The following criteria provide one way to choose resources, particularly printed resources. It might be helpful to make several file cards with this information on them to take with you to a store or when ordering materials. Make a file of this information to keep at your congregation. Make a copy for yourself for the future and leave a copy with your congregation as a gift.

Step 1: Look at the materials. Don't be fooled by fancy multicolor covers or the word "success" in the title. Look at an individual session. Read the whole session, not just the goals and objectives. After you have read it, ask yourself these questions:

• Did I understand the unit or session?
• Could I find all the materials needed?
• What feeling might specific young people in our group have about this lesson?
• Were the photographs and/or graphics representative of persons of various racial and ethnic groups, as well as females and males?
• What ideas or understanding would surface?
• How did we arrive at these perceptions (actions, words, images, textures, colors, etc.)?
• What need(s) or interest(s) of our young people does this material meet?

Step 2: Review the characteristics and theological principles of relational youth ministry. How does this resource agree with the characteristics and principles? How does it match your own sense of relational youth ministry? One publication will not meet them all. You will have to decide if it meets enough of them to buy the resource.

Step 3: Evaluate the implications. Ask yourself these questions:

• What could we do with this resource?
• If we need to adapt parts of it, how much would need to be adapted?
• Am I---or are we---willing and able to make those changes?
• Will this resource match enough of our criteria to buy it?

Step 4: Make a list. Write down on a file card the author, title, publisher, date of publication, and cost. This will be particularly helpful if you decide not to buy that day but to come back or if you put it in the file for someone else to use.