Youth Ministry Mini-Series: Post 1--Giving Voice to a Dream

It’s no secret, we’re living and breathing youth ministry these days. We probably will be for the next 30 years :) This new reality has us doing an awful lot of reflection and thinking about what makes a successful youth program. We’re digging back into our class notes from all our youth ministry classes, we’re re-reading books, we’re talking constantly about what makes a disciple of Jesus. When we imagine our own children heading off to college, we are already praying that they will be a disciple of Jesus--so we’re constantly asking the questions, “what would this look like?” “If we couldn’t ask our child, how would we know they were a disciple of Christ?” (And no, church attendance alone doesn’t count). “What would we need to do for our kids in elementary school, middle school, and especially in high school--both in our home and in our churches--to shape them in this way?” We’re dreaming about the kind of youth program we want in place at a church for our own teenagers someday, and we’re doing a lot of reflecting on our own experiences in youth ministry--as teens ourselves and then as volunteers at various churches over the years.

I have a lot of thoughts, more than I think anyone wants to read in one single blog post! So I’ve decided to do a bit of a mini-series here. I want to write about what’s going on in the world of youth ministry, why I care, what we’ve learned that has given birth to this dream my husband and I have--a dream of being part of a church that takes the discipleship of it’s young seriously. People have spent a lot of time lately asking us “so what’s your vision?” “What do you want to do?” and most importantly, “Why?” We can have these conversations with individuals, and we’re happy to do so, but I thought it would be kind of fun to share some of these answers with folks around the country, not just in our community here in Seattle. I have several posts written that I will be posting over the next couple weeks (every couple days), and I hope these help spark a conversation in your lives--wherever you are--about what it might look like to disciple our young. I hope some of these thoughts lead us all to learn more, to care more--whether we have kids or not. I hope we don’t let ourselves settle for doing things exactly the same way for years and years. Youth culture doesn’t stay the same--anyone who looks at the media today’s kids are inundated with will know their lives are vastly different than even when I was in high school in the late 90s. I hope we realize the Holy Spirit will continue to lead and guide us as we care for students, but that sometimes this requires us to be open to change. Sometimes what met needs twenty years ago, isn’t meeting the same needs today. That doesn’t mean something is a failure, it doesn’t mean a part of our youth program was bad, it just means the needs of kids in 2011 might be different than the needs of kids were in 1984.

About a week ago Charles and I shared a meal with three couples, all in their early 70s (I think!). It was a delightful time sharing conversation around a table, and eventually one of them began asking us these same questions. We shared our vision, we shared what we’ve been learning and experiencing. They asked questions, they shared their experiences with their children vs. their grandchildren. We dialogued. I loved it. Yesterday, one of these women told Charles that she loved our conversation--she loved thinking in a different way and wrestling with what we were dialoguing about. That’s my hope. I realize it’s not as possible (or preferable!) to do in cyberspace, but my hope is that these thoughts might spark lively conversation wherever you are. My prayer is that we would be a people unafraid to ask questions, and search for answers as the Church moves forward into the 21st century.

A quick disclaimer :) Throughout these posts when I refer to the “church” I’ll be referring to the Church with a capital C. Nothing I share is intended to be in reference to any of the five congregations I’ve been privileged to be a part of in the past 29 years. Yes, we are currently involved in ministry at a particular congregation that we love, and while its my hope that these postings will invite conversation around that community, my aim in sharing these things in cyber-land is bigger than that. What I share here is simply to invite conversation (hey, I’m a verbal processor, I like conversation!) I don’t have teenagers, I don’t pretend to know what its like to walk the difficult road of adolescence with a child I love, so I won’t pretend to have all the answers. I do, however, have a dream that has taken shape over the past several years--partly from research and partly from living my own experience in a variety of youth programs. I have a dream for the discipleship of students--and that’s what this mini-series is about--giving voice to that dream. I pray those of you who read this will read this with that in mind. I also will probably be posting some life-updates and other posts mixed in with these, just know that those specifically in this series will be designated as such. Thanks for reading!