Continuing Education for Youth Pastors and Sunday School Teachers

As a youth leader, volunteer youth leader, or youth pastor, continuing education is a must.
Your personal spiritual growth should never stop.
I recommend you always have a book read in progress.
Here are my book recommendations for Christian youth leaders.

Encountering the Old Testament, Third Edition: A Christian Survey

By Bill T. Arnold & Bryan E. Beyer / Baker Academic

This widely-used survey of the Old Testament is a must-have for students of the Bible. Updated with a new interior design, Encountering the Old Testament covers a wide array of topics in an innovative style enhanced by photographs, maps, illustrations, sidebars, learning objectives, chapter outlines, study questions, and further reading recommendations. Includes free online access to supplemental resources.

This is a course textbook from Colorado Christian University. It will give you a college level education on the Old Testament and it’s not boring.

These two books, How To Read The Bible for All It’s Worth, and How To Read The Bible Book By Book both by Gordon Fee and Douglas Stuart, are used as text books by Colorado Christian University, and highly recommended in the book Encountering the Old Testament. They are not huge boring books. You’ll find them fascinating. They will transform your ability to teach with authority overnight.

How to Read the Bible for All Its Worth

By Gordon D. Fee & Douglas Stuart / Zondervan

Enjoy God’s Word to the fullest! This classic reader-friendly manual, How to Read the Bible for All Its Worth, Fourth Edition, explains the different kinds of biblical literature – such as prophecy, Gospels, poetry, and history – so you can get the most from them.

The revised fourth edition includes updated language for today’s generation of readers, a new preface, bracketed Scripture references, and redesigned diagrams.

Covering everything from translational concerns to different genres of biblical writing, How to Read the Bible for All Its Worth is used worldwide. In clear, simple language, it helps you accurately understand the different parts of the Bible—their meaning for ancient audiences and their implications for you today—so you can uncover the inexhaustible worth that is in God’s Word.

How to Read the Bible Book by Book: A Guided Tour

By Gordon D. Fee & Douglas Stuart / Zondervan

Reading the Bible need not be a haphazard journey through strange and bewildering territory. Like an experienced tour guide, How to Read the Bible Book by Book takes you by the hand and walks you through the Scriptures.

For each book of the Bible, the authors start with a quick snapshot, then expand the view to help you better understand its key elements and how it fits into the grand narrative of the Bible.

Written by two top evangelical scholars, this survey is designed to get you actually reading the Bible knowledgeably and understanding it accurately.

In an engaging, conversational style, Dr. Gordon Fee and Dr. Douglas Stuart take you through a given book of the Bible using their unique, progressive approach. Features include:

Orienting Data: concise info bytes that form a thumbnail of the book
Overview: a brief panorama that introduces key concepts, themes, and important landmarks in the book
Specific Advice for Reading: pointers for accurately understanding the details and message of the book in context with the circumstances surrounding its writing
A Walk Through: the actual section-by-section tour that helps you see both the larger landscape of the book and how its various parts work together to form the whole.

If you only read one more book make it this one:

OK, just one more study book recommendation, again another Colorado Christian University textbook:
(don’t let any attitude or prejudice about universities, or pride get in your way of reading these books)

Encountering the New Testament: A Historical and Theological Survey

By Walter A. Elwell & Robert W. Yarbrough / Baker Academic

Studying the New Testament can be an exciting–and yet–intimidating experience. Encountering the New Testament is a dynamic survey designed to engage the reader’s mind and immerse them fully in the New Testament–thereby making study of the New Testament maximally exciting-and yet-highly informative.

Now in its Third Edition, Walter Elwell and Robert Yarbrough’s exemplary and award-winning text draws on the knowledge and pedagogical wisdom of two experienced classroom teachers. It offers students a well-rounded comprehensive survey of the New Testament: and to professors a reliable text with cross-denominational appeal and fully up-to-date scholarship and an entirely new interior design.

Luke 7:47 “Therefore, I tell you, her many sins have been forgiven—for she loved much.

But he who has been forgiven little loves little.” (NIV)

Have you ever felt like you want to love Jesus more? Read Dr. Larry Crabb’s book, Inside Out. It will really change the way you view sin and forgiveness. You will grow in your depth of gratitude towards Jesus.

Inside Out

By Dr. Larry Crabb / NavPress

You don’t have to pretend you have it all together—when you don’t! Dr. Crabb’s bestseller encourages you to take an honest look at your innermost struggles and bring them before God. Only then can you be set free from them, and experience a truly fulfilling Christian life. This anniversary edition includes a new preface and final chapter. Includes a 12 week study guide at the back of the book.

Do Hard Things: A Teenage Rebellion Against Low Expectations

by Alex & Brett Harris.

This is a book by two remarkable teenagers who debunk the idea held by many adults, and believed by teens, that the years of a person life age 13 to 19 are the least productive. I actually heard a 7th grade teacher (who is now a youth pastor!) say this. How can we possibly expect our youth to excel if we believe this of them.

Hear Alex and Brett explain their opposing thoughts with this video:

Do Hard Things: A Teenage Rebellion Against Low Expectations

By Alex & Brett Harris / Multnomah Books

Teen years: preparation for life or permission to loaf? Popular Christian writers online, twins Alex and Brett have sparked a growing movement of young people who rebel against their culture’s low expectations.

Choosing to “do hard things” for God’s glory, they present compelling strategies for long-term fulfillment and eternal impact!

Youth Pastor Continuing Education must never stop

John Osborn (ministerial secretary and director of continuing education for ministry in the Pacific Union Conference at the time this article was written) writes:

“The minister is constantly called upon to face new conditions and problems demanding fresh knowledge and increased skill. Often he faces an active, aggressive, highly educated laity. [These people] sometimes challenge the preacher more than he challenges them. They want him to update himself. They want increased performance, better preaching, more efficient pastoral care, and greater capability in running church organization. In fact, I firmly believe that the minister is expected to do more things, and do them well, than is any other professional.”

Shattered Dreams: God’s Unexpected Path to Joy

By Larry Crabb

If God loves us, why is life so painful? Exploring the biblical account of Naomi, Crabb explains how God longs to awaken his children to the dream beneath the rubble of tragedy—changing lives for good and forever. Ideal for small groups, this edition includes a workbook to help you dig deeper.

I used information from this book to write the Teen Bible Lesson Conviction or Condemnation

Learn Before You Leap: 100 Case Studies for Youth Pastor

By Kevin Turner / Zondervan
Learn Before You Leap: 100 Case Studies for Youth Pastors is a collection of 101 case studies designed to help youth workers grow. By employing a “problem centered” learning strategy, this book gives new and experienced youth workers a chance to consider and discuss the kinds of real-life situations you’ll face in the ministry. This book provides opportunities to think carefully about how you’ll respond to particular issues that arise in youth ministry, and sets the context for discussing these solutions with colleagues and mentors.

The case studies are divided into six sections for easy reference:

So, You Want to be a Youth Worker.
Music, Media, and the Message
Dealing with difficult issues
The Bible, Theology, and Christian Education
Recreation, Retreats and Road Trips
Worship, Prayer, and Evangelism

Each case study includes a fully developed interview worksheet on the given topic-appropriate to a formal classroom setting, an online threaded discussion, an informal youth ministry network lunch, a one-on-one internship discussion over coffee, or an individual reading.