Is Youth Ministry Killing the Church? (Part 1)

First, breathe- I haven't lost my calling, conviction, or mind!  Then go read this.  http://www.charismanews.com/us/41465-youth-groups-driving-christian-teens-to-abandon-faith.  Now, let's talk about it.

As someone who has devoted my life to teenagers knowing Christ & making Christ known, things that are slanted towards a specific end and involve generalities instead of specifics irk me.  However, they also make me evaluate and think about valid points that are made.  We'll start with valid points-

1.  Family based discipleship is God's plan ("It is the parents' primary obligation to disciple their own children, impressing God's commandments upon them in the home on a daily basis.")
Totally true.  If you cannot see that in the communal context of Deuteronomy 6, read it again (particularly 4-7):

Hear, O Israel! The LORD is our God, the LORD alone.  And you must love the LORD your God with all your heart, all your soul, and all your strength.  And you must commit yourselves wholeheartedly to these commands I am giving you today.  Repeat them again and again to your children. Talk about them when you are at home and when you are away on a journey, when you are lying down and when you are getting up again.

Sounds to me like God's primary force for discipleship was meant to be the family.  Not only that, it was meant to be family by lifestyle.  If everything we do speaks of the God we serve, there is no way the message is missed.  That's the simple truth conveyed via the the admonition- it's an all or nothing commitment of your person: heart, soul, and strength.  If that's who you are, your kids should know it because you are permeated with it, it drips from your pores, and every aspect of you is both influenced and impacted by it.  If that is not the case, the words we speak don't carry water and the message they need to SEE is never communicated.

2.  Discipleship means becoming & maturing in the body of Christ ("spiritual adolescence is prolonged well into adulthood. It's crippling the body of Christ.")
This is a major issue with many youth ministries, but it's also an issue in the culture as a whole that must be addressed, not blamed on youth ministers.  Expectations are part of that, but the deeper issue in most churches comes from an enforced by tradition separation.  Instead of being part of the church, they are separate and not equal.  The idea springs from people who like a "non" messy church service.  Students, children, and babies create noise, interruptions, literal messes, distractions, and disruptions.  Thus, the idea that students should be somewhere away from the "real" church where they can be "messy," "noisy," and only seen when people want to be reminded they're changing young lives.  That's a farce and is a BIG reason for the plethora of youth ministries who cater solely to youth with nary a person over 40 to be seen and no involvement with the larger church other than fundraisers or maybe a token "youth Sunday" service so they can be seen.

Now, there is  a lot to be said for space and specific places for youth, but you cannot understate the importance of intergenerational contact, especially for the students!  They desperately need the wisdom incurred from age.  They have an acute need to hear the stories and gain the experience that their elders have acquired, often through much pain!  But, the biggest key is gaining them in relationship.  It is my firm belief that any student ministry that doesn't have each student connected to at least three caring adults in regular relationship is doomed to failure.  The mentoring, discipling, and overall impact that comes from regular relational contact cannot be understated!  Scripture has a lot to say about the impact of others on us, but here are two important admonitions:

 As iron sharpens iron, so a friend sharpens a friend. 

...let us consider how to stir up one another to love and good works, not neglecting to meet together, as is the habit of some, but encouraging one another...

If students are not involved with people of multiple ages who are "sharpening," "stirring up," and "encouraging," the church & youth ministry are not doing as they should!  I advocate for each student to have a minimum of 3 caring adults investing into their lives through the student ministry, whether through small or large groups, one on one mentoring, or any other methodology.  Why?  The simple truth is that the more voices reinforcing the message, the better.  It's literally better with a village and in truth, many youth ministries are based on a couple of people running everything which does NOT help the cause.

3.  Evaluation and change are necessary parts of any ministry ("...practices in the churches related to youth groups are changing dramatically.")

It's a great thing that changes are being made in youth ministry.  Why?  The culture around us is dramatically shifting and will continue to shift until we're dead and in our graves!  If the church hopes to communicate, the language spoken must be that of the masses.  That was part and parcel of the Reformation, right?  Luther and the other reformers knew that if people actually could read (and understand!) Scripture it would change their lives, instead of being something someone else told them.  Thus, the Scriptures went from Latin to German, English, & French so that they were accessible to all, not just priests and those of the "church" class.  Sound familiar?  Some would have it that culture had never changed, that language remained static, and that there was no need to adapt and adjust.  However, things have radically changed.  Some embrace that, instead of denying it, and make a great impact for the Kingdom of God (just check out the number of people who are engaging God's Word in their own language via a church who sees a way to equip & expand the Kingdom of God in a new way).  Youth ministry is yet another attempt to frame the gospel in terms the target audience understands.  

Now, instead of evaluating a whole subset (without the full picture or even complete data no less!), let's look at specific examples.  What percentage of a church should be made up of teenagers?  5%?  Maybe 10%?  Or less?  In my experience, a church that sees 10% of it's worshipping attendance made up of students is healthy.  Sure, it can be more or less, but that is a decent metric.  I've had more than 20% of a church's worshipping attendance in a youth ministry.  Currently, it's closer to 10% (probably a bit less right now as we're in the transitionary phase still).  Why do I point to this?  That's between 20-120 students in the average church in America.  If 80% of those students will leave the church, what about the students' who are in the church and not involved?  Is there a lesser attrition rate or is there something else going on entirely? I don't have the answers, but I know in my experience students who have been involved in the church (not just the youth ministry) stay involved in a church after high school. Maybe one of these days I'll work up a study and tell you for sure.  Until then, let's ask the important questions the folks who wrote the initial article missed.

If we are to throw our youth ministry because of it's failure rate, what then should we do with the church who has seen attrition of unbelievable numbers through the years and lost much of it's flavor?  Throw it out?  Luther, Swingli, and Calvin didn't and the challenge they confronted was much worse as it literally led people away from Christ!  Instead of throwing out the baby with the bathwater, what can and should be done to change youth ministry to make it more effective? We'll talk more about that next time...