The Church Calendar, Don't Drown! Stop, Start, Change And Swim w/ Amanda Mejias

What if your calendar didn’t own your ministry — but served it?

Welcome to the podcast garage Amanda Mejias! Lifeway Specialist for Girls' Ministry and Women in Youth Ministry. Check this pastoral note: We to need to make the move from submission (giving in after the fight) to surrender (choosing trust before the fight begins).

In this episode, Zac and Amanda unpack a simple, repeatable framework to audit your year:

Stop – Start – Change

• Stop what burns energy without bearing fruit (even if it’s beloved).
• Start where your God is calling you out: only when you have conviction and capacity.
• Change the good-but-not-great by adjusting structure, timing, and goals to serve outcomes that actually matter.

We talk:

• Anchoring your plans to your church’s mission
• Working backward from your budget cycle
• Defining fruit before you plan
• Volunteer buy-in and giving ideas real runway
• Why leaders must measure what matters

Plus, a live case study: Her Good Retreat — a focused gathering for women leading in youth and college ministry. Born from real needs (belonging, rest, targeted training), it models how vision, people, and place shape events that last.

Key Points
• the value of discipline through a swim lesson story
• moving from submission to surrender
• defining fruit before planning
• annual audit using stop, start, change
• aligning events to church mission
• budgeting timelines and approvals
• volunteer capacity and early buy-in
• when to kill traditions and when to tweak what you inherited
• launching Her Good Retreat for women in youth and college ministry
• links to Youth Pastor Summit and  Experience

Check the links below for the Her Good Retreat this March, the Youth Pastor Summit locations in April, and the Preaching Experience in May. Like, rate, subscribe, and review, and we’ll see you next time

Her Good

https://www.lifeway.com/en/events/her-good-retreat

Preaching Experience

https://www.lifeway.com/en/events/experience-2026

Transcript

Garage Hang And Guest Intro

SPEAKER_02 0:01

Uh snap.

SPEAKER_00 0:13

Hey, and welcome back to another episode of the Mistry Booster Podcast. Hanging out finally, finally in the garage with our friend, the one and the only Amanda Mejia. Hello.

SPEAKER_01 0:24

That was also a terrifying voice you just said.

SPEAKER_00 0:26

Oh, is that too deep, too guttural? Oh, yeah. The children are past their bedtime. Sorry. It's too much. I can't. It's too much. Hey, bud. Hello.

SPEAKER_01 0:36

Um, live in the working garage is where we're at right now.

SPEAKER_00 0:40

Podcast West here in uh Tulsa, Oklahoma. It's sunny today, it's beautiful.

Why Talk Calendars Now

SPEAKER_00 0:45

Uh, we're here for an essentials run hanging out with our Arkansas and Oklahoma friends, and we figured why not have Amanda Mejia all the way from Pensacola, Florida, hang out with us in the garage and talk about calendars. Calendar.

SPEAKER_01 0:57

Which, like, you know, we are in a part of the year where people are like, we're just starting the year almost.

SPEAKER_00 1:04

Um Buddy, I haven't even got through summer. How am I supposed to think about next year?

SPEAKER_01 1:09

Yeah. So um, but I know we're gonna talk about it. We're talking about it at Life Wire already.

SPEAKER_00 1:14

We we are talking about it. That's where I think sometimes it's always fun to like for this for this podcast, is it feels like this is community discourse amongst youth ministry friends. Yes. So it's literally the hey, what do you want to talk about? And it it is. We uh we spent some time on our essentials run. Uh, we are finishing up uh Arkansas, Oklahoma. We're gonna go see some friends in North Carolina and Virginia. Uh, we're gonna be in New England this fall. Uh, we got some big fun things planned and hanging out. I want you to talk about here in a minute uh what you have going on in March and what we have going on in May because we love to connect and hang with ministry friends. But the discourse is this. Uh, what are you gonna talk about? Because what are you doing? Because some of us are doing more than we need to. So tell us a little bit about what is your family doing in Pensacola? So

Family Life And Spring Chaos

SPEAKER_00 1:58

you're here. Uh tell us, tell us about, tell us about Bubba and Sissy, tell us about Jude the Dude. Oh man. Uh what are they up to at home in their world in the springtime in Pensacola?

SPEAKER_01 2:08

Oh, you know, we uh uh well, first of all, this spring is gonna be wild. Uh Lord willing, we're gonna get a house. Um, we may be renting a house, but we're going to be moving from where we're currently.

