The Problem with the Church is ______.

I swear, someone must have declared 2013 to be the year where people would use their blogs to solve the “problems” of the church.¹

I can’t tell you how many posts I’ve read this year which purport to explain what is wrong with the church or why certain people are leaving it. Many of these blog posts have come from within the fellowship of Churches of Christ (a relatively small group of people), but that fact has not prevented the analyses from being all over the place.

Depending on whose blog you’re reading, the main problem with Churches of Christ is that we are too left-brained—we are out of touch with our emotions and therefore unable to relate to our culture. Or, if you read someone else, the problem with the church is that we aren’t catering to the millennial generation (people who are roughly my age, give or take a few years). We aren’t valuing their perspectives and ideas, so they are leaving. Or, if you stumble upon a third blog, you’ll hear that people are leaving (especially preachers and ministers) because our practices in the area of church music, the role of women in the church, and leadership, are unacceptable and thus, driving them away.

After a while, reading these sorts of posts tends to frustrate me. Not because the church is problem-free (it isn’t), but because over and over again, the tone in the posts is that the author has discovered the problem in the church and is now proposing the solution. Of course, if they really had discovered the problem, you would expect there to be a little more overlap in the different posts rather than so much disparity.

Also, these posts tend to frustrate me because they are usually not based on real research, but rather on one person’s observations. I don’t mean to discount the relevance or importance of a person’s experience, but I do think we should be careful about making broad generalizations about an entire fellowship of churches based on one person’s (inherently limited) point of view.

Having vented these frustrations, I want to end this on a positive note by highlighting a couple of genuinely good things that I think posts like these indicate:

(1) People care about the church. If people didn’t care, they wouldn’t spend time and energy identifying problems and thinking up suggestions on how to fix things. Even if I disagree with some of the suggested problems or proposed solutions, I can still appreciate the authors’ intentions and the concern for the church which lies beneath them.

The alternative to this is people not caring, which is never a good thing. Apathy never solves anything, whether about politics, a football team, a business, or in the church. Generally speaking, even with people I disagree with, I can find some common ground  with people who are passionate about the church. On the other hand, there’s no point in even trying to work with people who don’t care.

(2) The Restoration spirit is alive and well, at least in one sense. People who work and worship in Churches of Christ will know this already, but for others who might be reading, Churches of Christ, while desiring to follow the teachings of the New Testament and emulate the church of that time, also have direct historical and theological roots in the American Restoration Movement of the 1800s. This movement was an attempt to unify people of different denominations by cutting away the manmade traditions and creeds which had accumulated over time in an attempt to “restore” the church of the New Testament.

That movement was only made possible by the fact that people were willing to take a hard look at church practices of the day, identify problems, and go about trying to fix them. Clearly, we still have men and women today who care enough about the church to do the same (I added the qualifier “at least in one sense” at the end, because while many of these folks are quick to point out problems in the church, they are not turning to the model of the New Testament church as the solution…but that’s a post for another day).

Restoration is an ongoing process. We should always be willing to examine what we do and make sure we’re not confusing traditional practices with biblical ones. And for those things which are just traditions, we should be willing to consider changing them if such a change would help us to better reach out to the lost or care for those who are already saved.

1By putting “problems” in quotation marks, I am not suggesting that there aren’t problems in the church. There certainly are, and this spat of bloggers have hit upon some of them. Rather, I am suggesting that not all of the issues proposed as “problems” by these bloggers are, in fact, genuine problems.

How to Have a Great VBS

This past Wednesday, we wrapped up our 2013 Vacation Bible School at Farmington. If I have done my math correctly, this was my ninth consecutive year to help direct VBS, and although it is a lot of work, it is a lot of fun as well.

I think some people have the idea that VBS is a hopelessly outdated program from a bygone era. I do think that some congregations have a VBS like this, but I don’t think it has to be this way. VBS is one of the highlights of the year for our congregation, and while what we do is by no means perfect, I thought I would share some of the things that have made it successful.

What Does “Successful” Mean?

Before you have a VBS (or any program really), it’s important that you have specific goals, or at the very least, a general idea of what it is that you are shooting for. If you don’t have any idea of what a successful VBS will look like for your congregation, then it’s impossible to know if you’ve had one or not when you are finished.

For us, Vacation Bible School provides a lot of benefits, and I generally consider our VBS to be a success if these things happen:

(1) Kids have fun. Vacation Bible School is supposed to be fun. If kids from the community come and are then bored out of their minds, then all your hard work has been for naught (at least with that particular child).

(2) The church gets excited. The summer months can be somewhat of an energy drain on a congregation. A lot of people travel, so attendance and giving sags. Sometimes it seems that you go for weeks and weeks without seeing people that you care about and are used to seeing on a weekly basis. For us, VBS is an antidote to the summer slump, as every year it provides an energy boost to our congregation. A lot of people pool their talents and abilities for a common purpose, and then get to experience the satisfaction of watching their plans and efforts come to fruition. This is an important thing.

(3) Our reputation in the community is enhanced. Vacation Bible School provides a great opportunity for your congregation to increase its visibility and reputation in the community. If you get visitors from the community to come and then put on a quality Bible school, children and their parents will leave with a good impression of your church.

(4) A lot of people come. Numbers aren’t the most important thing (which is why I listed this one last), but they are important. After all, what does it matter if you have the most amazing VBS in the world if no one is there to see it? Attendance of visitors is especially important, as the church should always be trying to reach out to bring more people in. This year we were blessed with the largest attendance we have had in my time year (Also, related to the second point, if a lot of people come it definitely adds to the excitement factor of your congregation).

Tips for a Successful VBS

Now that you know how I define a successful VBS, here are some tips for bringing it about:

(1) Recruit a lot of talented helpers to do what they are good at. If you do it right, VBS takes a lot of work. So, you can either have a few people try to do everything, or you can recruit a lot of people who can focus on specific tasks. I have tried it both ways, and believe me, the second way is preferable. When you do it the second way, you end up having a better product, fewer burned-out people, and more church involvement. For example, this year we had:

• A coach in charge of our outdoor games and activities
• Someone who had studied theater in college working with our skits
• Teens with years of experience doing Puppet Theater at Lads to Leaders doing the puppet shows
• A talented song-leader directing our time in the auditorium
• People with strong organizational skills doing registration and refreshments
• Some very talented ladies doing decorations and crafts

All of these people used specific skills they possessed to enhance our VBS. And as a result, I got to do less work!

