Relationships

So many teenagers in our society have become disposable. Like a year-old cell phone, they have simply been cast aside or stuck in a drawer. Broken families leave many teenagers today lonely and angry. Many resist anyone who seems to care about them for fear of disappointment and resent anything that looks like authority because their experience with authority has always been abusive. God loves those “throw-away” teenagers. How do we reach them?

There are no easy answers or instant solutions. Ministry with hard to reach teenagers requires an investment in relationship . . . just like all other ministry with teenagers. The difference, of course, is that these relationships are usually harder to form, less predictable, and require a longer investment in time. Claire Sullivan (writing in City Lights: Ministry Essentials for Reaching Urban Youth, Scott Larson and Karen Free, gen. eds., Loveland, CO: Group Books, 2003) has suggested 10 approaches that are needed for reaching hard to reach teenagers . I think these are important ideas:

1. Start by going. We won’t reach hard to reach teenagers by waiting for them to come to us.
2. Begin working with one person and develop a relationship by listening to their stories of survival. It is more likely you will reach one teenager who is hurting than an entire street gang. He or she may bring others to you, but start with one.
3. Find a ministry that is already doing what you want to do, and learn from their successes and failures.
4. Be consistent. Hard to reach teenagers need to see you as a consistent presence in their lives and communities. Sullivan correctly says that this will require some personal sacrifice.
5. Realize that this is a long-term process. Hard to reach teenagers will probably not be reach the first time you speak . . . and you will probably encounter a number of set-backs.
6. Look for gifts and talents God has given them and affirm those gifts as they pop up. It is so easy to focus on the negative behavior of hard to reach teenagers. Focusing on their gifts gives them a sense of hope.
7. Begin steps of transition by inviting the young person into your life through such things as a small group at church, a meal out, a ball game, or whatever common ground you have to build on.
8. Allow the Holy Spirit to reveal what is in your heart through this relationship. Difficult relationships can cause our own issues of brokenness and sin to surface. Quickly turn to Christ as you discover things in your own life that need his healing touch.
9. Model Christ before you try to present Christ. Your testimony will mean more if the teenager can see Christ living through you first.
10. Help people in local churches to allow teenagers to find their place in the kingdom where they are, not where they’re supposed to be.

My first youth ministry position was at a little rural church in Oklahoma. I was a college student and the church was willing to trust me to help them reach and disciple their teenagers. Most of the youth group consisted of three brothers whose dad ran a farm and three sisters whose parents worked in the city but wanted to raise their kids in wide-open spaces. When I arrived at the church, I met a young farmer who had been teaching the youth in Sunday morning Bible study. He offered to step aside so I could have the time with the teenagers. I agreed and took over teaching Sunday School to about seven teenagers from 7th to 12th grade.

As I look back on the decision now, I see it as my first major youth ministry mistake. I’ve made a bundle of mistakes as a youth leader, but I’m pretty sure that was the first. The teenagers traded the investment of a young farmer who they had grown up with for the investment of a college student who was new to them. They appreciated us both. The question is, why did they have to choose?

As a college junior, I knew that youth ministry involved building relationships with teenagers. I loved the teenagers in that little youth group. Together, we dug into Scripture, talked about problems and frustrations, shared inside jokes, and enjoyed time together. We did the things it takes to build a good relationship. I suppose there are some youth leaders who don’t want to build relationships with teenagers, but I don’t think I’ve ever met them. Most of us are attracted to youth ministry because we love teenagers and want to guide them into a closer walk with Christ.

The part of youth ministry I didn’t get was how important it is that I find ways to surround youth with godly adults who will love them, teach them, encourage them, and listen to them. The teenagers in that little, rural, Oklahoma church didn’t just need the college student and the young farmer; they needed spiritual moms and dads, spiritual grandma’s and grandpa’s, spiritual aunts and uncles. They needed to be loved by a lot of adults. My friend, Richard Ross, says that teenagers need significant relationships with at least five godly adults.

The challenge for youth leaders is how to divide the time. Do you invest your time in building relationships with teenagers, or do you focus on equipping adults so that you are able to expand your ministry and touch more teenagers? Of course, the answer is both, but how?

First, never do anything in youth ministry alone. Always find other adults to help. Whether they are young adults or senior adults, find someone to go with you to the football game or hang out with the kids at the Friday night fellowship or help with the Sunday morning Bible study.