SPEAKER_00 2:20

But moving of any kind is like add that to add that to the docket. It's a lot. Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 2:25

Yeah, it's gonna be a lot. We keep joking that like in a month, like our whole lives are gonna be like different, different. Um, Lord willing, our kids are gonna be in a different school, maybe the same school, which is a big deal. For parents of multiple kids, you understand. Uh shout out not driving a multiple. You go to you drive, you do pick up and drop off at two schools.

SPEAKER_00 2:43

Every morning. Yeah, well, it's a beautiful thing. We wake up at 5 30, we go to the gym, we take the first kid to school, we come back, we clean up for the day, we take the second kid to school, and then we start our day.

SPEAKER_01 2:52

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 2:52

And it it's a different and it wasn't always the way last year they were same school, same school, one drop-off, one pickup, uh, one Highlander to rule them all. It was great. Um, but this year, not so much. So, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 3:01

Yeah, so it's a little different. Um, and so the spring will be crazy, and this is obviously our busy travel season.

SPEAKER_00 3:06

This is it. This is the window. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 3:08

So this is just already

Pools, Boats, And Beach Parenting

SPEAKER_01 3:10

busy. But I think something fun we're gonna be doing is uh swim lessons because you know we are by the beach and uh Nene and Pop will have the pool. Yes. That's like the pro-level move. Yeah, move to grandparents who have a pool. Listen, don't just don't just move to anybody. Tell it too. Don't get your own pool.

SPEAKER_00 3:30

That's right. Yeah, no preach.

SPEAKER_01 3:32

Have family members that have a pool.

SPEAKER_00 3:34

Here's the best pool. It's not the pool you own, it's the pool you neighbor next to, whether that's a family member or an hoa. That's the pool you want in your life.

SPEAKER_01 3:43

Same with people with a boat.

SPEAKER_00 3:44

Oh, yes. Never buy your own boat. Yes, just befriend the boat people. That's right. You need a boat in your life, not on your balance sheet, but in your life.

SPEAKER_01 3:53

Yeah. Uh so I'd like to uh make this offer to anybody who's out there who has a boat and wants to be a friend.

SPEAKER_00 3:58

Okay.

SPEAKER_01 3:58

I am here for it.

SPEAKER_00 3:59

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 4:00

Bring your boat to Pensacola.

SPEAKER_00 4:01

Florida boaters beware. That's right. Just panhandle and for a boat in the Florida panhandle. Come on. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 4:08

I'm a great, you know, whatever. What's a co-captain on a boat?

SPEAKER_00 4:11

Uh first mate. First mate. First mate.

SPEAKER_01 4:13

Yeah, I'd be a great first mate.

SPEAKER_00 4:14

Amanda, first mate, Mahias. We have that here. We'll go ahead and drop the title card now. Perfect. Amanda, first hate Mahias. Okay. Uh okay, so swim lessons, is this like uh like throw Judah

Swim Lessons And Safety

SPEAKER_00 4:26

in, hope he does well? Or do you are you what are your what's your parenting a swim lessons?

SPEAKER_01 4:30

Oh, you did? I did that for two years. Okay. Uh first summer. Two summers in Psychicola. Horrible. Um I don't know who was more traumatized, me or Judah. Uh fair. But it's like if for those who don't know what, I think their ISR is like the right language.

SPEAKER_02 4:44

Okay.

SPEAKER_01 4:45

Um, they essentially want to train a child that if they were to fall in the pool with their clothes on, sure, they could learn how to float to the top.

SPEAKER_02 4:52

Oh, okay.

SPEAKER_01 4:53

And so Judah was just a turn two when we started. And pretty much for uh a year straight, Judah did nothing but scream. Oh the lessons are only 15 minutes.

SPEAKER_00 5:03

It was horrible. Is that like a grab an iced coffee before it starts kind of thing? Yeah, or is that like therapy after it?

SPEAKER_01 5:12

But also like I gotta cook dinner after, and like we're driving from school, and you're paying just on better health.

SPEAKER_00 5:19

You're paying one am I living? Am I doing right? And um if I wanted to do that, we'd go Disney again. Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 5:29

And I'm like, you know, and knowing Judah, his personality, he's my three and a half year old, and he is just he don't care. Like, you know, um, we I think it maybe gave me some more peace. I would say he loves water, and so maybe kind of overcame some fears of it. I was afraid that he was just gonna be straight up traumatized from it.

SPEAKER_00 5:48

Sees a sprinkler turns and runs. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 5:50

So this year we like to move from the float to actually swimming.

SPEAKER_00 5:54

Oh, good, yes.

SPEAKER_01 5:55

Um, we like to spend our summers by the pool and the beach and everything else.

