean the world to us even more. A subscribe is really a next level opportunity to just engage back with us. Either one of those two things like subscribe would mean the world to us and we would love to connect with you further and deeper because more than just donuts, more than just brackets, we are talking about this world of not just physical, not just digital, but hybrid ministry. So let's move on and let's hop in to the setup and the event planning, the pre-event side of this event that I'm talking about, the world's greatest donut. So we know, we knew that we wanted to do this voting style event around donuts that would last around a month. The way I set it up is I will do round one.
Nick Clason (09:42):
We have a Wednesday night and then a Sunday morning in our environment, and so the voting is going to be live on a Wednesday. They'll vote on the topics and the rounds, and so round one we do all the voting. So that's where Instagram and the stories, that's where the most decisions need to be made. So because of that in round one, then we will announce the winners on Sunday, and then we will resume voting the following Wednesday for the Elite eight. We'll announce the following Sunday of the winners of that, and then we'll move to the final floor when there's the most activity, when there's all the contestants are still alive, no one's been eliminated yet. That's round one. And that to me is the most exciting time for the actual bracket. So because the actual bracket is exciting at that time, that's when we decided to lean into an event.
Nick Clason (10:31):
So we knew we had this bracket. In fact, I created this resource. It's a link in the description on Download youth ministry on the world's greatest donut bracket. It's on there right now. Feel free to go grab it. It's got all of the digital elements and it's got a few games in there, but not all of what I'm about to share with you. So make sure that you hang around to the rest of this video. However, we knew we wanted to do an event centered or a month centered around voting, and then we wanted the first night, the kickoff night to be a big deal. And so the question kind of always is do you focus on the kickoff of the bracket or do you focus more on the championship round of the bracket? I've found the beginning to be more exciting. Like I said, we did a cereal bracket most recently here at this church, and we have in our space, we have eight different garage door bays that lined the side left and right of our meeting space.
Nick Clason (11:26):
That's actually where our small groups meet on Sunday morning. Those doors are up, they go in there and then they close down, creates little rooms for all of them. It's really cool design. Sometimes it also makes 'em feel like caged animals, but nonetheless, we did an event back in March where we voted on serial and we had the one in 16 matchup in one bay. We had the three and 14 matchup in another bay. We had the eight and nine matchup in another bay. And so all the bay doors came up. There were tables in there with basketball themed tablecloths on and then cereal boxes with a number pasted on it, one versus 16, and then all the bowls of cereal there. And so as we're wrapping up our programming, we had adult leaders sitting in there pouring milk into each of the bowls so that students could grab that and then they could go eat and just literally had one kid eat 16 or 25 bowls of cereal that night, tried every single one of the things in the matchup.
Nick Clason (12:19):
So that was a super fun way to just kind of lean into the kickoff portion. And so we had that same question. Now we have donuts and what are we going to do? And so in our space where we have tables, and so we ended up deciding to buy a little half fishbowl things. All the supplies by the way, are going to be linked in the comments below, in the description below. Make sure you check that out. But we had little fishbowl things, half fishbowl things sort of decorative. It's not like a fishbowl where the tops right there, but it's like off to the side a little bit. And we filled each table with donut holes. We ordered several dozen donut holes, and that's what we did. We went donut holes instead of actual donuts. It's cheaper. It's also quicker. You can pop 'em into your mouth as opposed to committing to an entire donut.
Nick Clason (13:04):
And so we have 16 round tables, and so every table had a tablecloth and every table had a vase full of donuts. That was our decision to supply the donuts without breaking the bank on the budget. Don't get me wrong, it was still expensive, but it's less expensive than a dozen donuts per table or something like that. So we had donuts on every table, and then one of my favorite elements or pieces of the event is we bought a giant vase and then we filled it with donuts. We counted 233 donuts that we filled into this vase. The funny part was that we put the donuts in and then the weight of the donuts actually started to smash 'em down, and so it was full, and then the weight of the donuts started smashing 'em down. So there was a gap. So we actually had to go back and add more donuts at the end.
Nick Clason (13:48):
So I don't even want to know what the bottom donuts looked like. They probably were a little mini pancakes, but we let students vote simply, how many donuts do you think are in here? We had a Google form for that. They shot it with a QR code on their phone. We also had an iPad set up where they could just type in a Google form. All we got was their name and their number, but if you have a marketing brain or a marketing department, you can use that to capture an email and start to create a little list and start to market to those people as well. That's another kind of next level tip if you want to lean into something like that. But then it also made it easy to just have it all dumped into a Google sheet and I could command F find the closest number.
Nick Clason (14:32):
And so one person, we had 2 33 in the thing and one girl guessed 2 32, so she won it, and this little sixth grade girl carried out this giant vase of donuts and it was hers. She got to take it with her, she got to keep it. She got to bring it in her car with her. Then the actual bracket side of things, we printed, because we are doing this so much, we printed a generic bracket on a giant vinyl banner. When you walk into our space, we have a big window with an indoor half kind of sports court right there on the other side of it. And so for the cereal bracket, I took gaff tape and I taped out a bracket and then I pasted or taped the cereal to the window. But this time around we're like, what if we just print a vinyl banner and then we can swap out whatever we're voting on at that time?
