Youth ministry in the Emerging Church Part 1:.
Ryan Bolger has a post about youth ministry here
Ryan's post spurred a need to write about youth ministry and the Emerging church. Every day I work with churches and help them be more healthy, especially in regards to youth ministry. I support the church leadership in their desire to minister to youth and families. I support current youth ministry staff (paid or non-paid). I support "lay leadership", youth and families as well. Primarily my work is one in terms of systems and infrastructure.
There is not one way to do ministry. There is not one way to do youth ministry. Every model, or ministry has problems. The work of systems thinking is to begin to understand the ramifications of decisions we make, and deciding which of those problems we can live with. We make these decisions based on what we value and believe. (most of the time) We understand our values based on assumptions that we make about the world around us.
All that to say. Emerging churches are not going to write off youth ministry. At least in the long run. They can't. Many who do initially, will return to some kind of focused youth ministry. Sure many of these churches won't have weekly programs for their youth. Sure many of them value all the people together. These are great changes, but cannot be pendulum swings, from what has been.
Why must emerging churches have youth ministries?
1. The perceived gap between adults and teens is growing. With new people groups like "tweenagers" being formed by the American Marketing Machine the gap will only be growing unless there is a intervention. Let me be clear. I don't think the gap is all that large. But the perception is huge. Teens feel abandoned by their parents. Teens feel used. Teens are ornamental in our society. Adults are scared of them. While individuating teens are more and more able to make decisions on their own they are faced with more and more adult issues to deal with. All the while they know fewer and fewer adults personally. There is a need for someone to lead local churches (emerging or not) in their ministry to teens. In today's understanding of youth ministry, youth pastors often reinforce this gap.
2. Often adult solutions contribute to the divide. The soccer mom who doesn't want her teen to feel alone, isolated and abandoned carpools more often, and volunteers at the PTA, etc. However, the pace of their lives together and the busyness of their lives and activity actually contributes to the feel of abandonment, by (among other things) depriving the family of time together. Again. This is an issue of systems. The cure is often worse than the disease. There need to be relational architects who focus on families and teens in our churches. There is no getting around it. It must be a big priority.
3. Changing the paradigms for ministry within the emerging church will actually contribute to a coming crisis. If you scratch below the surface of American teens you will find a deep well of issues that teens will want to deal with. Much like the house church of 40 people who try to support the others in the community who are in crisis, there will be times when those crisis tip to becoming overwhelming to the local community.
What will likely be different?
1. Youth Staff will be pastors, not directors of programs. This will be born from the value that the God given ministry to adolescents belongs to the parents and the church at large. A mercenary youth pastor will actually lead a ministry to youth away from the values these churches have.
2. You will stop hearing youth pastors say, "I'm going to work myself out of a job." Which tends to limit the role of youth pastor to programs.
3. Youth Staff will likely be hired from within the local congregation.
4. There will be fewer paid youth pastors in Emerging churches than in others because there will be fewer staff in emerging churches. While most churches in America hired a youth pastor as one of the first two or three positions, this will change. Emerging churches may not have any staff, and a youth staff person will be likely be lower on the list of priority.
Just some thoughts...
If I have time in the next few days I'll post some thoughts on implecations of this shift.
Ryan Bolger has a post about youth ministry here
Ryan's post spurred a need to write about youth ministry and the Emerging church. Every day I work with churches and help them be more healthy, especially in regards to youth ministry. I support the church leadership in their desire to minister to youth and families. I support current youth ministry staff (paid or non-paid). I support "lay leadership", youth and families as well. Primarily my work is one in terms of systems and infrastructure.
There is not one way to do ministry. There is not one way to do youth ministry. Every model, or ministry has problems. The work of systems thinking is to begin to understand the ramifications of decisions we make, and deciding which of those problems we can live with. We make these decisions based on what we value and believe. (most of the time) We understand our values based on assumptions that we make about the world around us.
All that to say. Emerging churches are not going to write off youth ministry. At least in the long run. They can't. Many who do initially, will return to some kind of focused youth ministry. Sure many of these churches won't have weekly programs for their youth. Sure many of them value all the people together. These are great changes, but cannot be pendulum swings, from what has been.
Why must emerging churches have youth ministries?
