Tag: transition

Thank you, Mr. Long

Tic Long & Mark Matlock reviewing their announcement video. They got it on the first take.

“Well, I’m in if you’re in.”

That was the phrase that began my next season at Youth Specialties. Back in December 2009 I’d been offered the opportunity to stay on with YS after the purchase by YouthWorks. Tic and I exchanged a couple phone calls and texts… and I remember saying to him playfully, “Well, I’m in if you’re in.”

Verbalizing with my lips what was in my head for the very first time I wanted to stay on for the next phase of YS’s history. But I wanted it to be with him at the helm. Everyone knew it was our best chance. Just crazy enough to work. And just crazy enough to be fun, too.

Tic rejoining our team meant a world of difference. Instead of pushing the sled uphill we’d take it to the top of the hill, throw our hands in the air, and gleefully shout “wwwhhheeeee” at the top of our lungs.

Today, Tic announced that he was leaving YS to pursue something he’s always wanted to do but never quite felt called to until now, working for his church. I have mixed emotions about that. On the one hand there’s nothing more important than listening to the still, small voice of the Holy Spirit and obeying. On the other, when this transition period is over I’ll miss his daily presence in my life.

The last 16 months have been a blast. Knowing you are on borrowed time has made the whole thing more precious. (He made it clear from day one that he didn’t intend to stick around forever. Though, like the video points out, we’d all hoped it would be 2-3 more years. God changed the timing!) Each day of gleaning wisdom and knowledge has been a gift. I’ve known it was a gift– and done my very best to savor that gift day-by-day.

That’s not to say that the last 16 months have been super serious. If you know Tic at all you know the last 16 months have been filled with deep moments where you’d cry followed quickly by massive amounts of laughter. One thing I’ve learned from Tic is that it’s OK to be the guy who is a wussy-sissy-cry-baby and also to break the tension by telling a joke that’d make a middle school boy blush.

All this to say, I’m thankful to Tic for the gift of the last 16 months. Coming to YS three years ago I had hopes that I’d get to know Marko and Tic well. Like a lot of youth workers I kind of grew up in ministry looking up to them. And while I never could have predicted that I’d get to know them in this season of their lives, I’m grateful to call them both friends, to have seen their character exhibited again and again in the toughest of circumstances, and to see them chose the right way versus the easy way again and again… the only way I can express it that its been a gift. A gift I am thankful for.

Am I excited for Mark and the future of YS? Absolutely. I’ll have much more on that another day.

What about you, Adam? How are you doing in all of this?

(Thanks for asking. I appreciate your love for me and my family.)

I love words. And I love making up words in my head that serve as mantras. This has been the word/phrase rattling around my head for the last few weeks. “I’m Happysadexcitedscaredhopefulangst-tastic.”

I’m happy for Tic.

I’m sad that I won’t get to work with Tic forever.

I’m excited for Mark.

I’m scared for Mark because expectations are crazy like that.

I’m hopeful for the future of YS. I wouldn’t work there if I didn’t think our best days are yet ahead.

I’m angst-tastic because it feels like we’re leaving the dock of what we know to sail into the Sea of Unknown once again.

More than anything, today I chose to be thankful.

April 19, 2011
My Transition to YouthWorks
On January 1st, 2010 I will become an employee of YouthWorks.

Before I talk about YouthWorks I do want to mention some things about Zondervan. A lot of negative things have been said and written (Facebook, Twitter, blogs, etc.) about Zondervan through this process. I want to convey publicly what I told them privately. They have been great through this. The last few months have been painful to say the least. (I think the right term is agonizing!) And at every turn the people I worked alongside at Z were professional, kind, and quick to pray for and with me. Whether or not you agree with all of their decisions in the last year or so, know that they are not awful people with maniacal laughs and evil plans. From the CEO (Moe Girkins) to the CFO (Gary Wicker) on down through the leadership team and the ranks of employees, I’ve found them to be intelligent, hard-working, and upstanding people. I’m a better person for having worked with them. I’m thankful and proud of my 18 months of work with Z. (And by proxy, being an employee of HarperCollins and News Corp was pretty nifty, too.)

A couple weeks back, as the deal became final for YouthWorks to buy Youth Specialties, also came an opportunity for me to continue on in my ministry with YS as an employee of YouthWorks. Despite the fact that I had every reason to suspect I would be offered a job, the offer itself still came as a shock! I really had never thought about what my response would be if I were given the chance to stay on.

The next 36 hours were as near to insanity for me as I’d ever like to get. I asked hard questions that needed to be answered. (Of YouthWorks and myself) I listened a lot. I took a couple long walks by myself. I talked to my dog. I wasted gas driving around San Diego for an evening. I shed some frustrating tears. I aimlessly walked around Best Buy for a couple hours. I talked in circles to Kristen. I burned through a few hundred text messages. I put out a Twitter request for a burning bush. Around and around I went. I just didn’t know what to do.

Apparently my iPhone changed "divining rod" to "diving rod." See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dowsing

See, it’s not in my nature to do things halfway. There was a lot of wisdom in the advice I was getting… “Play it safe.” But that’s not me. That’s not how I roll. To me, it would have been better to just say no and move on with my life than to do something halfway with an eye on the door. I wanted to be resolute one way or the other. “Let your yes be yes and your no be no.” I wanted to be true to myself even if it meant putting into action plans B, C, D, or E and all the fear and second guessing that went with that.

Make it clear God! That was my prayer.

That resolve I was looking for came early Friday morning.

Long story short. On Friday morning, I talked to the folks at YouthWorks and let them know that I had decided to stay on with Youth Specialties/YouthWorks.

And so a new adventure begins! After a weekend off, transition work began bright and early on Monday morning and will continue through the Christmas holidays. I’ve got this theory that decisions generate energy. And in this case, I’ve got lots of new energy and enthusiasm for what is next for YS.