Nick Clason (15:24):
So we made the investment on the front side knowing that we're going to do this. We love these style of hybrid events in our ministry, so we bought the big banner. It fit perfectly in our space. I can drop the artwork for that in the description, but it's going to vary a little bit for my ministry. Your ministry. It's also got our logo on it, but you can find any bracket online, any generic non-branded bracket online, add it, print it, make it into a banner if that's something that you want to do. What it does for us is when you walk in, it immediately draws your attention. It's not there most of the year. And so when it's there, you're like, oh, it's different. And then people know and notice that there's a bracket going on, there's a voting happening. And the other crazy thing is that people get really into it on their opinions.
Nick Clason (16:17):
What things are seeded? How such and such donut beat that donut. For example, the beignet took down, what did it take down? The chocolate cream filled donut lost to a beignet. I think beignets are good, but are they the best? I don't think so. And I think they're super kind of niche and they're really just, honestly, they're like funnel cake. And so anyway, that giant bracket in our actual space, we also allow, because we have a lot of students, a lot of kids, young kids that don't have social media yet, we allow them to vote on a paper bracket as an additional means to let their voice be heard. We got donut shirts for all of the staff and we all wore them. And so that was kind of like the event setup space. In addition to that, we had some donut balloons blown up and kind of scattered throughout the lobby.
Nick Clason (17:13):
So they walked in. On the left was the big V to vote, regular check-in, back behind check-in was the banner with the voting and the brackets printed out and people could let their voice be heard that way. So now let's dive into the rest of the event. I'm going to put the planning center event sheet right here. We're going to walk through it and I'm just going to explain to you what we did, why we did it, and just my thoughts on it, and feel free to take and adapt any of it to your ministry. So all the setups done, students are walking in. We had a countdown, which if you buy my product on Download Youth ministry, it will come with a specific donut themed and then a specific donut themed five minute countdown that I created with just random facts and stuff like that.
Nick Clason (18:00):
So that was what was playing on our TV and our screens all throughout our space. And when the time hit zero, myself and my boss, Darren, we were both on stage and we were hyping up the crowd, welcoming people, letting them know that voting had been live all day on Instagram. We were letting them know who was winning what matchup students could with the screen behind us. We then had a screen that said, voting is live now with a QR code. They could shoot that and take it to Instagram. I think we gained three to six or something like that. New followers on our Instagram, not a ton, but still some students who were. So we had 23% new students. So we're introducing our students to our Instagram, and if any of them are into this idea now they're following us. So now we have them on our Instagram opportunity to reach out to them, but we just did some like, Hey, here's what's going on.
Nick Clason (18:52):
Here's the bracket, explaining what a bracket is. It's going to be lasting for a month, but it's all about you and your voice and letting your voice be heard and voting is live on Instagram every single Wednesday. We also kind of teased our next series, which we're talking about big issues, elephants in the room that we often don't want to address. So we use that moment to sort of tease the topic. We didn't spend a lot of time on that. And also we had a message drop, if you've heard me before, link in the description of my full YouTube strategy, but we've our messages. And so we had a message live on YouTube, but we didn't do live teaching that night. You can do that. It's your call. It's philosophical decision for an event like this. We like to kind of pull the teaching and let this be a truly invite night, a truly bring your friends style event style night.
Nick Clason (19:41):
And then we did a bunch of door prizes and giveaways. Now, here's how I do this. I use Sidekick through Download Youth Ministry. I created a little slide, I'll drop the slide into the link down below that I've referenced before and it says World's Greatest Donut, and that says You're about to win something, dude with Little Arrow pointed up and then all their names filter through. Here's how we got the names. Every single student who checked in, we created a People search, a save search in C C B Church Community Builder. That's any student who's not a leader that has checked in within the last day. And so whenever I go into that, especially if an event has started it's live, I click refresh and it populates every single student who has checked in to our student ministry within the last 24 hours. And so since we didn't have an event on Tuesday, I know that anyone who's checked in is now here on Wednesday night.
Nick Clason (20:32):
So that list is not just going to be a random full mailing list of all of our students going to be the actual live dynamic list of the students in our event space. Figure that out in your church database system, but find some way to capture all the info of the students that are actually in your space. Now, downloaded that into a C S V, copied it, pasted it into Sidekick, and then boom, we had all the names they're filtering through and we're giving away some door prizes. So what we gave away was a donut blanket that's like the shape of a circle. We gave away a little mini donut maker. We gave away donut key chain. We gave away little rubber donuts. I almost think they were like dog toys. I think we bought them for something else and we forgot. And so we just ended up giving them away.
