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🕰️TIMECODES
00:00 Retreat Games that Extend the whole Weekend
02:21 Exploring the Game Show 'The Floor'
05:17 Adapting 'The Floor' for Retreats
08:07 Randomization and Contestant Selection
10:40 Categories and Audience Participation
12:13 Prizes and Momentum Building
14:17 Logistics and Setup Tips
17:01 Category Hacks
19:43 Did Jay really just do that?!
21:50 Next-Level Set-up Hacks
25:15 Final Thoughts and Encouragement

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TRANSCRIPT
Nick Clason (00:01.075)
Alright, what's up everyone? I'm here with my friend Jay. Jay, how we doing this morning, bro?

Jay Reynolds (00:07.379)
Man, I'm good, I'm good. It's almost, it's looking like it might want to snow outside. So I might figure out some, hanging in some snow later.

Nick Clason (00:15.672)
Doesn't snow a lot in Raleigh? Like is that a thing that you deal with very often?

Jay Reynolds (00:20.085)
No, really never. it basically I'm from the north and I've lived down here if you spill a cup of ice They shut the schools down. It's so it's yeah. It's a big deal around here

Nick Clason (00:22.424)
Ha

Nick Clason (00:28.62)
Yeah. Yeah, yeah, yeah. That's, mean, certainly that's how it goes in Texas as well. But I'm with you. I'm also from the North. So I know what it was like, but the more years I'm here, like the more I'm forgetting, you know what I mean? Like, I'm like, man, it's cold, you know? And I was back home Thanksgiving, during, you know, in Minnesota in November. It was cold. It was a cold experience. And they're like, you're from here. And I'm like, not anymore. So.

Jay Reynolds (00:56.969)
Yeah, yeah. My in-laws live in Buffalo, and so I just recently spent Thanksgiving in Buffalo. yeah, 20, know, 24 degrees and a wind blowing feels like, you know, seven, you know? And yeah, so.

Nick Clason (00:58.149)
Ha ha!

Nick Clason (01:02.652)
yeah.

Nick Clason (01:07.808)
Yeah, dude. Well, I appreciate you hopping on. I posted a thing in the DIY and Facebook group asking for like retreat games and things that kind of like you could go back to. And you responded with a comment about like you tried to emulate a game show called The Floor. that what it's called? All right. So for people like me who who don't know what you're talking about, like explain this game show to me like I'm a five year old.

Jay Reynolds (01:29.119)
yeah, yeah, yeah.

Jay Reynolds (01:36.501)
Yeah. Okay. Wonderful. So, um, it's a game show. I watch it on Hulu. I don't know which network technically has it. Um, but on Hulu it's, uh, Rob Lowe is the host and it's called the floor. And it's basically, I mean, it's, it's a nice floor setup. It's like all led, whatever. And basically the floors is made up of a hundred boxes. And for the game show, every box, so a hundred people have like their specialty category. Maybe it's like,

Star Wars characters, you know, or maybe it's like cereal brands or maybe it's like college football teams in the SEC. I don't know. Like it's just everybody comes with their specialty and what you need to do is you basically challenge somebody, you know, it's like it's randomized, you know, it's one to a hundred and it's like, say it lands on, you know, 49 and say their category is cats, you know, and they get to choose who do they want to challenge.

and their box 49 is connected to a bunch of other boxes. And so they basically challenge somebody and let's say they challenge somebody it's bridges. I don't know. I'm just making stuff up here, right? But it's just all random categories and then they go up to the front and they challenge. And what the challenge looks like is there's basically a picture on the screen and they just have to guess what it is. So it's pretty simple kind of trivia.

Nick Clason (02:46.264)
K-E-A-A.

Nick Clason (02:58.071)
Hmm.

Jay Reynolds (03:00.885)
And now in the game show they have like each contestant, know when they're battling they have 45 seconds And so if they're like thinking a lot of time like, you know, what is that? Like their own 45 seconds is kind of like going down on the clock think of like when you play chess There's like that like your own time clock So that's how it's played in the game You know on the game show And when I saw that I was like, man, I think I could play that

Nick Clason (03:19.51)
Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Nick Clason (03:24.791)
Okay.

Jay Reynolds (03:28.985)
in like a retreat weekend, you know? And so now I have asked multiple times, Nick, with my leadership, can I get an LED floor so that I could really play this game? And of course, what do you think my answer I got is?

Nick Clason (03:31.105)
Yeah.

Nick Clason (03:41.623)
Yeah.

They probably were like if we had the budget yes, but right now You know the Lord hasn't blessed our our church with the funds to do an LED floor. That'd be my guess

Jay Reynolds (03:52.234)
Yeah.

That's you are 100 % correct. You're 100 % correct. So, so thinking so since I was not, you know, recipient of a blessing of an LED floor, but I still had this, this gumption to want to play this game. So I figured it out. I was like, okay, I can't do a hundred. Like, you know, in programming, you know, there's programming, you're like, man, that game would be a banger, but it might be like three hours long. And it's just like, do I have that amount of time? No, but

Nick Clason (04:04.811)
Right.

Nick Clason (04:20.247)
Yeah.

Jay Reynolds (04:24.181)
What I decided to do is how can I make it manageable and reproducible in my context? And so when we go off to retreat with middle schoolers, we take over a whole campground and we basically use a gym. We convert the gym to like our main auditorium. And so what I did is just use some painter's tape and I created boxes on the ground, basically built a frame and then did 16 boxes.

Nick Clason (04:29.645)
Yeah.

Nick Clason (04:37.006)
Mm-hmm.

Nick Clason (04:46.445)
Okay.

Jay Reynolds (04:51.393)
And so basically I narrowed down 16 categories. And in that, what I did was I just chose simple categories, just like I mentioned before, simple ones that middle schoolers would want to get into, know, thinking through food, snacks, know, common pop culture type stuff, things that the whole crowd will get into. And so basically what I did was like, okay, 16 boxes, I can do about four, five questions per round and kind of see how it goes.

Nick Clason (04:54.604)
Yeah.

Nick Clason (05:04.758)
Right, right, right.

Nick Clason (05:19.085)
Yeah.

Jay Reynolds (05:20.987)
Originally when I played it, I was like, okay, I'm just going to pick 16 kids. It's going to be the same 16 kids. You know, when I start the game, what I mentioned is once you win against somebody else, then you take over their box. Right. So in 16 boxes, if you're number 16 and you play against someone who's 15, now you take over their category, right? And, and there's one less person they get kicked out. and then your goal is to take over the whole floor.

Nick Clason (05:34.673)
gotcha, okay.

Nick Clason (05:44.877)
Yeah.

Nick Clason (05:50.922)
Right, gotcha, okay, interesting, that's fun. Totally, yeah. So, you take over the cat, I've been looking it up here while you've been talking, like the setup on the game show looks amazing. So, I can imagine how you can set up 16, how do you, in a retreat type setting, how do you determine your 16 contestants?

Jay Reynolds (05:53.097)
Yeah. Does that make sense? Yeah.

Jay Reynolds (06:13.577)
Yeah, so completely random, you know? And what I really did was I just randomized and just picked 16 kids. I mean, some ways that you could do that. And so I would suggest 16 because it's an easy multiple, right? You can do four questions each time and you can carry it through, say, a typical retreat. Maybe there's four main sessions. You know, you could play around with that. If you only have three sessions that maybe you do nine or do some type of multiple of that.

Nick Clason (06:16.824)
Yeah.

Nick Clason (06:26.732)
Right.

Nick Clason (06:41.346)
Right, right, right.

Jay Reynolds (06:42.005)
But I would say in a typical four sessions, four questions is pretty good and you get the crowd all into it. But how to pick kids. Here's what I originally thought. I would just pick 16 kids and the same kids that were in their box on Friday night would be the same kids playing throughout. But as I thought about it, in my retreat, we had a couple hundred kids and I was like, how should I do this? So.

Nick Clason (06:58.862)
Mmm.

Nick Clason (07:04.503)
Right, right, right.

