Youth Ministry Fail Blog
Recently I have been getting a huge kick out of a website called failblog.org. The website consists of a variety of pictures, videos, and other websites that consist of epic fail moments. FOR EXAMPLE:
I have decided to write about my own youth ministry epic fail moments so everyone can learn from them or at least have a good laugh....
YOUTH MINISTRY FAIL
1. TURKEY BOWLING FAIL: Around Thanksgiving time last year I thought it would be awesome to play a game called “Turkey Bowling” at youth group. So I went to the store and bought a turkey. I took it home and carved a hole through the center of it so I could put my arm through the Turkey making my hand look like it’s head and began to make it speak using my hand to mimic it’s beak with ping pong balls for the eyeballs attached to my hand. I basically made a turkey puppet with a real butterball turkey. I then encouraged everyone to throw it down a tarp covered in olive oil towards pins… hence the name “Turkey Bowling.” Unfortunately I saw two kids sitting out looking down. I kept encouraging them to play and they refused. Later I remembered they were vegan due to their beliefs of the poor treatment of animals. OOOOPS!
2. JR HIGH SEX ED FAIL: The other day I was talking to a group of 6th grade girls at the cafeteria. They were randomly talking about all the people they knew having a babies including, older siblings, teachers, parents etc. My response… “Wow, everybody’s doing it I guess.” When they all started giggling I tried to fix this by saying, “No! Wait not everybody’s doing it! That’s a lie! I meant everybody’s having babies, not doing ‘it’… the it part was having babies not…. well you know, doing it… cuz not everyone is!!!!” That is when they told me stop trying and they all completely erupted in laughter for the rest of lunch.
3. PLANNING FAIL: Last year I scheduled messy games night at the end of November. It was freezing outside so we had messy games inside and let’s just say all the games were definitely meant for outdoors. Syrup and chocolate were everywhere in the youth room among other things. That was the longest Sunday night ever.
4. TRIP FAIL: I made sure everyone had all their stuff for the ski trip, packed all the food, paper work, games, first aid kit etc. I made sure my snowboard was in the bus. Later, after we were already on the road I realized I forgot my own wallet with the church credit card to pay for everything once we were there.
5. TEACHING FAIL: After a lesson about encouraging my small group to use wholesome language while we were playing a game later that night I ran into one of the youth and definitely used some poor choice words.
6. SERVICE PROJECT FAIL: My very first year as a youth pastor the night before the first overnight event I tripped and broke my foot. Before I knew it was broken I thought if I just went to bed I could sleep it off. The next morning I was surprised when I still couldn’t walk but refused to go to the hospital until after the weekend event. The weekend service project I went on was ironically called Hands and Feet. For me, it was Hands and foot.
7. CHRIST-EXAMPLE FAIL: I was really pissed off at a youth while at camp during a mission week for harassing some of my girls. When he walked away I said that if he did it again I was going to punch him in the face. One of the campers looked at me and said, "Aren't you a youth pastor? You shouldn't say things like that, you are not modeling Christ." So then I punched that kid in the face. JUST KIDDING! But seriously... this was not a proud moment.
8. JR. HIGH GAME FAIL: Before bible study one night the weather was so gorgeous I thought I would get the Jr. High students to play some games outside. I found a metal horse shoe set that someone donated us and thought it would be fun to play. When I walked outside kids had ripped the metal poles out of the ground and were sword fighting with them while running around in the parking lot. Other students were throwing metal horse shoes aimlessly near cars and people.Nobody was hurt and nothing ended up broken... and SOME people say God doesn't do miracles any more. Still a fail of choice for Jr. High games.
9. FAITH FAIL: I went for a walk with one of my students and it was a bit stormy in the distance. I thought I heard sirens but chose to ignore them at first.Then I asked, "Josh, why is that siren noise not going away?" He casually replied, "Oh because that's a tornado siren." My response: "Then why are we walking away from your house? RUN WE ARE GONNA DIE!!! Wait, I mean have faith because God will save us." (Big boom of thunder) "JUST KIDDING! RUN WE ARE GONNA DIE!" Thankfully, we did not die due to my lack of faith.
I think even Jesus felt like a failure sometimes...
"If you have a group of twelve kids who don’t understand your illustrations and one of them wants to kill you, you have a youth group just like Jesus."
