July 14th, 2025, 6:30pm MDT
Some may think that young people need to “sink or swim.”
But that is not the role of a young female leader and Aaron’s priesthood quorum leader.
When you look at the parents and leader’s guides on Youth.churchofjesuschrist.org, certain words stand out.
assist. prepare. guide. Minister. serve. Give an example as a disciple of Jesus Christ. Encourage. support. know. pray. Help.
Essentially, we are a support team. That’s our role.
What this looks like is actually teaching someone to ride a bike. Not only do they buy a bike without training the wheels, but also give it to one of the kids for Christmas and hope they understand it.
There is a process of individualized instruction and education, running together, helping them find courage to know how to manage that situation. As they get older, there will be less needs from you until they are ultimately successful. That’s your role as a leader.
It appears you know your young man well when you advise together and say, “This is this Sunday or Sunday lesson.” You say, “Who do you think will be the best person to teach you this?” Are you one of the advisors? Is someone to teach from the presidency? Is there anyone from the youth group that should add something here? Maybe they want to invite someone from the ward family to help teach it.
Then, “These are the young people we need to gather together. Do you think we should teach this lesson?”
President Russell M. Nelson said young people are “unusually talented at reaching out to others and sharing their beliefs in a compelling way.” In the activity, we don’t ask young people to lead because we don’t think they have anything to do. They ask the gathering because they are “unusually talented.”
For young people, we know you are busy. We know you’re going to school. I know about homework. We know you have a job. We know that some of you are involved in sports and other hobbies and what you do.
We are not asking for your help. Because you don’t think you have anything to do. You need to help us because you are extraordinarily talented at gatherings and know what activities to plan and what to kick your friends out. You know what brings them here.
You may come up with some great activity ideas, but you probably have a football that will finish on Wednesday at 7pm. Therefore, while counselling together, the leader can ask the young woman what it takes to set up the activity. The leader can then say to her, “When you finish football, you’re just running in this room and we’ll have everything ready for you.”
During Final Week, the leader said, “What do you know? I’ll go home at 8am to study. We’re really good at cleaning. We’re a support team and we can do that.”
Our job is to help young people find success, knowing their abilities is to get to know them well, and we know what might be too much for them now.
Above all, we want them to come and take their friends and own the ideas of these activities and what we do so that they want to be with us and belong here.
As you balance these roles between leading young people and becoming a support team, you become an independent learner, an independent teacher, and an independent planner at age 18.
But we hope that it will take place over time at its capabilities and levels.
To the young people we say this: We trust you. We know your abilities. We know your creativity and your abilities. We know how good you are inclusion and welcome.
We need you and your people called by the President. You stand out to support leadership in this program, and it is important. And you will also need to work in collaboration with an adult leader who is calling to lead this program.
And when we work in tandem, that’s where real growth happens. We all remember one leader who coached us throughout the year. Adult leader, you have the opportunity to do it. Young people, you have the opportunity to be that.