Nick Clason (21:14):
And what else we give away? I can't remember. But we gave away six different things, just kind of like, Hey, you won and now you won. Now you won. Kids were going nuts for it. They were excited for it. And then I had this big old pillow, this big of a donut pillow, and I was like, who wants this? And the room's going crazy. I'm like, you have a chance to win it later. And so I kind of teased that, but then we're like, Hey, we got worship. So we had two hype songs. Again, philosophically not my favorite, but our students love worship and have been clamoring for it, and we haven't had it regularly for the last year. And just our worship department, which is how our church navigates it, the worship department handles all worship for all of our different ministries. So they do it for kids and students and adults.
Nick Clason (21:58):
And so we hadn't had worship. Worship was just now able to accommodate our desire to have it more regularly. And so since we started the week before, we decided not to pull the plug on it, just let it go. So we asked them for two hype songs. They sung here in your house. They sang glorious day, and then we played a donut game. And this one, full disclosure, I didn't even make. I got it off of D Y M, the Donut Showdown, a couple different people. We have myself, my boss, we have a resident, and then two interns. So there's five of us that we can kind of cycle through on the stage. And so my boss, Darren and one of our interns, Eli, they got up and they ran the donut showdown and then the winning table, because remember I said we have 16 tables.
Nick Clason (22:38):
They got a box of donuts that are more expensive, like bougie box of donuts from one of those bougie donut shops. We bought three of those, one for the winner this game, one for the winner, the next game, and then one box for our leaders in our leader lounge. So they kept track of their answers on whiteboards, and then off they went. The winning team got that. Then we created a 15 second donut on a string bumper. My resident created it. Shout out to Caleb, ADA. And then Caleb and Kaylee came out and they ran the classic Eat a donut on a string without your hands being tied. So that's another box of donuts or maybe two that we bought. Just glazed donuts just for the donut on a string game. They had to get one holder and one eater from each table. So we had 32 people come up front to the stage.
Nick Clason (23:28):
We have 16 tables, so 16 eaters, 16 holders that went on the stage, held the donuts, and then the first person to eat the full donut without using their hands. They also win a box of boujee donuts for their table. And then at that point, I hopped back up and I gave instructions for a guided rec time. And so what we did was they could go to our cafe and decorate cake donuts. So that's another set of donuts that we bought, probably three to four, I dunno, maybe even five dozen, just like unglazed cake donuts. But then we bought frosting and sprinkles and things like that. So we allowed students to have a space to decorate donuts on their own. We also offered a game called Find the Donut. That's where I gave away my big donut thing. And what I did for that was I had seven clues of things that they could do, and so they could get any of the seven clues in whatever order they wanted, but it was a speed thing, so they'd grab a clue.
Nick Clason (24:21):
I typed it out, put it on a little piece of paper. I made it into a Word doc where it was like four on 1, 2, 3, 4 on a word doc. So I could cut the word doc up and down side to side and then have four off of one full sheet of paper. And so then I printed 10 of the first clue and then cut it. And that got me 40 clues or whatever. So it was like, Hey, some of the clues were ways to get them to go interact with our staff. So go ask Darren what his favorite donut is. Go ask Kaylee what her favorite donut is. One of the stations that we created during this guided rec time was a temporary tattoo station, so go get a tattoo from the temporary tattoo station. Another one of 'em was to encourage them to go towards our YouTube channel or answer questions from last week's message.
Nick Clason (25:06):
And if they didn't know, it was like the answer's on YouTube so it would get them onto our YouTube channel, all that type of stuff, trying to again, hybridize it, right? So they'd grab a clue, they'd read it, and then they'd go do the thing. One of the clues was prove that you voted. So if they hadn't voted yet, they had to go fill out a paper bracket or show me they casted their vote via their phone via Instagram. And then the last and final station of guided rec was the tattoo station, as I had mentioned and alluded to, by the way, the first students come back with all seven of their clues completed. They won that giant donut. And then the last thing that they could do is they could continue to make their guests for the VAs of donuts. And then just the general rec stuff that we have.
Nick Clason (25:50):
We have a game room with nine square foosball pool and just kind of like a hangout space. And some students kind of opted into that, but there were five to six options and we gave them about 30 minutes to just do whatever they wanted. They could go do one thing the whole time, they could try and do all the things. I had one student who was like, I'm going to try and do all the things. And from that event, actually, I kind of thought and decided, what if we created a passport or a frequent flyer kind of option to let students try different things when we have a guided rec type of moment? I dunno, just an idea. Then at six 50, we called everybody back into our space. We announced the winner, sixth grade girl who won the vass of Donuts. We let them know about what Sunday morning was going to be, and then that was our final word, and we were like, Hey, thanks so much for hanging out.