SPEAKER_00 5:59

And that's some of those things. I mean, yeah, like that's those are those parenting things that are like formative values, like like swim for so for our family, outside of like, you know, going to church, being in the word, going to school, learning school subjects, learning how to swim. Because dad was dad was boat owner. That was the boat owning. Um, playing on a team sport because there's nothing like winning and losing when it either was or wasn't your fault, and then learning to read music. Like these are like these are like formational truths. We talk about this a little bit with some of our crew at essential stuff of like what are we actually trying to do when we youth minister? And I think there's some of that to it where it's like there is some screaming and gnashing of teeth, but we know that like the swimming matters because for our family, we gotta go be by water. 900. We gotta be by water.

SPEAKER_01 6:44

I I'm not trying to jump into like a full, like,

From Submission To Surrender

SPEAKER_01 6:48

spiritually deep conversation right now, but but take us to the deep. We're going from float to swim. I will say I remember um that first summer of swim lessons. I had we had just moved there, and again, it was really hard. You go every day, it's 30 minutes from my house, it's a huge investment. Kids screaming the whole time. And I I just like remember like, how is this good? Right?

SPEAKER_00 7:13

How is how can this actually be good? The return on this good seems far away.

SPEAKER_01 7:18

Yeah, this does not seem like this could actually work out, and um, and then I like I felt like the Lord was like, I don't know, just speaking to me um of a this is what discipline looks like. Discipline isn't easy, discipline isn't no one is letting my son drown in a pool, right? Like my son is not unsafe. Yeah, he's right there, he's mad about it, but he's not unsafe. Um, and in fact, what they're doing is they're teaching him to trust like the coach, right? Like the the teacher. Um, and I felt like in that moment, uh in a season that felt like there was like a lot of like, I wouldn't say necessarily discipline in my life from the Lord, but definitely like that like surrender to the Lord. And I remember being like, that was a kind of a shifting moment of okay, just move to this new area, starting a new life. Come on, am I going to fight the coach who is trying to teach me something for my good, or am I gonna surrender to the God who I know who has me and who's not gonna let me drown?

SPEAKER_00 8:21

Talk about the value of showing up to surrender. Say a little more for the people in the back that didn't connect all the dots because they're still floating. But we had to keep showing up for surrender. Say more, say more. Say it no more. Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 8:34

I I do. I think that there's um that was such like a growing season in my life in so many different ways because in the moment I cannot see fruit from it. I know God asked us, God let us, God provided for us to do it. But when I look around, I don't feel the good from it. Um, in fact, I feel almost resentful for like, this is what you brought me to. Like, are you sure you like it?

SPEAKER_00 8:59

You're just thinking about your previous living situation, and then now I'm just imagining you driving back from some lessons where he's just like Judah in a towel, just like I know, and you're just like, What did we leave?

SPEAKER_01 9:10

Yeah, what why don't I just give up?

SPEAKER_00 9:12

It's a real Abrahamic moment. Yeah, no, it's so that's so dramatic because obviously we were good, but just children, just children of Israel out of Egypt, like, yeah, I mean, it wasn't great, but at least we had homes.

Waiting, Growth, And Seed Of Faith

SPEAKER_01 9:25

Yeah, you know, we did a podcast with Christy McClellan on the His Glory, Her Good. This was probably two years ago, and she shares about one of her Bible studies that she did with Lifeway, and oh um, and it was actually one that she didn't want to do. Oh, okay. And then we recorded in Israel, and that for her, those were just like sacred spaces of like this is just where she did a lot of personal teaching, and she just didn't feel she wanted to have cameras in Israel, like capturing. Are we capitalizing on that? Yeah, exactly. She just felt like weird about it, but and so she said that until like the first day of the video shoot, like she had said, Okay, God, you've asked me to do this. I'm submitting myself to you. And then on that first night, you know, she didn't even sleep the first night. Um, but then she talked about how the Lord walked her from a place of submission to a place of surrender. And like when we are submitting to something, we say, Okay, sure. But surrender says, like, okay, I trust you. And when we like that's like the attitude of like shift, and it's not that doesn't mean it's gonna be easy. Yeah, it doesn't mean it's simple.

SPEAKER_00 10:32

There is that is that is such a a wonderfully elegant way to put it. Because I think for so many folks, we come to terms with submission because we fought, we fought, we fought, we fought, and then we finally just give in. But surrender when we explain it, couch it that way, it's almost like preemptive where it's like I I could fight this, but it's not worth the fight because this is I believe this to be truer or better. And that is, I think for a lot of ministry folks, that's important to hear because I think so many of us talk about like you know, yielding or submitting to the call, like Jacob. Uh, but the idea of it being a surrender of like a welcomed, holy, like, yep, nope, uh we don't even have to fight.

