The goal of "Welcome to Student Ministry" is to post interviews that help guide both new and experienced student pastors toward faithful ministry over many years. This eleventh interview (and first one since February of 2020) in this series is with Aaron Swain. Aaron serves as the pastor of students and operations at Freedom Church in Lincolnton North Carolina!
1. Tell our readers some background information about how long you have been in student ministry, how you started, and anything else that you think would be useful.
This year marks twenty-two years since I first served in student ministry in a local church.
My love for student ministry began in the early 2000s, when I was a freshman in high school with a student pastor who loved me and invested in me. Our student ministry was a safe place for my friends and me to study the Bible, ask questions, and learn to live out our faith. I loved it.
It was then that I began to aspire to serve in pastoral ministry. My local church encouraged that and allowed me to take on some unofficial leadership roles while I was still in high school. In 2004, during the summer after my freshman year in college, my pastor invited me back to lead the student ministry for the summer, and again the next summer. Leading the student ministry during those two summers was invaluable. I was able to learn, lead, and make inevitable mistakes (and I did!) in a context where people genuinely loved me and wanted the best for me.
2. How has your view of youth ministry changed from when you started to now?
Since the beginning of my ministry to students, I wanted student ministry to be deeply theological and deeply relational. That has not changed at all, though I have certainly grown in my own theological depth.
However, my teaching style has shifted in emphasis. My earlier teaching philosophy would have been almost entirely expository, focusing on a single biblical text. This would have paralleled most of the preaching our students received from the worship service on Sunday morning. More recently, I have shifted my focus to doctrinal, theological, and biblical teaching. Even with this shift, we always have Bibles open, seeking to examine the Scriptures faithfully.
You can think of it like this: As our students get to take a microscope to Scripture on Sunday mornings with the gathered church, I try to complement that by zooming out to see the big picture when we gather on Wednesday evening. Over the past few years, we have studied historic Christian orthodoxy by examining the Apostles’ Creed, the Lord’s Prayer, and soon we will study the Ten Commandments. These studies start with broad, doctrinal concepts, but they always drive us to the text.
3. Share one of your favorite student ministry moments.
My favorite student ministry moment was seeing two students completely consumed with making disciples. After I spent some time discipling them, they, in turn, began seeking out students in our church to disciple. They not only began meeting with these students to teach them the Bible, but they also opened their lives to them. They ate meals together, spent time together, and grew to love one another.
Eventually, each of those students came to faith in Jesus and was baptized. It was an amazing display of how a student ministry can become a place where hospitality, evangelism, and discipleship can flourish.
4. Share one of your least favorite ministry moments
That one time I did a lock-in. #neveragain
5. What resources do you find helpful to use in student ministry?
There are two resources that I have found especially helpful in my student ministry.
The first is the ministry of 9Marks. Though you may be surprised at this answer, I think it makes sense. Student ministries, at least in my experience, can unintentionally (and sometimes intentionally) pit themselves against the local church. Sometimes they function as siloed ministries apart from the local church. Sometimes they try to compete with the local church, setting themselves up as more relevant than what happens on Sunday mornings. 9Marks has taught me that the local church is primary, and therefore, it is my responsibility as a student pastor to help students see the beauty and centrality of the local church.
The second helpful resource is Youth Pastor Theologian. This ministry is a welcome oasis in what seems to be a desert of pragmatic or theologically weak student ministry resources. Their curriculum is excellent, their articles are timely, and Mike McGarry has done a wonderful job writing books that serve student pastors well.
6. What is one or two things that you do to make sure that you do so that you don’t burn out as a youth pastor?
First of all, I’ve learned that it’s perfectly fine to include rhythms of rest in your student ministry calendar. Our student ministry takes off the week before Christmas through the first week of the new year. It’s good for your own soul to rest, and it’s also a way to love your volunteers who labor throughout the year.
Similarly, your student ministry does not need an event for every holiday on the calendar. Save some holidays to spend with the rest of your church family, with your wife and kids, and with friends. Kids in the student ministry can celebrate New Year's and July 4th without you. I promise they’ll survive.
The second thing I do to avoid burnout is commit to hobbies and rhythms that ground you as a person and as a disciple of Jesus outside your job. I have found renewed joy in exercising and walking, listening to audiobooks and podcasts, cooking (especially smoking delicious meats), and writing.
7. What advice would you give to yourself when you started as a youth pastor if you could go back to that time?
1. Read your Bible and pray. Don’t neglect this.
2. Exercise and pay attention to your health. Ministry in general, and youth ministry in particular, can be bad for your health. Pizza and Mountain Dew are fun in your twenties, but it will come back to bite you.
3. Prioritize safety. Background checks, abuse prevention training, the two-adult rule, and other best practices for child safety were never taught to me as a young student minister. You need to familiarize yourself with these things, implement them, prioritize them, and insist that your ministry be a safe place for minors.
4. Invest in leaders. You can’t – and you shouldn’t – do it alone. Let Ephesians 4:1-16 undergird your philosophy of ministry. Your ministry is temporary, so start now by training your replacement, even if you end up being a lifer like me.
5. Be an encourager. My personality can be described as a Seinfeld-ian sarcasm. I often express affection by playfully teasing. It was the primary love language in my house growing up. But not everyone understands that, and it can be received as unloving and unkind. I’ve had to learn to switch sarcasm into encouraging words – the words I’ve always believed but not always plainly communicated.Everyone’s struggling with something, so speak to them accordingly.
Thank you, Aaron, for taking time to answer these questions. In coming weeks I will post our 12th edition of "Welcome to Student Ministry."