(2) Provide something for the adults to do. Kids may be the primary focus of VBS, but that doesn’t mean you should ignore your adults. Some parents will drop off their kids and leave, but others live far enough away that they would rather stay if there was a reason for them to. And what about adult members of the congregation who aren’t helping to run things? Shouldn’t they get to be around the fun as well? We have had good classes for adults in the past, but this year we focused on it more, bringing in one speaker for all four nights to present a topic that was different from what people generally get to hear (biblical archaeology). The class was excellent, our adult numbers swelled, and I heard from members and guests alike how much they enjoyed the class and how it strengthened their faith. 

(3) Get teens involved on the service side. Several years ago we made the decision that, rather than having the teens come and sit through a Bible class, we would get them involved in serving during VBS, and I think it was one of the best decisions we could have made. Our teens spend hours at the building the week before VBS moving furniture, decorating, and cleaning. During VBS itself, they are the primary characters and teachers in the story rooms, they do puppets, they help lead the kids around from place to place, and they help run games outside. Not only do our teens really enjoy these roles, it also provides opportunities for them to interact with all generations of the congregation: they get to work alongside those who are older than they are, and teach and lead those who are younger (this is hugely important!).

(4) Provide a variety of activities for the kids. Our hi-tech digital society does not cultivate long attention spans in children. Just the opposite. So if your VBS schedule calls for children to sit in class for 90 minutes listening to a teacher, then it will probably be hard for the teachers and rough on the kids. I absolutely believe that biblical instruction is important, and that is at the center of what we do. But the lessons are taught through skits in decorated rooms and then reinforced in craft time and puppet skits. Kids also get to play games outside, sing, have refreshments, and buy trinkets in the VBS store with coins they have earned by bringing guests and answering questions in class.

(5) Choose good material. Not all VBS material is created equally. Some of it looks really nice; some of it looks like it was made in 1975. Some of it looks like it was made for children; some of it seems like it was made by someone who had never even seen children before. We have found some VBS curriculum that we like, but even it isn’t good every year. This year we actually re-used (good) curriculum from 2009 rather than use the new (not-as-good) stuff. Personally, I am a fan of VBS themes that try to transport the kids to Bible time and places (this year our theme was “Rome: Paul and the Underground Church”) rather than those odd topical themes that don’t make sense and seem incredibly lame to me (things like “VBS Pirates: Searching for Buried Treasure in God’s Word” or “Tropical VBS: Learning Lessons from God’s Word in an Island Paradise”).

(6) Advertise. Honestly, I didn’t do a great job advertising this year; if I had, we might’ve had even more people. There are a lot of ways to advertise. You can send out flyers to area congregations. If your VBS is early in the summer, you can see about sending home flyers at local elementary schools. You can hang attractive banners outside of your church building for those who drive by. For us, the best method of advertising is contacting those parents from our community whom we already know through Thursday Bible School. If you have a similar program at your congregation, these are exactly the sort of people who would be interested in participating in your VBS. 

(7) Follow up with the guests who come. We have, admittedly, been weak on this in the past, but are trying to do better this year. If you have registration information on all of the children who came, then you should have contact information for those whose parents are not members. Send a card thanking them for their attendance. Send a letter or brochure telling them more about your church family and the programs you have available.

(8) Plan for next year. Soon, we will have a follow-up meeting to reflect on things that worked well, and things that we could improve for next year. It’s important that we do this now, while this year’s VBS is still fresh on our minds. No matter how successful things were this year, there’s always something that could be done better or more people who could be involved.

Vacation Bible School can be a powerful ministry for your congregation if only you put the necessary time, planning, and effort into it. The ideas I have suggested above might not be the only “right” way to do VBS, but it certainly works for us!

Destroying the Works of Satan

A couple of weeks ago I had the opportunity to speak at a youth rally and my topic was the purpose of the church. I talked about how the church is God’s vehicle for saving the world today (through the preaching of the gospel), for influencing the world and trying to make it a better place (through service), and equipping Christians for those first two tasks (through education and discipleship).

And those are all pretty standard ideas—we hear about those things a lot when we talk about what the church should do. But the church has another important purpose that is often neglected in such discussions: the mission of the church is to oppose and destroy the works of Satan.

In 1 John 3.8, John said that Jesus came to earth so that “He might destroy the works of the devil.” In Ephesians 6.12, Paul says that our struggle as Christians is not against flesh and blood, but against the forces of darkness. 

These verses make it clear that as the church, we are a part of a spiritual battle against Satan and his influence. Moral corruption and sin are the works of the Devil (and we focus on things like that a lot),  but so are things like disease, starvation, poverty, terrorism, and racism. 

When you look at all the sad and messed up stuff that happens in our world—do you think God likes that stuff? Of course not! Children starving to death in the developing world, or innocent people being killed because of racial wars, or bombs going off at marathon finish lines—those are works of Satan, and when we take part in efforts to fight against those things, we are fulfilling the purpose of the church in opposing and destroying the works of the Devil. 

To me, realizing that when we fight against evil, we’re part of a cosmic struggle and are fighting against Satan himself gives us a whole new level of motivation for doing it. The decisions we make each and every day are important because we have the opportunity to stand up against evil. 

A cosmic struggle against evil: think about that the next time one of your friends tells a racist joke—are you going to sit there and laugh at the works of Satan, or realizing that God loves all people regardless of race and that racism comes from Satan, are you going to speak up and put a stop to it? 

Or the next time you have an opportunity to give to people, maybe people living on the other side of the world who have less than you do—are you going to be willing to use what you have to fight against the works of Satan like poverty and starvation, or are you going to hold onto those things so you can continue to pursue the idolatry of the “American dream”?

Studies show that a whole bunch of teens leave the church after high school, and I think a big reason for that is because it just doesn’t seem like the work of the church is all that important. After all, if we narrow down what church is to only a couple hours of activity a week, of course its importance is going to be diminished. But when we realize the cosmic nature of the struggle we are involved in—saving the world, serving the world, training Christians to do those things, and opposing the works of Satan—we see that the church is absolutely a cause worth giving our lives to.

If you liked this post or found it to be challenging or helpful, please share it with others by clicking on one of the buttons below. Thanks!

Churches and Lifesaving Stations

Pea Island Life-Saving Station crew, 1896. Photographer unknown.

A cautionary parable from Managing the Congregation: Building Effective Systems to Serve People, by Norman Shawchuck and Roger Heuser, pp. 78-79:

On a dangerous seacoast where shipwrecks often occur there was once a crude little lifesaving station. The building was just a hut, and there was only one boat, but the few devoted members kept a constant watch over the sea, and with no thought of themselves went out day and night tirelessly searching for the lost. Many lives were saved by this wonderful little station, so that it became famous. Some of those who were saved, and various others in the surrounding area, wanted to become associated with the station and give of their time and money and effort for the support of its work. New boats were bought and new crews trained. The little lifesaving station grew. 

