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I don’t think that all churches should hire a vocational youth minister.

I’m not talking about whether churches can afford to hire one or not.  Some churches that can shouldn’t, and yes, I realize given my history of being of vocational youth minister that this probably sounds strange.

The church in America has a big problem regardless of denomination. In general, most churches are missing at least their 18 to 30-somethings, and in reality, it’s more like 16 to 40-somethings. Our youth start leaving when they can drive, and something is seriously wrong with this picture.

Now some of you may be in a church with healthy youth ministries and lots of young people which is great, but unfortunately for the church as a whole, your church is the exception to the rule. And even in your church you can probable see a decline from early children’s ministry, to junior high ministry, with a major decline in high school ministry, or at least in the percentage’s of junior’s and senior’s that you still have.

I’ve been asked by several churches who have noticed this trend if they should hire a vocational youth minister, and seen even more churches run out an hire a vocational youth minister, assuming that will somehow “fix” the problem and automatically start bringing those elusive “young people” into the church.

After all, young people are the future of the church right?

Well, if you’ve read this blog before you’ve heard me talk about how young people are only the future of the church in the sense that without them the church will literally die of old age, but they are also the present of the church, and all too often we forget that.

And so we throw a vocational youth minister at the problem, and go “whew, so glad the youth are taken care of.”

Several problems with this, one, the youth aren’t being actually valued by the church in the sense that the church isn’t giving of their time, only of part of the budget. And while funding is important, it’s not everything. Think about when you were a kid, would you rather have had money from your parents, or time with your parents? Would you rather have spent time with the greatest, most fun baby-sitter in the world, or have your parents actually “invest” time in you?

Now I’m not equating vocational youth ministry to baby-sitting, but the reality is that one youth minister cannot do the job of Christian formation and discipleship for these young people. A vocational youth minister’s primary role should be to mentor adult leaders who can then in turn disciple and mentor the youth. Then the youth will have a connection with the church as a whole, and one part of integrating our youth into the church as a whole will be put in place. (More on this later).

So, then the double-edged sword of vocational youth ministry is that if churches are too quick to hire without having first embraced their youth ministry as a congregation, they end up abdicating the responsibility to that youth minister. The other edge is that with the responsibility pushed to the side, the youth minister is suddenly not as essential as they were, and their position is the first to get cut in a budget crises. This is ironic really, given the fears I hear frequently expressed about the health of the church without young people.

For more see What do young people think of the church? @ Daily Radicals.

I was thinking as I got started on this final installment of the Youth Ministry series that perhaps this last piece should have in fact been the first.  I’m guessing there’s a good number of you who are reading this, or skipping over them, and thinking that they don’t pertain to you because they’re talking about youth ministry.

And when we talk about youth ministry, we tend to think of programs and youth ministers and buses and lock-ins.  Lots of pizza, staying up all night, and who knows what else. 

And let’s face it, most of us aren’t cut out for that sort of thing!  I don’t even want to stay up all night any more. It’s not fun.  And I’m so sick of pizza that I’ve wondered if it was a good enough reason to leave youth ministry all together! (okay, so I’m not wholly serious on that one!).

So while not all of us are called to be a part of a youth ministry program, I think a lot more of us are called to ministry to youth then we tend to think. 

See ministry to youth, as opposed to all the programs and such, which have their place, is in some ways a whole different ball game.  We as Christians are called to be disciples of Jesus and ambassadors of his reconciliation wherever we go (2 Cor. 5:11-21).  We are the ministers of the body of Christ—all of us, together—old and young, ordained and not ordained.  And as such, we are called to be disciples who make disciples. 

I hope that the previous three articles (and if you missed them, you can download them from the website!) have painted a different sort of picture of what ministry to youth looks like.  It’s a process we can all be involved in at some point or another.  Mentoring teenagers and young adults is something that all of us in the body of Christ can do as we draw them alongside us to journey along in this adventure with Jesus.

I’m willing to guess that everyone reading this knows a teenager or a young adult.  How would it change your relationship with them if you knew that they desperately wanted input from a mature adult?  Adolescence as the process between childhood and adulthood has lengthened to where some say the average end of it is now twenty-four years of age.  Twenty-four! And that’s the average! Which means that you’ve got some later 20-somethings and perhaps even some early 30-somethings that have never made the transition into functioning adulthood because there was no one to show them how.