Second, get to know the parents of your teenagers. They are great potential youth leaders and it helps you in your friendships with teenagers as well.

Third, find training events to attend . . . and take several adults with you. These may be one evening meetings at your church or offered by your local denominational headquarters, or they may be national events that require a long car trip. Either way, both the training and the investment in other adults will be worth the effort.

Finally, never allow yourself to be threatened by teenagers connecting with adults other than you. Most of us love the connections we have with students and if we get real honest we would rather not share those connections. Just remember: teenagers need at least five godly adults in their lives. If you don’t help them to connect with those people, they are not likely to find them.

I just finished reading a refreshing book on youth culture, Pamela Erwin’s A Critical Approach to Youth Culture: It’s Influence and Implications for Ministry. Okay, with a title like that, you would expect it to be a college textbook  . . . and it is. (I admit it: I’m a geek. I read college textbooks. Of course, the fact that I’m a seminary professor probably has something to do with it.) What I liked about Erwin’s book is that she doesn’t approach youth culture as if it is a one-size fits all experience. True, there are elements of American youth culture that almost all teenagers bump up against:

• Growing use of a wide range of technological devices.
• Instantaneous connection with people from all over the planet through the Internet.
• Increasing cultural and ethnic diversity among their peers.
• Multi-million dollar movies designed to stimulate the senses.
• A permissive cultural attitude toward sex.

And so on. The problem is, teenagers do not hear, comprehend, or react to these cultural markers in anything close to a uniform way. Each teenager responds in ways that are somewhat unique to themselves and are heavily influenced by their cultural experiences: family dynamics, economics, crisis experience, friendships, and much more.

We have a tendency to want to put people in groups: all old people, all teenagers, all Asians, all Californians. And while it may be helpful on some level to talk about group characteristics, the only thing that is true for all Asians is that they are all . . . well, Asian. People are different. Unique. If you want to understand teenagers, don’t watch MTV. Talk to them about their world–how they see it, how they interact with it, and how they react to it.

My next door neighbors in Nashville were from El Salvador. They had four children, all boys. Those little guys loved to cover over and hang out when I was trying to do yard work. They always wanted to help. Of course, that meant taking twice as long to get things done. Before long, I started getting invitations to barbecues and yard parties where I was the only non-Salvadoran present. The truth is, I loved it. The food was different than what I was used to. They spoke Spanish when they weren’t talking to me . . . and my Spanish is . . . well, a little worse than their three-year-old.

It sounds trite to say that America is becoming more multi-cultural. It is less likely, even in a small church, that your church is full of people who share your skin color and your ethnicity. The cultural mix of adolescents today adds a new dynamic to youth ministry. If I read the Bible correctly, the expected norm for believers is that we would reach into other cultures with the good news of Christ. There are some good reasons why ethnic churches exist, but we should never use our ethnicity as an excuse to limit the love of Christ to those who are only like us in cultural background.

That said, how do I minister to teenagers who do not share my cultural background?

1. You cannot leave your own culture behind. Culture stains our lives deeply. It colors the way we see the world and the way we interact with other people. Despite my best efforts to understand my brothers and sisters in the Ukraine, I will always be a product of American culture. And perhaps I should be.
2. Realize that culture can act as a prison. We can be so trapped in our own cultural perspectives that we fail to understand how others see things. One of the greatest failings of some of the modern missions movement was to equate their cultural heritage with something what is Christian. The way we do government, the kind of songs we sing, the buildings we design for worship (or that fact that we build a building at all) are all cultural distinctives. The message of Christianity is not a system or approach to church; it is a person–Jesus Christ!
3. We need to seek to understand. A friend recently told me that he asked a man from a different ethnic group to let him know if he ever did anything that was culturally thoughtless. “I may be ignorant of important issues in your culture,” he told him, “and I don’t want my ignorance to be mistaken for something else.”
4. Pay attention to times when you don’t seem to connect with youth of other backgrounds. Some of the differences that crop up in cultures include: the way we view time, the desire to be an individual as opposed to being part of a collective, how much respect we believe an authority figure should receive, and how willing we are to live with uncertainty.
5. When you discover a cultural difference, attempt to find ways to make Jesus known in their culture. It is easy to insist that people conform to our culture. Someone might say: “Please be on time. We start at precisely 10:00.” To someone in an African culture, that sounds like you are saying: I don’t really care about people; the clock is what is important. Or, he might say:  “I know I’m your teacher, but don’t call me Mr. Smith. Just call me John.” The statement could be confusing to someone from an Asian culture who sees definite differences between teachers and students. They might think: Are you telling me you don’t deserve my respect?