SPEAKER_01 11:14

There's almost an expectation of like I know that it's gonna be okay. Um I will say last thing about this, but there's a song that I was like introduced to. Charity Gale's like really, you know, popular. Um, but there's a very specific song um called Seed of Faith. And when I hear Seed of Faith, I'm like, what in the prosperity gospel is this?

SPEAKER_00 11:37

Should I buy small towels and send increments of $20 bills? You know, listen, did you tell? I think Tulsa rubbed off on you. Yeah. Girl visit Tulsa for three days and she's already got seed faith. That's good. Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 11:50

But that that idea of seed of faith, I'm just thinking, oh, like, you know, pray it and believe it, you know, and then it'll all Hey, believe it, receive it, need it.

SPEAKER_00 11:58

Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 11:59

And uh anyway, so that is a song I would recommend checking out if you are in a season of waiting and not seeing the growth, um, maybe that you're wanting to, or the answers that you're looking for. Um, because the lyrics essentially just go on the fact that like the Lord doesn't require us to like produce the really good fruit, right? We want to look around our lives and just see a bunch of fruit everywhere. Um, in our ministries, we want to see kids running to the altar every Wednesday and Sunday night, and that's not what God's asked us to do. Um, He's asked us to trust Him, plant that seed of faith, and the the chorus goes on and God will bring the rain. Like, and so I love that idea of that um I think it's first or second Corinthians of like, you know, Apollos planted high water, but God gave the growth. God gave the growth. And um in those moments of like remembering like who is it that gives the growth.

SPEAKER_00 12:56

It's good. It's good.

Why Audit Calendars Before Emotions Fade

SPEAKER_00 12:57

We wanted to talk a little bit about the ministry practice of calendaring or calendaring and auditing, evaluating. Uh, and I want you to share just a little bit of your rubric of stop, start, change. Is that right? That's the three stop, start, change, uh, for some of the ways in which we evaluate. Not just because this is let me say it this way. I think for a lot of us, we evaluate after it happens, which is fair, but usually the evaluation is pretty emotive where it's like, hey, camp happen. How'd y'all feel about it?

SPEAKER_02 13:27

Yeah. Right.

SPEAKER_00 13:28

And like, and that's not wrong. Like, I mean, I like I you're gonna have big feelings about it, but usually big feelings after you're done with something are always like relief.

SPEAKER_01 13:36

That's so true.

SPEAKER_00 13:37

And that's not like necessarily the best posture to like make we made it through.

SPEAKER_01 13:42

We did it.

SPEAKER_00 13:42

Yeah, uh, like hey, I you know, it's the line, like I wouldn't do it again, but it was good. And I'm like, well, oh, oh, whoa, whoa, well, you wouldn't do it again? Like, there's like there's something in there that like it's hard to be fully objective when you're like free of something or whatever. And so true. Um, so I think just the idea of like stop start change actually needs to be in a season when you don't feel obligated or just finished by the thing that you're talking about. Like you can't you can't evaluate camp like too close to it. Let's just use that. And this is not like saying like it's always camp, but usually for ministries, that's always like how we did it or where we did it. That's always one that's kind of always there because it's such a big investment. Uh, and I think for a lot of folks, there's some smaller ones that might be closer to the stop or the change. Um, but yeah, give us a little more stop tarts change uh and maybe some of the things we should be considering.

SPEAKER_01 14:31

No, I love that. Um, yeah, if you're talking about um when you're listening to this and you know, summer is coming and you want to know should I change where I'm going to camp? Yeah. Um maybe you really need to. Okay. There's certain things that you're like, red flag, we gotta, we gotta pivot right now.

SPEAKER_02 14:47

Yes.

SPEAKER_01 14:48

Um, but probably not the season that I would recommend um having those big deep conversations.

SPEAKER_00 14:52

Yeah,

Stop Start Change: The Rubric

SPEAKER_00 14:53

changing May before changing June before March, April. That's that's the that's a law. That's too too fast. Probably. Probably. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 15:00

I, you know, and I think it's funny we talked about swim lessons because obviously that wasn't planned, but that idea of swim lessons, right? We are practicing something so that when we get there, we are ready. And I think this idea of planning a calendar and thinking about what we want to stop, start and change is not just so that way we can say that we're good calendar planners. Yeah, yeah. It's so that when you arrived at camp, yeah, you knew a year and a half what camp was gonna look like. You weren't worried, you weren't worried about the last minute where what bus company do we need to rent to take our kids to s uh camp. And so anyway, all that to say is um first, I think that calendar auditing should be done on a yearly basis.