--Mark Yaconelli
That’s all I have for now!!! I am sure there will be much more to add to this. Please feel free to share with me your own personal fail moments.
YOUTH MINISTRY FAIL
1. TURKEY BOWLING FAIL: Around Thanksgiving time last year I thought it would be awesome to play a game called “Turkey Bowling” at youth group. So I went to the store and bought a turkey. I took it home and carved a hole through the center of it so I could put my arm through the Turkey making my hand look like it’s head and began to make it speak using my hand to mimic it’s beak with ping pong balls for the eyeballs attached to my hand. I basically made a turkey puppet with a real butterball turkey. I then encouraged everyone to throw it down a tarp covered in olive oil towards pins… hence the name “Turkey Bowling.” Unfortunately I saw two kids sitting out looking down. I kept encouraging them to play and they refused. Later I remembered they were vegan due to their beliefs of the poor treatment of animals. OOOOPS!
2. JR HIGH SEX ED FAIL: The other day I was talking to a group of 6th grade girls at the cafeteria. They were randomly talking about all the people they knew having a babies including, older siblings, teachers, parents etc. My response… “Wow, everybody’s doing it I guess.” When they all started giggling I tried to fix this by saying, “No! Wait not everybody’s doing it! That’s a lie! I meant everybody’s having babies, not doing ‘it’… the it part was having babies not…. well you know, doing it… cuz not everyone is!!!!” That is when they told me stop trying and they all completely erupted in laughter for the rest of lunch.
3. PLANNING FAIL: Last year I scheduled messy games night at the end of November. It was freezing outside so we had messy games inside and let’s just say all the games were definitely meant for outdoors. Syrup and chocolate were everywhere in the youth room among other things. That was the longest Sunday night ever.
4. TRIP FAIL: I made sure everyone had all their stuff for the ski trip, packed all the food, paper work, games, first aid kit etc. I made sure my snowboard was in the bus. Later, after we were already on the road I realized I forgot my own wallet with the church credit card to pay for everything once we were there.
5. TEACHING FAIL: After a lesson about encouraging my small group to use wholesome language while we were playing a game later that night I ran into one of the youth and definitely used some poor choice words.
6. SERVICE PROJECT FAIL: My very first year as a youth pastor the night before the first overnight event I tripped and broke my foot. Before I knew it was broken I thought if I just went to bed I could sleep it off. The next morning I was surprised when I still couldn’t walk but refused to go to the hospital until after the weekend event. The weekend service project I went on was ironically called Hands and Feet. For me, it was Hands and foot.
7. CHRIST-EXAMPLE FAIL: I was really pissed off at a youth while at camp during a mission week for harassing some of my girls. When he walked away I said that if he did it again I was going to punch him in the face. One of the campers looked at me and said, "Aren't you a youth pastor? You shouldn't say things like that, you are not modeling Christ." So then I punched that kid in the face. JUST KIDDING! But seriously... this was not a proud moment.
8. JR. HIGH GAME FAIL: Before bible study one night the weather was so gorgeous I thought I would get the Jr. High students to play some games outside. I found a metal horse shoe set that someone donated us and thought it would be fun to play. When I walked outside kids had ripped the metal poles out of the ground and were sword fighting with them while running around in the parking lot. Other students were throwing metal horse shoes aimlessly near cars and people.Nobody was hurt and nothing ended up broken... and SOME people say God doesn't do miracles any more. Still a fail of choice for Jr. High games.
9. FAITH FAIL: I went for a walk with one of my students and it was a bit stormy in the distance. I thought I heard sirens but chose to ignore them at first.Then I asked, "Josh, why is that siren noise not going away?" He casually replied, "Oh because that's a tornado siren." My response: "Then why are we walking away from your house? RUN WE ARE GONNA DIE!!! Wait, I mean have faith because God will save us." (Big boom of thunder) "JUST KIDDING! RUN WE ARE GONNA DIE!" Thankfully, we did not die due to my lack of faith.
I think even Jesus felt like a failure sometimes...
"If you have a group of twelve kids who don’t understand your illustrations and one of them wants to kill you, you have a youth group just like Jesus."
--Mark Yaconelli
That’s all I have for now!!! I am sure there will be much more to add to this. Please feel free to share with me your own personal fail moments.
FUNNY
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