There’s a poignant scene in the recent movie Lars and the Real Girl where Lars, the protagonist, a 27-year-old living in the garage apartment at his brother and sister in-law’s house asks his older brother, “How do you know when you’re a man?”  And his brother is stumped by the question for several minutes.  Finally he answers some to the effect of “Doing the right thing just because it’s right. Putting other’s first.”  I think the scene illustrates so well the predicament of even 20-somethings who have fewer issues than Lars (the movie is about his recovery from delusion, but that doesn’t do it justice, you really should see it!). 

I think the young people of today are dying to ask us not only “How do you know when you’re a man or a woman” as in “How do you know when you’re an adult” but also “How do you really follow Jesus?” “What does that look like?”  Our society has allowed itself to become so segregated among the generations that few of our teens and young adults have someone they truly feel comfortable asking those sorts of questions.

But they are desperate for the answers.  Will we form relationships with them and help them to figure out what those things look like?  It has to be us that initiates, that proves we’re actually just interested in them for who they are and not what they can do for us. 

Will we take up this call to disciple the younger generations?  To be ambassadors of reconciliation, as though God himself was making his appeal through us?  This is our mission, our vocation as the church, Christ’s body.  How can we say no?

After laying the groundwork for ministry to youth by understanding that God calls people of all ages, we looked last month about what it means to step into what often feels like a completely foreign culture: the world our teenagers inhabit. And so building on the concept that for youth ministry to be effective it has to be incarnational (we inhabit their world as Jesus came and inhabited ours), then the third piece is that ministry has to be relational in ordering for mentoring to occur. And it is in mentoring that the real stuff of making disciples happens.

In the gospel of Mark, we find Jesus and many followers up on a mountainside. “Jesus… called to him those he wanted, and they came to him” (Mark 3:13). There are several points that we can draw from this passage.

First, relational ministry is not to the crowds. In verse seven of this same passage, we see crowds of people following Jesus. He went apart, and “called to him those he wanted.” He limited the group of people that he would spend most of His time with. Second, He called them to Him. This shows deliberate intention on the part of Jesus, and thus, we must also be intentional about how we go about our relational ministry. Third, they came to Him. This may seem obvious, but it is important that we are clear enough in our intentions toward people that we are investing in so that they want us to be in their lives in that capacity. It’s a waste of time to try to mentor someone if they don’t want to be mentored. However, this needs to be done in a subtle way, because the concept of mentoring is often completely foreign to folks. Think of it as coming alongside someone and journeying with them as you both grow in your lives with Jesus. You’ve been further down the path then they have and can help them out as they learn some of the things you’ve already learned. But you can also learn from them, and so while you may be that person’s mentor, don’t forget to be a student yourself! And find a mentor for yourself as well… none of us were meant to accomplish life all on our own.

In Acts, Paul is depicted as always traveling with someone: first Barnabas, then Silas, then Timothy joins with him and Silas (Acts 13:1-3; 15:40, 16:1-3). As Paul went through his ministry, he brought people with him. Despite the fact that it was a disagreement that separated him and Barnabas, Barnabas also followed this model in taking John Mark with him, (Acts 15:39) which increased the number of two-man teams that were modeling this type of ministry in that day. The discipling relationship came before the sending out.

We see this also in Matthew when Jesus sends out the twelve (Matt 10). They had been with him, learning of Him, and then He sent them out. At some point, which is unclear in Matthew, the disciples come back to learn more. In Luke, the evangelist has them coming back to report to Jesus what they had done (Luke 9:10). When they did this, Jesus took them and they went away by themselves, or tried to, but the point is that they withdrew for more time with Jesus.

Again in Luke, when Jesus sends out the seventy-two, He sends them out two by two, they return and tell Him what happened, Jesus responds with more teaching (Luke 10). All of these examples point to a pattern in the Scripture of what relational ministry looks like. In the New Testament, we don’t find examples of people in ministry by themselves per se; they seem to at least be in groups of two. Also, as a pattern for discipleship, the disciples are taught, and then sent out. They return and give a report; they receive more teaching. They are not left cut off from relationships, and they are not left without feedback or teaching. This is key for our ministries today.