SPEAKER_00 15:46

Um that should be part of the calendar is the audit process. There needs to be some days or a week where we actually do the thorough work. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 15:54

So if you're listening, my um homework to you right now is figure out when your budget season starts over.

SPEAKER_00 16:01

There you go, there you go.

SPEAKER_01 16:02

Um, so for a life way, ours is October. Yeah. Um, some churches start over in January. I'm actually.

SPEAKER_00 16:08

Yeah, January, September. Yeah, it's either it's usually like either start of the school year, start of the calendar year, both good.

SPEAKER_01 16:13

So anyway, determine that. And then you want to work backwards of like, okay, I'm gonna have to submit budgets to be approved. Okay, and so before you uh get your budget, a ministry budget approved, then you have to think, okay, what what am I getting approved for, right? Well, we're gonna get approved for camp because we always do camp.

unknown 16:31

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 16:31

Well, do you do camp every year?

SPEAKER_00 16:33

Do you have to or do you always invest at camp every year? You can pick it on camp. You should do camp. Or or winter weekend or or dodge. Summer conference, dodgeball conference. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah, dodgeball conference. Dodge con. Sorry.

SPEAKER_01 16:46

Dodge DodgeCon. DodgeCon. Okay. Everyone wears costumes. Yeah. That's just what I imagine.

SPEAKER_00 16:51

Just dodge con cosplay. See, now say now we're starting something that we don't even know if we can afford. This is how the idea spins out of control.

SPEAKER_01 16:58

It's got like a big like um Comic-Con. Like it's like a whole thing.

SPEAKER_00 17:02

You guys have invited means why they changed the airport.

SPEAKER_01 17:05

Like the airport has like the the each like gate number is like Star Trek themed, okay? Um, and you walk out on Darth Vader's meeting you outside the gate. I was very confused when I came home last week.

SPEAKER_00 17:18

She knows that Star Trek and Darth Vader are not the same universe. She does just there's somebody that listened that was like Darth Vader, not part of Star Trek. Darth Vader, not part of Star Trek. No, no, man, no.

Budgets, Timelines, And Buy In

SPEAKER_00 17:33

The Wars Trek, yes, yes.

SPEAKER_01 17:34

I would have just lost so many points. No, it's okay. No, you're good. No, you're good.

SPEAKER_00 17:38

You're good. No, that's it. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 17:39

I'm here, guys.

SPEAKER_00 17:39

May the Spock be with you. Absolutely. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 17:43

That's so funny. Anyway, so you want to work back and so figure out where your budgets need to be submitted and then to have your plan um kind of ready and set to go. So Zach and I, I mean, we have to submit budgets usually April, May um for the following year, which kicks off in October.

SPEAKER_00 18:00

So we're meeting in January, February.

SPEAKER_01 18:02

Yeah. So uh so we we work backwards because we want to be able to flush out new ideas and we want to say, okay, is this working? If we do it this way, can we change it? So that's gonna be your first step. The second step is then when you actually sit down with your calendar. Um, I we go you walk through every single thing you did the year before. So maybe it's 2025, maybe it's 26, whatever that looks like for you. But you want to walk through one year of ministry, everything you do, and you say, Do I stop it? Do I start it? Do I change it? Um I would say across the board, what how you answer those questions is does it align with the vision and mission of my ministry and of my church? Um, so maybe your mission is to go make disciples and leave a legacy and baptize people, you know, whatever, whatever it may be. Um, or maybe your mission is small groups is really important or evangelism is part of the DNA of your church. Okay, so if what you're doing is not aligned with your church in the least bit, that's an easy way to say I need to stop this event. If it does align with your church and you're not already doing it. So if you have evangelism in your mission statement and you have zero evangelist opportunities for your students to practice evangelism or to share their testimonies, or like that is an easy place for you to say, This is something that I need to start.

SPEAKER_02 19:31

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 19:31

Um, and then change is like, okay, I we we say we want students to make disciples, but we're not providing really great opportunities for them. So we have a couple, maybe a VBS, and they can go and serve in those capacities, but on an ongoing discipleship way doesn't really exist. So maybe we need to change what we're doing. Yeah. So we're trying, we've already got something going, but we need a pivot. Um, or you already have a camp, you already have a D now, you already have a retreat. What in those existing events can I change to then help align even more to the vision of making disciples? Yeah. Um, so stops our change, vision is a huge component. The other component is um financial and um you know personnel

Killing Traditions And Measuring Fruit

SPEAKER_01 20:15

support. So you may not have a massive budget or a massive um team to come around you and to accomplish things. And so what God has given you, um, you have to be a steward of those things. And so um, if something is eating away your entire budget and you are not seeing fruit from it, you probably just stop doing it.