Jay Reynolds (07:07.475)
I just completely randomized it. It was kind of like a game day decision. And the only people that stayed was if they won out. So Friday night, whoever won, you know, now they had like the large and basically what does it mean to win on like the first session for question? There's 16 boxes. They didn't take over the whole floor, but whoever has the largest section, right? So it's four questions. So it's just like, if they have three, you know, they own like three other boxes, you know,

Nick Clason (07:10.935)
Yeah.

Nick Clason (07:15.63)
Mmm.

Jay Reynolds (07:37.481)
then they have the largest section, they win. And so I would give some type of prize for the night. And the way that the show works is they would do like eight or nine boxes, you know, and you win. And whoever has the most boxes like connected, you know, the largest area on the floor, they would win like a high dollar prize. Right. So I just mimic that. And I was like, here's like tons of candy to like go back in your cabin, that type of thing. And so there was intrigued to win for that night.

Nick Clason (07:41.558)
Ahem.

Nick Clason (07:55.98)
Right, right.

Jay Reynolds (08:06.557)
or that session, even if you don't win the overall. Does that make sense? Yeah.

Nick Clason (08:06.657)
Right.

Nick Clason (08:10.412)
Yeah, yeah. So, okay, so and then you're randomizing, you're calling up a couple contestants to go head to head and then are you just asking like trivia questions to them back and forth or like where are you sourcing your questions from?

Jay Reynolds (08:26.709)
Yeah, great question. So what I did is out of 16, I built like basically in Pro Presenter, I built 16 categories and it's all picture related. And so behind them, there's a big old screen, you know, and let's just say it was a serials, you know, like cereal, like, and so they just have to guess, oh, that's Reese Puffs, that's Honey Nut Cheerios. And what I did instead of like, playing like chess, how the game show is like each has your own 45 seconds. It's a whole lot to manage.

Nick Clason (08:38.829)
Yeah.

Nick Clason (08:43.095)
Right.

Nick Clason (08:56.385)
Yeah.

Jay Reynolds (08:56.629)
I just put one timer up and so I flipped a little bit of the game show and I made it whoever has the most correct in 45 seconds. And I encourage high crowd participation, right? And so like the kids up there and you know sometimes a kid would get a little bit of stage fright and they're like, oh, I know what that is. That is definitely, you know, Lucky Charms, but I can't, I just can't think of what the name is, but the whole crowd's yelling Lucky Charms, you know?

Nick Clason (09:01.912)
Gotcha.

Nick Clason (09:06.229)
Okay.

Nick Clason (09:10.37)
There you go.

Nick Clason (09:14.733)
Right?

Nick Clason (09:25.599)
Right.

Jay Reynolds (09:26.365)
And so it keeps the whole crowd engaged while at the same time, know, so, you know, a good game, I believe it's just like, it's not just for the contestants on stage, but it gets the whole crowd also into it.

Nick Clason (09:29.41)
Yeah.

Nick Clason (09:37.87)
Yeah, and I love that, that you encourage crowd participation rather than try to stifle it because then that makes, that means everyone in the room is able to join in and participate. And yeah, it's not just for the people up there. It's beautiful.

Jay Reynolds (09:42.441)
Yeah. Yeah.

Jay Reynolds (09:48.944)
Yeah. Yep. Yeah. And that's where a lot of the prizes, I tried to make them like, maybe there was like, actually, I think that's the year I gave away like some panda hats and like, so I may have like made like a panda shirt or something. That was kind of our little subtle branding. And so that just kind of went with it. It was like, oh, this was for you, but it's also paired with like five bags of candy to share with your cabin. You know what I mean? And so.

Nick Clason (09:59.468)
Okay.

Nick Clason (10:05.015)
Right.

Nick Clason (10:12.192)
Nice, yeah. So there's more incentive for the people in the crowd. Like if their buddy's up there, they might get to, yeah, that's awesome.

Jay Reynolds (10:16.915)
Yep. Exactly. Yeah. You know, and so that just cries a call a lot of crowd participation. Here's what I didn't expect, but something awesome that happened. So in 45 seconds, you know, you sometimes go into it thinking like, this game is going to be great. This kid's going to get like eight. This kid may get seven, like clear winner. That didn't always happen. Like this kid got eight. This other kid got eight. Time ended. Now I'm like in the moment, like, well, what do I do? Right.

Nick Clason (10:26.519)
Yeah.

Nick Clason (10:36.173)
Yeah.

Nick Clason (10:41.165)
Mmm.

Nick Clason (10:44.801)
Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Jay Reynolds (10:45.649)
And so, so here's what I did. Like I'll just give a little secret sauce so you don't have to think through it if you play this. And so I just like, okay, you guys tie. How do we end this? And so I basically just put my hand out and you know, and then for the contestants hand behind the back, you know, go to the next one, the first one, you know, high five and answer correctly. Then they got to choose and that was created in the whole, like the whole room, like this anticipation who's going to get it, you know?

Nick Clason (10:51.308)
Yeah.

Nick Clason (11:07.362)
Yeah they win.

Nick Clason (11:13.527)
Yeah.

Jay Reynolds (11:14.173)
And then it's like the one kid that happened to and they guessed they were so confident and they got it wrong, you know? But then the other kid got it, right? And it just creates like kind of like this little bit of storybook kind of ending whenever they tie. And so it just works, you know, pretty well.

Nick Clason (11:20.758)
Yeah, dude

Nick Clason (11:27.297)
Yeah.

Nick Clason (11:30.7)
Yeah dude, that's awesome. Okay so, a kid wins the majority of the board Friday night. So Saturday morning let's say, you come back to play it again. You're getting random contestants. Now if someone was on the board but they weren't selected or they weren't eliminated, did you swap them out with new contestants? So you just had the people who like, so like one carryover from Friday night and then everyone else was new?

Jay Reynolds (11:37.78)
Yes.

Jay Reynolds (11:52.467)
Yep.

Nick Clason (12:00.672)
on the board on Saturday? Is that how you handled it? Okay, great.

Jay Reynolds (12:03.285)
That's how I handled it, right? And so some of that, you know, sometimes when you play a game, it's like, oh yeah, that kid, you know, gets participated, but somebody wins before they get there, right? And it's just like, it's kind of that concept. And you know, what, what I had a little bit of the workflow is that every kid who had a box, I gave them basically like piece of paper. I'm number one, two, you know, whatever their number was that went with the box. And so that also helped for, you know, like in the moment there's all these kids around. It's like, oh, it,

Nick Clason (12:23.18)
Right, right, right, yeah. Right.

Jay Reynolds (12:32.445)
chose number 12, you know, to be able to cue the folks in the back and be able to set up Prober Center, everything correctly. It was like, we got number 12, you know, coming on up, you know? And, and so it's like while they're traveling, it's able to kind of like cue some of the tech team. So they're able to get the next things all set up. But with that, it was all new kids. Like if you want now when it come to Saturday night and Sunday morning,

Nick Clason (12:44.834)
Yeah, yeah.

Nick Clason (12:49.656)
Right.

Jay Reynolds (12:58.471)
If you won Friday night, you were still on the board, you know, unless you lost, you know? And so, so it is basically kind of like you win, you get to stay in the game and earn the right to keep going.

Nick Clason (13:01.186)
Right. Right, right, right.

Nick Clason (13:08.04)
Yeah. Yeah, I think that part's really cool. So did you have a kid make it all the way through or did like a winner from Friday end up getting eliminated on Saturday and you kind of kept daisy chaining it all the way to the end?

Jay Reynolds (13:20.529)
I think it was... We may have had, at least a Saturday night, we have Friday winter and Saturday morning winter into it. I can't remember Sunday morning. May have had a couple. Because we didn't play it this year, we played it last year. And so I'm a little bit of a year plus removed from like into it. But it just created a cool environment. But also like some of the dynamics, let's say like it was number 15, they beat 16, they beat, you know...

Nick Clason (13:29.966)
Okay, that's cool. That's cool.

Nick Clason (13:35.134)
Yeah, yeah. Right.