Some of the members of the lifesaving station were unhappy that the building was so crude and poorly equipped. They felt that a more comfortable place should be provided as the first refuge of those saved from the sea. So they replaced the emergency cots with beds and put better furniture in the enlarged building. Now the lifesaving station became a popular gathering place for its members, and they decorated it beautifully and furnished it exquisitely, because they used it as a sort of club. Fewer members were now interested in going to sea on lifesaving missions, so they hired lifeboat crews to do this work. The lifesaving motif still prevailed in this club’s decorations, and there was a liturgical lifeboat in the room where the club initiations were held. About this time a large ship was wrecked off the coast, and the hired crews brought in boatloads of cold, wet, and half-drowned people. They were dirty and sick, and some of them had black skin and some had yellow skin. The beatiful new club was in chaos. So the property committee immediately had a shower house built outside the club where victims of shipwreck could be cleaned up before coming inside. 

At the next meeting, there was a split in the club membership. Most of the members wanted to stop the club’s lifesaving activities as being unpleasant and a hindrance to the normal social life of the club. Some members instisted upon lifesaving as their primary purpose and pointed out that they were still called a lifesaving station. But they were finally voted down and told that if they wanted to save the lives of all the various kinds of people who were shipwrecked in those waters, they could begin their own lifesaving stations down the coast. They did. 

As the years went by, the new station experienced the same changes that had occurred in the old. It evolved into a club, and yet another lifesaving station was founded. History continued to repeat itself, and if you visit that sea coast today, you will find a number of exclusive clubs along that shore. Shipwrecks are frequent in those waters, but most of the people drown!

Churches would do well to consider what happens when they lose their sense of purpose. Without a purpose and reason for existence, churches become nothing more than social clubs.

Youth Ministers: Don’t Move Around So Much!

From Mark DeVries’ Family-Based Youth Ministry, Rev. Ed., p. 87 (emphasis added):

“When a student makes it to mature Christian adulthood, he or she can almost always point to either the influence of godly parents or that of at least one available, durable, nonexploitive Christian adult who modeled for them what being an adult Christian was all about. Sometimes twenty-something youth directors can make this kind of long-term, ongoing investment in a handful of students, but by and large, their age-driven transience severely limits their long-term availability.”

Youth ministers: try to put down roots and invest in the lives of a congregation’s kids for a number of years. If you have to go sooner, keep yourself available to those students with whom you have forged relationships.

This is important stuff we do; it’s not to be entered (or exited) lightly.

Wanted: Role Players in the Body of Christ

Joe Kleine was one of the best basketball players in Arkansas Razorback history. An All-Conference Selection in 1984 and 1985, and Kleine also played on the 1984 Gold Medal U.S. Olympic team. In a game against the 2nd-ranked Houston Cougars in 1984, Kleine led the Razorbacks to victory, snapping Houston’s 31-game conference winning streak and outscoring future Hall of Famer Hakeem Olajawon 22-10. During his career at Arkansas, Kleine averaged 18 points per game—more than Michael Jordan averaged during his career at the University of North Carolina. 

But, after completing his collegiate career and joining the NBA in 1985, Kleine went from being a stand out all-star to an average, back-up, role player. In the late 80s and early 90s, Kleine played for the Boston Celtics. While he was there, he was overshadowed by a number of very famous and very good players—Larry Bird, Kevin McHale, Reggie Lewis, and Robert Parrish. Parrish in particular overshadowed Kleine, because Parrish played the exact position that Kleine did—center. Robert Parrish is considered by basketball experts to be one of the greatest centers who has ever played the game, so Joe Kleine got to be Parrish’s backup. 

It's not easy being a backup, a second teamer. Backups are called things like “substitutes” and “bench-warmers” and “role players”. Backups don’t get to play on the Dream Team; they don’t get to play in All-Star games. Their basketball cards aren’t worth very much, and they don’t get to make many commercials. It would seem that being a backup isn’t a very important job.

Nothing could be further from the truth, however. Consider the following description of Joe Kleine from an article by a Celtic sportswriter a few years back: 

“He is what he is. And he knows exactly what that is—the backup center on an NBA team. Every NBA team would love to have Kleine be what he is, which, in addition to being a competent NBA center, includes being a first-rate person.” 

The article goes on to quote one of Kleine’s former coaches: 

“When we had him here, Joe was our lug. Now, he’s your lug. But you know what? He’s a good lug, I wish we still had him.”

Why is Joe Kleine, a second-string backup center, the kind of player that every coach wants on his team? Why is he the kind of player that coaches don’t want to give up? Because he is willing to accept the role he is given, and give his best performing that role, even if it is not exciting or glamorous. 

Paul talked about role players in 1 Corinthians 12.14-18: 

“Now the body is not made up of one part but of many. If the foot should say, ‘Because I am not a hand, I do not belong to the body,’ it would not for that reason cease to be a part of the body. And if the ear should say, ‘Because I am not an eye, I do not belong to the body,’ it would not for that reason cease to be a part of the body. If the whole body were an eye, where would the sense of hearing be? If the whole body were an ear, where would the sense of smell be? But in fact, God has arranged the parts in the body, every one of them, just as He wanted them to be.” 

We don’t each fill the same role, but Paul goes on to tell us that we each have a role to fill. Moreover, he tells us that God bestows an extra measure of honor upon those who fill roles that seem unglamorous: 

“The eye cannot say to the hand, ‘I don't need you!’ And the head cannot say to the feet, ‘I don’t need you!’ On the contrary, those parts of the body that seem to be weaker are indispensable, and the parts that we think of as less honorable we treat with special honor. And the parts that are unpresentable are treated with special modesty, while our presentable parts need no special treatment. But God has combined the members of the body and has given greater honor to the parts that lacked it, so that there should be no division in the body, but that its parts should have equal concern for each other.”

Just as role players are an integral part of any NBA team, they are also indispensable within the church. Unfortunately, this is often a difficult lesson for Christians to learn. Even some of Jesus’ apostles struggled with this concept—in Mark 10, James and John asked to sit at the right and left hand of Jesus so that they could receive special recognition. This request was made because they did not understand the role that God had given them. In Mark 10.43-45, Jesus explained to them that “whoever wishes to become great among you shall be your servant, and whoever wishes to be first among you shall be slave of all. For even the Son of Man did not come to be served, but to serve, and to give His life as a ransom for many.”

Are you willing to be a role player in the Body of Christ? Because that’s the kind of player that God is looking for on His team.