SPEAKER_00 20:36

Uh even if you really enjoy it. Yeah. And I think that's that's those are when it gets hard. Like it's easy to kill the thing that you inherited that you don't want.

SPEAKER_01 20:44

We love taking our kids to Dollywood. Yeah. Awesome. Awesome. If you are spending thousands of dollars that you do not have to take your students to Dollywood, half your kids go to Dollywood anyway.

SPEAKER_00 20:53

That was I mean, not to pick on ministries of past, but one of the churches that I worked at, the thing that inherited was ski trip. Well, I'm that was an easy one for me because I don't really love to snow ski. Like, that's fine, but I'm not signed up for it. But it was in a major investment for a group of students that most of them went on their own with their families. And so we weren't really robbing them of anything, right? And there was no alignment to it. So that one was easy. The the one that was hard uh was the local spring break mission trip because that was like, well, this seems like the right idea, but I my volunteers were all doing spring break stuff. I didn't have I didn't have the help. That's exactly what I think. I was in a spot where it was like me and two leaders for way too many kids. Yeah. So the personnel wasn't there. It was it was a cheap option. Yeah, it was an easy option and it was a service opportunity. It seemed like win win win until it was like pulling teeth to get more than me and one other person there. I don't know if you've had two van loads of kids that were like half hearted and the other leader wishes they weren't there. That's not fun. It's not fun. It's not fun. And I don't know if we actually got the return. The yeah, some kids got to like rake leaves. We painted some houses, and parents were appreciative that three of their spring break days were occupied or whatever. But I got I missed three days of time with my own personnel of family.

SPEAKER_01 22:14

Yeah. No, it's so true. So you we uh love um to start things. I think when you are thinking about do I start something, yeah, you do need to consider do I have the financial means to do it and do I have the volunteers to support?

SPEAKER_00 22:26

Yeah. So like literal buy-in, both the buy-in of the dollars and the buy-in of the people. Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 22:33

With that, that means when you are planning your calendar for the next year, you need to be having key people. You may not have a team, but are there key parents, key volunteers that you need their buy-in for maybe new things you want to do before before you sell it. Before you before you say we are doing this, guys, we're gonna be about this.

SPEAKER_00 22:52

Okay, does anybody want to help? It's true, it's true.

SPEAKER_01 22:55

We're going to Australia. Who wants to come?

SPEAKER_00 22:58

Um me and Frodo, we're going, yeah, yeah. Get them on board.

SPEAKER_01 23:03

And uh um and honestly, like when you get to invite leaders and parents into those conversations early on, they actually are more likely to buy in than something that's last minute or something that doesn't feel like they got to say in.

SPEAKER_00 23:16

And it may take a

Starting New With Patience And People

SPEAKER_00 23:18

whole year of putting it together to get the buy-in. And that's and that's something that I think, especially when it comes to manners of start and stop. Changing, there's variance, but starting and stopping may take a little more of a runway or an exit, an on-ramp or an off-ramp to use some of our friends' favorite.

SPEAKER_01 23:37

Okay, so change one, I would say, when it comes to like personnel support, it may be that your volunteers are like faithful people, they're gonna show up whether you tell them to walk the desert or not.

SPEAKER_02 23:48

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 23:48

Um, but if your people are miserable, your people are not having fun, if like the camp that worked for you for eight years, and you know, this is what we always do. If it's running dry, it's okay to say, let's try something new. Yeah. And guess what? If it, if it flops, you don't have to do it the next year.

SPEAKER_02 24:08

That's right.

SPEAKER_01 24:08

So, but giving yourself that space and that time of looking ahead early enough kind of gives you that freedom to say, okay, maybe this is the year we can try something new. I've been wanting to do it, um, been a little nervous, but I have a little bit of buy-in. We're gonna try it. And yeah, that's how that's how you can try different things. You can't try new things at the last second is never gonna go.