Youth groups tend to take on a culture of their own. Teenagers find ways to interact with each other, traditions you share, and stories you use to define yourselves. All of that evolves over time. But perhaps it is worth considering: Is your youth group culture exclusive? Do young people of different races and ethnic backgrounds find a place where they are loved and accepted? Are differences approached with understanding and compassion? Or do your leaders assume that everyone thinks and interacts like they do?

The key is to keep the focus on the person of Jesus Christ. He has the ability to stride across cultures and transform hearts regardless of where they grew up. Make him the center of your youth ministry culture and hold everything else with open hands.

by Eva Lee

In the 1960s, 90% of American children and adolescents lived with their biological, married parents, while today only 35% do. While the reasons for this change are complex, much of it can be attributed to the large number of children and youth whose families will be disrupted by divorce. Divorce laws changed dramatically in 1969 when California became the first state to pass legislation enabling spouses to separate without having to prove cause or harm. Within a few years, “no-fault” divorce laws took effect in most of the 50 states, thus making it possible to end marriages with greater legal ease. Currently 45% of first marriages and 55% of second marriages end in divorce.

“Since 1970, at least a million children and teenagers have seen their parents divorce – building a generation of Americans that has come of age. It bears repeating that a quarter of adults in this country under the age of 44 had their parents divorce during childhood or adolescent. Demographers also report that 40% of all married adults in the 1990s have already been divorced” (Wallerstein, Lewis, and Blakeslee, The Unexpected Legacy of Divorce: A Twenty-Five Year Landmark Study).

We are living in a divorce world and we have to realize that divorce does affect people’s mental, emotional, and physical health.

For many children and teenagers divorce is a tragic ending of the secure, predictable family structure they have known. Divorce represents an abrupt, forced end to happy life. Divorce of  parents causes the children to feel afraid, to assume adult responsibilities at an early age, and to feel abandoned by the parent who moved away from the family. Young people often live with a mother who is emotionally unavailable while she struggles to cope with the massive changes of divorce and was often depressed. They may be without key role models or models for building positive relationships. Grown children of divorce may lack critical life skills, have difficulty coping with change, struggle to build long-term relationships, and be unable to identify and communicate their desires, feelings, and needs.

How can youth leaders help teenager who have experienced parental divorce?

1. Youth ministers can help the divorce find resources to reconstruct the family. “Family reconstruction” does not mean parents will live together again. However, parents need to develop a new structure that allows the teenager to have both parents active in his or her life. Parents need resources–which may include counselors or pastoral care–that will help them to set aside their animosity and work together for the benefit of the children. The goal is to let teenagers overcome feeling lost, isolated, alone, or frustrated.
2. Let teenagers voice their concerns.  Youth leaders can provide one-on-one mentoring programs or small groups of teenagers facing similar situations. Building friendship is key to helping an adolescent adjust to life after divorce.
3. Help to develop peer support. A positive peer group can be a great place for teenagers to feel loved and accepted. Work at making your youth ministry a place where teenagers can trust each other, can confide in each other, and can affirm each other. Lead your students to avoid cutting humor that would tear down the self-confidence of group members.

Eva Lee was a youth worker in Hong Kong until five years ago. She currently lives in San Francisco where she is a volunteer youth leader and a student at Golden Gate Baptist Theological Seminary.

For Jesus, discipleship was relational. When he called his disciples to “follow me” (Matt. 4:19), Jesus was inviting them into a relationship with him. It was not a casual relationship but an intentional relationship. He was inviting them to spend time with him, learn from him, watch what he did, listen to what he said, and prepare for the ministry God had for them. Discipleship with the teenagers in your church should take on a lot of the same characteristics. Students need more than an hour a week sitting in your Bible study class. They need a relationship with an adult in whose life they can see the Gospel fleshed out.