Jay Reynolds (13:49.253)
14, you know, and they had like their pocket, like all the way on the end. Well, the next day we showed up, it was, um, Hey, do you want to like play or do you want to kind of go back and just like sit in your leg little area? And so that's kind of where like, we'll just sit in our area. Okay. Let's throw up a randomizer. What do we get next? Number two, right? They're almost the other side of the floor. And so, you know, it may have been like, Oh, you didn't win, you know, or you didn't play that day or that, that session.

Nick Clason (13:52.631)
Right.

Nick Clason (14:01.506)
Right.

Nick Clason (14:11.555)
Right?

Nick Clason (14:18.454)
Yeah, to win, but you survived because you weren't on that part of the floor. I get it.

Jay Reynolds (14:20.989)
Exactly. So some of that, and if you watch the game show, that's how like people will play. Like, I won like three rounds. I have a small little section, but I'm like in an aisle. I'm like all the way in the corner. Maybe it's better. go back and then, know, but it's also like, I'm playing for the category, right? Now let me talk a little bit about categories, you know, cause I, I chose all that myself, the game show, like you, you go in saying, this is my category. And it's like, you're almost like,

Nick Clason (14:33.986)
Yeah.

Nick Clason (14:41.399)
Okay, yeah.

Jay Reynolds (14:49.393)
You're bringing category to the game show.

Nick Clason (14:52.01)
Yeah, like that's you're an expert in that category is how it works on the game show you're saying

Jay Reynolds (14:54.835)
Yeah. Yes. But in my context, I don't know. And I'm like, to keep things to be able to be randomized, I was basically like, here's your category. You are now an expert. You know, like you are now an expert on dogs, you know, or you are now an expert on fruit, you know, you are now in and it was all common stuff that's in their world. And so so instead of it being as eclectic as what you might experience, like watching the game show, as I just made it more actually slide on the side of common.

Nick Clason (15:01.859)
Mm-hmm.

Gotcha, okay, cool, cool, cool.

Right.

Nick Clason (15:14.296)
Right.

Nick Clason (15:20.429)
Sure.

Jay Reynolds (15:23.477)
and that most people are going to know what it is, right? Because when you think through audience engagement, actually, the more eclectic it gets, the more you minimize participation, right? And so in this context, it's like playing other games, like if you play um or pie in the face type games, it's like you actually want some of those topics that people are going to know.

Nick Clason (15:28.417)
Right.

Mm-hmm.

Nick Clason (15:36.302)
100%, yeah.

Jay Reynolds (15:49.353)
you know, car brands, type of thing, know, shoe brands, you know, like some of those things. And it just creates a higher engagement, which ends up being a better experience for the entire audience.

Nick Clason (15:51.586)
Yeah.

Nick Clason (15:59.982)
Yeah, okay, so one like just last little point of clarification I have is when you get two contestants, do you have them bounce back and forth like you say a carb brand, I say a carb brand until the one person can't remember or do you give them each 45 seconds and they have to list as many as they can and then the other person goes.

Jay Reynolds (16:18.355)
Yeah, no, great question. in using the slides, you know, and for us, we had a screen right behind us. So it's easy for them to see, easy for the whole crowd to see that type of thing. And it was basically like a, you know, person A is person B. So A, know, it's just like, that's let's say it's animals like, that's a panda, you know, next person, person B. that's a, that's an eagle person A. that's a dolphin. You know, that's a shark, you know.

Nick Clason (16:30.843)
yeah, that's right.

Nick Clason (16:41.366)
Okay. Gotcha. So it's not like a speed thing against him. It's like, person A, this slide is yours and you either get it or you don't. Got it. Okay. Cool, cool,

Jay Reynolds (16:50.517)
Yes. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. And it's like, if it takes you a second, know, like animals is pretty easy, you know, but, know, when you get into like, and I think like for, was it like cereals? I may have had a picture of the cereal. I may have had the box and kind of canvad out the name of it or something like that, but make it so it's recognizable. But you're like, it takes you a minute or not a minute, but it takes you a few moments to think about it. You know, the overall timer was 45 seconds.

Nick Clason (17:06.71)
Right, right.

Jay Reynolds (17:17.053)
and was just whoever got the most correct, but it was just back and forth, back and forth, that type of thing. Yeah.

Nick Clason (17:19.286)
Yeah.

That's awesome. I love it. Okay. Now you told me when we were texting back and forth, like, do you still have the purpose under file? Like, is that something that, that, you could get and we could give to people who are listening? Yeah, that'd be amazing.

Jay Reynolds (17:34.581)
Dude, I'd love to, you know? And so, yeah, and I use ProPresenter and so, you know, it's all built in ProPresenter, but I, man, I think it's all built in folders. So if you don't use, you know, if somebody's listening and they wanna try it out, I think I have folders that are all like the images. And I built, I built the floor off 16, but I built like two other categories. So if like something happened, like they, or something glitches, you know, things like that. So I think I technically built like.

Nick Clason (17:51.714)
Yeah.

Nick Clason (18:01.27)
Right, you gotta fall back, yeah. Okay.

Jay Reynolds (18:03.317)
18 categories. But man, I would gladly share it, you know.

Nick Clason (18:07.818)
Yeah, that'd be super cool. Yeah, so we'll get that from you and we'll link it down below. I think the thing I like the most about this is that you can make this the game for your D now, your winter retreat, your fall retreat, whatever, and you can just go back to it. And as opposed to every session, let's say you got four sessions over the course of a weekend, you don't have to come up with four things. This thing carries you all weekend long.

the more they know it or get to understand the rules of it, by the end of it, the hype level is probably gonna be raising every single time they do it. So maybe Friday night, it's basic understanding and basic learning, but by the end of it, people get the rules, they're locked into it, and they're trying to carry home the ultimate floor champion moniker, if they get to take home that final prize or whatever.

I think those are some of my favorite styles of games, things that can just, that well that you can kind of keep going back to. And so that's what I love about it. And I did not understand it at all when we were texting. So as you've described it more, I'm more more into it. And even my wheels now are turning. I'm like, all right, we got a winter retreat coming up. Do we incorporate this? Or do we bring this with us to summer camp or something like that? Because this sounds super fun, super amazing. And just a great way to like,

build the competition and build the camaraderie.

Jay Reynolds (19:37.181)
Yeah. And I think, you know, that's exactly it, man. You know, and if you think through like and how we set it up, like I think we just set up like two or three, you know, or maybe it's like two blocks and just like right as a center aisle. But let's just talk a little bit about that. Like I use painter's tape so that way it's not messing with the floor at all. Super cheap. But then what I did to make it easier is like think through if you were playing like that, that kids like dock game, you have to build boxes.

Nick Clason (19:49.485)
Yeah.

Nick Clason (19:55.319)
Right, and cheap.

Nick Clason (20:05.709)
Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Jay Reynolds (20:06.451)
Yeah. So think of it in that a whole frame on the outside was just solid lines to be able to build it. But on the inside, it was all like, you know, just think through each box by itself, because then when you have some volunteers like, box eight takes over seven, you know, and now you pull that one strip between the two. Now, you know, it's all box eight, right? You know? And so that just makes it easier logistically, because if you run long strips,

Nick Clason (20:11.607)
Right.

Nick Clason (20:16.91)
Mm-hmm.

Nick Clason (20:26.163)
Mmm. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Nick Clason (20:32.558)
Totally.

Jay Reynolds (20:34.451)
like across multiple boxes on the interior, then like, now I have to like weirdly pick up like. Yeah, and that will be logistically, you know, that's like something like, I didn't think of it until I was in the in the in the situation. Now it's an issue is that think through like small like so the boxes say, you know, two or three feet wide, you know, just the interior pieces are all single pieces.

Nick Clason (20:40.788)
Yeah, cut it and yeah.

Nick Clason (20:50.124)
Right, yeah.

Nick Clason (20:59.852)
Yeah.

Jay Reynolds (21:00.393)
So it's a little bit longer to set up, not much, but a little bit longer to set up, but much easier for flow by game flow.

Nick Clason (21:08.046)
Yeah, I got you. Okay, so then, you know, seven overtakes eight. On Saturday morning, do you redraw, like, the seven box, or has seven still overtaken eight on Saturday morning for that morning's board? Does that make sense?

