Archive for October, 2008

I teach a youth ministry class at the Birmingham extension of New Orleans Seminary. This week one of the experienced students in my class raised this question: If I’m teaching a class of youth, I probably have two punching each other, three counting ceiling tile, and maybe one or two interested in Bible study. How do I help all of those students to grow in their faith?

That is an amazing question. In a small church, you may well have three 12 year olds, a 13 year old, and a 16 year old in your youth class. Even if your students were all at the same age, their development–emotionally, spiritually, mentally, and physically–would be at different stages. How do you engage all of them with the truths of Christ?

The work of spiritual development is really the work of the Holy Spirit. As a youth leader, you get to parnter with the Spirit as he works in students’ lives. Leading engaging Bible study is an important part of your partnership, but I am convinced that most youth need to see what the Bible looks like when it is fleshed out in real life. When students see you up close living out the principles of Scripture, they are often very open to what the Spirit would like to do in their hearts.

Good discipleship is not just a matter of good teaching; it is a matter of intentional relationships. Capture the flag may be the best ministry with the two guys elbowing each other in class. Show the students counting tiles how to share show Christ’s love to an underpriviledged kid and she may suddenly get why the Bible study is important. Youth who are ready to learn may need some new tools that allow them to dig deeper into God’s word. The relationships can be very different, but the goal is the same . . . to get students face to face with Christ so that his Spirit can transform their hearts.

Leading students to grow in their faith is a life-on-life issue. And the way the relationships get fleshed out will be as different as the students you are teaching.

Most of us in small churches (big churches, too) deal with losing students as they get older. Sixth or seventh graders come into our youth ministries with lots of excitement. A few years later, high school sophomores begin to disappear. We plan activities and can’t seem to motivate our older students to get involved. They opt out of going to camp and are working part-time jobs on Sunday morning.

Why does it happen? Several reasons. Students lives are busy. They have more activities to choose from than ever before in their lives. Students are more mobile. Once they get a drivers license, they are no longer dependent on parents to drive them around. Students feel the need for money. Maybe for dates; maybe for college. Part-time jobs may make them choose between working on Friday night and missing the football game and working on Sunday morning and missing church. Students want to see themselves as independent adults and youth groups often make them feel like kids. Students may have a “been there, done that” feeling, since a 16 year old has been able to participate in everything the youth group offers since he was 12.

No easy answers to this problem exist, but let me suggest a couple of things that I think are helpful. First, create opportunities for older students to have greater status in the youth ministry because of their age and experience. For example, ask them to be team leaders for your mission projects; allow them to lead part of the Bible study on Sunday. Ask them to organize a game for your fun times.

Second, give them experiences in ministry that excite their imagination. When I was at a big church in Nashville, we took graduating seniors on an international mission trip every summer. Little churches can’t do that? Actually, it may be easier for us. Two years ago, I took our one graduating senior on a mission trip to Ukraine. It was an amazing trip for both of us and changed his perspective on God’s movement in the world. The church helped with the cost.

Third, help students find their place in the church . . . even if it isn’t in the youth ministry. Last year, we graduated a student who seldom came to youth ministry events. However, she had invested more than a year in helping with preschoolers. It is a ministry she loved and kept her growing and learning in her own faith. One of our juniors, Adam, plays the base in our praise band. He is plugged into the youth ministry, but his real love is hanging with the four or five musicians that lead worship on Sunday morning. God has used his love for music to help him grow in Christ.

As parents allow older students to begin to make their own choices about church, some will opt out. It is a great disappointment. However, our call as youth leaders is not a call to get kids to our activities. It is a call to invest in the spiritual lives of students. Don’t let the fact that students don’t show up at your fun night mean that you quit investing in them. Pray for them. Encourage them. Confront them with humility and love. Speak words of truth into their lives. Your relationship may be what God uses to draw them to himself.

Podcasts are a great thing, but keeping up with them is a bit of a challenge. So, I’m not sure when David Platt (Pastor of The Church at Brookhills in Birmingham) taught it, but I was listening to one of his sermons this morning. He was teaching on Exodus 33. In the passage, God told Moses he was going to give the Israelites the blessings he had promised them–the holy land and all–but God himself was not going to go with them because they were a stiff-necked people.

Moses would not leave. He pleaded with God to go with them. God agreed. There is much about God’s conversations with Moses that I don’t understand, but Platt asked a very pointed question:

If God offered to give us his blessings without his presence, how would we respond?

Is it possible that God could fail to show up in our youth ministries . . . in our Bible study classes, youth mission projects, or fellowship activities . . . and we would not even notice?

We in America are good at doing church. Your church may be small, but, compared to the standards of history, it is probably very wealthy. You have a place to meet, resources to help you, and probably some trained leadership. Is it possible that we have become so comfortable with the blessings of God that we no longer feel the need for his presence?

The most important aspect of youth ministry is a leader who is passionately clinging to the presence of the living God. Nothing can replace that. Can we do good youth ministry without the presence of God? I shudder to think, but perhaps we can.

What a dismal failure to experience God’s promised land . . . but not have the presence of God.