Viewing Your Church Leaders as More than the Customer Service Department

We live in a consumer culture which, among other things, means that we are constantly buying things, using them up, and then buying more. In a consumer culture, the idea of customer satisfaction and the practice of customer service is incredibly important—if you want customers to purchase and consume your product or use your service instead of those of your competitors, then you either have to focus on having a better or cheaper product/service than they do, or treating your customers better than they do (or, ideally, both!).

As a consumer, I value customer service highly. I’ve mentioned before about how I love Amazon because of their outstanding customer service. They make it easy (and usually free) to return items and they’ve even paid the shipping before for me to return items even when it was my fault. 

And there’s nothing wrong with any of that.

The problem though, is that we take our consumer mindset and try to apply it to church as well. You see this all the time: when looking for a new congregation to be a part of, families “shop” around for a church and compare different congregations like they would products in a store. 

And to a degree, that’s a necessary thing—when looking for a church, you need to find one you agree with theologically, and you need to find a community of believers where you can fit in and form relationships. But it can also be a dangerous thing, I think, when churches are evaluated only from the perspective of what they have to offer you (as a consumer), rather than you asking yourself how your gifts and talents could be added to make the work of a particular congregation more effective (to paraphrase JFK: “Ask not what your church can do for you; ask what you can do for your church.”).

Another part of this consumer mindset in the church is that it basically turns church leadership into the customer service department.

In his book, A Church That Flies: A New Call to Restoration in the Churches of Christ, Tim Woodroof says something that I think is incredibly important (even though it’s not at all the focus of the book). Basically he says that it’s amazing how many church members are willing to voice their opinions and complain to their elders* but are very reluctant to listen and learn from them. In my experience, this is absolutely true—church members are very quick to run to elders with their complaints, but very slow to seek their counsel and advice. And that’s a shame.

We have four elders at Farmington, and I know all of them well. None of them are perfect, and they all have flaws (as they would freely admit). But all of them are good, mature Christian men who deeply care about the spiritual well-being of the flock they oversee. As a group, they complement one another well, and would be a valuable resource to any church member who is struggling.

And probably the same could be said for the leadership at your church, which means they deserve more than to be treated like the church customer service department. Think about that the next time you have a complaint.

*One of the distinctive marks of churches of Christ is that we seek to follow a model of church leadership, found in the New Testament, where each congregation or church is autonomous and led by a group of men known as elders (or shepherds, or bishops, or overseers).

Follow this blog and/or follow me on Twitter!

Winter Retreat Recap: SHINE

This past weekend was our annual youth group Winter Retreat. This is one of my favorite youth group events of the year, because we are able to take a break from our regular schedules for a weekend and focus on other things instead. It is always a time where the kids in our group grow closer together, get spiritually re-engergized, and have a ton of fun.

This year, the theme of our retreat was “SHINE,” and we talked about light and darkness from a spiritual perspective. Throughout Scripture, God is consistently portrayed using the metaphor of light, and as followers of God, Christians are to be people of light as well.

Our teachings on this topic were organized around three lessons which showed the progression of the theme throughout the weekend:

(1) The Shining Face of Moses (Exodus 33.18-23; Exodus 34.28-35). After Moses leads the people out of Egypt, he spends 40 days and 40 nights with God on Mt. Sinai while God gives the Law to him. Moses is protected in the crevice of a rock, and is only able to see the back of God’s glory as He passes, but the glory of God is so bright that it leaves Moses with a face that literally shines. He even wears a veil to cover his face. Being in the presence of God changes us.

(2) The Shining Light Comes to Earth (John 1.1-14; The Nativity Story). With the birth of Jesus, God reveals His glory and brings His Light to the earth in a new and special way. Jesus was fully God and fully man at the same time, and this means that the life of Jesus gives us the perfect example of how we can live in our dark world and still shine God’s Light.

(3) Shining God’s Light to Others (John 8.12; John 9.5; Matthew 5.14-16; Philippians 2.14-15; 1 John 1.5-7). After talking about the greatness of God’s glory and how that glory was brought to earth in a special way through the Incarnation of Jesus Christ, our last lesson brought all this together, and focus on our main task as Christians: shining the light of God into our dark world.

Instead of presenting this material in a traditional lecture format, our teens were broken into discussion groups based on age, and processed and learned the material that way. We then combined the separate groups for a larger group discussion, which (hopefully) helped to reinforce the material.

It was a great weekend! We had a lot of fun, and I am optimistic that the teens learned a lot as well.

“Liberal” and “Conservative” as Religious Labels

Liberal.

Conservative. 

They are terms that you tend to hear frequently if you are in ministry, or studying theology, or spend much time at church.* Since all three of those descriptions fit me, I have definitely heard the terms a lot. I have also used them both, and I have even seen or heard myself described with both of them before. Despite their widespread use, I dislike them, and have come to believe that, without significant contextualization, they are basically meaningless. Let me explain. 

What makes someone liberal? Well, there is a wide degree of difference between people who claim to be Christian, so it really depends which type of “Christian” you ask:

• If you ask a Catholic, a liberal might be someone who advocates the use of birth control or believes that priests should have the right to marry.
• If you ask an Amish person, a liberal might be someone who drives a car or fastens their clothes with zippers.
• If you ask an evangelical Christian, a liberal might be someone who denies the divinity of Jesus Christ, or advocates that practicing homosexuals should be able to serve as priests or pastors.
• If you ask a member of the mainline Churches of Christ, a liberal might be someone who believes that baptism is not a part of the process of salvation, or that instrumental music is acceptable in the worship of the church.
• If you ask a member of the Non-Institutional Churches of Christ, a liberal might be someone who thinks it is permissible to eat in the church building, or that churches should provide assistance to the local poor.
• In other sub-groups of the Churches of Christ, a liberal might be someone who advocates having a Bible class for children, or believes that the Holy Spirit personally indwells Christians, or thinks that it is okay to use more than one cup for the juice in the Lord’s Supper.

We could repeat the exercise with the term conservative, but hopefully, my point has become clear: if Person A, who denies the divinity of Christ, and Person B, who zips up his pants, and Person C, who thinks that a Bible class for children is a good idea, can all be described by the term “liberal,” then it’s not a particularly useful term.

How these terms are used depends almost entirely on our own perspective—where we are located on the conservative/liberal spectrum. In my own case, I am definitely conservative in the wide spectrum of Christianity, but would consider myself to be pretty middle-of-the-road within the context of Churches of Christ. Others (on both sides) would dispute where I placed myself though. In fact, based solely on the fact that I am a graduate of Harding University, some would label me as a “crazy liberal” while others would write me off as a “backward conservative.”