Jay Reynolds (21:24.713)
Yeah. Say seven takes over eight. And so now, yeah. And so basically your goal is to win the whole floor, you know? And so, ultimately, you know, and so now you get down to it is like, let's just say you winner keeps winning and they keep staying, they keep playing all this kind of stuff. And now you get down to it. They have 15 boxes, you know? And so let's just say it's one against number now, like let's say nine that won everything. One didn't.

Nick Clason (21:31.458)
The whole thing, yeah.

Nick Clason (21:40.097)
Mm-hmm.

Nick Clason (21:51.063)
Yeah.

Jay Reynolds (21:52.319)
play at all. And it's just the kid who just got in that day and they just sat and watched nine keep winning, keep winning. And they get up there and then one who's had no action the entire time. They beat this person who's won everything. It's like a David and glide style matchup. And then they win that round. They win it all, you know? And so that's the other thing. What's intriguing about it. It's like, you know, some games it's like, if you're, could have the sheer advantage.

Nick Clason (21:56.278)
Yeah. Yeah.

Nick Clason (22:09.918)
moment yeah yeah that's cool that's cool

Jay Reynolds (22:21.885)
or you keep winning and then now it like builds all this momentum. It's nice because it's almost, it's like there's neutralizers built into this game all the way throughout, you know? And it could just be like, just luck of the draw. Like, I don't know, I don't eat cereal. I only eat toast. Like I don't even know. And then that kid who's like, man, just sat, I randomly got chosen. You know, the kid who's like, man, I don't know it. I just eat cereal every day. I don't even know why I'm here, but I know this. And then I ended up winning everything, you know?

Nick Clason (22:29.238)
Yeah. Yeah.

Nick Clason (22:37.857)
you

Nick Clason (22:47.351)
Yeah.

Yeah, that's cool.

Jay Reynolds (22:50.813)
And so that's the cool thing that makes it so easy and fun and all that kind of stuff.

Nick Clason (22:57.43)
Yeah, that's amazing. Nice. All right, bro. That really does sound super fun, super cool. So any last final parting words about retreats or games or this game in particular before we hit stop and close out the recording?

Jay Reynolds (23:15.219)
Yeah, dude, I think the last thing I'd say as far as for playing this game, because it builds on itself, you know, think through, I think how I played it was Friday night. I think I only did three questions, you know, because of Friday night, you have the rules, you have all this kind of stuff and not just the rules for this game, but, know, just think through your retreat overall. What is all of it, you know, entail? And so, you know, we did maybe three questions and then that allowed us to choose which other session do we want to do five, you know?

Nick Clason (23:25.954)
Okay.

Nick Clason (23:33.197)
Right.

Jay Reynolds (23:43.517)
And so just think through some of that from a momentum standpoint on how you want to play it. The other thing from a momentum is let your, you know, your session prizes build. So Friday night, maybe it is like a, you know, hat in like two bags of candy, you know, but then Saturday morning, you know, I think we did prizes that like relate. We were going to do like some, some, I don't know, pool games and things like that. So we gave away like beach towels, you know,

Nick Clason (23:43.725)
Mm.

Nick Clason (23:47.447)
Mm-hmm.

Nick Clason (23:54.669)
Mmm.

Nick Clason (24:12.436)
Okay. Yeah.

Jay Reynolds (24:12.871)
and candy, right? And so it just kind of built and it just seemed that, you know, as the game builds, because it's over multiple sessions, that if you have budget and that's how you kind of ministry works, I would encourage you to think through, let your prizes build also, you know, and because that is just going to intuitively kind of go in with the whole game, you know, that type of thing. And so for me, my style is I always get other leaders involved, you know, small group leaders, things like that. I'm like, Hey, pick two kids to play, pick two kids to play.

Nick Clason (24:26.935)
Yeah.

Nick Clason (24:32.673)
yeah that makes sense

Nick Clason (24:40.8)
huh.

Jay Reynolds (24:42.687)
You know, and so, you know, that's how I help in the randomization, you know, but I'm getting other leaders involved in that process. That also helps like in a ministry. it's not like, Jay just picked his favorite kids to play to try to win, you know, well, no, I picked this leader and that lead, you know, and so it's like, I try to, so depending on how the structure is set up, getting other voices involved, help to take away like what could be speculation. Does that make sense? Yeah.

Nick Clason (25:04.513)
Mm-hmm.

Nick Clason (25:09.408)
Yeah, yeah, totally, totally. Yeah, I love it, man. Well, I, again, I appreciate your time. I thought this was a great conversation, great game. Like, and that one of the things I think is so, like interesting in the world of youth pastors, cause I did this too once where I was like watching a game show, you know, just at home with my wife and I was like,

I can make that into a game. You know what mean? And that's just the way our brain, we never turn off, we never stop thinking, we never stop ideating. And so I've never heard of this concept before, I've never even heard of this game show, but you're so right. It's a perfect youth ministry game and I love the fact that it can span the whole thing. And that's exactly what I was looking for, for all these different conversations, all these different ideas. And so again, really appreciate you hopping on and we'll throw the link to your.

Jay Reynolds (25:33.036)
yeah.

Never. Never.

Jay Reynolds (25:48.627)
Yeah. Yeah.

Nick Clason (25:57.634)
your files and stuff like that down below. really appreciate you giving that away and that'll be super helpful for anyone who wants to take it and run with it.

Jay Reynolds (26:05.683)
Yeah, feel free. And hey, if one of your listeners wants to try it out and they get a little confused or want to kind of process through a little bit more, dude, feel free. You know, they can reach out and connect me with them. I'd love to kind of just help walk alongside someone who's trying to, you know, trying something new in their context, trying something to see what it would work. And I hope for folks who try it.

Nick Clason (26:14.851)
Yeah.

Jay Reynolds (26:25.683)
Man, hope you end of the day, if you're gonna play game like this, it's just as much as you having fun with your kids, with your students having fun, because that's kind of the momentum that really builds and getting them all into it.

Nick Clason (26:36.364)
Yeah, perfect. All right, Jay. Well, I appreciate it, And everyone else, thanks for listening. And we'll talk again soon. See you.

Jay Reynolds (26:43.455)
Cool, great chat man, take care.

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🕰️TIMECODES
00:00 Meet My Boss & Friend, Darren Sutton
01:02 35 Years in 35 Seconds
04:10 Shocking Bar Raising Leader Strategy
05:33 What if Leaders Don’t Respond?
07:56 Start Recruiting Leaders from Scratch
19:33 How do you keep good leaders?
21:57 Conducting Leader Debriefs
25:45 A Complete List of Roles
31:20 Final Encouragement

--------------
TRANSCRIPT
Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry (00:01.036)
We've recorded so many podcasts together. I don't even know how I feel like we're supposed to Well, everyone here we are. I am with my boss, Darren Sutton, who has his youth ministry till I die shirt on, which I was wearing yesterday. So I'm glad that we coordinated this. But I wanted to get on here and I've been working for Darren now for five years, two different places.

Darren Sutton (00:04.982)
Welcome back.

Darren Sutton (00:20.691)
Thank you.

Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry (00:29.72)
And aside from having written a book, I would also say practically speaking, Darren has a lot to say about volunteers. But Darren, first, tell us a brief overview. Distill your 35-year youth ministry journey down to 35 seconds. But why in that did volunteers become such a thing for you?

Darren Sutton (00:53.484)
Yeah, I don't know if I can say that in 35 seconds, but I will say this. I was pretty much the Lone Ranger youth pastor who would just grab chaperones when I was absolutely desperate for adults to be in the room or whatever. I would have adults lead Bible study classes and go to summer camp with me and the stuff where you know you can't do everything, so you have them there. But I didn't realize the...

extent of needing people to carry the mission forward and to lean into their own calling until I was about maybe 10 years in and we were having our yeah we were having our third baby and my lead volunteer was like I can't do this and you need you need more people you're not doing this right so my wife basically was like listen you're you are

Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry (01:32.354)
Did something happen?