Building relationships with teenagers can be a challenge. The truth is, it can be a challenge to build a relationship with anyone. I suppose that is why our country has such a high divorce rate. Investing your life in someone else takes time, and that usually means sacrificing things you would prefer to do. Giving teenagers your time can be tough.

Building relationships with teenagers can also be a challenge because teenagers may not seem to be interested. Most teenagers are hungry for an adult who will care about them, but they may not trust adults. How do you build relationships with teenagers? Here are nine things I think are important.

1. Building a relationship with a teenager normally takes time. Don’t try to rush it. Be a consistent presence in their lives.

2. Showing up at things like football games, band concerts, and school plays indicates genuine concern. Students may not say much, but they will notice.

3. Ask students about their interests. You will often get a grunt, a shrug, or a non-committal “fine” when you ask how cheer-leading is going, but students do like the fact that you ask.

4. Let them see that you are human. Don’t tell teenagers about everything you struggle with; they probably aren’t ready for that. But do let them see that you have questions, you fail, you are unsure at times. Also, let them see that you genuinely desire to see God at work in your life.

5. Talk about your faith and about Christ. Most non-Christian teenagers appreciate you talking about what Christ means to you even if they haven’t made a commitment of Christ for themselves. Plus, that is where the intentional part of intentional relationships really begins.

6. Invite them into spiritual conversations. Ask them to pray for you. Ask them where they see themselves spiritually. Ask them what struggles they have walking with God.

7. Spend at least as much time listening as you do talking.

8. Challenge them to be people who stand for Christ. Share with them ways you think God could use them . . . right now and in the future.

9. As your relationship with a student grows, be willing to lovingly confront them when they are unkind or unchristian. Use the sandwich technique: tell them something you appreciate about them, the thing you are concerned about, and then why you value them enough to tell them about your concern.

Most of us would not be where we are spiritually except for the investment of some Christian mentor. In your youth Most of us would not be where we are spiritually except for the investment of some Christian mentor. In your youth ministry, you have the opportunity to be that for someone else.

I spent last week hanging out with an amazing youth minister in Malmo, Sweden, Joel Sjovall. (Don’t even try to pronounce the last name unless you are Swedish.) Youth ministry in Sweden has its challenges. Teenagers in Sweden are often slow to respond to the gospel. They often lack spiritual background and are hesitant to accept the teachings of Jesus at face value. However, youth leaders in Sweden are deeply committed to Christ and are desperately sharing Christ with a generation they hope will turn back to God.

Joel introduced me to the Swedish word “Fika.” It roughly translates, a small meal. It is more than a snack, and it seems that the purpose is more social than nutritional. The food they eat for fika can be almost anything: a roll with cheese, falafal (a Malmo favorite), fruit with cream. Sharing fika gives people time to talk, laugh, and enjoy time together.

Perhaps by now you are saying: Thanks for the lesson in Swedish culture, but what does that have to do with youth ministry where I live? I’m glad you asked.

The message of Christ is desperately important. There is nothing we do as youth leaders that is more important than helping teenagers to truly know Jesus Christ. However, sometimes in our zeal, we may miss an important component of the message of Christ . . . the “one another” part of it. The Bible calls us to love one another, serve one another, care for one another, correct one another, and teach one another. At times in ministry, we may spend so much time as youth leaders talking that we miss the chance for teenagers to be with one another.

In Joel’s ministry, teenagers usually gather for fika before worship and teaching. Youth leaders sit among teenagers, encouraging them and listening to their hearts. Teenagers have time to tease each other and get to know one another. And sometimes, they do exactly what the Bible calls them to . . . to love, serve, correct, and teach each other. After the worship service on Sunday at Joel’s church, has fika together so members can invite guests to sit and talk.

Maybe teenagers in Oklahoma or Illinois would look at you funny if you told them you were going to start having fika before Bible study. But, I wonder: Do we need to be more intentional about helping teenagers to have times just to be with one another?

This week I am traveling in Sweden. I have a friend who leads a youth ministry in Malmo, near Copenhagen. Yesterday, while walking around town, I wanted to ask him if he wanted to get something to eat and decided to try it in Swedish. Instead of using the word “something,” I asked if he wanted chocolate to eat. He gave me an odd look and said, You want to get some chocolate? (Fortunately, he speaks fluent English.) While I have made worse errors in my life, it reminded me of the challenge of cross-cultural communication.