SPEAKER_00 24:31

Well, because it's it's excitement, but again, there there is a and this is wisdom coming from from folks that have been doing this for a while. Keep fighting for the new, yeah, but bring the people with you. That's so good. And I and I think that's something that again, this is 40-year-old Zach talking directly to 24-year-old Zach. Like the new is not the problem. The problem is you didn't give it enough time for everybody else to get pulled in with you. Nobody's thinking about the ministry more than you. That's it. That's a blessing and a curse. It's a blessing because it means you've really thought about it. The curse is it just takes them longer to catch up to you than maybe you were patient to give them. And so just find ways to let them be patient, you to be patient for them that you've been thinking about saying you know what? Small groups aren't working. We do need to change it. Okay, you arrived there after thinking about it hard

Her Good Retreat: Vision To Launch

SPEAKER_00 25:20

for three weeks. It may take three to six months of your leaders being like, I don't know if this is working.

SPEAKER_01 25:26

And like letting them uh ask questions and wrestle with it. And you could still be able to do that. Do you think this is working? But um no, it's so good. So stop, you know, stop anything that doesn't align with the vision of your ministry in church. Stop if you don't have financial and personnel support. Stop if you're not seeing fruit from it, right? Stop if, you know, it's it if you're saying this is the event for making disciples, and students are more excited about going to whatever theme park or whatever that you know you've thrown on the end than actually the hard work of disciples.

SPEAKER_00 25:58

This is the event we utilize to invite all of our friends, and nobody well, I mean, so that was a great idea. Uh we for a few years, many moons ago, tried to have events to on-ramp folks into the larger events. So we would have like a big night that was a sign-up night to get into the winter weekend or a big, you know, barbecue party time to get people to sign up for camp. Well, it worked one year and then it didn't work the next. So the third year we're at a crossroads, and one of them we kept doing, one of them we didn't because we didn't, it didn't actually get more people on ramp to the thing that we were trying to do. That's so good. Which was the reason it wasn't wrong. It just it wasn't doing what it was supposed to do. And that's again, some of the issue, if we can speak a little bit, is some of the things we're gonna have to audit is what were we trying to do here other than just the thing that we were doing.

SPEAKER_01 26:48

Yeah, no, that's good. And I mean, I get it. When you most youth pastors go and they inherit a whole ministry that is a they've inherited the calendar that came with it, right? And all the programs. These are the traditions we've had since I was a teenager on the youth group. And um, but it's okay.

SPEAKER_00 27:06

Three weeks in a row for bingo, is that a thing? Oh, the kids love it. The kids love the bingo. All right.

SPEAKER_01 27:11

Sure, sure, sure, sure. Um, but yeah, it's it's not worth it if there's no fruit. And this is where I'm gonna lead to the start. So start is yes, it aligns with the vision. Yes, we have financial personnel, but also like you have to say, like, is the Holy Spirit like actually like speaking to me and leading me in a direction? Am I leading from a place? Am I starting this because it's easy for me or I want to do it? Just sounds fun. Another church down the road does it, so it must be awesome. Um, like, no, none of those answers justify starting something new. You everyone is already so busy, right? We talk about this all the time. Like, our culture's busy, universally busy.

SPEAKER_00 27:49

Just just know, like, it ain't just you. Yeah. Big church, small church, left coast, east coast, everybody's busy. Every no, no, no, everybody's busy. So if the plan was more, you're gonna have to sell me pretty hard because our calendar's already full.

SPEAKER_01 28:04

Yep. So when you start something like that, that is a series, that is what sets us apart from any other job, is that we don't just do things for the sake of doing them. If we believe this is actually sacred work, come on, then the Holy Spirit has to be guiding us. God's word has to be our compass um into leading us. And so that is that is the green light of okay, I need to start something. And guess what? That takes even more time than just showing up one day and said, Let me look at my calendar.

SPEAKER_00 28:32

What can we add in? Yes.

SPEAKER_01 28:33

Um, usually the Holy Spirit should you you want to be asking the Holy Spirit right now, okay. God, in the 2027 and 2028, where are you leading my ministry? Where are you leading my students? What what is it that we can do different than what we're doing right now?

SPEAKER_00 28:47

Okay. So let's let's make this test case real. You have something new coming up that you're about to start in March. Oh, yeah. So I want to show us your process. So, okay, but but but for real though, like you have a brand new thing that's coming up in a month.

SPEAKER_01 29:02

Okay.

SPEAKER_00 29:02

We're excited about it for good reason, but you have been dripping it out for a while to keep us excited about it. So walk us through the process of the development of the Her Good Retreat coming in March to Tennessee.

SPEAKER_02 29:15

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 29:15

Uh, for women that are serving either in youth ministry or college

Closing Invites And Resources

SPEAKER_00 29:18

ministry in a leadership role in leading both youth or young adults, uh, exclusively and specifically for them in a world that has many conferences and opportunities. How is this the thing that you got carved out and excited about beyond just the fact that you could do it, the why you're doing it?

