Direct Ministry

Welcome Back!

We hope your experience doing HOT with a new leader went well. Let's spend some time reflecting on this experience:

Discussion Questions:

In what way do you do direct ministry in your current role? (gives context to your cohort)

Share a bit of your experience:

  • What did you do?
  • What surprised you?
  • What challenged you?

What did you learn from your leader?

  • What did they do really well?
  • What could they improve upon?
  • Where would you use the Learning Square with this leader?

Observation: How were the youth you interacted with different from when you were a young person or even when you first started doing Young Life?

How did the ministry you visited align with the ministry distinctive we discussed in the previous lesson (listed below for your reference)? Where did you see these distinctives lived out and what was missing?

  • The next kid is reached by a team of equipped leaders in the lives of young people
  • Ministry is supported by adults close and far.
  • There is a regular verbal proclamation of the gospel.
  • There is follow-up discipleship and leadership development with the invitation to reach the next kid using a map, tree, and list.

Describe the ministry team you saw during your experience. What traits did they have as a team that made them effective?

How were Map, Tree, List used in the context you observed? Were they used correctly?

Refer back to the Learning Square in the Leadership Development lesson. What is one thing you would take from your time with the young leader and take them through on the Learning Square.

Personal Reflection

Let’s review the Methods of Young Life. Take note of how you saw or did not see these lived out in your HOT experience:

  1. Praying for young people.
  2. Going where kids are and building personal relationships with them.
  3. Earning the right to share the good news of Jesus Christ.
  4. Providing fun, adventurous, life-changing, and skill-building experiences
  5. Inviting kids to personally respond to the good news and walking in friendships with them regardless of their response.
  6. Preparing kids for a lifelong relationship with Christ and a love for His Word, His mission, and the local church
  7. Working in the community alongside like-minded adults (volunteer leaders, committee members, donors, and staff)
  8. Effective use of Map, Tree, and List.

Personal Reflection: During your time with the leader, you hopefully witnessed some of the mentioned methods. (Unlikely to see all in just one experience) Which one of these methods would you want to encourage your host to develop further in their ministry? And why?

Lead a HOT Training

The next part of the Direct Ministry lessons is to lead a small HOT training. It does not have to be with people far away but with the people near you and hopefully on your tree.

Consider:

Which group of people do you want to lead?

Which aspect of direct ministry do you want them to experience? Maybe it is something they need to learn.

Refer back to the Teaching Square we discussed in Leadership Development. How can you integrate the steps on the square into a HOT experience?

What is a HOT Training?

HOT stands for Hands-On Training. We know that so much of what we do in Young Life cannot be taught but must be caught. We see this in the use of the Learning Square to develop others - observe, do together, evaluate, and do with others. HOT creates space for people to go and do ministry and learn through experience and reflection. HOT trainings have been some of the most effective ways for leaders to learn Young Life around the world. Some HOT trainings can be two weeks long and some can be two days. The shorter it is, the less there will be to show but can still be effective.

HOT trainings are not limited to direct ministry work of contact work, club, campaigners, etc. but can be any form of leadership development - how to lead a regional meeting, how to meet with a donor, how to do your expenses, etc.

HOT is how we can think about discipleship. Just as Jesus invited his disciples to “Come and See” we can do the same with all aspects of ministry.

HOT trainings happen in all divisions but attached is a guide for HOT trainings in Africa

Hot Guide
Call to ACtion
  1. Meet with your supervisor and discuss what you have learned. Share where you felt encouraged and where you felt challenged.
  2. Lead a HOT experience that fits well within your job.. Share your experience with your divisional cohort. iReps will set a time to debrief as an i100 group.
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