Nick Clason (26:39):
Thanks for playing. We will see you next time. Love you guys. Peace, love and crabs. I think that's like a Joe's Crab Shack thing. I'm not sure. Right? All in all, I think this was a great event. Frankly, it's one of my favorite hybrid style events. And again, I remember one time I was talking about hybrid on my social, all links to my socials down the description below. But my sister was like, what do you mean by hybrid? Do you just mean zoom groups? And I can mean zoom groups, right? But this is what I mean when I talk about hybrid. I mean, create an event for one thing, and that's the thing. World's greatest donut. Linking the description to my D Y N product was already created for a voting a month worth of voting on Instagram and on your socials. Then we just said, what if we take that concept and then just craft a month around it and then craft an invite outreach event around it, and then boom, we just had donuts, we leaned in, and that's all the things that we did for it.
Nick Clason (27:35):
The point of this is not just to create vanity metrics, both in our physical space and also in our digital space with followers and whatnot, but the point of it is to step in to the space where students find themselves in 2023, right? It's like a digital mall. In fact, I have a completely free resource to help you navigate that digital mall. It's my done for you Surefire Resource 40 done for You events. On this video right here, it's going to show up on the screen what every youth ministry needs to be focusing on. I also have a video talking about a digital mall and incarnation ministry. So I'd love for you to check those things out. But until next time, we're making digital discipleship easy and accessible, and as always, stay hybrid.
29 min
October 26, 2023 Episode 068: ☝️ The Ultimate One-Click Viral Reels and Shorts Solution for Churches: Social Media Strategy for TODAY! 🗓️
🔥SURE FIRE RESOURCE TO LEVEL UP YOUR SOCIAL MEDIA GAME 🔥
☝️ONE-CLICK SOLUTION
OPUS FOR AI SHORTS & REELS
https://www.opus.pro/?via=a5d361
📅 "1 Month Done for You Social Media Posting Tool"
https://hybrid-ministry-40060036.hubspotpagebuilder.com/free-hybrid-ministry-e-book
📹 Adobe Premiere Pro Presets for Animating Layers
https://share.hsforms.com/1VL1oWwWwQ82PLwsPFkPITgnumis
========================================
DESCRIPTION
👋Welcome to the Hybrid Ministry Show! In this video, we are thrilled to introduce you to the ultimate solution for creating viral reels and shorts with just one click for churches and youth ministries.
☝️This powerful platform empowers content creators like you to skyrocket the popularity of your videos in no time. Get ready to unlock a world of endless possibilities and boost your content's reach like never before!
📲With our innovative one-click solution, you can now effortlessly create captivating viral reels and shorts that will captivate your audience from the very first second. Gone are the days of spending hours editing and optimizing your content to make it go viral. Our platform takes care of all the technical details, allowing you to focus on what matters most: creating engaging and share-worthy content.
📈Experience the thrill of watching your videos go viral as our solution optimizes your content for maximum visibility. Engage with your viewers on a whole new level and attract a massive influx of followers, likes, and shares. Whether you're a passionate vlogger, an aspiring filmmaker, or a digital marketer looking to promote your brand, our one-click viral reels and shorts solution is your key to success.
========================================
🆓 FREEBIES 🆓
📅 "1 Month Done for You Social Media Posting Tool"
https://hybrid-ministry-40060036.hubspotpagebuilder.com/free-hybrid-ministry-e-book
😨 "Have I already Ruined my TikTok Account?"
https://www.hybridministry.xyz/articles/ebook
📹 "Adobe Premiere Pro Presets for Animating Layers"
https://share.hsforms.com/1VL1oWwWwQ82PLwsPFkPITgnumis
========================================
🛠️TOOLS
Some of the below links are affilate links in which we do recieve a small commission based on your purchase or use of products
//YOUTUBE STARTER KIT FOR UNDER $100
https://www.hybridministry.xyz/articles/youtubestarterkit
AUTO POD
https://autopod.lemonsqueezy.com?aff=MX7Vv
TRY REV.COM FOR TRANSCRIBING
https://rev.pxf.io/R5nDOa
OPUS.PRO FOR AI SHORTS & REELS
https://www.opus.pro/?via=a5d361
👉 STAY CONNECTED
YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@clasonnick
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/hybridministry/
TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@clasonnick
Website: https://www.hybridministry.xyz
📓SHOWNOTES
//SHOWNOTES & TRANSCRIPTS
http://www.hybridministry.xyz/068
//ADOBE EDITING TUTORIAL
https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLngXlSr64YaKVpQBDSQV6Q9hFeXCptHSu
//CAPCUT
http://www.capcut.com
🕰️TIMECODES
00:00-02:26 Church & Social Media are Changing
02:26-04:10 The Ultimate Done for You Resource
04:10-10:18The Best Youth Ministry Strategy for Churches
10:18-21:01 Viral Reel, TikTok and Shorts Strategy for Youth Pastors
21:01-25:55 3 Video Editing Solutions: The 3rd One will Blow your Mind!
