The Young Life Leader 'Write Now Challenge'

When I think about the people who’ve had the greatest influence on my life, almost all of them have given me handwritten notes. As a kid, my parents often put notes in my lunchbox. Thirty years later and I still have one from my dad taped inside my Bible.  It can’t be a coincidence that…

Read More

A YL Bus Tour Prayer Night

A couple of weeks ago I saw my friend Matt Margaron, YL Area Director in Naperville, IL, post this picture on Instagram.  One night, his area loaded a bus full of leaders, committee members and friends. They rode around town to five different high schools in their area. At each school they stopped and prayed.…

Read More

Leaving A Legacy: Thoughts On Running A YL Senior Meeting

Over the past few years we’ve kicked off the new semester of Young Life with a ‘Seniors Only’ meeting. Special thanks to Brian Summerall for sharing his wisdom with us and prompting this new rhythm. For us it has worked well to hold our ‘Senior Meeting’ on the evening of the first day of school. In…

Read More

How To Get Freshmen To Club

Originally posted Sept of 2013. Our area has a tradition of starting each new school year off with an All-City Freshmen Club. I honestly wasn’t expecting many freshmen from our school to show, but to my pleasant surprise, a ton of them poured through the doors. Why did they come? Not because they saw me…

Read More

The Best Thing You Can Do With Your Campaigners Group This Summer

Last summer I grabbed two of my high school friends with great leadership potential. We went on a car ride and listened to these talks below. I’m convinced that car ride changed the direction of their lives and deeply impacted an entire school for Christ.  In my opinion, the most valuable thing you can do…

Read More

We ‘Bout 4-5 Seconds From YL’n

HT to @KnapYoungLife for the idea. (The line ‘we bout fourfiveseconds from wildin’ is from the new song by Kayne & Rihanna & Paul McCartney, ‘FourFiveSeconds.’)  You’ll need to do some lyrical maneuvering in order to sing it as a club song but could always just use the pic to promote club on Instagram or…

Read More

Practicing Lent With Your Campaigners Group

Next Wednesday, Feb. 18th, is Ash Wednesday, the beginning of Lent. I didn’t start practicing Lent until college when our Regional Director taught on the spiritual practice at a YL leadership meeting. With each year, this Lenten season grows more personally significant and is consistently a time of deeper intimacy with the Lord. The term ‘Lent’ comes from the…

Read More

High School Is Hard

High School is hard. Let Young Life help. Here are some Insta-squares you can edit, post and tweet out. 

Read More

Questions To Help Your Young Life Team Celebrate & Evaluate The Semester

One of the most valuable, but often neglected, activities we can do as a Young Life team is to regularly celebrate and evaluate. Since we just had our final club of 2013, our YL team is getting together next week on our club night to reflect on the semester.  Below are some questions we plan…

Read More

Young Life Christmas Gift Ideas

Originally posted in November 2012. If you’re a staff person looking for Christmas gift ideas for committee or leaders… If you’re a volunteer leader looking for ideas for your high school friends… If you’re a ridiculously selfish person, addicted to YL gear, looking for items to add to your own Christmas list…here are some ideas for you!…

Read More

It’s Time To Design Young Life Shirts For Your School

In our area we always make YL shirts for the school year. Usually each school has the same design on different color shirts. Now is the time to begin deciding what your shirts will look like!  The best t-shirt company I’ve ever worked with is Retro Fashions. Ryan Durkin and his team do TONS of Young Life…

Read More

Tim Keller’s Advice For Helping Teenagers Grow In Their Faith

On Monday Tim Keller fielded questions via Twitter. Jordan Randall asked Keller’s ‘best advice for helping teenagers grow in their faith, ministry, and discipleship on a real level?’ Keller’s response has been pinballing in my mind for the last couple days.  ‘Teenagers have more information about God than they have experience of him. Get them in places…

Read More

Jesse G. Clothing: High Schoolers Changing The World

Recently, @JonHoughton, YL staff in Indiana, shared with us about Jesse G. clothing.  A few high schoolers who are involved with Young Life were inspired to design a clothing line to help kids in poverty. Similar to Tom’s shoes, Jesse G clothing donates half their profits to those in need.  Being a Young Life leader…

Read More

Ben & Jerry's Free Cone Day

Can’t think of a better thing to do with your middle and high school friends tomorrow, April 9th. Free Cone Day at Ben & Jerry’s noon-8pm. Do it.  Find your nearest Ben & Jerry’s here.  HT to @BostonYoungLife for the reminder. 

Read More

How To Make Hilarious Good Morning Young Life Videos

Traditional “Good Morning Young Life” wake-up videos are a great way to create buzz for your YL Club. While it seems like an easy, no-brainer idea, it actually has lots of ways it can go wrong and not be as funny as you intended. 22 Helpful Tips To Making Hilarious GMYL Videos 1. Pick the…

Read More

Questions For The New Year

My wife and I have a New Year’s Eve tradition we’ve come to love.  Dinner combined with a little reflecting and dreaming. We head to a restaurant and bring two sheets of paper. Nat gets one, I get the other.  On one side of each paper we write “Thankful in 2012,” on the other “Hopeful…

Read More

Young Life Banquet Videos

Due to the nature of this post being video heavy, it probably will take a few seconds to load. Our area banquet is coming up next week. Last year we borrowed Colt Helton’s “Friday Night Lights” video idea. I’ve watched our area’s version of it 10+ times and still boo hoo like a teething baby.…

Read More

Breaking The Ice

This guest post was written by Tripp Graziano. Tripp is a YL leader in NC and the Director of The Greensboro Fellows program we’ve previously mentioned on the blog. Greensboro Fellows will soon begin taking applications for the fall of 2013.  Slippery ice, very thin, Pretty girl tumbles in, Saw a boy on the bank, Gave…

Read More

Would An Email Be Helpful?

Did you know you can get The Young Life Leader Blog posts sent to you by email every time a new one is published? Just enter your email address below. Enter your email address:

Read More