On Youth Ministry
The following is an excerpt my husband wrote to a young man asking for advice about pursuing a position as a youth minister in a church. How I pray for faith to live according to God's Word, and not according to our cultural habits. I wish you could see Big David holding baby Alex until he fell asleep during worship. Or AJ and Austin setting godly examples, such as they are, for Jimmy and Bruce. Or Kilby befriending Joshua at Bible study. Or the fun Leah and John have during Biography breaks. We live in a covenantal community. Oh, for faith that God's people would see that.
Grace and peace to you in Christ. I'll be glad for us to talk about youth and children's ministries, but I seriously doubt that you'll be much encouraged along the path you suggest by what I would have to say. I can tell you from the start that I think the best ministries to children and youth focus on training the parents to raise their children (right up through college to adulthood) in the nurture and admonition of the Lord. (The church has as many youth ministers as it has parents--no more, and no fewer. This means that youth ministry should be mostly indirect, not direct--ministry to the youth through ministry to the parents. Insofar as it is direct, it should simply be ministry to the youth simultaneous with ministry to the adults.) Training parents to do that generally is the work of a pastor (often of a pastor-and-wife team, older women teaching younger women, per Titus 2) old, mature, and experienced enough in his own raising of children to earn (not demand) the admiration, respect, and trust of younger parents who observe that he has successfully understood and applied the Scriptures to his own family and the fruit has been excellent.
I am well aware that many young men who become "youth ministers" do so with every good and honest intention of facilitating the parents' raising of their own children, not substituting for the parents. I have never--repeat, never--seen that work. I have never, ever, seen a church with a youth minister in which it wasn't clearly observable that the parents increasingly abdicated their roles in raising the children since it was convenient and seemingly consequence-less to do so (seemingly--in reality, the consequences are severe). (Our whole culture does that--it's not that this is a conscious choice by the parents, it's that they've all grown up in a milieu that automatically entrusts most of the raising of children to someone else. Having a "youth ministry" simply encourages and eases going with the flow.)
The most Biblical and effective ministry the shepherds can do for the sheep is to minister to them as covenant households--whether those households consist of husband-and-wife, husband-and-wife and children of whatever ages, single parent and children of whatever ages, or single adults living independently--teaching them, by the Word, how to live as Christians in faith and obedience, in the fear of the Lord, in holiness, in generosity and grace. Dividing up those covenant households for institutional ministry to different pieces of them invariably, inevitably distorts life, straining or breaking the bands (that word, by the way, is old Scots for covenant or treaty) God designed to enable people to grow together as believers, as servants of God, as warriors in His Kingdom, as ambassadors of Christ. The qualification there--institutional ministry--is important. It is fine and right for husbands to focus on teaching other husbands how to love their wives and live with them in an understanding way and train up their children, and it is fine and right for wives to focus on teaching other wives how to love their husbands and children and be keepers at home, and it is fine and right for older children to focus on teaching younger children how to obey their parents and grow in the faith. But that should happen organically, not institutionally--as a fruit of the church members' loving one another and having true koinonia, fellowship, partnership in the gospel and the whole of the Christian life. As soon as it gets institutionalized, it tends to divide rather than unite families.
Grace and peace to you in Christ. I'll be glad for us to talk about youth and children's ministries, but I seriously doubt that you'll be much encouraged along the path you suggest by what I would have to say. I can tell you from the start that I think the best ministries to children and youth focus on training the parents to raise their children (right up through college to adulthood) in the nurture and admonition of the Lord. (The church has as many youth ministers as it has parents--no more, and no fewer. This means that youth ministry should be mostly indirect, not direct--ministry to the youth through ministry to the parents. Insofar as it is direct, it should simply be ministry to the youth simultaneous with ministry to the adults.) Training parents to do that generally is the work of a pastor (often of a pastor-and-wife team, older women teaching younger women, per Titus 2) old, mature, and experienced enough in his own raising of children to earn (not demand) the admiration, respect, and trust of younger parents who observe that he has successfully understood and applied the Scriptures to his own family and the fruit has been excellent.
I am well aware that many young men who become "youth ministers" do so with every good and honest intention of facilitating the parents' raising of their own children, not substituting for the parents. I have never--repeat, never--seen that work. I have never, ever, seen a church with a youth minister in which it wasn't clearly observable that the parents increasingly abdicated their roles in raising the children since it was convenient and seemingly consequence-less to do so (seemingly--in reality, the consequences are severe). (Our whole culture does that--it's not that this is a conscious choice by the parents, it's that they've all grown up in a milieu that automatically entrusts most of the raising of children to someone else. Having a "youth ministry" simply encourages and eases going with the flow.)
The most Biblical and effective ministry the shepherds can do for the sheep is to minister to them as covenant households--whether those households consist of husband-and-wife, husband-and-wife and children of whatever ages, single parent and children of whatever ages, or single adults living independently--teaching them, by the Word, how to live as Christians in faith and obedience, in the fear of the Lord, in holiness, in generosity and grace. Dividing up those covenant households for institutional ministry to different pieces of them invariably, inevitably distorts life, straining or breaking the bands (that word, by the way, is old Scots for covenant or treaty) God designed to enable people to grow together as believers, as servants of God, as warriors in His Kingdom, as ambassadors of Christ. The qualification there--institutional ministry--is important. It is fine and right for husbands to focus on teaching other husbands how to love their wives and live with them in an understanding way and train up their children, and it is fine and right for wives to focus on teaching other wives how to love their husbands and children and be keepers at home, and it is fine and right for older children to focus on teaching younger children how to obey their parents and grow in the faith. But that should happen organically, not institutionally--as a fruit of the church members' loving one another and having true koinonia, fellowship, partnership in the gospel and the whole of the Christian life. As soon as it gets institutionalized, it tends to divide rather than unite families.
posted by Compleat Mom at 1:48 PM
1 Comments:
Way to go Cal! So excellently put on what I have seen and experienced as a mom of 4 children. Blessings,Denna;)
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