✍️TRANSCRIPT
Try Transcribing for Yourself at Rev.Com
rev.pxf.io/R5nDOa
Nick Clason (00:00):
Social media and the church is changing. Maybe it's even changed all the way with Gen Z and Gen Alpha using their phones greater than any other screen-based device combined. Churches are adapting and they should, that's not a bad thing. They're looking for ways to reach the next generation. And I see all kinds of programs out there offering for you as a youth pastor or church leader done for you. Social media resources, heck, I even have one. But what I think is the difference and what I think is really important is that mine is custom. Mine puts you in front of your students, puts you on camera and lets, it allows you to be the face and the voice and not just a bunch of static standard and irrelevant graphics. Because I think a lot of times we allow our social media to just be an additional announcement portal.
Nick Clason (01:01):
It's an extension of our website or it's almost like an email newsletter. Hey, don't forget about this, don't forget about that. But it is changing. All of that is changing because we are in this digital moment. Because here's the thing, you can now reach teenagers and the students that God is already entrusted and placed in your church or in your ministry with the message of hope of the gospel of Jesus and to help them understand and come to a full robust relationship with him. And so the way you might be asking which social media is changing, social media has switched from event-based or post based or who you're following, algorithm to discovery-based algorithm ushered in by TikTok during the pandemic with short form, vertical based video. The algorithm has switched into one that is focused on discoverability. And so in this three part video, I'm going to walk through not only the strategy that you should have for your church social media, but in addition to that, the viral short form video framework for reels, YouTube shorts tos, and finally editing, which is often the hardest part. So make sure that you stick around to the end of the video because I have an editing solution that can take this and take your entire strategy and make it happen in one click too. Good to be true. Let's find out.
Nick Clason (02:27):
Well, hey everyone, my name is Nick Clason. I am the host of the Hybrid Ministry Show located as a youth pastor in Dallas Fort Worth the D F W area, but I have been in youth ministry across five different locations, primarily in the Midwest now here in the south for over 12 years, going on 13 years here soon. And I'm on a mission to help churches embrace digital, not as a replacement for the in-person moment, but to realize that digital and hybrid ministry is a relevant and real option to help reach students and also help disciple the students that God has entrusted into your care. In fact, as I mentioned earlier, I have a resource 40 free done for you resources, and I want to have you check that out because it is a turnkey P D F ebook that you can just take and turn and start to implement.
Nick Clason (03:16):
It has ideas and resources and video options that you can recycle week in and week out, whether you have a full team of students, staff, or whether you are a volunteer youth worker and you want to pull in some other volunteers or some students to help you accomplish this mission. And guess what the good news is, almost all of it can be done completely on your phone. Click the link down in the show notes to grab your copy of it. And hey, I also want to let you know that as we're about to dive into this video, likes are free and subscribed are even less of a barrier to entry. And both of those things would be incredibly helpful, not only to me, I really do appreciate it, but also to help us get this message out there to others who need to hear it and who are also in the trenches just like you and just like me trying to fight through and figure out this digital media stuff together.
Nick Clason (04:10):
All right, so social media strategy. My social media strategy is to film your messages ahead of time. Now what do I mean by that? So if you're anything like me, you get a curriculum or you plan out your messages and every single Wednesday night or maybe Sunday night or maybe even Sunday morning as well, you are teaching some sort of content. Now in my context, we meet two times a week. We meet Wednesday nights and then we meet Sunday morning for group-based discussion. And so on Wednesday night we introduce the topic and that's where we have our more traditional kind of message type of thing. And then on Sunday morning, we dive a little bit deeper into that concept and that content, and that's where the students discuss it in a small group connect group type of format. So the Wednesday night message is the main and primary message for the week.
Nick Clason (05:01):
And so what we do is we deliver that message live and in the room. Now, COVID I d had all of us doing some sort of digital or hybrid version. Most churches in America were able to upgrade their livestream capabilities. They have a better board, they have good cameras in the back of the room now to be able to capture their pastor's sermons. And if that upgrade happened in your context than what I want to recommend is that you capture your messages right then and there if it is good enough. Now, if you're like me and I'm at a pretty big church, but even still our student space does not have the tools that it takes to capture a video live, not for even livestream purposes, but even just capture the teaching concept. So what we've decided to do as a team is to sit down very similar to what I'm doing right now on this video and look direct to camera and deliver the message.
Nick Clason (05:59):
We use a teleprompter. We've built out a full studio one day. I'm going to share that all with you, how we do all of that, but essentially script out our message, deliver it direct to camera, and then we edit it and post it to YouTube. Now, you might be thinking, I don't have any editing abilities. No problem. We have a complete crash course playlist, Adobe Premier Pro and Adobe Photoshop to help get you up to speed on that if that's something that you're interested in or just simply capture it and do some minimal and basic editing and something like iMovie or Cap Cut or Windows movie maker that you already have installed on your device or pass it off to a student who likes doing this because they're good at it as well. But so that's my recommended strategy. In addition, there's all kinds of other social media type stuff, but the bedrock, the framework, the thing that you can derive all of your other social media content off of is your weekly message.