Darren Sutton (01:48.29)
fantastic and you have lots of adult leaders, but you're not equipping them for ministry. You're just having them hold down the pieces that you can't hold down and they have more to offer than that. And you're not, you're not giving them, you know, the runway to do that. And that changed everything. It totally transformed my whole philosophy about why we use volunteers and how we keep them and why that matters.

Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry (01:57.676)
Mmm. Mmm.

Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry (02:03.98)
Yeah. Yeah.

Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry (02:16.982)
Okay, so yeah, so like I would imagine that, you know, average youth pastor listening is like, you know, they have that mentality, right? The volunteers are a necessary like evil, I don't wanna say, you know, but like they just, know they have to have them. There you go. They're a necessary component, but maybe like, maybe they don't even know what to do with them.

Darren Sutton (02:36.088)
Component. Let's go with component. They're necessary component.

Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry (02:46.028)
You know what mean? like that, would imagine maybe some of that was your story too. Like maybe control a little bit, but also like, what do I even do with these guys? So yeah, so how did you, before we dive into kind of the recruiting conversation, how did you mentally release yourself and be able to trust that you could actually hand off like meaningful things to said volunteer?

Darren Sutton (02:53.294)
You worked for me, you know part of it was control.

Darren Sutton (03:13.89)
Yeah, great question. This, I mean, you know, this is gonna sound like a no brainer, but 25 years ago it wasn't. I started writing job descriptions and I just sat down and said, okay, if I was handing off deeper parts of this, or if the people who were already serving were gonna own it the way I wanted them to.

Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry (03:23.96)
Mm.

Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry (03:35.0)
Yeah.

Darren Sutton (03:37.58)
What did I want that to look like? Like, what did I want them to do? Part of the struggle is that I wasn't recruiting them to anything other than filling the spot and hanging out with kids. And so if I wanted them to be at football games and, you know, choir performances, and if I wanted them to be writing cards to kids who weren't there, and if I wanted them to be reaching out to parents on the regular and all that, I needed to spell that out, and I hadn't done that. And so I was doing all that part, and they were just showing up.

Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry (03:46.978)
Mm-hmm.

Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry (04:01.261)
Mm.

Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry (04:05.622)
Yeah.

Darren Sutton (04:05.866)
And as soon as I kind of raised the bar and said, here's what I really need you to be doing in this role. If you love Jesus and love students and you want to make an eternal impact, it looks like this. It changed everything. So job descriptions were my number one thing. And again, that sounds a little bit like a no brainer now, I think for a lot of people, but we weren't doing that back then.

Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry (04:25.962)
Yeah. So and then they did they did race to the challenge, right? Were you nervous that they wouldn't or couldn't or didn't have the time to or was there any of that?

Darren Sutton (04:31.902)
yeah. Yeah.

Darren Sutton (04:37.71)
You know, I don't remember being nervous about it as much as I was just, was at a point in my ministry and in my family life where I was like, they have to do this. You know, so it never dawned on me, I think, and also young and arrogant. Like it never dawned on me that anybody would say, I don't want to do that. And to their credit, nobody did. Like everybody rose to the challenge. And I really think that

Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry (04:56.802)
Sure.

Darren Sutton (05:07.32)
we sell the body of Christ, not volunteers, they're the body. We sell the body short when we assume that they won't invest more. Give them a chance to show you that, right? And if they do, then you know, like they might be better suited for a different role in your ministry, but this role with the job description as it's written, they're just not good for that. And it also gives you a great entry point for a conversation when you do need a leader to level up.

Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry (05:18.348)
Hmm. Yeah, that's good.

Darren Sutton (05:37.078)
to say like, listen, here's what we signed on for. Help me understand what's a struggle for you in this. Because it seems like these components aren't happening. And I'm just wondering, is that because you're unsure of what to do? Is that because you don't want to do that? You've had bad success with it? Like, help, teach me. Teach me what this, you know, where the holes are here.

Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry (05:41.944)
Hmm

Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry (05:56.672)
Mm, yeah.

Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry (06:00.844)
But then you have, like you said, have teeth, right, a little bit to go back if volunteer's not performing and there's nothing more awkward than trying to fire someone who's not getting paid. So.

Darren Sutton (06:04.152)
Yeah.

Darren Sutton (06:10.798)
I'm sure. Helping them find their fit in the body of Christ.

Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry (06:17.46)
Yep. So, okay, so aside from, you know, someone just buying your book, which is linked down below in the description, obviously.

Darren Sutton (06:25.514)
hey, thanks. I don't even know if I have a link to my book. Yeah, probably. Maybe the three people who bought it are done with it.

Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry (06:27.956)
Yeah, well, we'll scrounge it up. It's on eBay or something. What? So if you're if someone's just, know, regular old youth pastor and they're like, just like, OK, I hear you. Yeah, I'm doing too much. I'm spinning my wheels. Job description, maybe step one. Step two. Let's talk recruiting like because you.

you may not even have any leaders to write a job description for. So help someone start. Just rattle off the best recruiting strategies, methods, ideas, and I'll take notes for our own ministry as we're trying to also recruit some people.

Darren Sutton (07:00.908)
Yeah.

Darren Sutton (07:08.172)
Yeah.

because there are always holes. Well, where I started was I'm not a big fan of cattle calls from the pulpit or anything like that. Yeah, that's a struggle. Yeah, or you don't get anybody because nobody listens during announcements.

Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry (07:21.686)
Yeah, the youth need volunteers. You're gonna get weirdos.

Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry (07:29.047)
Yeah.

Well, it's a plural you, right? So it's like, you all interested? And so the individual you assumes one of the other ones is gonna take it and they're off the hook.

Darren Sutton (07:36.118)
Yes, exactly. So let me tell you guys, so here's what I did, Nick. Like I, you're right. The individual ask is everything. And I don't mean a fly by, you know, I don't mean a fly by conversation in the hallway on your way to the bathroom. I mean a sit down, real talk. but it takes a minute to get to that, right? Especially if you don't know everybody in our current context, the student ministry is literally a

across a creek from the rest of the building and so.

Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry (08:07.372)
Yeah. It's one of the most distant locations I've ever served and I would imagine the same for you. So us being a part of the rest of the life of the church, we have to be incredibly intentional to overcome that for sure.

Darren Sutton (08:16.588)
Yeah, for sure.

Darren Sutton (08:22.27)
Exactly. And that's true everywhere, especially if your facility or the space that you occupy is siloed from the rest of the church.

Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry (08:31.372)
Yeah, because it's great to have the youth space, but that their inherent challenge of that is you're in the youth space and not, yeah.

Darren Sutton (08:37.132)
Yeah, it's a youth space. Yeah, it's a youth space. So if you're not a youth, you're not in it. So, yeah, the first thing I did was I went to my senior pastor and said, our students need more visibility. And, you know, in in that church, like where this whole philosophy of how I handle volunteers was born, my space was was attached, but it was up and to the back on a second floor in the far corner of the property. Right.

Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry (08:50.253)
Mm.

Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry (09:06.06)
Yeah, so was separated.

Darren Sutton (09:07.362)
Yeah, exactly. Like you would see kids coming down from the upstairs and be like, my gosh, I'm glad I'm not serving up there. And that was it. So we started using students to take the offering, serve communion, do greeting. And I just, you know, kind of poached a dozen of my highest capacity students and said, let's help the church understand why youth ministry matters.

Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry (09:13.334)
Right? Yeah, yeah.

Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry (09:31.405)
Mm.

Darren Sutton (09:31.854)
And that didn't require them to be on the platform. We did have some on the platform. We had some students doing worship. We would occasionally do a youth night or youth day at church where students would speak and, or I would speak and all of that. starting there was actually the most critical, I think, the most critical component because people started seeing teenagers.

And it's a little bit like, you know, trying to acclimate people to wild animals. Like you got to get them a little bit close while they're in a cage and then you stick a little, you stick your hand in the cage and then you're in the cage, you know? And so that was the start of it. Also helping my senior pastor catch the vision that student ministry is not babysitting.

Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry (10:07.682)
Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry (10:18.04)
Yeah, how do, can you talk about that for just a quick second? how do, I would imagine, you someone might be listening and they're like, oh yeah, I love that, but I'm either A, getting or I'm anticipating that I would get pushback. How do you lead up in that?

Darren Sutton (10:32.994)
Well, if you're anticipating, stop doing that. Like give them a chance to say, you're a babysitter. But also I think storytelling is the most critical component. We had this kid come in, let me tell you this story about this student who shared their faith at school and not necessarily about what student ministry is doing in the building, but what student ministry is doing outside of the building.

Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry (10:35.992)
That's good, yeah.

Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry (10:41.105)
Heh.

Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry (10:51.405)
Hmm.

Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry (10:59.608)
That's good.

Darren Sutton (11:00.908)
you know, was super helpful. It also helped that I had a very open senior pastor. You know what? I didn't turn my phone off.

Sorry, Nick. You probably couldn't hear that, but I could. Okay, sorry. Are you editing this? I'm assuming you edit. All right, I'm gonna go back then. It didn't hurt that I had just a really open senior pastor. I think he hired me with the babysitting mindset, but it didn't take him long to see that student mystery could be way more than that. So I was fortunate in that way.

Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry (11:11.224)
That's good.

No, I heard it. It was great. It was a great sound.

I mean, I will, yeah. Yeah, okay.

Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry (11:34.548)
Mm. Yeah, that's good.

Darren Sutton (11:36.3)
So once we had students kind of operating around the building, it made it way easier for me to go up to randos and say, hey, so and so told me you'd be great. Or I'm gonna out myself with some really shallow things. I'm just gonna say. So if we were in worship and I saw folks who I felt like were truly connecting with worship.

Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry (11:52.856)
lol

Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry (12:04.663)
Yeah.

Darren Sutton (12:05.132)
That mattered to me, not because we had a worship ministry, but because I felt like those people were intentionally trying to connect with the heart of God when we were doing, you know, church. And so I just started introducing myself and doing a slow kind of a slow ask. Some might call it chess, where I would, I know you would, you know, where I would just go introduce myself. I'm a student pastor. Hey, just, you know,

Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry (12:07.703)
Yeah.

Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry (12:12.354)
Hmm.

Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry (12:24.472)
I would call it chest.

Darren Sutton (12:32.429)
appreciated your investment in church today or whatever. And then a of weeks later, I asked them how they were doing. Like I would start trying to build a relationship knowing that my end game, which didn't always work out, but my end game was to get them involved in students. The Lord might've had a different end game and sometimes he did, but I did that. I made sure that this was easier.

Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry (12:57.282)
So this is everyone's permission to keep your eyes open during worship.

Darren Sutton (13:01.228)
Yeah, 100 % 100%. And you know, not to say that hands raised means anything because it doesn't, but I looked at people and went, look, their hands up. They're volunteering. Another thing that was again, a little easier in the context I was in, I got involved in a in a connect group and a life group Sunday school class, whatever your know, whatever your church calls it. And while

Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry (13:07.884)
Yeah, yeah.

Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry (13:11.584)
you

Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry (13:22.614)
Yeah, A D group.

I wanted to keep rattling them off but my brain went completely dead.

Darren Sutton (13:31.534)
While that didn't, I wasn't necessarily pulling people from that group. That group of all kind of young parents, it was early in our ministry, like they were the movers and shakers in our church. And so they were talking up the student ministry. I was able to talk it up in my small group. And then the last thing I did was done a little bit because I...

Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry (13:47.949)
Yeah.

Darren Sutton (13:59.936)
you know, because I just felt stubborn about it. We had a set of senior adults in our church who were fantastic. I mean, you know, they did everything. They did all the serving. We had a Wednesday night meal. This is a long time ago. We a Wednesday night meal and they cooked the meal and they ran the kitchen and they just did everything. And I intentionally started developing relationships with those ladies.

and started trying to get them involved in doing some things. And I have always kind of felt like senior adults make some really great student ministers. And so I was intentionally going after them and there was a lady, her name was Belle. Belle was a little bit of your typical cranky church lady. And I said something about, you know, being involved in student ministry or whatever. And she was like, I'll never work with students. And I just went.

Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry (14:35.028)
Mm-hmm. Yeah, yeah.

Darren Sutton (14:55.148)
before I die, you will, whatever it takes. And so a little bit, I would target people, I think that way. don't, target's probably not the right word, but I would just, I would set my sight on somebody that I really wanted and I just kind of wouldn't let it go. Didn't harass. Sometimes that took a long time. It took me maybe like three-ish or four years before I finally got Bell to start something in students. And by the time we were,

Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry (15:04.152)
lol

Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry (15:09.089)
Yeah.

Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry (15:22.861)
Yeah.

Darren Sutton (15:24.84)
She was all in like she was hosting D nows at her house and you know all kinds of stuff. So I just think that it is not being afraid to ask, making sure that your students are visible so that people know that teenagers don't bite. They're not scary and then not counting anybody out. I mean from from 21 we are our age range started at 21. We wanted to give kids some separation from student ministry, but from 21 to death.

Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry (15:28.258)
Yeah.

Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry (15:36.482)
Mm-hmm.

Darren Sutton (15:54.208)
It didn't matter who you were, parent, not a parent, old lady, college student. Like we would go after everybody and did. just never, I never met a person that I didn't think was called. And you know, my dad, yeah, I think there was a book title and a full philosophy. And I just wouldn't, I mean, I took no for an answer. I didn't try to get people to serve who didn't really didn't want to.

Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry (15:54.242)
Yeah.

Yeah.

Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry (16:02.476)
Yeah, that's good.

Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry (16:08.29)
Some might say there's a book title in that.

Darren Sutton (16:23.148)
but I wouldn't take no as the first answer. So Belle said no and I was like, well, will you make sandwiches for Wednesday night? We didn't need sandwiches for Wednesday night. We already have Wednesday night supper, but she did it. You know what I'm saying? She started there. And then I would get some of those key students and say, hey, you guys make sure and thank Ms. Belle for these sandwiches. so, you know.

Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry (16:33.431)
Yeah.

Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry (16:43.032)
Well, and I think there's a, probably a principle in there of like, if you only ever like recruit to the need, then when the need is great, then your anxiety is high because you have like a lot of, a lot of need and a lot of holes to fill. But if you're always have your eye on this sort of like recruiting or onboarding mindset, even if you are onboarding them and there's nowhere to put them, like it's better.

Darren Sutton (17:10.733)
Yeah.

Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry (17:12.044)
to have an overabundance, a wealth of riches, than to just be like, well, I'm fully staffed, quote unquote, right now. But in a few months you might not be, and then again, you're like, man, I'm failing again. So I think the good principle is for anyone in youth ministry who feels like they're struggling with volunteers, just start asking people and keep asking them.

Darren Sutton (17:14.091)
percent.

Darren Sutton (17:35.852)
never, it didn't matter how full I was, I never told somebody no. And in that church specifically, and in several of my churches, like I would have every spot full and I would be creating roles because I just wanted to make sure that people who wanted to be involved in the next generation could be.

Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry (17:40.087)
Yeah.

Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry (17:47.928)
Mm.

Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry (17:54.7)
Yeah.

Darren Sutton (17:54.894)
And I tried really hard to not enlist them to a position, but to enlist them to a vision, to a purpose and what their life could mean, even if all they were doing is making sandwiches. And sometimes that's what it was, right? I don't have a spot for this person, but hey, could you go shopping for me on Tuesday? I would find things for them to do so I didn't have to tell them no. Because you might be fully staffed today and tomorrow, you know,

Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry (18:02.102)
Mm.

Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry (18:10.828)
Yeah. Yeah.

Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry (18:20.342)
Yeah.

Darren Sutton (18:24.848)
your leader has a parent who has to move in with them and their whole life changes and they need to step out. So I never counted on being fully staffed. And when I was fully staffed, I felt like I was always kind of back filling with the people who were the next to step in.

Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry (18:41.58)
Yeah. So that's a flex, being fully staffed or being so staffed that you have volunteers that you're just like making stuff up. So that leads to like, in my opinion, the next sort of like big bucket of this conversation is like, how do you, how do you keep good leaders so that they don't dip out on you?

