Variety or Consistency?

on May 5th, 2009

A recurring theme in our junior high team conversations lately seems to revolve around the value of providing students with variety vs providing them with consistency.  Here are some areas of ministry that this has bubbled to the surface:

- Weekend Music: Is it better to have one music/worship leader that is in front of students each weekend, or is it better to mix it up? One leader can build momentum, create a consistent level of quality, create a music “culture”, build relationships with students off stage that helps the “on stage” presence be more effective etc.  Having a variety of music leaders….four or five that rotate….has some obvious benefits, too.

- Seating and room set up: Is it better for students to have a consistent experience (be that around tables, in rows, on the floor) that they can depend on or is mixing it up better?

- Large Group teacher: Is a team approach better than having one person who does bulk of the teaching?

Much of this discussion, if not all of it, comes from the fact that we have been mixing things up much more lately than we ever have. In my mind, it makes a TON of sense to have a ton of variety in our weekend program. But, the interesting thing is that after a few months of variety, I’m feeling oddly drawn back to some sort of consistency. I feel like students never know what to expect when they come through our doors…which is something I thought would be a really good thing, but am beginning to question.

Let’s hear from you: How much variety is too much? Do young teens flourish in a stable environment? How do you wrestle with this?

Related posts:

  1. Weekend Wrap Up
  2. Experiment In Progress
  3. Simple Thought: Starting Off Right
  4. Sweet Spot
  5. Weekend Wrap Up

Share Discuss (10)

dan at 3:02pm May 5

with so much inconsistency in their lives, it looks like it would be good to have something consistent…but they also love a variety. maybe it is on occasion with the variety and not the norm. good thoughts.

[WORDPRESS HASHCASH] The poster sent us ’0 which is not a hashcash value.

Kurt at 10:58am May 7

I’m finding that when I don’t have consistacy in the music and worship our group loses focus. We’ve been working on mixing up the rest of the program elements, but making sure that worship stays the same. When we mix up the music too much, we quickly get back into a “concert” atmosphere and we lose our focus on the cross.

[WORDPRESS HASHCASH] The poster sent us ’0 which is not a hashcash value.