"Too Much Preaching & Too Little Mentoring!"

 Recently, I was in a thread asking what a new College Minister needed to know or do.  I commented something on the lines of "Too much preaching and too little Mentoring".  Some of my friends laughed and said that was so me.  I have confessed previously to liking big crowds....never had a crowd as big as I had hoped for.  But, I also believe the most transformative thing we can do in college ministry is meet one to one with students.  It is not a choice between big crowds and one to one.  It has to be a mix of both.

Recently, a friend told me his church College Minister spent twenty hours a week working on his talk/message for his Wednesday night large group event.  I think my friend was partly asking if this was the norm. I certainly will not claim to know what every College Minister does.  If that College Minister works forty hours a week (and none I know work only forty), that would be half of his working time.  If he works sixty hours a week, that is a third of his time.

I have a friend who is pastor of a fairly large church and who is known for being a really good preacher.  The church has doubled since he has been there, so I would say his preaching is not hurting the situation.  I asked him how much time he spent each week prepping his Sunday morning sermon.  He said, he lays out his whole year at a weekend retreat.  Then, he spends eight to ten hours each week on his message. 

I have shared previously that I think there has developed an over emphasis on College Ministers being speaker/preachers.  Some of the best College Ministers I know and who lead large college ministries are not speaker/preachers.  I am all about a College Minister speaking at the large group event, if that is a plus to the ministry.  I do not know how good of a speaker/preacher my friend's College Minister is, but I will say that I think he is out of proportion in his time as to what will affect and bring about life change and life long discipleship in the most students.  Large group events speak to the lives of those who would never meet with us one to one and we would never have time to meet with all of them one to one. 

This is not a statement that College Ministers should not speak at their large group event.  Rather, it is a strong belief of mine, that we cannot let it be the engine that drives the whole ministry in terms of the time we spend on it.

Some Suggestions to Consider if it takes a significant amount of your time to prep to speak:

-Speak once or twice a month.

-Speak a month and then have someone do a series for the next month.

-Ask one of your students to speak once a month or have two or three "share their story".

-Do a significant amount of study and prep in the summer and Christmas Break that will cut down your prep time when students are on campus.

-Get honest with yourself as to whether speaking/preaching is one of your gifts.  It is ok, if it is not.

How many hours a week do you spend meeting one to one with students or leading a small group Discipleship Group?  How does that compare to your prep time?  So, what do you think?

Could your college ministry be reaching more students?  Check out Reaching MORE College Students:  Next Level College Ministry, at Amazon.com/dp/B0BMW8NPMN.