Nick Clason (06:58):
Now, if in your context you deliver two teachings or you have multiple different teaching type of settings, just pick the one that's your most basic sort of student ministry sermon so to speak, and maybe consider finding a way to tie your different environments together so that you're not in one curriculum on Wednesday and one curriculum on Sunday. Odds are even if you are in that sort of setting, one is a little bit more deep and one is a little bit more for your wider audience, I would say pick your wider audience. One, you can post that on YouTube and you can even start to explore and get a little bit better at keyword, ss, e o, search, all those types of things. And that's going to help you get that message of hope out to the people that are on YouTube watching and looking for messages.
Nick Clason (07:44):
So with that strategy in mind, and again, I detail and outline all of this in my ebook, if you want to know what I do for our social strategy, which does include direct to camera messages, you can grab that link in the show notes, like I said, but I also want to let you know this is that the other advantage of pre delivering it is that by the time I actually get to the moment where I'm going to deliver the message live in the room, everything's done, graphics for it are done. I've already prepped and practiced for it. And so to get up there and deliver it is a breeze at that point. Prior to that, putting all the work in, writing it, fully, transcribing it so that I can put it on teleprompter and read it while it's going in front of me, that's a lot of extra work, but by the time I'm ready to deliver it, I am done.
Nick Clason (08:32):
So it helps you even get a little bit ahead in your student ministry rhythm, and it also helps give you something really, really beneficial and useful for social media based content. Now, here's the other thing you might be thinking like isn't a YouTube video, isn't it supposed to be a little bit shorter? Yeah, YouTube videos work best between 10 and 15 minutes or right in that range. There's all kinds of different and analytics that people have gone into to parse that out. But just take my word for it, 10 to 15 minutes. And in the room we teach longer. We're like 20, 25 minutes or so. We include some more elements where they kind of turn and talk and maybe when I do a turn and talk type of moment live in the room when I'm doing on YouTube, I'll say something like, Hey, calm it down in the section below.
Nick Clason (09:16):
So I'm tweaking it and optimizing it to be for social, to be for YouTube. So I'm using things like in this video series as opposed to in this teaching series. So I'm tweaking and adjusting my language and even my approach just ever so slightly to be optimized for an online audience. However, I'm still delivering the same biblical content, the same outline, and the same message and motive sort of from scripture. So that's going to help you if you are willing to adopt, if you're willing to put the work in. And I recommend that you do and listen. Maybe you're like, Hey, I don't know. I don't have the time. I really don't think I can get to it. What if you tried it for just one series? See what one series did, and it's going to take some time. I know you're going to have to look ahead on your calendar and budget for it, but if you do, I think you'll be pleasantly surprised at the benefits that it's not only going to give you, but that it's also going to add to your hybrid experience.
Nick Clason (10:12):
But let's move on and let's talk about what we do after we pre film our messages. So after we pre film our messages, now we're going to clip those messages up into small short form reels, TikTok, shorts, content. Now, you might be thinking, I'm not on any of those platforms. Odds are you are on Instagram and if you're on Instagram, yes, Instagram has the feed, but they also have stories across the top and then over to the right of the search bar at the bottom or the action at the search bar button. The ad content button is the reels section. And reels are huge on Instagram right now. In fact, the c e O of Instagram. So we're no longer just a photo sharing app. Short form, vertical based video is king on social media. So whether even if you don't have an active TikTok account or a TikTok account at all, you can post directly to reels and maybe you don't have a YouTube account set up yet.
Nick Clason (11:09):
If you're going to pre film your messages, I recommend that you post those to YouTube. And YouTube also now has a functionality with short form, vertical based video called shorts. And so you can post shorts and reels and you can duplicate that strategy and have enough content for both of those things posting identical content on both of those platforms. And if you do have a TikTok, great boom, just add that in as well and post a TikTok post to Instagram, post to shorts, and hey, even if you want to cater to the old people post on Facebook as well, and you can do all four of those by using the exact same piece of content. Again, I outline that in my 40 done for you resources. But that being said, the bedrock of that foundation is going to be your teaching strategies. So I post three teaching videos per week.
Nick Clason (11:56):
You can make it five, you can make it eight. I'm going to tell you how you're going to be able to do that here in just a minute. But you can do a few reels from your teaching content depending on how many you do, depending on your flow, your outline or whatever. And then just fill in the gaps with some other things. So you can do Wednesday night, Sunday morning recaps by just getting two to five second videos, stitching them together using the auto cut feature directly in TikTok using Cap Cut. You can do an Instagram, you can do a YouTube, whatever the editor of your choice is, if you haven't started exploring them, open 'em up, give 'em a shot, add some music to it, and boom, you're done. And then once you post it in one of those, simply search for a TikTok downloader without watermark on your browser.