1. The perceived gap between adults and teens is growing. With new people groups like "tweenagers" being formed by the American Marketing Machine the gap will only be growing unless there is a intervention. Let me be clear. I don't think the gap is all that large. But the perception is huge. Teens feel abandoned by their parents. Teens feel used. Teens are ornamental in our society. Adults are scared of them. While individuating teens are more and more able to make decisions on their own they are faced with more and more adult issues to deal with. All the while they know fewer and fewer adults personally. There is a need for someone to lead local churches (emerging or not) in their ministry to teens. In today's understanding of youth ministry, youth pastors often reinforce this gap.
2. Often adult solutions contribute to the divide. The soccer mom who doesn't want her teen to feel alone, isolated and abandoned carpools more often, and volunteers at the PTA, etc. However, the pace of their lives together and the busyness of their lives and activity actually contributes to the feel of abandonment, by (among other things) depriving the family of time together. Again. This is an issue of systems. The cure is often worse than the disease. There need to be relational architects who focus on families and teens in our churches. There is no getting around it. It must be a big priority.
3. Changing the paradigms for ministry within the emerging church will actually contribute to a coming crisis. If you scratch below the surface of American teens you will find a deep well of issues that teens will want to deal with. Much like the house church of 40 people who try to support the others in the community who are in crisis, there will be times when those crisis tip to becoming overwhelming to the local community.
What will likely be different?
1. Youth Staff will be pastors, not directors of programs. This will be born from the value that the God given ministry to adolescents belongs to the parents and the church at large. A mercenary youth pastor will actually lead a ministry to youth away from the values these churches have.
2. You will stop hearing youth pastors say, "I'm going to work myself out of a job." Which tends to limit the role of youth pastor to programs.
3. Youth Staff will likely be hired from within the local congregation.
4. There will be fewer paid youth pastors in Emerging churches than in others because there will be fewer staff in emerging churches. While most churches in America hired a youth pastor as one of the first two or three positions, this will change. Emerging churches may not have any staff, and a youth staff person will be likely be lower on the list of priority.
Just some thoughts...
If I have time in the next few days I'll post some thoughts on implecations of this shift.
posted by mark at
3:41 PM
4 Comments:
Mark,
First know that I meant no disrespect by saying that youth pastors and emerging churches don't compute...
Keep in mind that a primary form of emerging churches is the smaller, networked, organic, extended family -- ranging from 15 to 40 people. If it is bigger than that, it is often networked. Thus, the training of the youth is often shared by the parents, but also each parent takes a greater role in the child-raising.
Your other point about lack of staff is the other key -- there are few paid pastors in emerging churches, if at all. So it is not only youth pastors that may not be paid staff, but senior pastors, associate pastors, and others.
Yes, we continue to need adult leaders to model to our youth what it is to be Christian. We need cultural understanding amongst the generations so that they know how to interpret and understand cultures other than their own. We need leaders to help facilitate mission amongst our youth within their peer groups.
These functions all need perpetuating, I'm just not sure if it will still be filled by what we have known as the youth pastor...
Peace,
Ryan
good to see you ryan.
I think the very mindset of 'youth' programming is part of what is/will shifting. Initiating persons into the life of the community and into missional living takes on very organic forms in many of these new faith communities. New people start investigating Christianity, the community shifts, adjusts, creates a new organic space or network to welcome, nurture and include new people in the life of faith.
What I can imagine happening differs from more familiar models, as you noted, by a dramatic move away from programming as a structure and more into a communal model. Seems to me that as children move into adolescent experiences, the community of faith will adjust creating networks of relationships (mentoring and otherwise) along with opportunities for discovery, worship, exploration and missional living in ways that are meaningful for students and the community.
A greater responsibility for inclusion, attenetiveness and spiritual formation falls on the community as a whole for creating opporutnities for students' developmental needs as well as creating necessary space for students to discover and explore the faith of the community and take it on as their own.
Regarding the size of the church. Do you think that there will be emerging churches that will be mega churches ?
In this, I mean that there will be communities where there will be 15 - 25 individuals in these communities but they can be and will be networked into a larger gathering ?
From the ym standpoint, I think that it is very important to make the standpoint from community and having them live in community and be missional.
They are "born" for community. Thus, the shift for them can be easily, if leaders are willing to move in that direction.
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