In most cases, the teenagers you minister to don’t speak another language. (I guess it may seem like they do, at times.) But there are cultural differences that influence your teenager and may make communication difficult at times. Sometimes what teenagers hear is not what we are trying to say. Understanding the words is not usually the problem. Understanding the context sometimes is.

Youth ministry means hearing teenagers, even when they are saying things that are hard to hear. Their language may define “love” through a provocative MTV filter. It may include a definition of “family” may be something caustic and angry. For some, the word “Jesus” may be equated with rules or may have little meaning at all.

So, how do we communicate cross-culturally with teenagers? We listen well. We teach with more than words. We depend on God’s Spirit to translate His Word into their hearts.

Early in youth ministry, I really thought my investment would make the difference for Christ in the lives of the teenagers with whom I worked. Some of the teenagers would tell you I was important to them. But I don’t think any of them were really shaped for life by my really cool Bible studies. In youth ministry, we play a vital role in helping teenagers to get face-to-face with Christ. However, research says the faith of most teenagers ends up looking a lot like the faith of their parents. The truth is, we may have more impact on teenagers by encouraging parents to live out their faith with passion in front of their teenage children. Unfortunately, a lot of parents see our only role is to make sure their teenagers enough fun at church that they won’t get in trouble with sex or drugs. Finding ways to build up and encourage parents can be a challenge. Here are a few things to keep in mind.

1. Most parents truly love their children and want the best for them. However, a lot of them simply do not realize how vital their involvement in their teenagers’ lives is. When students come home, grunt at them, and lock themselves in their bedrooms, the message parents hear is: LEAVE ME ALONE. And a lot of parents do. Parents may simply want to keep peace in the house. Parents need to be reminded how vital it is that they communicate with their kids, that they set age-appropriate limits, and, perhaps most of all, that they listen.

2. Many parents of teenagers are in the sandwich generation. Not only do they have demands on their time to raise their teenage children–a task that seems daunting to many–but they may also be trying to help their aging parents. Add to that the physical and social changes in middle adulthood–slow decreases in sight and hearing, thinning hair and thickening mid-sections, decreases in muscle mass, and the realization that there are more years behind than ahead, to name a few–and you can understand why many parents feel stretched thin. Some youth leaders get frustrated because parents seem critical of the youth ministry. Try to hear the frustrations of parents through the lens through which they see the world. Many times, parents need encouragement more than anything else.

3. Lost parents need Christ. I know this sounds simplistic and it is not necessarily the youth ministers job to witness to every family member of every teenager who visits your church. However, your church needs to love families to Christ. The relationship you have with a teenage son or daughter will often give you a unique welcome into the home. Look for ways to care about and meet the needs of parents. Introduce them to others in your church who can continue that ministry. Be the champion at your church of ministries that will care for, equip, and encourage parents . . . whether you lead them or not.

Youth ministry is most effective when you are enhancing a faith that is being taught at home. Don’t miss the importance parents are to the life of faith their teenagers will develop.

By Nancy Hamilton

An effective youth leader can have incredible influence by placing bricks of positive influence in the lives of young women in the youth group. You may be a male leader. The girls in your group may be a little harder for you to connect with than the guys. The girls in your youth ministry have a basic core need: to be known, cared for, and loved unconditionally in relationships with parents, friendships, and godly role models. So, if you have girls involved in your student ministry, here are a few things to be mindful of as you strive to encourage, nurture, and challenge these young women:

1. Girls long for a male perceptive on matters relating to them.

As you know, girls and guys often times act and think differently about everything! Finding ways to interject godly wisdom on relationships and life direction into the lives of young women is important and crucial for them.

2. Girls long to have a healthy relationship with a godly man.

For many girls who do not have positive relationships with men in their lives, having a student minister who is focused on encouraging them to become the person God desires them to be could be instrumental in the life of a young woman.

3. Girls long to know that you care about their gender, not just the guys.

While girls in your ministry need to be ministered to and mentored by godly women in your church, creating opportunities where you as the student minister can demonstrate geninue care and concern within healthy boundaries will help young women know there’s a man who she is able to trust and desires the best for her life.

Nancy Hamilton ministers to girls and young women on the student ministry team at Fellowship Bible Church in Little Rock, AR. To find out more about Nancy’s ministry visit www.fellowshiponline.com.