Just as surely as it is hard to say goodbye to so many co-workers… its been exciting to meet a whole new staff of people from YouthWorks. Over the past couple months I’ve gotten a chance to meet the leadership at YouthWorks. In my desire to learn more, I even went out looking for complaints and couldn’t find any. Lots and lots of happy customers. Lots of people impressed with their mission trips and how they go about their ministry. As I’ve gotten to know them I’ve been very impressed with how forward-thinking they are. And it’s been scary how much we’re on the same page with overall ministry-styles. I’ve only met about 10 of their staff of 60 face-to-face, so I am looking forward to getting to know more and more YouthWorks peeps over the coming months. They are differently culturally from the SoCal-YS-style, but in heart and ministry value they are very much the same.

Soon, we’ll be rolling out a lot more about the future of YS, what’s next, etc. But just know that a big reason I’m joining YouthWorks is because I have a deep-gut belief that the best days of Youth Specialties are ahead. I know that’s a bold statement considering how great the past has been for YS, but that’s why I’m on board. I think there are even better days to come.

Here’s a few quick FAQs based on the innumerous texts, Facebook messages, and Twitter DMs I’ve gotten in the past couple weeks.
1. Will you have to move to Minneapolis? Nope. Sorry San Diego, you are stuck with the McLane family for a few more years. We’ll be keeping it classy together. We will be moving offices eventually. Hopefully, it’ll be something near a trolley stop.
2. How does Kristen feel about this? I just want her to get to know my new co-workers. They are, as a whole, very missional. That’ll resonate with her. At this point, she is just glad to have my sanity back. This decision released a lot of energy! She got her husband back.
3. What’s the new YS going to look like? More will come out in the next few weeks/months about our plans. I’ll just say I’m really excited about the stuff we’re talking about! I do know this… whatever it is, it’ll be true to the long-term mission of YS and YW, serving and equipping youth workers and church leaders.
4. Will you be at NYWC this Fall? Even if I had to pay my own way, I’d be there. You will want to be in Nashville the weekend before Thanksgiving.
5. Will you travel more or less? For some reason the YouthWorks staff wants to come here to San Diego more than they want me to come to Minneapolis. Go figure! So time will tell on that one.
6. What will you be working on? As time goes on, this will get more clear. But for now not a lot is changing with my job. It’s a safe bet that I’ll be calling 612 now more than 616.
7. Do you even own a winter jacket? No, we donated it to the Salvation Army when we left Michigan. I do, however, own a lot of t-shirts, shorts, and sandals. See question 6.
8. Can I ask you more questions? You bet. Leave me a comment. (Verbal comments would be awesome!)
December 28, 2009
Longitudinal Youth Ministry

Photo by Ben Lawson via Flickr (creative commons)

There is something so cheap about a program that graduates students.

Maybe it’s just that I don’t like to let go? Or maybe it’s just that I can’t reconcile the theological ramifications of shoving a copy of My Utmost for His Highest in a kids hands and saying, “Thanks for the memories. Have a nice life!”

In reality, I’ve not let go of them. I just can’t. It wouldn’t seem right. And I am pretty sure they don’t want to either. Why else would I be maintaining these relationships with them into adulthood? Why are we still sharing life?

The way my youth ministry career has gone, in many ways that relationship is just getting started when they walk across the stage to accept their high school diploma. It’s not over, we’re just changing gears!

And yet, the programmatic approach to youth ministry depends on me pushing kids through the system. Freshmen take steps 1-2, sophomores steps 3-4, juniors do step 5, seniors do step 6. We’re always working kids through a system. We say we love them… but that’s a short-term love that lasts as long as they are in high school. Sayonara, sucker! I’ve got a whole slew of incoming freshmen to look after!

The way I see it, that type of program is a cheap Wal*Mart edition of discipleship. Real discipleship is taxing. It’s tough. It’s costly. It’s complicated. It requires more commitment than getting assigned to 8 kids for a small group year or running a program at work.

When I think of the way Jesus discipled I think of a process that was open-ended. They ground it out over time. It wasn’t a wheel or bases that he ran those young men through. It was life shared. Three steps forward, two steps back. But together they got there.

From my own ministry experience, you just know when you have a few kids who get it and want to be discipled long-term. You don’t get assigned these kids. A pastor doesn’t have to bestow anything on you. It’s just natural, you pick it up, and you see where the relationship goes. You recognize it in them when they are 14 when they won’t leave your house because they just have to talk to you about something. You see it when they are 17 and they just drop by to watch a movie or something. You see it when they are 19 and they are just back for the weekend and want to grab a cup of coffee to catch up on life. You see it when they are 23 and you are chatting about life on Facebook.

Maybe I’m just an abnomaly but my ministry to those kids continues long after I hand them a book and a graduation card. To do anything less would seem cheap. Like I didn’t even mean it.

“Programs are short-term. Discipleship is long-term.”

Maybe instead of trying to force discipleship into a 4 or 6 year box we need to re-shape youth ministry so that it starts with kids who want to be discipled and it ends… like at a later date when its over? Why are we trying to redefine discipleship instead of trying to redefine youth ministry?

There’s always room for a couple newbies in my life. As we get rolling with this new youth ministry venture in San Diego I can see the cycle starting over again. I’m getting to know 14-15 year olds who are looking for someone to walk with for the long-haul. I’ve got room in my life because the reality is that the ones I’ve been mentoring/discipling for the last 5-6 years don’t need much attention. That’s exciting for me to see it starting all over again. I’m hard-wired for it. But that’s how you would hope the process works, right?

Am I alone in this? Should we start looking at youth ministry as a long-term investment instead of a program?

December 23, 2009