All that brings me to this—the labels only have meaning if you’re talking to someone who is in the exact same location on the conservative/liberal spectrum as you are.

Of course, there’s a reason why we like to have labels like this. They enable us to put people into categories and treat them accordingly. If we think of someone as a “crazy liberal” it is much easier to just write them off as unfaithful and never address any of the issues they bring up. And if we think of someone as a “backward conservative” we can condescendingly poke fun of their close-mindedness and never study any of their viewpoints or any of the cautions they raise.

What’s the alternative? Well, I guess we could look at people as individuals and get to know what their specific views are. We could try to learn why they think the way they do on a given issue, perhaps reexamine our own beliefs on that issue, and see to what extent both viewpoints are rooted in Scripture. And when we disagree with them, we could give the benefit of the doubt to people who claim to love God and want to do His will, rather than automatically question their motives or their intelligence.

But…that seems like a lot of work. Labels are definitely easier; maybe we should just stick with those.

*This blog post addresses the terms “conservative” and “liberal” in a religious sense, not a political one. The fact that the two terms are also used in the arena of politics and that they don’t always line up (people who are conservative religiously are not always conservative politically, and people who are liberal religiously are not always liberal politically) adds to my overall point.

Reflections on Graduation, Youth Ministry, and Hoop Dreams

Hoop Dreams is a documentary film from the 1990s that tells the story of two kids from the projects in Chicago who play basketball and hope to use their talents to make it to the NBA and ultimately, change their lives. It is a brilliant and poignant film, and touches on a lot of heavy issues like race, poverty, and drugs, but it also has a bearing on this particular idea.

Near the end of the film, William Gates, one of the two main characters of the film, goes in to talk to his high school basketball coach, Gene Pingatore, at the end of his senior year. Pingatore coached for St. Joseph’s, a private Catholic high school with an expensive tuition, but because William was a basketball phenom as a freshman, he was able to receive a scholarship. William had a good career, but a devastating knee injury prevented him from being the player that everyone expected him to be.

The particular clip I’m talking about starts at the 30.51 mark in the video below, and runs until about 33.05:

As Gates walks out of the coach’s life, Pingatore chuckles and remarks, “Well, another one walks out the door and another one comes in the door. That’s what it’s all about.”

It comes across rather callously: it’s as if the last four years meant nothing to the coach; Gates was just a player on a team, a piece he manipulated for a few years, and now it’s time to use the next piece.*

•   •   •

Last night I went to Farmington High School Graduation to watch five seniors from our church walk across the stage to receive their diplomas.

As a youth minister, I’ve now been with the church here long enough that I have worked with some of our teens for several years—all the way from sixth grade through their senior years. All that time invested into students can stir up a lot of bittersweet feelings—I am proud to see how they have developed and matured and what they have accomplished, and am excited for what they will go on to do. At the same time, I am concerned about the trials and temptations they will face, the decisions they will make, and ultimately, whether or not they will remain faithful. I can’t help but wonder about things that I could have done differently that perhaps would have impacted their spiritual growth in a better way, and I wonder if I could have taught or exemplified a particular point of Christian discipleship more effectively.

Graduation is also a bittersweet time because I know that my relationships with my students (in a sense, I guess they’re not mine anymore) always change when they go off to college. Sometimes we get closer (which is a joy), a lot of times we drift apart somewhat as we don’t spend as much time together, but always there is a change, and I’m not a big fan of change.

To sympathize a bit with Coach Pingatore from the clip above, there are the realities of youth ministry (and coaching)—as kids graduate and move on, other kids do come into the group, and you have to devote efforts and attention to them as well. If spend all of your time focusing on the students who have already left, then you neglect the ones who are still around. But at the same time, I can’t just chuckle about it and laugh it off the way he does. New students come in, but they don’t replace the ones who have left as if they are interchangeable pieces.

As the summer ends and my graduating teens ultimately move on, I watch them from a distance, cheering on their accomplishments and praying for God’s guidance in their lives. But to me, they’re still my kids: I’ve poured too much of myself into them for them to be anything else.

•   •   •

*For the record, Pingatore did not like the way he was portrayed in the film and ended up suing the directors. He might actually be a great guy who invests a ton in his players; it didn’t come across that way in the film.

Being a Christian Without Being Part of the Church

It’s a popular notion today that one can be a Christian without being a part of the Church. It’s also a thoroughly unbiblical notion.

In The Prodigal God, Timothy Keller has some good thoughts in this regard:

“Christians commonly say that they want to “get to know Jesus better.” You will never be able to do that by yourself. You must be deeply involved in the church, in Christian community, with strong relationships of love and accountability. Only if you are a part of a community of believers seeking to resemble, serve, and love Jesus will you ever get to know him and grow into his likeness.”

I have known plenty of people who were in one sense or another actively involved with the Church who did not particularly resemble Jesus. That’s a common enough claim, and shows that just “going to” church or being involved in church activities doesn’t necessarily conform someone to the image of Christ.

Of course, at the same time, I haven’t known anyone who resembled Jesus who wasn’t also deeply devoted to the Church. Jesus loved the Church enough that he paid for it with his blood (Acts 20.28); to think that one can somehow be a Christian without belonging to that Body is absurd.

What’s Wrong With Youth Ministers? Summary and Conclusions

This post will serve to wrap up my thoughts on several problems which people commonly associate with youth ministers. If you’ve missed the first three parts of this series, you can read them here, here, and here. 

Youth ministers often don’t get a lot of respect, and people who complain about them have a lot of criticisms. In this series I discussed five different criticisms which I think have varying degrees of validity:

(1) Youth Ministers don’t stay very long.

Is this criticism valid? Generally, yes. It will always be difficult for youth ministers to get respect if they are viewed more as hired hands than as good shepherds (cf. John 10), and people can’t help but view youth ministers as hired hands when they don’t stick around long enough to put down roots and build meaningful, lasting relationships with the congregation. There are certainly some valid reasons to leave a congregation (even after a short period of time), but in general, I think youth ministers as a group are guilty of leaving a little too quickly when things get difficult. 

Suggestion for improvement: Congregations are made up of people, which means that any church and therefore any church-related job is going to come with problems and headaches. Realizing from the outset that no ministry position is perfect helps to temper unrealistic expectations. Furthermore, working on developing the biblical virtues of perseverance and patience helps a minister weather the bad times while working diligently to help bring about better ones.

(2) Youth Ministers are never in the office working. 

