Your church is on the hunt again . . . for another youth director. The last one probably burned out, blew up, bailed out, or you gave him the boot.

You’re beginning to wonder whether your church will ever hold on to a youth director much less maintain a youth ministry that is fruitful over the years. Mark DeVries feels your pain.

You may recognize Mark as the author of the ground-breaking Family-Based Youth Ministry originally published by InterVarsity Press in 1994, then revised and expanded in 2004. Mark has served since 1986 as the associate pastor for youth and their families at First Presbyterian Church in Nashville, Tenn.

Now IVP has again partnered with DeVries to offer Sustainable Youth Ministry, released in December 2008. As a veteran youth pastor and the founder of Youth Ministry Architects, a youth ministry consulting organization that has helped dozens of churches build sustainable youth ministries, Mark understands “why most youth ministry doesn’t last and what your church can do about it.”

Catalog this book in the “where were you when I needed you” section. I could have used the practical wisdom of Mark DeVries’ Sustainable Youth Ministry when I started my first youth ministry job 20 years ago.

Here are the folks I think should read this book and why:

Solo or senior pastors, church leaders, search teams, volunteer youth workers, and every youth pastor should read chapters one through seven:

I am the regional student ministries consultant for the Southeast region of my denomination. Just before Christmas I arranged for an anonymous donor to buy a copy of Sustainable Youth Ministry for every one of our denomination’s senior or solo pastors in the region. I’ll be hosting a discussion group with these pastors at dinner at our next regional meeting. Why send it to pastors? Pastors too often get discouraged or frustrated because they want their young people to be discipled but don’t know how to help or how to find help. The youth ministries of our churches are simply too important to let pastors miss out on a great resource like this one.

DeVries wrote the book with pastors and church leaders in mind:

As hard as it may be for you to believe, no one will influence the building of a sustainable youth ministry at your church like you will. In a survey of ten thousand Christian teenagers...students said that the senior pastor has more influence on their choice of church than even their youth director. There’s no one we’d rather have reading this book than you…We offer this book as a youth ministry handbook for senior pastors and senior church leaders who may or may not have hands-on responsibility for the week-to-week management of ministry to teenagers. (pp. 12-13)

One of the pitfalls common to pastors and church leaders who genuinely care about the youth of their church and communities is what DeVries refers to in his introduction as “today’s most popular youth ministry model . . . a model best described as gambling.”

It looks like this: The leaders of the church cross their fingers and believe, with all their hearts, that this time the cards will fall in their favor. This time, they’ll find the superstar youth director who will change everything . . . fast. This time, they’ll find just the right curriculum, just the right convention that will, finally, make youth ministry work as it has never really worked before, at least not in a sustainable way . . . But wealth—and sustainable youth ministry—come not from gambling but predictably from a strategic, sacrificial and annoyingly inconvenient investment of time and resources. . . . Churches that have failed to build sustainable youth ministries typically spend all of their resources on quick fixes. Those churches spend very little time or energy investing in the future of their youth ministries. (pp. 10-11)

DeVries then goes on to diagnose, and prescribe treatment for, the systemic problems infecting churches whose youth ministries fail to achieve long-term effectiveness.

• In chapter one, DeVries exposes the five questions that “stuck” churches tend to ask.
  
  
• In chapter two, he describes the symptoms of “chronic underinvestment” and gives five practical guidelines for how and how much churches must invest in sustainable youth ministry including: an average youth ministry budget “including program budget, staff salaries and benefits” that spends “one thousand to fifteen hundred dollars per kid;” “one full-time staff person for every fifty youth;” and “one [volunteer] adult for every five youth.”
  
  
• In chapter three, DeVries points “beyond the frantic search for the youth ministry superstar” by uncovering “five telltale statements from churches afflicted with the superstar virus” and why the virus is so deadly to a thriving, sustainable youth ministry.
  
  
• Chapter four makes an important observation that may seem obvious at first glance: “Sustainable youth ministries make the leap from a short-term, patchwork ministry to ones based on established systems that last long after the current leadership team has moved on.” It doesn’t matter who the dancers are, DeVries argues, if the dance floor is in a shambles.
  
  
• In chapters five and six, the author examines in more detail the “two key components of systems thinking in youth ministry” that he introduced in Chapter 4:

1. 1. Architecture: the structures of sustainability
      
      
   2. Atmosphere: the culture, climate, and ethos that sustain the health of an organization.

• Chapter seven is a must read for pastors and church leaders given the responsibility to hire staff for their youth ministry. This chapter is slammed full of practical wisdom and is aptly subtitled “A Primer for Youth Ministry Search Teams.”

Again, chapters one through seven (at least) should be read church wide, from the pastor to the person in the pew, because the entire church has been given the joy of encouraging and equipping its next generation of disciples. This is not a job left to a few people who like to hang out with kids, but is one of the congregation’s most basic tasks for the advancement of God’s kingdom in their communities.

Every youth pastor, youth ministry staff person, and student of youth ministry should read the rest of this book.

Chapters eight through 13 focus on the youth ministry leader and team. DeVries offers more of the practical wisdom that he and his consulting team have gleaned over the years. Topics include:

• The emotional health of the youth worker.
  
  
• The importance of managing time and tasks, building healthy relationships, and practicing the priorities of “prayer, planning, and persistence.”
  
  
• The crucial concept of understanding the youth ministry as providing one or two of many relationships in a “constellation” of godly relationships that teenagers need to have with adults. DeVries includes a plan for recruiting and keeping quality volunteer leadership for youth ministry.
  
  
• DeVries and his consulting team have learned the power of the “friendship culture” of the youth group itself as a contributing factor to sustainable youth ministry. He devotes an entire chapter to the whys and hows of building this atmosphere of grace among students.
  
  
• Another whole chapter is devoted to helping youth workers learn to “navigate the turbulent waters of church politics.” Again, DeVries shares from his own years of experience. Youth workers, take heed to his words. You’re longevity in ministry is at stake.
  
  
• Finally, the book addresses those ubiquitous “rabbit trails” that threaten to get every youth ministry off of the narrow path to sustainability.

One more observation I’d like to make: DeVries has an uncanny ability to use word pictures, metaphors, and illustrations that give color and clarity to the concepts he presents. Youth workers will find it easy to pick them up and use them to communicate the principles of sustainable youth ministry to their volunteers, students, church leaders, and parents.

If you’ve lost hope that youth ministry can still be effective in the local church, give this book a chance to change your mind. Sustainable Youth Ministry is sure to be another youth ministry classic and will no doubt be used to train future generations of youth workers.

Jimmy Davis is associate editor of the Worldview Church and an 18-year veteran of youth ministry, currently serving as the regional student ministries consultant for his presbytery. He also maintains The Cruciform Life Blog.