Nick Clason (12:43):
Paste the link in there, download it, go post it to Instagram reels. Go post it to YouTube shorts. If you did it in Instagram, search for a reels downloader without watermark. If you did it in shorts, search for a shorts downloader without watermark and then post it in the other two or three places that you're going to be using it. So the 40 done for you resources, I outline all of that. Again, link in the description, go grab that. But I'm going to tell you how you can get those shorts in one click, literally one click if you sit down and if you pre-fill your messages, then there are resources out there now, especially AI powered that can help deliver for you, done for you and take away some of the editing headache that we're going to have. And so what you need to know is that while we're doing these reels, I want to help show for you right here right now, the viral framework. Okay? So there's kind of like five different things that are important when it comes to a viral reel. So you got to think on social media. What you're always trying to do is you're always trying to get people's attention, so you got to be mastering the stop the scroll. That's the goal is you got to get people to stop swiping through because they're swiping through at a quick rate. They're deciding in one second or less if your video is worth it. So if you take a big breath,
Nick Clason (14:07):
Hey everyone,
Nick Clason (14:08):
Boom, they're scrolling past that. You got to dive right into the video and just editing can take care of that. You can take your big breath in the room, you can take your big breath as you deliver on camera, Hey everyone, but clip right there to the hey everyone. Or better yet not. Hey everyone. Tonight we're going to talk about does God really love me? Why don't you just go to, does God really love me? You see how that's a much better stop the scroll, a much better hook. The other thing is if you are clipping little snippets and segments out of a full 10, 15, 20 minute long form video, you're going to be dropping people into the middle of a video that already has context around it. So create a moment for context on the screen, fly in a text that says that gives them context for what you're talking about, discovering God's ridiculous love for people, unleashing the power of the Holy Spirit in your life, helping make an impact in your life, becoming liked and loved by those around you.
Nick Clason (15:07):
You know what I'm saying? Having that in there so that that's going to peak interest and curiosity. And then as you're actual talking to the camera, that context is there just literally on screen. You can go right over your head. You can go right down here. I mean, if you're watching this on shorts right now, you're probably seeing texts kind of all over the place that's going to help the viewer know what's going on. You're going to help them understand the context of the message and where you were, and then now where you're going to be taking them. The other thing, the must do thing on social media right now, especially short form, vertical based video, if you ignore all the other things I'm telling you, do this thing, caption your video. Captions are amazing. Everything now on TikTok, Instagram reels and YouTube shorts, all the text both in the captions, like the actual captions of the post, as well as the text captions on the screen, all of that is being indexed in search for search engine optimization so that the people that can search things, they may stumble across your video if you have the captions on screen.
Nick Clason (16:16):
There's also a wide percentage of people who are in positions sometimes where they are watching reels without sound. If you don't have captions, you miss out on that entire audience of people who are trying to watch it. Imagine if a teenager opens up their phone to watch you at school, but you don't have captions on it. Boom, they're going to keep moving if you do, you least give them that option. Now, do I recommend that teenagers watch reels and shorts on their phone at school? No, not at all. But I do recommend that you include captions on your videos. The other couple of things is number four, a relevant hook, something that's going to keep them. Again, remember they're making that decision in a second two seconds on short form, vertical based video. So try and script out craft out a good hook. Again, if you're clipping this from a message, you may have to find ways to add hook type things in your message as you're going that don't seem awkward and clunky, but that you're weaving in naturally.
Nick Clason (17:12):
But then you can go and find those spots and boom, clip, clip, clip, clip, clip, and then create this framework for viral short form, vertical based video. And finally, if you have the ability, if you can edit sound effects, those things change the game. If people aren't paying attention, plop all kinds of different things where things are flying on the screen, the sound effects help drive people's attention back to the screen. Back to the screen. I want to give you an example. The other day I was watching a video that I had just edited. It's one of my favorite frameworks that we do. I detail and outline it in my 40 done for you. It's called Drafts, okay? And so what we'll do is we'll just draft anything. So I might be like, Hey, let's draft Avengers. And so me and another person will just go back and forth, and so my first pick obviously would be Thor, who would your first pick be?
Nick Clason (18:03):
Let me know in the comments down below. And then that person, you probably pick like Spider-Man or something. It's like, okay, great. I'm going to go back. I'm going to pick Captain America now. Who's your second pick? Now, let me know in the comments below. You probably like, I don't know, black Widow. Great, that's fine. She doesn't have any superpowers, but she's amazing. My third pick is going to be the Hulk, who's your third pick going to be probably Drax from Guardian to the Galaxy. That makes sense. He's hilarious, but I wouldn't pick him. Now I'm going to add Iron Man, because you left him off for so long and you're like, okay, great. I'll take Wanda Max off. She's super powerful. That's great. I'll take her husband vision, who's dead in Wanda Visions, and he's also super powerful. And you're like, okay, I will take the og.
Nick Clason (18:44):
I can't even think of one right now. Maybe you'll take a rocket from Guardian to the Galaxy and you got your team. I got my team now whose team's better? Let us know in the comments down below, you do that live with the person. You have commentary sort of in between. You film it for two, three minutes. You clip it down to shave it for time. You go shorter, shorter, shorter, as much as you can. Anyway, I did a draft. I was rewatching it on my phone. My kids were around me, they were watching tv. And then I saw a Mr. Beast video that had a interesting thumbnail and it was a short, and I clicked on it and he said, this is Puffer Fish, the most poisonous fish in the world, and I'm going to eat it. And as soon as he said that, my son across the room goes, wait, what gets up comes over to my phone.