Is this criticism valid? To a degree, yes. It is not valid when based on the assumption that being in the office is the single most important thing that a youth minister can do, because the majority of youth ministry cannot be done in an office where no young people are present. Thankfully, most congregations realize this today, and adjust office hour requirements accordingly. Unfortunately, some youth ministers take advantage of this arrangement and are never found in the office at all, and that is a problem. Youth ministers hold a visible position of leadership and, therefore, need to be accessible to members of the congregation at certain times.

Suggestion for improvement: If you have office hours posted (or even if they are not posted, but were agreed upon when you were hired), be a person of integrity and make it a priority to be in your office at those times. Make the hours you spend in the office as productive as possible by focusing on those aspects of youth ministry that can be done without your youth group being present: studying and preparing Bible class lessons, answering phone calls and emails, planning and publicizing events through social media,  or reading books on ministry and Christian living.

(3) Youth Ministers build allegiance to a group, not to the Church.

Is this criticism valid? Yes. I spent a lot of time covering this one, because of all the criticisms people make about youth ministers/ministry I think this is the most significant. A lot of the activities and strategies that youth ministers typically employ serve to isolate young people from the rest of the congregation, leaving them without any meaningful relationships with other, older members. Once the teenager graduates from high school (and the youth group) he/she can feel out of place at church and not surprisingly, a lot of teenagers leave the church during this time of life.

Suggestion for improvement: Limit how often you remove your youth group from the corporate worship of the congregation; the more often you are gone (regardless of how important the reason seems), the more you underscore that, on some level, the youth group is not a part of the larger congregation. Allow high school graduates to still hang out at youth group activities, and invest some level of responsibility and leadership in them. Encourage your teens to be actively involved in the life of the church in worship, in service, and in church-wide events. Finally, provide opportunities for adult Christians to mentor teens one-on-one or in small groups—the more relationships a teen develops outside the youth group the better.

(4) Youth Ministers are shallow.

Is this criticism valid? At times it is, but on the whole, I don’t think youth ministers should be roundly criticized for this. As I mentioned before, I honestly don’t know of any youth ministers who do nothing more than plan fun events and play games with their teens. I do think that youth ministers sometimes lean too far toward entertainment when trying to teach their students, but even that generally comes from a desire to instill biblical principles in a way the student will remember rather than an unwillingness on the part of the youth minister to teach the Bible. Youth ministers are sometimes unacceptably ignorant in their Bible knowledge, but as I argued before, so are most Christians. That’s not to say that it isn’t a problem (it’s a huge problem), it just isn’t a problem that youth ministers should be singled out for.

Suggestion for improvement: Youth activities which are fun should be balanced with activities that focus on other important aspects of the Christian life. There’s nothing wrong with taking your teens bowling or visiting Six Flags, but you should also take them to spiritually-focused events like retreats and youth rallies and also provide them with abundant opportunities for service. With regard to Bible class, teaching the Bible should always take precedence over entertaining the students, and that is made easier when the youth minister has made a personal commitment to Bible study.

(5) Youth Ministers are liberal.

Is this criticism valid? Mostly, I don’t think so. Generally speaking, because of their age and educational background, I do think that youth ministers tend to be more “liberal” than the average church member, however, I don’t think it’s particularly common for youth ministers to swoop into a new ministry position, determined to make the church more liberal at all costs and causing irreparable damage along the way. Actually, I think it is much more common for youth ministers to forget about some of their own personal preferences, realizing that they are out of place in their current congregation and not worth causing grief over.

Suggestion for improvement: Congregations can go a long way toward alleviating this problem (to whatever degree it exists) in the interview process. Since terms like “liberal” and “conservative” are relative and generally used in relation to certain beliefs or practices, it should be easy enough for churches to ask specific questions during the interview process which determine if the candidate would be a good fit for their particular congregation.

I’m sure there are other criticisms that I could have covered in this discussion, but I tried to hit the ones I hear most often. As you can see, to some extent I think that youth ministers are criticized unfairly, but because of the questionable actions of a lot of youth ministers over the years, I also think that we deserve a lot of what we get. 

As I have tried to make clear in these posts, I am by no means the perfect youth minister, and I am sure that at times I have done some of the very things that I have been criticizing. Nevertheless, as I move forward, my goal is to exemplify the positive aspects of youth ministry rather than the problems often associated with it.

What’s Wrong With Youth Ministers? Some Common (and often Legitimate) Criticisms, Part 3

Disclaimer: I have been involved in youth ministry in some fashion for almost ten years now, so the statements below are based on observations I have made during that time. That being said, I am in no way claiming to be an expert on youth ministry, and I am certainly not suggesting that I am a perfect (or even particularly good) youth minister. Below are a collection of humble opinions and suggestions based on personal experience. See Parts 1 and 2 of this series here and here.

(4) Youth Ministers are shallow.

I had a hard time coming up with the title for this area of criticism, but really it’s just an umbrella description for specific criticisms of youth ministers that I’ve heard voiced or implied several times like, “All he does is plan fun events! There’s never any spiritual emphasis!” or “His Bible classes are pure entertainment! There’s no Bible to them!” or “He doesn’t even know the Bible! Why is he teaching our kids?”

Fun Events: in a time when a lot of teenagers are having fun in some decidedly unholy ways, I think there’s nothing wrong with having certain events that are for the express purpose of having good, clean fun. Of course, these fun events should be balanced with other types of events, but I honestly don’t know of any youth ministers who do nothing more than play basketball with their teens. Most organize regular devotionals to provide a time outside of worship to study the Bible, and many travel to a variety of youth rallies, retreats, and summer camps to provide an opportunity for worship and spiritual growth.

If there is one area in which I think youth ministers as a whole could be more intentional about planning activities it would be service. Fundamentally, Christians are supposed to be servants, but that’s a hard message to get across in our self-centered, consumer culture. One thing I’ve always tried to do as a youth minister (sometimes more successfully than others) is to provide a variety of opportunities for service to remind my students that following Jesus means adopting His model of servanthood.

Entertainment vs. Bible: I don’t know if you’ve noticed, but teenagers in today’s world don’t exactly have stellar attention spans. This isn’t particularly surprising since most of them have been watching television since birth and spend most of the day plugged in through a smart phone, iPod, or laptop.

Because of this, there is undoubtedly a need for capturing the attention of our students in order to teach them effectively. That being said, if you’re not careful, you can spend so much time engaging the students that you don’t have time to engage Scripture. I’ve seen Bible lessons for teens that were so focused on grabbing their attention and making the Bible relevant that they barely had mentioned the Bible at all!

Fundamentally, I believe that the Bible is relevant to the life of every person, and because of that, it is interesting. I don’t claim to be a great teacher, but the Bible is a great book, and since I make it a priority to teach Scripture in my classes, it’s usually fairly effective.