We’re not just mentoring young people in a vacuum: we’re teaching them how to do the work of the ministry so that they will be disciples who make disciples. We’re helping mobilize the next generation of workers in God’s harvest, and we’re doing the work of the ministry ourselves while we are accomplishing this.

The Great Commission tells us to go and make disciples of all nations. This is how disciples are made: as we who have gone further in the faith look behind us and pull someone up alongside us and teach them from what we’ve learned. Then as they do that, and the person they pull up beside them does that, we very soon have a whole network of relationships where the people of God are learning from one another and growing together to spread the good news of the kingdom of God to world in turmoil that desperately needs to hear it.

Last post we looked at how the basic groundwork of youth ministry calls us to understand the truth that God gifts young people, calls young people and uses young people and therefore we must take seriously ministry to young people just as we take ministry to adults seriously. But as adults, ministry to other adults is often far easier to fathom. We inhabit the same world, often have similar or parallel life experiences to draw from in conversation. With young people though, we all too often feel at a loss. Their world seems so different, their experiences different than ours, and different than ours when we were in high school. How can we possible hope to relate?

In order to do successful ministry anywhere, we must be willing to follow in the steps of our Savior and become incarnate, or take on flesh, in the world of the people we are ministering to. Paul outlines what incarnational ministry should look like very clearly in his letter to the Philippians, chapter two. We then, as adults who are called to pour into youth, are to follow Jesus’ example in that he made himself nothing, (Phil 2:7) being found in the appearance of a man, (v. and was obedient. What does that mean in our world? He came into our world, assuming nothing. He emptied Himself of all His heavenly glory and authority to come into our world and meet us where we were. We, then, need to empty ourselves of all our “grown-up-ness,” meaning that we must go against the stereotypes youth have of other adults in their world as being aloof, uninterested in “kid things,” authoritarian, among others (but not implying that we have to then start acting like the kids). This doesn’t mean that we have to act like kids. We need to be comfortable with being adults, but not so hung up on it that we can’t be interested in what the youth are for the sake of showing interest in them.

Assuming nothing also means taking on those pesky insecurities that we have that are so easy to sort of take out on the youth in the form of unnecessarily displaying knowledge to the disadvantage of the youth (e.g. making the kid feel stupid for not knowing something). All of these things are potential barriers to adults being able to enter the world of the youth.

Therefore, because of this, we have to consciously empty ourselves, and not consider our current position as something to be grasped (Jesus “did not consider equality with God something to be grasped (Phil 2:6)). Rather, we must let go of it and become obedient unto death (v.8)—death to ourselves, death to our pride, death to our insecurities—so that by our death, the youth in our sphere of influence might be exposed to life through Christ. In order to come across in the right spirit to these youth when we enter their world, we must have the mindset of a servant, the “very nature of a servant” (Phil 2:7).

Two other things that are important to notice are these: when Jesus came to earth, He came to earth and He came to earth. The first involves motion, the second location. He moved from where He was, but this move was more than moving from the sanctuary to the youth room, He came to where humans were, and not just the clean, nice-smelling respectable humans, but also to the blind, the beggars, the tax collectors, the lepers, the prostitutes, in short, the unwanted, the “unclean,” the outcasts. Hence, it is not enough to be seen in the youth room of our church on a regular basis, though this is important. But we must also be seen in the malls, in the libraries, on the school campuses, at the talent shows, the basketball games, and anywhere else that youth gather. We must go because the vast majority of them will never come to us while we remain safely ensconced in the neat, clean youth rooms (okay, so somewhat clean and neat) decorated with posters of Christian bands and having Veggie Tales marathons and worship services. This going forth, this living in the context in which the youth of today live, this is incarnational ministry, the kind of ministry that points young people to the reconciling power of the gospel of Jesus Christ.

What basic understanding must be in place in order to provide good groundwork for the youth in that ministry? Throughout scripture we see examples of God calling young people to do his work. If God can use, and in fact, wants to use people of all ages, then we as the adult member of the body of Christ must take on as our solemn responsibility the discipling and equipping of our children, teenagers and young adults.