Nick Clason (19:36):
And I just wanted to highlight, I think our hooks for our student ministry social media are good, but I played that video where it's like an AI generative voice that says Drafting Avengers. And then we start going back and forth. He didn't care. Mr. Beast gives his hook. Boom, he's instantly hooked. Mr. Beast has years and years of experience and has absolutely crushed of the game in doing this. And so I'm not trying to say that I'm some sort of Mr. Beast knockoff or anything. I'm actually trying to point out that Mr. Beast is amazing at this, and we can learn some things from him as far as crafting good hooks and stopping the scroll. But he does such an amazing job, and so watch what he does. Look at the amount of B-roll that he does, the amount of text he does, how quick he's moving things, how he's moving people's attention along so that they don't get bored by his video and how he's grabbing their attention, how he's literally grabbing their attention from across the room to get them to come up and over and watch his video. Now, you and I we're not in there to make money. You and I were in there to share the message of hope of Jesus, which is meaningful, impactful, and powerful and worth it. And so I think you and I can hone in on this skill, but I'm going to give you a one surefire way in the next section that you can just do this in one click. It's going to change the game. Let's check it out.
Nick Clason (21:02):
So one of the ways in which we do this, we craft this viral framework, is we need an editor. You don't have to edit, but if you edit, your videos will be better. It's just the way it is. So I'm going to give you three tools, three kind of options to explore. The first one is Cap Cut. Cap Cut is a free editor owned by TikTok. They have a mobile device or a mobile app for your device, and then they also have a web-based browser that you can use on just like a computer. So you would import your video into Cut, and you would use that to start editing it. You can edit it in its long form version if you want to do that. And you can also edit it for vertical based video. So nine by 16. Okay. Additionally, it's going to have a little bit of a learning curve, but has a ton of free resources on there, text editors, sound effects, transitions, things that are super next level cap cut has done an amazing job and they made it really, really easy and really, really accessible.
Nick Clason (22:10):
The second option is one that is going to require a little bit of a higher learning curve. I mentioned it earlier, but my complete crash course on Adobe Premier Pro and Adobe Photoshop. It's a three-part playlist that will help walk you through how to edit a long form video, how to edit a short form, vertical based video, and then how to create graphics using Adobe Photoshop, and then how to kind of put all of that together. It's worth it. It's expensive. I think for churches. It's something like $34 per month for two users using the Adobe Creative Cloud, but that's going to get you access to Adobe Premier, Adobe Photoshop After Effects, InDesign, Adobe Audition, like all the things that you could possibly need in the Creative Cloud is available for you under the Creative Cloud umbrella for that cost. It's hefty, it's a big jump, but this next one is free, completely free at least for trial version.
Nick Clason (23:11):
And I have the link down below in the show notes. It is called Opus Pro. And here's what you do. You film your long form video, and then you upload it into Opus Pro, and then it takes a minute to upload, and then it takes a minute for it to analyze it, but you can upload it and then click submit and then walk away, and then you'll get an email when it tells you that it's ready to go, so you don't have to sit there and kind of babysit it anymore. And then it'll give you 10 to 14 viral videos with captions on screen and graphics, as well as the option for an intro context, sort of like hook type thing. And it will do it all for free up until you use that all of your credits. And then I just bought Opus Pro at my church for $119 for a year worth of content, which is pennies on the dollar.
Nick Clason (24:08):
And so if you don't want to use it, it has a watermark. The watermark looks like this. So you can make that decision if you want that or not. But if you pre-fill your messages, and if you take my 40 done for you ideas and fill in things like drafts and some of the other ideas I have for you and you use Opus Pro, then you can filter in the rest of your content on your social media calendar. If you want to do 5, 10, 14 different posts on your social media throughout the week, one or two, maybe even three if you want to be super aggressive. But I recommend one or two posts per day video based on all the platforms, and Opus will help fill that. In fact, if you get 14 from Opus, you can do all teaching clips two a day every single day, all the way throughout your week.
Nick Clason (24:58):
I detail and outline how to do all that in my ebook, but Opus is an amazing free resource. Like I said, link down below in the show notes to help you fill that strategy out. And best thing of all is it does almost all the things that we talked about for creating a viral clip on social media. And here's why this matters because students matter and people matter to Jesus, and they're spending an exorbitant amount of time on social media, and there's a lot of bad things out there, but there's also the opportunity to redeem it for good, which is why I believe that every youth ministry needs a strong social media and digital presence. And that video is going to be linked right here on the screen. Make sure that you check that out. We're making digital discipleship easy and accessible. Don't forget, and as always, to stay hybrid.
26 min

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Hybrid Ministry is complicated and hard. Or is it? How do pastors and youth pastors create a vibrant extension, not replacement, of what's already happening during their weekly church services? To…

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