See also past and current Facets    

Tough Questions about Youth and Family Ministry

Ask yourself the following questions about youth and family ministry in your congregation:

When a youth enters your church for the first time, what is his or her first impression?

Sam, age fifteen, walks through the church doors for the first time. He is greeted pleasantly by an older couple who welcomes him to the church. He tells them that he is meeting his friend in the youth room and asks them where it is. Their puzzled looks tell the young man that they are unsure of the exact location of that room. They call over the first young person they see and ask her to guide him to his destination. They are relieved to go back to their task of greeting the next family entering the church.

As Sam follows the girl, he passes by the new sanctuary and notices the beautiful stained glass windows that surround the space. He is in awe of the pipe organ from which he hears amazing sounds. He has been playing the piano for most of his life and has lately been considering taking organ lessons. But he can’t stop for long because the girl is already several steps ahead of him. He wonders where he is going, but he follows silently. They walk to the end of the narthex, turn right, go down a narrow staircase, around a few more corners, and down a dark hallway to an unmarked door. The door swings open, and he is greeted by his friend and several other teens seated in a circle.

The youth leader begins the discussion by asking the teens about their week. Only half listening, Sam looks around the room. The walls are cinder block, painted white in an attempt to lighten the room. Water stains from years of rain and a roof that leaks are apparent on the walls, and there is a musty smell. The chair on which Sam is sitting reminds him of a chair in his grandparents’ basement.

The hour passes quickly, and he and his friend decide to go to the Starbucks around the corner. They leave by the outside entrance from the youth room. As Sam leaves he wonders about that pipe organ. Maybe next time he will get to hear it.

Is the space allotted to your youth isolated from the main part of the church?

Implication: The space that we claim as belonging to each of us is integral to our well-being. The comfort we feel in our homes is just as important in our place of worship. What can you tell me about your place of worship? Do you have a specific pew in which you sit every Sunday? Do you like the way the sun shines through the windows during the service? Are the pews cushioned? Just ask church members how it feels to leave the sanctuary in which they have worshipped for twenty years to walk into a new one. It bothers those who have been in the old place of worship for a long time much more than the newer members because it has been home for so long.

Why should it be any different for your youth? The place where they will be spending most of their time while they are in the church — the youth room — needs to be inviting, warm, open, cheerful, clean, and comfortable. It should be located near the center of activity, not isolated in a separate building or far enough away from the main traffic pattern so your youth will not be seen or heard. Church leaders often say that the teens like to be away from the adults. Is this the desire of the youth or of the church leaders?

Application: Take your youth committee on a tour. Have them pretend that they are teens and new to the church. Have them silently walk the path from the entrance of the building to the youth room. What do they see on the way? What do they pass that might be interesting to them? How is the lighting? What colors and smells do you notice?

Change the meeting place of your next council meeting. Have it in the youth room. Be aware of the comments of your council members. It will probably be similar to that of your youth.

How do the resources for the youth space and the youth program compare to resources expended for the rest of the church?

Implication: Our children and teens are gifts that God has entrusted to us for a few short years. How we care for them reflects their importance in the life of the church. We may tell them that they are our most important resource, but our actions may not always be congruent with our words. The statistics tell us that we lose many of our youth after they are confirmed. There are many reasons for this, but if the church is “home” for them, would there be such a mass exodus?

Application: Do the math. Take the number of the youth who could possibly attend and compare it with the budget line item for youth ministry. Is there a budget line item for youth ministry? How much do you spend per youth in your congregation? Now do the same with the number of adults and compare the two. If they are similar, that’s great. If they are very different, discuss it at your next youth committee and council meetings.

How many teens participate in your worship service each week — not counting Youth Sunday?

Implication: The youth of our church are talented, creative, and very comfortable being in leadership positions. All we have to do as leaders is to give them the opportunities.

Two areas that traditionally have been youth positions during worship are the youth choir and the acolytes. Youth can be important contributors in other areas of worship such as readers, greeters, worship leaders, communion assistants, and ushers. Sermons by youth may be not only knowledgeable but very spiritual. Worship is a wonderful place for youth to share their musical talents both vocally and instrumentally. It seems so simple. It just needs to be implemented. It is often said that ownership is important to church growth. Does it follow then that if our youth felt more ownership in the worship service they would not want to leave after confirmation?

Application: Take a survey of the youth participating in the service for a month. How many do you see, and in what roles are they active? Are they the same young people week after week? Find out how many are active in your youth group. If they are not in worship, where are they and what are they doing? If your church has a Sunday school hour at the same time as worship, find out how many youth come to worship after they participate in Sunday school. Publish the results of your survey.

Your youth committee (Do you have one?) can be very helpful with this project. Plan a forum for the youth with your worship team. Brainstorm possible ways that youth might be involved in worship. Work with the worship leaders to find new ways for the youth to be involved. Be intentional about adding youth participants to each service. Ideas are great, but until they are implemented you will not see an increase in your youth participation.

Is the “family” in youth and family ministry a reality in your congregation? If the “family” isn’t present in your concept of youth ministry, are you willing to find out what it means and its importance?

Implication: The idea of a youth group and a charismatic leader who keeps our youth busy and out of the way of the general masses of the congregation disappeared as a youth model years ago. Youth ministry includes the family of origin as well as the church family. Our youth are the church of today as well as the church of the future. Our youth must be seen and heard in the church throughout all of its structure.

Youth events need to include adults as participants, not just as chaperones. Servant events must be planned that include both young and old. A young person needs to see the church lifting up the family as inclusive, not separate. Young people need to interact, talk, listen, and communicate with younger children, peers, adults, and the elderly. There should be a spirit of inclusion as well as a network of helpfulness. The youth need to be assured that the church family is there to support and love them so that they have a backup system when needed.

Application: Look at all the events in your congregation. How many of them have the youth interacting on a personal level with their families as well as with other adults in the congregation? Observe the youth during your coffee hour. Is there interaction with adults or are they off in a corner by themselves? Observe how many families sit together during worship. Observe the number of parents who drop off their youth for Sunday school and youth activities and then leave. How could you get those parents involved? Look at the number of youth who went on the latest retreat. How many families were involved? How many families worked together on the last servant event reaching out to others?

Youth and family ministry is about helping youth and their families make healthy choices in a world that is less than helpful. It is about working and playing together, worshipping together, spending time together, being responsible together in a society that stresses individualism and independence. It is about communicating with each other, eating meals together, interacting with and talking to each other in a culture in which youth spend more time on computers, watching television, and listening to music by themselves than ever before. Our youth do not have to socialize or talk to adults to get many of their needs met. They can live in a virtual world in which adults have little interaction.

However, the needs of our youth are not all being met. They are crying out for attention, love, and support. The church and the faith that we proclaim have the resources to assist with this problem, and those resources are us. As adults we have to put our youth on the top of our priority list. We cannot simply fill the position of youth director and think that the problem is solved. We need that professional youth director to lead our youth, but the whole congregation must be involved in youth and family ministry. We cannot drop the ball when we think we have “done our time” in teaching and youth work. We must take our most valuable resource of time and give it to our most valued gift from God, our young people. We are the family of God, and we must begin to act like it.

Audrey D. Forbes, a diaconal minister, serves on the pastoral staff at Calvary Lutheran Church in Mt. Airy, Maryland. She is a former professor of Youth and Family Ministry at Trinity Lutheran College, Issaquah, Washington. She has worked with children, youth, and families for more than twenty years.