When God called Jeremiah to be a prophet, he was still young enough to consider himself a child and doubted that he could do the task at hand. God’s response to him was this: “…do not say, ‘I am only a child.’ …Now I have put my words in your mouth.’” (Jeremiah 1:9 NIV). In the same spirit, Paul instructs Timothy, “Don’t let anyone look down on you because you are young, but set an example for the believers in speech, in life, in love, in faith, and in purity” (1 Timothy 4:12). This God hasn’t changed. He’s still putting his words in the mouths of young people, and they still have the capacity to set an example for us all. Most of the time, all they need is for someone to get them started in training for godliness.

Just prior to the verse in 1 Timothy, Paul urges Timothy to “train yourself to be godly,” painting an image of rigorous, daily practice. We all know that physical exercise does no good if only done haphazardly, and the same is true of striving to be godly. We must train every day, and train our young people to train every day, for only when a daily practice of godliness is made is it possible to “Set an example for the believers in speech, in life, in love, in faith and in purity.

Paul’s next instructions are to “devote yourself to the public reading of Scripture, to preaching and teaching. Do not neglect your gift, which was given you through a prophetic message when the body of elders laid hands on you” (vv. 13-14). Here he not only outlines habits that are part of striving every day for godliness, but recognizes Timothy’s gift. This highlights two elements that are often lacking in our ministries to youth.

The first element is the gift. All the youth in our sphere of influence have spiritual gifts, but often no one helps them to realize this. A college girl once came to me after having taking a spiritual gifts inventory, and said, “Wow, I have gifts?” And I asked her, “What, did you think God left you out?” Her eyes widened and she said, “I guess I never thought of it that way.” All of our youth have gifts, but many of them perhaps think that God somehow left them out. This must be addressed in our ministries so that the kids can realize that God has equipped them to do His work.

To call out the gifts in our young people takes the body of elders. This is the second element. Too often, the church as a whole is not as committed to the youth of today being equipped for ministry as they are committed to the youth minister equipping the youth for ministry—when they are older of course and have learned how to dress like grown-ups do. This cannot be. Our youth need the recognition from the adults that they are gifted. It’s not enough to merely have the youth minister or the adult volunteers recognize this, but the church as whole, the body, must take part of recognizing the gifts of young people to empower them to step forward in the calling God has placed upon them. Granted, most youth don’t have a well-defined idea of what calling is. However, as they mentored by adults in the church, who continually affirm the gifts that God has given them, then they will be able to start actively walking the path that God has for them.

When God called Jeremiah to be a prophet, Jeremiah thought he was far too young to do what God had asked him to do. God’s response to him was this: “…do not say, ‘I am only a child.’ …Now I have put my words in your mouth.’” (Jeremiah 1:9 NIV). Several hundred years later, we find Paul encouraging Timothy, not to let “anyone look down on you because you are young, but set an example for the believers in speech, in life, in love, in faith, and in purity” (1 Timothy 4:12).  Our God hasn’t changed.  He’s still putting his words in the mouths of young people, and they still have the capacity to set an example for us all

Young people have great gifts, but too often no one helps them realize this. A college girl once came to me after taking one of those spiritual gift inventories, and said, “Wow, I have gifts?”  And I said, “What, did you think God left you out?”  Her eyes sort of got really big and she said, “I guess I never thought of it that way.”

To call out the gifts in our young people takes the body of elders.  Our youth need recognition from adults that they are gifted. The church as whole, not just the youth minister or the adult volunteers, must take part in recognizing the gifts of young people to empower them to step forward in the calling God has placed upon them.  Granted, most youth don’t have a well-defined idea of what calling is. However, as they are mentored by adults in the church, who continually affirm the gifts that God has given them, then they will be able to start actively walking the path that God has for them.

Teenagers and young adults are looking for something to die for. See, if something not worth dying for, then it’s not worth living for. They are looking for a revolution, and what better revolution to offer them than the revolutionary love of Jesus Christ, who came preaching a kingdom that turned the world as we know it upside down, and made the most radical sacrifice of all in his death on the cross. This is the sort of passion young people long to find. They long to live a life with that sort of commitment and that sort of passion. As we get this message to them, disciple them, mentor them in what it means to live out the gospel—to live out the kingdom of God—on a day-to-day basis, they will pick up the torch and start to spread it themselves. And the next thing you know, we’ll have groups of young revolutionaries in our churches, working side-by-side with people of all generations, living out the call of God to us, the body of Christ, to do the work of the ministry.