Darren Sutton (18:51.255)
Yeah.

Darren Sutton (19:03.405)
Yeah. Yeah, 100%. You know, I think this just happened because a little bit it's my personality bit. I wasn't being intentional about this. I just felt like, you know, as I knew that volunteers were important and that part of my job was shepherding them and it wasn't just about hanging out with the kids and you know, all of that. So I was very...

Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry (19:15.512)
You

Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry (19:26.306)
Right.

Darren Sutton (19:32.066)
what's the right word? Pastoral is the only word I can think of. I knew my job was to shepherd them. It wasn't just to enlist them and get them sitting in front of teenagers, it was to help them along. So, you know, I...

Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry (19:39.159)
Yeah.

Darren Sutton (19:48.148)
I'm pretty good at sending notes of appreciation and not generic notes. Hey, I saw you talking to this kid. Hey, I heard a parent say this about you. Hey, you know, so that they would know that what they were doing was being seen. And I think that's a piece of it. know, gift cards go a long way, even if it's five bucks to Starbucks, because we all know five bucks isn't going to buy anything at Starbucks. But it's not that it's not that it is.

Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry (20:01.826)
yeah

Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry (20:15.625)
Mm-hmm.

Darren Sutton (20:15.936)
it is noticing them that matters, right? I was a little bit of a bulldog, absolutely insistent on leader training. Not necessarily to make them better, but to make them better, but more to build community among our leaders so that they didn't want to leave.

Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry (20:24.971)
Hmm.

Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry (20:33.048)
Mm.

Darren Sutton (20:36.91)
Often volunteers who serve in students sacrifice a community group of some sort in order to serve so they don't have that. And a lot of times when they don't have that or they don't sense the feel of community, they'll dip so they can go be in their own Sunday school class or, you know, life group or whatever it is. And so I even though we weren't that we weren't doing Bible studies together every week, I wanted them to feel like, man, if something happens, my student

Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry (20:43.052)
Mm-hmm.

Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry (20:55.607)
Yeah.

Darren Sutton (21:07.044)
team has my back and so and you know this because you work with me I'm pretty intentional still to this day about making sure that those leader training times are as much about building community and connection as they are about becoming a better you know volunteer.

Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry (21:08.152)
Mm.

Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry (21:19.544)
Mm-hmm.

Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry (21:23.041)
Yeah, for sure.

Darren Sutton (21:24.416)
And then I'm a big fan of not recruiting people until death. So we actually recruit to a cycle. So we're gonna ask you to step in here and we're gonna ask you to go until this point. And then if you wanna step out, we'll embrace you and be sad when you go, most of you. You you occasionally have that one leader where that ending date really helps you.

Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry (21:37.536)
Mm-hmm.

Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry (21:43.606)
Yeah.

Darren Sutton (21:49.966)
what you said earlier, like kind of helps you fire somebody. Like, hey, it's coming to the end of your term, thanks so much. Like, here's a Sunday school class for you to go to, you know, whatever. But largely, it was an opportunity for me to be more mindful and intentional about recruiting division. So if they didn't hear it any other time, once a year in the kind of re-recruiting phase,

Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry (21:53.431)
Yeah.

Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry (21:56.856)
Yeah

Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry (22:07.233)
Mm-hmm.

Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry (22:16.823)
Yeah.

Darren Sutton (22:17.33)
They were going to be reminded of what they were doing. It was an opportunity for me to say, tell me, tell me what to struggle. What? How can I help you? Do you still love this role? Is there another role that you've seen other people performing in that you would like to try out? Would you so they don't feel like, hey man, if I say yes to leading this, you know, home group, I'm going to be leading it until I die. Yeah, exactly. You know.

Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry (22:26.295)
Mm-hmm.

Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry (22:31.894)
Yeah.

Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry (22:38.018)
I'm stuck for life, yeah.

But I think that might give some youth pastors listening hives, because they're already feeling strapped with leaders, and then they get good ones and they're like, wait, you give them an end date? And the irony in that is that doing that, again, I won't put words in your mouth, but doing that helps them feel like seen and appreciated and that you value them. so rather than them leaving at the end of the term,

Darren Sutton (22:55.148)
Yeah.

Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry (23:11.562)
they like immediately re-up and come back.

Darren Sutton (23:13.612)
Yeah, yeah. And the truth is when you're when you have equipped them well, they know what their mission is. They feel supported by their community. They don't want to leave. We we in all kinds of different ways for the last 25 years, I've tried to give my volunteers breaks, whether that was a bucket of time like, hey, everybody's off in the summer and we'll take care of it. Or, know, what we currently do is

Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry (23:32.311)
Mm.

Darren Sutton (23:40.672)
a day off about every six-ish weeks where we just say to our volunteers, don't come, the student ministry's got it, students got it, you know, whatever. Giving them those moments basically to come up for air helps them stay in the water a lot longer. So yeah, we do give an end date, but I have only had a few people take advantage of that. And when they have, it's never been because they didn't want to do student ministry anymore.

Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry (23:44.343)
Yeah.

Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry (23:54.413)
Yeah.

Hmm.

Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry (24:09.89)
Right.

Darren Sutton (24:10.228)
It's always been because my life circumstances have changed and I need a break. And, you know, the other piece of that that is helpful is when life circumstances do change, most of them won't dip until they get to that end date. And so even though their trauma, you know, whatever it was, their job change, their, you know, sickness, their parents or kids or whatever happened in November.

Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry (24:15.074)
Yeah.

Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry (24:34.367)
Mm. Yeah.

Darren Sutton (24:39.63)
They know they committed until June 1st and they're going to say occasionally, occasionally, you know, to be a good pastor, you're going to say, listen, I know your life is upside down right now. Uh, just go ahead and step out. Like let's take a break. And then you're going to bring in, you know, somebody who's on the bench, who's been begging to be involved, who you've got in a, you know, maybe a less influential position, but who's ready to step up. Yeah.

Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry (24:41.666)
and they'll still ride it out. Yeah, that's good.

Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry (24:49.409)
Yeah.

Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry (24:52.78)
Yeah.

Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry (25:03.35)
Yeah, so real quick before we leave, let's just make a big list of volunteer roles that are a little bit, because I think, again, Average Joe, Normal Youth Pastor, Normal Youth Ministry in America, every volunteer that they have is to lead discussion, small group, school, whatever you want to call it with students.

Darren Sutton (25:29.134)
Yeah, for sure.

Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry (25:31.064)
But there's a million other things and some people don't want to do that. Like we have a guy on our team right now who's awesome. He's like, I don't want to lead a Bible study, but he loves teenagers. He's like fun at heart. You know, like he's, he's the type of guy you'd want on your team, but he, he felt disqualified because he's like, I'm not equipped for that slash don't want to do it. And so like, to your point, there's a million things you can do. can make sandwiches. So what are some over the years, you're 35.

Darren Sutton (25:53.112)
Right.

Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry (26:00.28)
plus years of experience. What are some of the different roles that you've had created, invented? Like give us some of the funniest best ones you got.

Darren Sutton (26:09.102)
Oh, I don't know. I have some that you couldn't do anymore. You know, I mean, I love that the, you're just going to show up at their like, you don't, you don't have to lead a Bible study, but I want you to show up at every single basketball game this kid has, you know, as just kind of a, you know, a big brother figure. You know, we had a lot of over the years had different

Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry (26:12.024)
Yeah, yeah, yeah. Share those two from the the crypt.

Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry (26:29.464)
Mm.

Darren Sutton (26:39.53)
spots had a lot of rec space. and so, you know, listen, I don't want you to do anything except play basketball. That's all you have to do. Play basketball and talk to students. you know, we also had the proverbial like set up chairs and, you know, come in and create, you know, new student, new student guest kits and, know, that kind of stuff. Probably the funniest one that we had was, in one church that I was in.

Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry (26:41.816)
Mm-hmm.

Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry (26:48.534)
I love that job.

Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry (27:00.684)
Yeah. Yeah.