SPEAKER_01 29:33

Man, okay. So I will say that um I would say this is something that the Lord has been kind of just like bringing to the top of a surface. Like, you know, when I think about what I desire for my role as, you know, specialist for women who lead in youth ministry, like what does that actually mean? We'll drop the title card and we'll what does it mean? How does it flesh out? Like, what could this look like? And um, the years that I've spent in this role, um, six years now, seven years at Lifeway, um, the overwhelming need is that these women who are serving in youth ministry need a place to belong. Um, they want, they don't just need a seat at the table, they just like want someone to have coffee with them, right? And um, and so like what does that look like? What can we offer? So from that, I would say probably clearly, you know, a year and a half ago, like this is something that I'm starting to flesh out with my boss. Like, what could this look like? We used to do a conference for teen girls, like, what if we pivot and do something for the volunteers, the leaders? And so we kind of started doing like smaller versions of like getting women together in smaller ways. And then we started realizing that it's working and that these women are finding community and that they're getting poured into, and then we said, like, what if we could provide even more like specific training for them? Um, but guess what? I didn't have any personnel support at the time, and so uh but is I so I'm like, I can't pull up a conference by myself. I'm in a team of one, a girls' conference, okay, or women's conference. I can't do that. Um, but then we got to open a door to invite some trainers to be part of the conversation at Lifeway.

SPEAKER_00 31:12

And so now building a team.

SPEAKER_01 31:14

I have uh six Lifeway girl trainers who these are ministers in their churches that just get to speak into what we do with Lifeway, and sometimes they get to come on the road and um, but got them together. This was December of 24, and said, What if you we could do anything, what would you guys want to do? And um, one of the things that they all spoke into was, what if we did like a retreat for women in youth ministry? Um, oh, what if we do a retreat for women in youth ministry and college ministry? These are women who'd be on staff leading in a role, so less than a hundred women, but we just get to intentionally pour into them.

SPEAKER_00 31:48

And so but also emphasis more retreat than conference, too. Again, there's some there's some careful nuance because it's it's for a specific group in a specific season for a specific reason. Because there are lots of conferences, there are lots of women's events, there are lots of youth ministry happenings, but not filtered in a way that's uniquely this and you so anyway, I would say from there, that was so December 2024.

SPEAKER_01 32:13

You're like, okay, let's write up a proposal, let's send it to the boss. Then you have to think about okay, where if I'm gonna do this, where I'm gonna do it at. And so, like looking for a location and picking the right, I mean, if you're gonna try to reach women throughout the country.

SPEAKER_00 32:27

Where's the spot? Yeah, where's the spot?

SPEAKER_01 32:29

These women who often don't have a budget, who can't just necessarily fly to any airport, kind of want to be in a drivable place for most states. And anyway, so it was, you know, spring of 2025, and we're launching it March uh 19th and 20 through 21st of 2026. So um still have a few spots. If you have a woman, yeah, if you have a woman on your team, whether she's a ministry leader, minister, admin, girls minister, yeah, event coordinator, we have uh such a wide variety of women um representing, and we'd love to have them kind of join us.

SPEAKER_00 33:02

Love it. So we're excited. Uh things happening new. You can check the links below. Uh Amanda, thanks for coming to join us today. Thank you so much for having me. Oh my gosh. Yeah, no, good. Uh we we are gonna be back out at it. So uh check out the links below for the Her Good Retreat this March, uh the Youth Pastor Summit locations in April, and then the preaching experience in May. We love connecting with folks in person about youth ministry in a variety of different ways, in a variety of different seasons of life. And so if you're listening and preparing or just finished your midweek, we love you. We're thankful for you, and we hope that you're auditing well. So, Amanda.

SPEAKER_01 33:36

See you next time.

SPEAKER_00 33:37

There you go.

SPEAKER_02 33:40

Snap.

SPEAKER_00 33:52

Hey, thanks for taking on that episode of the Youth Ministry Booster Podcast. Check the links below for the Her Good Retreat with Mahanda Mahias and the rest of our Lifeway girls team that are putting together a special thing for those that are leading women, youth ministry, college ministry. If you're serving in those ways, would love to connect with you there in person, just outside of Memphis, Tennessee. Or if you're gonna be in one of the regions that Youth Pastor Summit is visiting this spring, our team would love to hang with your team, bring your whole team, and then in May, if you're looking for a chance to practice your preaching, check out lifeway.com slash experience. Like, rate, subscribe, and review, and we'll see you next time.