Bible Knowledge: I have become personally convinced that Christians, on the whole, are woefully ignorant of the teachings of the Bible. That’s a scary thing to me, but even worse, a lot of Bible teachers (including some youth ministers) aren’t much better.

I don’t want to over-generalize here, because everyone is different: I’ve known youth ministers with little formalized training who are outstanding Bible students, and others with college degrees in Bible who seemed completely unaware of basic biblical teachings. Regardless of that, on the whole, we as a people don’t know our Bibles well enough, and I’ve never known anyone who spent too much time reading and studying Scripture.

And, related to the point above about Entertainment vs. Bible, the better you know and understand the Bible, the easier it is to teach it. Being able to describe the historical and cultural background of a specific story or passage is more interesting than just having your students take turns reading it out loud. Better understanding leads to better teaching.

(5) Youth Ministers are liberal.

I really dislike the labels “liberal” and “conservative” when it comes to church discussion, because everyone defines those terms so differently that they become largely useless.¹ I dislike the labels so much that I almost left this one off the list entirely, but it is a common criticism, so I thought I would address it briefly.²

In this last criticism, I am not referring to the idea held by some people that having a youth minister is inherently liberal,³ but rather the notion that youth ministers individually tend to be more liberal than the congregations that employ them, and thus, cause problems at those congregations.

Like I said above, this is a common criticism, and I’m sure it’s valid to a degree, but I think it tends to exaggerated a lot. Let me explain.

It makes a lot of sense for youth ministers to be a somewhat liberal group as a whole when you remember that, as a general rule, youth ministers tend to be young, and they also tend to be only a few years removed from an education at a Christian university (typically, people are more liberal when they are younger, and usually Christian universities are somewhat more liberal than are a lot of the congregations whose young people choose to attend them).

Nevertheless, if a congregation has done a good job in the interview process to find a youth minister that is a good fit for them, then really it shouldn’t be an issue—more liberal churches will have no problem accepting youth ministers with more liberal views, while more conservative congregations will avoid those candidates and instead hire someone whose views are more in line with their own.

I guess what I’m trying to say is that if there is⁴ a huge problem of youth ministers being too liberal for the churches they work with, at least part of the blame should fall on the congregations who hired them in the first place when they obviously weren’t a very good fit.

The next (and hopefully last) post will close out the series with a few summary observations.

• • •

1For example, some people use the term “liberal” to refer to the idea that Jesus wasn’t actually define and wasn’t physically raised from the dead, while other people use it to refer to the practice of clapping hands while singing in worship. The fact that the same term is used to describe such widely varying theological beliefs and practices renders the term almost meaningless. It becomes just a relative term—anyone to the left of (whoever is speaking at the time) is “liberal”, while anyone to his right is “conservative”.


2I won’t put the terms in quotation marks from here on out because that would be annoying to read; just realize that I am making no attempt to actually define the terms, but am just using them in a general and relative sense.

3Some Christians/congregations believe that, since the New Testament doesn’t specifically speak about the use of youth ministers, congregations that have them are using a “liberal” innovation. Obviously, I disagree. Not wanting to go into great detail on this point, I would suggest that since the New Testament comes much closer to supporting a congregation having a youth minister than having a multi-million dollar building to worship in.


4There is no doubt in my mind that there are multiple examples of guys who have come in with more liberal views, tried to bring change to the congregation they were working with and caused a great deal of damage in the process. Nevertheless, I don’t really think this is a common occurrence; it is certainly not true of the vast majority of the many youth ministers I have known and worked with. 

What’s Wrong With Youth Ministers? Some Common (and often Legitimate) Criticisms, Part 2

Disclaimer: I have been involved in youth ministry in some fashion for almost ten years now, so the statements below are based on observations I have made during that time. That being said, I am in no way claiming to be an expert on youth ministry, and I am certainly not suggesting that I am a perfect (or even particularly good) youth minister. Below are a collection of humble opinions and suggestions based on personal experience. See Part 1 of this series here.

(3) Youth Ministers build allegiance to a group, not to the Church.

In recent years, this has become a vocal criticism of youth ministry as a whole, and I think it is a valid one, so I want to spend some time addressing it.

Multiple studies have shown that evangelical teens leave the church at an alarming rate after they graduate high school,¹ and it seems likely that at least part of this phenomenon can be attributed to problems with the way we do youth ministry.

Consider the following, hypothetical example:

On a regular Sunday at ___________ Church, the youth group meets for class in their special, isolated, youth room in the Family Life Center. After class they head out to the auditorium for worship where they sit with the other teens on the special youth group rows, and after services are over, they either stay where they are, visiting with friends, or rush back to the youth room to play ping pong/foosball/PS3. 

On regular Sunday evenings, instead of meeting at the church building with ‘old people’, the youth group has a special Life Group where they meet in each other’s homes to have a devotional, sing a few songs, and then have a meal. 

These are just on regular Sundays though, which don’t actually occur all that regularly, because the Youth Minister has made it a priority for the youth group to be gone to as many trips and youth rallies as possible on weekends, in addition to regular monthly Sunday night gatherings with teens from other youth groups (after all, it’s hard to keep teens excited about just going to ‘regular’ church). 

On Wednesday nights, of course there is a special teen class in the youth room in the Family Life Center, and because this is such an important time during the week for the teens to fellowship with one another, they don’t come out after the Bible class period to spend time singing or having a devotional with the rest of the church family, but instead just stay in their room to have more time with one another. 

Each week there will be a devotional at one of the teen’s homes. 

In addition to youth rallies and weekend retreats, special activities include a ski trip over Christmas Break, a couple of church camps in the summer, and a short-term summer mission trip. All of these are primarily for teens, but there will be a few parents and maybe a youth deacon or two thrown in as chaperones.

Obviously this is just a hypothetical example, and to be clear, I’m not saying that there’s anything wrong with any of these specific activities, but when added together, what you get is a group of teens who spend a lot of time with each other, but have very little meaningful interaction with anyone else in the church. They likely don’t even know the names of the majority of adults who aren’t their Bible class teachers or youth deacons or parents of their friends. The careful and diligent work of the Youth Minister has made them very dedicated to the youth group, but has also (unintentionally) isolated them from the church family as a whole.²

What happens when they graduate? Is it particularly reasonable, after cultivating an allegiance to the youth group (which has been largely separated from the church as a whole) in them for years, to kick them out of the youth group once they graduate and expect them to eagerly ‘switch allegiances’ to the church as a whole (largely made up of parents and ‘old people’)? I think it’s increasingly becoming clear that the answer is, ‘no.’

