I was involved in a conversation recently with several ministers from several churches. One of those mentioned a problem-situation that has arisen in their church. This church is very large and all of you would know it should I name it. At any rate, this church has a very large and impressive youth building. You cannot imagine how large and impressive. The youth conduct all of their activities in this building. In fact, they never even step foot into the worship building in which their parents worship. Never. The church has a massive youth group. So what is the problem?
When these youth reach the age when they need to either find their own church or transition into the adult area of their home church, they are perplexed. It is almost impossible to find any adult worship service that compares to what they experienced in youth group (side note, this may be one reason the church in America is so anxious to be “contemporary” in its flavor, but that is another blog for another day).
There is great correlation between the problem mentioned above and the epidemic of young people leaving the church nationwide – somewhere between 70-85% of students are leaving the church (at least temporarily, if not longer) after leaving high school. Most churches are not wealthy enough to afford an entire youth building and most churches do not employ a strategy where students never worship at all with their parents. However, I have, over the years, come to see more harm than good from the youth group SYSTEM.
I am talking about the system, not the well-intentioned believers in the system. My youth minister was a dear man, strong believer, and was even my best-man in my wedding. I was a youth minister myself. Some of the greatest Christians I know are in youth ministry. So please hear me, I am doubting the system, not the people.
As I look back at my years as a youth minister, I am saddened at the number of young people who are not walking with the Lord today. The majority of the youth who were in my youth ministries who are still walking with the Lord today have one thing in common, their parents were involved in their spiritual lives.
The youth who go through youth group and stay with God commonly fall into one of two categories: either they make it because their parents actively disciple them at home, or their home lives are bad and some youth minister or youth sponsor takes up this role of discipling them. In both cases, the “answer” was being hooked up with adults, not with other teens. Are there exceptions to the above? Yes, and praise the Lord. But there also a ton of examples of teens from godly homes who were strung out on the fishing line as “bait” to draw in other teens, only to see the churched teens go the way of the worldly teen rather than the worldly teen go the way of the churched teen. I would much rather see my whole family trying to reach another whole family than send my children out as ambassadors alone.
Of course there are those young people who came to Christ through youth ministry and are still walking with the Lord. Praise the Lord. But there are also numerous young people who were raised by Christian parents and then were exposed to all sorts of temptations and worldliness in the youth group itself. When I was a youth minister, in an attempt to reach the unsaved youth, we used lots of rock music and so on. How many of those youth were damaged rather than blessed? As one said well, “Sometimes in the church we do more entertaining the wolves than feeding the lambs.”
The church I serve as pastor does not have a youth group. What? No youth group? I guess you don’t care about young people? Nothing could be further from the truth. We have a great percentage of young people in our church. Our youth are not a separate group. They are part of the church as a whole. Any youth attending Sunday School is a part of one of two classes in our church that offer “multi-generational” appeal. Both of the multi-generational classes have attendees from babies to adults. If a youth were to show up by himself, where would he go? To one of the family classes mentioned above. What will he find? A group of teenagers studying the Bible with adults (and children). This hypothetical youth who shows up alone needs more than anything to see and be a part of family. Do we have youth events? Yes and No. They are called church events. We have 60-70 church attenders aged 10 days – 21 years. When they are all together at an event where all these ages are mixed in with all the adults, too, I never hear the teens saying, “Oh, I wish these little kids weren’t here,” or, “Why are there adults here?” Instead, I usually hear my teens coming home saying, “Mr. So and So is so funny!” and, “All of us teen girls were fighting over who got to hold the new baby,” etc.
I read all the time in our denominational publications about the problem of young people leaving the church and there are always various helps offered. I usually read them wishing they could see that one of the problems is that youth need their families more than they need youth group. I was delighted to see recently, where the Southern Baptists of Texas are taking a step in the right direction. They are at least working on a program to put parents more directly involved with their youth. You can read it here: http://www.texanonline.net/default.asp?action=article&aid=6163&issue=3/23/2009
I could go on and on and I still might not help you understand, but if you will listen to the message linked below, you will gain more understanding. Dr. Voddie Baucham says it better than most. I hope you will take the time to listen. Click here: “The Centrality of the Home” by Dr. Voddie Baucham
Also, you can listen to Dr. Baucham on the subject, “Answering Objections to the Family-Integrated Church,” by clicking here.
I would be glad to answer any questions you might have about church without youth group. We are still learning, but I can tell you this – our church loves youth and we get to be with them and I think the youth may just love our church, too. Malachi 4:6 – “He will restore the hearts of the fathers to their children and the hearts of the children to their fathers, so that I will not come and smite the land with a curse.”