Darren Sutton (27:09.224)
our student center was a kind of refabbed pavilion on the back of an acre and a half plot. So the church was at the front right and the student ministry area was at the back left and no lights, barely electricity. We threw up fake walls. We had window units kind of shoved in the corner and you know, as janky as it could be.

Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry (27:16.578)
Okay.

Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry (27:23.755)
Yeah.

Darren Sutton (27:38.478)
and so every week we would have fire ants that were building in the building, right? Like building these nests in the building. So we had our, our guy who would come in and kill the fire ants every week, and sweep it all out. That was his only job. Like he didn't want to hang out with students and all that, but he felt like that was a contribution he can make. had people in that same church, like one of the ways that we

Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry (27:53.046)
You

Darren Sutton (28:05.814)
kind of lighted the path in the middle of the night to that back area where with tiki torches. And so we had folks who would come in and, you know, light the tiki torches and sweep the pathway off and, you know, that kind of thing. So those were kind of unique. We had for a time, folks who would be, you know, kind of the bus run, except in their vehicles, we, don't do that anymore. Just generally for ministry safe purposes, but

Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry (28:10.359)
Yeah.

Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry (28:28.941)
Right.

Darren Sutton (28:31.822)
Their only job was to pick kids up and drive them back and forth to church. They didn't stay in the youth ministry. didn't, but we gave them like in that job description, here are some questions you can be asking when kids get in your car to get the conversation going and you know, make sure you meet the parents and you know, things like that to help them be a little bit more invested in real life with kids. Had some volunteers whose main job was to reach out to parents.

Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry (28:37.016)
Yeah.

Darren Sutton (28:59.886)
and make sure that, you know, hey, we know parenting teenagers is tough. Is there anything the student ministry can do for you? That was their only job to just keep a list of parents would love this. Parents would need that. And they pass that over to me and I'd figure out what we could do and you know, what was a really stupid idea we had to throw away. So some stuff like that. Once, you know, this one is selfish, but was important.

Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry (29:07.672)
Hmm.

Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry (29:18.136)
Yeah, nice. keep going.

Darren Sutton (29:27.694)
uh, more important than I realized, I think at the time, uh, I enlisted somebody to pay attention to my kids. Uh, your job is and not just mine, but in that, in that church, just mine. But if we were in our context, we're having multiple staff members, it would be staff kids. Uh, but I, I was like, you know, my kids sacrifice a lot for me to be in student ministry and they were not teenagers yet. They were, you know, I don't know, 11, nine and seven, they were young. I just said, can you

Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry (29:35.063)
Uh-huh.

Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry (29:42.646)
Mm-hmm.

Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry (29:53.708)
Yeah. Yeah.

Darren Sutton (29:56.792)
Can you just notice my kids? Like they're here a lot. They sacrifice a lot for ministry. Their dad's a pastor and so I'm sure that they're they need adults who are not their pastor. You know as well and your your jobs to just notice my kids and they crushed that like our kids to this day feel like those people are their grandparents even more than their actual grandparents. So that's another one.

Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry (30:02.263)
Mm.

Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry (30:10.028)
Yeah.

Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry (30:21.4)
It's cool.

Yeah, that's cool.

Darren Sutton (30:25.21)
You can come up with everything. Host homes and sandwich makers and so many ways to get people close enough to see what Jesus is doing without them having to lead a Bible study ever.

Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry (30:27.832)
.

Yeah.

Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry (30:37.335)
Yeah.

Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry (30:43.512)
Yeah, that's good. So, okay, last thing. Talk to the youth pastor who's struggling, floundering, drowning. Find a word of encouragement about the importance of leaders and maybe just a basic for them next step. Hey, if you're gonna do anything, first thing to do is just do this. Don't feel overwhelmed by all of this. Maybe you don't have the...

Capacity to get a fire ant guy yet. Okay, that's fine But speak speak to that speak to the guy who's just like man. don't leaders are killing like it's just the hardest, you know part of my job, whatever like Encourage them for a second

Darren Sutton (31:22.712)
Yeah. Well, let me just say first, it's not your job. That's not your job. That's the job of the Holy Spirit. And he's very clear in scripture that we all have a part to play.

and that our job as pastors is to equip the saints for the work of service. Our job is not to make sure we have plenty of volunteers, not to make sure every hole gets filled. Our job is just to equip the people that the Holy Spirit brings. We can be more proactive in bringing them, but the Holy Spirit is the one who quickens their heart to be involved. So that's not your job. Your job isn't to convince them. Your job is to shepherd them and to give them an opportunity to step into what God is calling them to do.

Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry (31:39.352)
Mm-hmm.

Darren Sutton (32:04.718)
Don't take the whole burden on yourself. And I mean that in two ways. It's the Holy Spirit's job and also you have some people, you definitely have some people who care about student ministry who will help recruit for you. You utilize that, whether that's other staff members, folks that are currently on your volunteer team, a parent who just happens to take a particular interest in what's going on in student ministry.

Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry (32:20.792)
Mm.

Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry (32:31.224)
Teenagers.

Darren Sutton (32:32.364)
Yeah, for sure. 100 % ask a kid who they think would make a great youth leader. They'll have a list guaranteed. So.

Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry (32:34.519)
you

Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry (32:38.742)
Yeah, yeah. I had a teenager one time go and list the head usher on his own. Yeah, I was like, well, I'll talk to him too. But it was great.

Darren Sutton (32:44.891)
Poach them from other ministries? I love it.

That's fantastic. But just don't feel the burden that it's all on you and don't feel the burden that it all has to happen right now. For me, it was a slow, kind of a slow burn into that whole idea that volunteers could be more and I needed to ask them to do more and be more. That took time. And it's not a foolproof, like,

Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry (33:16.502)
Yeah.

Darren Sutton (33:21.322)
I mean, we serving in church right now and across from this podcast, there's a big sheet on my door that lists every volunteer hole we have right now. And we have a lot. There's probably 20 people on there that we need to fill. So, you know, you're always going to have the need. You can't let the holes be what drives you. You've got to let the people who are in the room, you know, a little bit.

Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry (33:31.384)
Yeah. Yeah.

Darren Sutton (33:47.384)
be what drives you. So, and it's totally doable because Jesus wants those kids even more than you do. And he's gonna raise up the people that are needed to help get them where he needs them to be.

Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry (33:48.984)
That's good.

Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry (34:01.304)
Nice, that's good. All right, anything else? Did we get it all?

Darren Sutton (34:05.312)
Yeah, think we, I mean, I'm sure we didn't get it all, but we got, you got all I got.

Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry (34:08.28)
Well, that's a lot it's helpful so where do people find you Darren?

Darren Sutton (34:18.03)
listen, I'm everywhere. I'm, I'm almost like the Holy Spirit everywhere you are. am, I'm on all, I'm on all social stuff. if you're, yes. Well, actually I can't, you can't say that anymore. I deleted my account after it banned.

Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry (34:22.039)
Woo!

That's scary.

Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry (34:29.738)
including band TikTok. If you'd like to send...

It's back, it's back now.

Darren Sutton (34:38.464)
I know I'm trying to decide like, listen, I had so this whole podcast, I had so much time open up in my life that I'm like, maybe I don't want to, I'm not sure if I want to, if I want to take it back. But yeah, I mean, you know, Insta and Facebook and Twitter and you know, all that, I have a blog. everyone's called the youth ministry.com and, I'm not, you know, I have, I'm just like you. I'm an in the trenches youth pastor. So if you're looking for a regular, like,

Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry (34:42.712)
You

Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry (34:56.856)
Nice. We'll link it down below.

Darren Sutton (35:08.184)
podcast and a blog post. I don't do that. But I've been in this thing for a few minutes and I'm not planning on going anywhere. And so I love talking to you pastors. And if you ever need a guy who has made as many mistakes as you feel like you're making, you can reach out. Cause I got a whole list. Lots of stories. Yeah.

Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry (35:24.856)
You

There you go. That's big right there. All right. Well, hey, for Darren, this is Nick signing off. See you guys.

Darren Sutton (35:33.944)
Bye guys.