Youth Workin' It

Consultancy and Resources for Youth Workers and Organizations Worldwide

Why Youth Pastors Need To Look Beyond Faith – Hidden Gem #2

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Youth PastorToday we’re continuing our series of Hidden Gems – some of our posts you might have missed.

Why Youth Pastors Need To Look Beyond Faith

This gem asked the question “Is there room to be both holy and holistic?” Although there are many different types of youth work, one of the most common forms is youth ministry.

As Andy at YM360 suggested, the aim of most youth pastors is to help ‘teenagers to know God and to see their lives changed as a result’. Youth pastors therefore tend to focus on the spiritual life of a young person.

This can cause problems when this is the sole focus though, as it can ignore the emotional and physical part of their lives, as well as overlooking areas they may be struggling in.

Shae’s post was therefore an important look at how youth ministers can expand their programs in order to incorporate other issues that affect young people, not just the spiritual ones.

So take a read of Is there room to be both holy and holistic?

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Are Young People Rejecting The Church Or God?

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Last weekend, Youth Workin’ It were one of the sponsors of the Youth Cartel Summit. If you weren’t there, you seriously missed out! There were so many amazing speakers and many different topics covered – it was awesome.

A few of the speakers touched on the growing “secularization” of young people in the US and how it’s heading the way of Europe. As a Brit living in the US who’s also a Christian, I find this topic interesting.

Aaron Arnold of Youth Hope had a stat that 34% of US youth born between 1990-94 see themselves as religiously unaffiliated. He then asked an interesting question, which was:

‘Is this a decrease of belief in the institution of church, or of belief in God?’

Later on, Brock Morgan talked about how to reach teens who don’t see a need for Jesus. He had many interesting points, one of which was that churches (and youth workers) need to embrace mission, as ‘teens are dying for a life worth living…..they want to do faith, not talk about faith.’

The next day, Marah Lidey of Do Something had a stat that the top 5 issues that youth care about are:

  1. Animal welfare
  2. Hunger
  3. Homelessness
  4. Environment
  5. Economy

Take another look at the list. What do you notice?

The thing that stood out for me is that the top 4 (and arguably all 5) are issues that – here in the US – are more commonly associated with being “left-wing”, “liberal” or “Democrat” causes.

As a result, I think some right-wing, evangelical churches and Christian youth groups can tend to overlook these issues. Instead they focus primarily on issues like abortion and gay marriage, which can be determined to be morally right or wrong when viewed through a traditional, biblical lens. The problem with this, in terms of reaching out to young people, is that today’s youth often have the opposite view as to what is and isn’t moral. n.b. this post isn’t about politics, determining the morality of those issues, to highlight the rightness or wrongness of the beliefs of today’s youth or whether issues should be viewed through this lens.

Some Christians also say things like they want to ‘do something about the “victims” who are a cancer on society’ (a recent comment by a trainee youth pastor). Can churches and youth pastors honestly expect to reach young people who care about the hungry, homeless or those who are suffering because of the economy, while simultaneously stating that those same people are a “cancer on society” (which is sadly a sentiment I’ve heard from many Christians)?

Consider again the question that Aaron asked – are young people experiencing ‘a decrease of belief in the institution of church, or of belief in God?’ Given what the church is perceived by the public as prioritizing, I’d argue that we’re seeing a decrease of belief in the institution of church, rather than belief in God. I think this is a good thing (given the two choices), as it means young people aren’t against God.

So, what can youth pastors do to counteract this?

Like Brock said, teens want to do faith, so embrace the issues that young people care about. Embrace the “Democrat” causes of caring for animals, for people and for the environment. Because ultimately, these aren’t Democrat causes. They’re not Republican causes.

They’re Biblical causes.

Question: What are your thoughts on this? We’d love to hear from you in the comments below.

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Is There Room To Be Both Holy And Holistic?

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Holy and holistic youth work
How hole-istic is your youth work?

I grew up going to a church youth group every week. I’ve ‘been knowin’ Jesus’ a long time (if you’re from P-Town – Portsmouth, VA – then you know all about the people ‘you been knowin” too) and I still be knowin’ Him today.

I try to write for youth workers and youth ministers no matter what their beliefs, because ultimately I believe youth are youth and these ideas can help anyone.

However, today I’m pretty much talking to religious (please don’t Jesus Juke me here, I know its about relationship not religion), faith-based or spiritual youth workers.

Other than the handful of typical Christian teen topics such as ‘Don’t have sex before marriage’ and ‘How can you witness at school to your unsaved friends’, I don’t remember a whole lot of practical advice. At least, not like the discussions and sessions I have with the non-Christian (unchurched, unreached, etc.) young people that I now work with all the time.

The question I pose to you today is this: Should we ONLY talk about faith (and other clearly spiritual things) in our faith-based programming?

Don’t get me wrong. I have a strong biblical foundation from my years in those youth groups that serve me well as an adult and I had a blast. Some of my dearest memories are from those times in my life.

But the Bible is all I can remember really learning about. Are we missing a key opportunity to speak about ‘normal teenage stuff’ to the youth in our care? Would we attract more young people to faith if it seemed like it really impacted on the regular, everyday things in our lives?

As adults, we’re very good at taking what we learned and applying it to many different areas of our lives. But young people, as we discussed previously, have a hard time with option generation and reasoning things out. By helping them make the connections between their faith and their ‘regular life’, we might be helping young people more effectively live out the faith they proclaim.

I once received a communication from a city-wide, faith-based youth worker who said that issues affecting youth throughout the community weren’t affecting the youth in their group. Really? Not one youth in your group deals with teen pregnancy, STIs, youth poverty or academic challenges?

Often we try and explore youth issues by talking about Timothy or David and giving examples from their lives. Our topics include forgiving 77 x 7, hearing from God and the Good Samaritan. But what about making it more practical and relevant by exploring aggression management, communication or racial profiling, while still exploring what your faith says about those issues?

I believe it’s about flipping our approach to the study of scripture in our youth groups. Often it’s ‘Let’s read this passage and then apply it our lives’, instead of ‘This is a real issue going on in your life, in the lives of your friends, in your family, in your community, in your nation, in the world’. What does scripture teach about that, or what does it teach us that might help us make a decision about that subject?

Let’s encourage youth to make just, ethical and moral judgments in every aspect of their lives by really digging into issues often left to ‘secular’ youth workers and exploring how faith and ‘real life’ really go hand in hand. Let’s offer after-school programs and tutoring, simply because it supports the youth in our community.

I would like to see more faith-based organizations use a holistic approach to youth ministry by exploring tough issues, encouraging questioning and using informal education opportunities to really effect real change in the lives of the youth in the church and beyond, by meeting their needs and equipping them for a life of faith.

Question: Do you think that faith should be the primary focus of church and other faith-based organization’s youth work programming? Share your opinions in the comments below.

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