The call is then to us, will we take up the mission of actively discipling young people? Intentionally include them in the corporate life of our church? Walk with them through the messy parts of the road to adulthood? For when we do this, we will see changes beyond our imagination in a generation of young people, we will see more variety in the generations that make up our own parishes, and we will all benefit from the life and passion that teenagers and young adults bring to anything that they have decided is worth living for.

Part One: Laying the groundwork

What basic understanding must be in place in order to provide good groundwork for the youth in that ministry? Throughout scripture we see examples of God calling young people to do his work. If God can use, and in fact, wants to use people of all ages, then we as the adult member of the body of Christ must take on as our solemn responsibility the discipling and equipping of our children, teenagers and young adults.

When God called Jeremiah to be a prophet, he was still young enough to consider himself a child and doubted that he could do the task at hand. God’s response to him was this: “…do not say, ‘I am only a child.’ … Now I have put my words in your mouth.’” (Jeremiah 1:9 NIV). In the same spirit, Paul instructs Timothy, “Don’t let anyone look down on you because you are young, but set an example for the believers in speech, in life, in love, in faith, and in purity” (1 Timothy 4:12). This God hasn’t changed. He’s still putting his words in the mouths of young people, and they still have the capacity to set an example for us all. Most of the time, all they need is for someone to start them training for godliness.

Just prior to the verse in 1 Timothy, Paul urges Timothy to “train yourself to be godly,” painting an image of rigorous, daily practice. We all know that physical exercise does no good if only done haphazardly, and the same is true of striving to be godly. But if we train daily in the practice of godliness with the young people entrusted to our care, then it is possible to “Set an example for the believers in speech, in life, in love, in faith and in purity.”

Paul’s next instructions are to “devote yourself to the public reading of Scripture, to preaching and teaching. Do not neglect your gift, which was given you through a prophetic message when the body of elders laid hands on you” (vv. 13-14). Here he not only outlines habits that are part of striving every day for godliness, but recognizes Timothy’s gift. This highlights two elements that are often lacking in our ministries to youth.

The first element is the gift. All the youth in our sphere of influence have spiritual gifts, but often no one helps them to realize this. A college girl once came to me after having taking a spiritual gifts inventory, and said, “Wow, I have gifts?” And I asked her, “What, did you think God left you out?” Her eyes widened and she said, “I guess I never thought of it that way.” All of our youth have gifts, but many of them perhaps think that God somehow left them out. This must be addressed in our ministries so that the kids can realize that God has equipped them to do His work.

To call out the gifts in our young people takes the body of elders. This is the second element. Too often, the church as a whole is not as committed to the youth of today being equipped for ministry as they are committed to the youth minister equipping the youth for ministry—when they are older of course and have learned how to dress like grown-ups do. This cannot be. Our youth need the recognition from the adults that they are gifted. It’s not enough to merely have the youth minister or the adult volunteers recognize this, but the church as whole, the body, must take part of recognizing the gifts of young people to empower them to step forward in the calling God has placed upon them. Granted, most youth don’t have a well-defined idea of what calling is. However, as they are mentored by adults in the church, who continually affirm the gifts that God has given them, then they will be able to start actively walking the path that God has for them.

 “Slipping through the cracks” is a cliché used for many things, but unfortunately it’s all too familiar in our churches. Mostly it’s come to define what happens to many kids as they transition out of high school youth ministry.

From The Journal of Student Ministries Read it all

Take a look at some of the upcoming or newly released movies next time you’re in a theatre. Fantasy books-turned-movie such as Eragon, Stardust, The Golden Compass and The Seeker have popped out in rapid succession, making me wonder if there’s something going on here that we should be paying attention to.  While these movies may be a blatant attempt by studios to cash in on the box office returns of the Lord of the Rings, Narnia, and, of course, the now ubiquitous teen hero, Harry Potter, I think there’s more going on here.