Youth ministry in Urban settings carries unique challenges. Some small churches are located in the city and are dealing with the issues that plague many of our major population centers . . . poverty, violence, high drop-out rates, high rates of substance abuse. I don’t mean to stereotype inner-city students. Certainly youth in the country and in suburban settings have their share of challenges. Still, many churches have abandoned the city because of the perceived danger of the city.

Fernando Arzola has just released an interesting book called, Toward a Prophetic Youth Ministry. Arzola contends that some inner city churches have focused solely on discipleship and have neglected the very real human needs of their students. Other churches have focused on meeting the needs for food, education, and affirmation, and have missed calling students to faith in Christ. Other churches have called students to social activism to address the overall problems of the city, but fail to do that in a way that makes a relationship to Christ the center of the ministry. Arzola calls inner-city churches to “prophetic youth ministry,” that is, a ministry that focuses on Christian ministry that addresses human needs and the systems that create that need, but does it with a clear focus on biblical discipleship.

I believe in discipleship. We cannot neglect it, but focusing on social justice is an important call of Scripture and of biblical discipleship. We will never eliminate poverty, but we can address its causes. We will never meet all of the needs students have, but focusing on human needs often opens the door for a walk with Christ. Recently, I heard Arzola say, “A tutoring hour can be every bit as spiritual as another discipleship group.” Interesting perspective.

If youth ministry is really “ministry,” should we bother with time to plan activities that are “just for fun”? Yes . . . and no.

Fun activities are essential in youth ministry . . . but they need to be the RIGHT fun activities. There are several reasons why we do fun activities, but one of the most important reasons is that they do a great job of building community among students. What builds community? Well, a lot of things, but here are a few:

1. Communities of teenagers have shared experiences. The students in my group love to tell the story of almost being killed by a tornado that swept across Florida while we were on an “amazing race” last summer. It really wasn’t as life-threatening as they make out, but the winds did get scary enough for us to take shelter in a truck stop. The story is important because it is an experience they share.

2. Communities have shared stories. One youth group I worked with used to go to this retreat center that had a cemetery beside it. Once while we were walking through the cemetery, one of the middle schoolers asked me why one of the headstones had a carved dog on top. Honestly, I had no idea, but I made up a story about how the guy buried there had a faithful dog that tried to save him from a fire. The dog failed, and was so damaged that friends decided he should remain with his master. “What you see here is not a replica of the dog, but the actual dog encased in concrete,” I concluded. While the students decided I had a worse sense of humor than they had realized, the story became a defining myth of our ministry. Every time we went back to the retreat center, they insisted we go to the tombstone and I tell the story again.

3. Communities have inside jokes. Some time ago, I started calling all the students in our youth ministry “Charlie.” We even did a T-shirt once that said our church was a place where we call you by your name–”and your name is Charlie.” When I call one of the kids Charlie and a guest tries to figure out why, they explain, “It’s just a thing with our group. Go with it.”

So, what fun activities are NOT the right kind? The kind that don’t build community. Take students to an amusement park and let them run off to ride roller-coasters with their friends from school. Meet together to eat supper. Then, meet to go home. Was it fun? Yes. Did it build community? Not likely. I’m not saying don’t do amusement parks; I’m saying make sure any activity you do gives kids an opportunity to connect with each other.

If our discipleship of students does not lead to students getting their hands dirty in the lives of other people, we are kidding ourselves about how much discipling we are really doing.

Doing a mission trip to Nicaragua may be a challenge for the typical small church. (Don’t rule it out. No telling what God will do.) But that doesn’t change the fact that our youth ministry has to involve students in ministry. Simple forms of ministry are cool. Collect food for a food bank. Send shoes to a mission in Mexico. Serve a meal at a homeless shelter. But get kids involved in doing the gospel.

We sometimes overlook the most important things. Prayer is not just a precursor to ministry; it is ministry. At my church this Sunday, we gave the kids some pizza and took about eight of them to the high school and middle school campuses in our community. We talked about the power of prayer and how to pray. Then, we gave each of them a partner and sent them around the school to be prayer warriors for the students, faculty, and staff at their schools.

Prayerwalking is a simple ministry that advances the kingdom in at least two ways. First, God really does choose to move when we pray. Second, our students are more aware of the spiritual needs as they go back to school on Sunday. They will be quicker to pray . . . and quicker to speak a word for Christ.

A.W. Tozer’s book, The Knowledge of the Holy, was published in 1961, probably before most volunteer youth workers were born. The book really could not be more relevant for today. Tozer’s basic concern in writing the book was that so much bad theology is being taught and so much bad ministry is being practiced because we really don’t know God. We really don’t have a clear picture of who God really is.

Youth ministry in a small church should never be youth ministry with a “small God.” We need to help our students capture a vision of God as He really is. Our students need to see God as the One who defines goodness, who is ever merciful, who is always righteous, and who never changes. We need to challenge the kind of thinking about God that tries to put Him in a human box or keep Him in the far distant sky, and help students truly capture a vision of the God who transcends from heaven to be ever present in our lives and in our world.

As you are teaching your students this week, help them to see God as He truly is. Maybe, like me, you will find Tozer’s book a good reminder. I recommend it.