Rethinking Youth Groups
I was involved in a conversation recently with several ministers from several churches. One of those mentioned a problem-situation that has arisen in their church. This church is very large and all of you would know it should I name it. At any rate, this church has a very large and impressive youth building. You cannot imagine how large and impressive. The youth conduct all of their activities in this building. In fact, they never even step foot into the worship building in which their parents worship. Never. The church has a massive youth group. So what is the problem?
When these youth reach the age when they need to either find their own church or transition into the adult area of their home church, they are perplexed. It is almost impossible to find any adult worship service that compares to what they experienced in youth group (side note, this may be one reason the church in America is so anxious to be “contemporary” in its flavor, but that is another blog for another day).
There is great correlation between the problem mentioned above and the epidemic of young people leaving the church nationwide – somewhere between 70-85% of students are leaving the church (at least temporarily, if not longer) after leaving high school. Most churches are not wealthy enough to afford an entire youth building and most churches do not employ a strategy where students never worship at all with their parents. However, I have, over the years, come to see more harm than good from the youth group SYSTEM.
I am talking about the system, not the well-intentioned believers in the system. My youth minister was a dear man, strong believer, and was even my best-man in my wedding. I was a youth minister myself. Some of the greatest Christians I know are in youth ministry. So please hear me, I am doubting the system, not the people.
As I look back at my years as a youth minister, I am saddened at the number of young people who are not walking with the Lord today. The majority of the youth who were in my youth ministries who are still walking with the Lord today have one thing in common, their parents were involved in their spiritual lives.
The youth who go through youth group and stay with God commonly fall into one of two categories: either they make it because their parents actively disciple them at home, or their home lives are bad and some youth minister or youth sponsor takes up this role of discipling them. In both cases, the “answer” was being hooked up with adults, not with other teens. Are there exceptions to the above? Yes, and praise the Lord. But there also a ton of examples of teens from godly homes who were strung out on the fishing line as “bait” to draw in other teens, only to see the churched teens go the way of the worldly teen rather than the worldly teen go the way of the churched teen. I would much rather see my whole family trying to reach another whole family than send my children out as ambassadors alone.
Of course there are those young people who came to Christ through youth ministry and are still walking with the Lord. Praise the Lord. But there are also numerous young people who were raised by Christian parents and then were exposed to all sorts of temptations and worldliness in the youth group itself. When I was a youth minister, in an attempt to reach the unsaved youth, we used lots of rock music and so on. How many of those youth were damaged rather than blessed? As one said well, “Sometimes in the church we do more entertaining the wolves than feeding the lambs.”
The church I serve as pastor does not have a youth group. What? No youth group? I guess you don’t care about young people? Nothing could be further from the truth. We have a great percentage of young people in our church. Our youth are not a separate group. They are part of the church as a whole. Any youth attending Sunday School is a part of one of two classes in our church that offer “multi-generational” appeal. Both of the multi-generational classes have attendees from babies to adults. If a youth were to show up by himself, where would he go? To one of the family classes mentioned above. What will he find? A group of teenagers studying the Bible with adults (and children). This hypothetical youth who shows up alone needs more than anything to see and be a part of family. Do we have youth events? Yes and No. They are called church events. We have 60-70 church attenders aged 10 days – 21 years. When they are all together at an event where all these ages are mixed in with all the adults, too, I never hear the teens saying, “Oh, I wish these little kids weren’t here,” or, “Why are there adults here?” Instead, I usually hear my teens coming home saying, “Mr. So and So is so funny!” and, “All of us teen girls were fighting over who got to hold the new baby,” etc.
I read all the time in our denominational publications about the problem of young people leaving the church and there are always various helps offered. I usually read them wishing they could see that one of the problems is that youth need their families more than they need youth group. I was delighted to see recently, where the Southern Baptists of Texas are taking a step in the right direction. They are at least working on a program to put parents more directly involved with their youth. You can read it here: http://www.texanonline.net/default.asp?action=article&aid=6163&issue=3/23/2009
Then, you can read of another Southern Baptist church undergoing a similar metamorphosis as our church has undergone: http://www.texanonline.net/default.asp?action=article&aid=6169&issue=3/23/2009
I could go on and on and I still might not help you understand, but if you will listen to the message linked below, you will gain more understanding. Dr. Voddie Baucham says it better than most. I hope you will take the time to listen.
Click here: “The Centrality of the Home” by Dr. Voddie Baucham
Also, you can listen to Dr. Baucham on the subject, “Answering Objections to the Family-Integrated Church,” by clicking here.
I would be glad to answer any questions you might have about church without youth group. We are still learning, but I can tell you this – our church loves youth and we get to be with them and I think the youth may just love our church, too. Malachi 4:6 – “He will restore the hearts of the fathers to their children and the hearts of the children to their fathers, so that I will not come and smite the land with a curse.”