See, from the studios’ perspectives, they’re just making what they think will sell to the most marketed to audience in our culture—teenagers.  But what is selling is worth noting.  All of these stories have something in common.  Young people setting out on dangerous quests to change the world.

And these stories present possibilities to ponder such as people have a purpose and a destiny, and concepts like you can’t use evil as a means to an end because in the end, evil will always win.  Teens are gobbling up stories that involve young people risking their lives for others, sacrificing their wants and needs for the protection of others, enduring great hardship to achieve their goals.

Such stories stir something in our spirits, dawnings of a realization that maybe, just maybe, we’re in a story that’s bigger than we are.

I was privileged to hear Sarah Arthur, the author of The God-Hungry Imagination (Upper Room Books, 2007), speak.  She read a passage from The Two Towers where Aragorn and his traveling companions, Legolas and Gimli, encounter the Riders of Rohan and inquire after their friends the hobbits, who have been kidnapped.  When the Riders haven’t heard of Hobbits, they try asking about “Halflings” and one of the Riders responds:

“Halflings! But they are only a little people in old songs and children’s takes out of the North.  Do we walk in legends or on the green earth in daylight?”

“A man may do both,” said Aragorn.  “For not we but those who come after will make the legends of our time.” (p. 434 of the one volume edition).

In this short exchange there’s a sense of past, present, and future, along with the possibility of legends walking the earth.  In her book, Arthur observes: “without a past or a future, it’s difficult to find meaning in the present” (p. 26).

We live in a world that has lost its stories.  With the modern age came a sort of snobbery towards things in the past because what we had accomplished in the present was so amazing and so advanced that suddenly past generations looked benighted and hopelessly behind where we found ourselves rapidly ascending towards the pinnacle of technological and scientific breakthroughs.

Without a past, however, there’s no way to learn and get a vision for our place in a larger story, or have hope for a future.  Mere achievements alone do not suffice.

And our young people are longing for connection to a narrative that is bigger than they are.  As Arthur puts it, “ the church is the living story we’re inviting young people to participate in” and then asks, “What kind of story is your church telling?” (p. 30).

In order to reach our young people, “we must become bards: poets charged with the task of keeping and imparting the stories, languages, values and beliefs of a culture.  We take the many texts of our hearers’ lives and thread them through the warp and weft of the Christian narrative until patterned meaning emerges” (p. 31).  We take their stories and help them fit into Christ’s story, giving them a past, present and a future as they learn to be his disciples.

And we can build on the opportunities presented us in the stories they are connecting to now in the form of the books and movies mentioned and show them how legends really do walk the earth in the God-man, Jesus Christ, and what that means for their lives.

What story is your church telling?

If you are signed into wordpress while looking at a wordpress blog, then you’ll see a blue tool bar at the top of your page with a series of drop-down menus that allow you to access your dashboards among other things. The far right tool bar, as I just accidentally discovered, is labeled “blog info” and the last option on the drop-down menu is “report as mature.”

And that word struck me. “Mature.” Of course, the meaning in the context of the drop down menu is that someone has posted x-rated content on their blog, something wordpress.com tries to discourage. But instead of, say, reporting as “lewd” or “inappropriate” we have to report this material as “mature.”

The fundamental implication would be, then, that those who do not wish to view this material are immature.

Of course, none of us strives to be immature. We even have ideas in Scripture that we want seeds (lives) to mature (Luke 8:14), and is equated with having reached fullness in Christ in Ephesians: “until we all reach unity in the faith and in the knowledge of the Son of God and become mature, attaining to the whole measure of the fullness of Christ” (4:13). (See also 1 Cor. 2:6; Phil. 3:15; Col 4:12; Heb. 5:14; James 1:4 NIV).

So we are told to strive for maturity in Christ, and yet one of the things I would think of as being a marker along that pathway to maturity in Christ would be refusing to view “mature” websites…

Where am I going with this? The clash between the kingdom and culture stood out to me as I reflected on this, and it shouted to me how we as the church, and especially we who work with youth need to help our students through meaningful rites of passage in teaching them what it means to be mature in in Christ and in practical ways in life as adults.

So here’s to being immature mature people!