Does that mean that mean that youth rallies, youth trips, youth rooms, and even youth groups should be done away with? Well, judging by the fact that I am a Youth Minister, I obviously don’t think so, but I do think that it means that youth ministry needs to be rethought somewhat.

I think it is important that we provide opportunities for our students to build relationships with other Christians their own age, and I also think it is appropriate to offer teaching that is customized and directed at teens, dealing with the issues they face in a way that is interesting to them. Taken together, these goals provide justification for a lot of the things I mentioned in the hypothetical example above, but these goals must be balanced with the intentional effort to make teens disciples of Jesus, which of course, involves a lifetime of service to His church (not just 6-7 years of involvement with a youth group).

Instead of being isolated from the church, teens are an integral part of it, with their involvement including, but not being limited to, youth group activities. Of course, that’s easier said than done—how do we make teens active and functioning parts of the Body instead of merely loyal members of a youth group? Well, I don’t claim to have all the answers, but here are a few suggestions:

Limit how often the youth group is absent from the corporate worship of your congregation. From personal experience, I can say that it is really tempting for youth ministers to have their groups miss a lot of the worship services of the church, opting instead for special events where the worship is different, fresh, and exciting. But is there any doubt that the more your kids are absent from worship with the local body, the less they feel like they are a part of that body?

If high school graduates want to hang around for a while, let them. I’ve known some youth ministers who are adamant about getting kids out of the youth group as soon as the summer after their senior year is over. Considering what I mentioned above about students leaving the church at an alarming rate after graduating high school, I’m not sure this is a great idea. Transitioning from high school to college is a difficult time for a lot of students, and especially if you don’t have an active college group at your church, some might not know where they fit in. I’ve always encouraged those who have already graduated but who are still interested in coming to youth events to come—they provide good, older role models for the younger students, and it also helps to keep them involved with the church.

Provide opportunities for adult Christians to mentor students one on one or in small groups. This is something we started doing this year as part of our Lads to Leaders program, and with work, I think it could develop into something very positive for our church. Having students work with adult mentors provides another positive Christian role model in their lives (and they can never have too many), and also gives them another connection to the church outside of the youth group and their own family.

Allow teens to be involved in the life of the church, and encourage them to do so. Let your young men serve in the worship assembly. When high school teens reach a certain level of maturity, encourage them to teach (or help teach) a children’s Bible class for a quarter. If there is a work day at the church building, let your young people know that they are needed as well. Look for ways in which your congregation can serve the community and make sure that your teens work hand in hand with older members to accomplish those projects.

These are just a few ideas; what other things can churches and/or youth ministers do to make teens an active part of larger congregation?

I know this post was long, but as I mentioned above, I think this is an important and valid criticism. Next time I’ll focus on two more that I have heard a lot.

• • •

1Statistics from different studies range on what percentage of teens leave the church after high school. CrossExamined.org places the number at 75%.

2For what it’s worth, I do think teenagers actually enjoy this type of youth group—taking lots of special trips, being isolated from adults and the elderly, having their own special worship and Bible study gatherings—I’m just not convinced that, when taken to an extreme, it’s conducive to healthy spiritual development.

What’s Wrong With Youth Ministers? Some Common (and often Legitimate) Criticisms, Part 1

Disclaimer: I have been involved in youth ministry in some fashion for almost ten years now, so the statements below are based on observations I have made during that time. That being said, I am in no way claiming to be an expert on youth ministry, and I am certainly not suggesting that I am a perfect (or even particularly good) youth minister. What I have written below is simply a collection of opinions and suggestions based on personal experience.

Typically, youth ministers don’t get a lot of respect. Many members of the congregation largely consider them to be glorified baby-sitters who come for a couple of years as hired hands, hang out with teenagers and then move on, unworthy of the salary they receive (“What do you do all day, anyway?”).

I think that’s unfortunate, because I believe that (good) youth ministry is an important part of a healthy church. However, if I’m honest with myself, I have to admit that we (youth ministers as a whole) have done a lot to warrant the criticisms and generalizations that are often directed at us:

(1) Youth Ministers don’t stay very long.

In a very good article on ministry, Lynn Anderson suggests that it’s hard to be really effective as a minister until you’ve been at a congregation for at least seven years.¹ This might seem shocking since a lot of ministers don’t stay in place for that long, but it makes sense when you think about it: it takes time to build deep, genuine relationships with people, and most people aren’t really going to trust you with their spiritual well-being until they know you well.

The problem is, as often as ministers tend to move from one congregation to another, youth ministers seem to do so with even greater frequency. I’ve been working with the teens at Farmington continuously since May 2006 (since then my title has changed and my responsibilities have evolved and expanded somewhat, but still, my foremost priority has been working with the young people). That’s a time period of a less than six years, but of the 12-15 Churches of Christ that I am aware of in Northwest Arkansas, only one has employed the same youth minister for that entire time.

Now that’s just one person’s anecdotal evidence, but it certainly seems to support the generalization. So why do youth ministers leave congregations so quickly?

Of course, there are a lot of reasons, and youth ministers shouldn’t be blamed for some of them. Sometimes clashes with an eldership or an “important” family will lead to a job transition that is entirely out of the youth minister’s hands. Sometimes a youth minister will transition into a different ministry role at the same congregation because it is what the church needs most. Sometimes youth ministers just get completely burned out and need a career change.²

But often, reasons for leaving aren’t as good. A lot of times youth ministers show up on the job with big plans and new ideas, and then get frustrated when things don’t quickly turn out exactly as they planned. Rather than stay, put down roots, and work to gradually make things better, they are enticed by the greener pastures of a higher salary or a larger congregation.

I don’t claim to know what the answer is, and I don’t know if Anderson’s figure of seven years is appropriate for youth ministers or not. I do know it is difficult for those teens who have to adjust to 2-3 youth ministers in their 6-7 years in the youth group, and that they feel somewhat abandoned each time they have to deal with a youth minister leaving. I also know that remaining at the same congregation for as long as I have has reaped rewards for me, as I am more trusted by the congregation now than I was when I first came, and as a result, am more able to implement new programs and ideas.

(2) Youth Ministers are never in the office working.

I know this is an idea that a lot of church members have, but really, I hear this said (or more often, implied) most by commonly by other ministers. A lot of preachers who spend hours and hours in the church office each week studying for Bible classes and sermons get frustrated when the youth ministers they work with are never around.

Certainly, I think it’s true that youth ministers spend less time in the office than pulpit ministers do, and I know from personal experience that if I call a church office trying to get in touch with a youth minister, it is more likely that I’ll end up speaking to a secretary who has no clue to the youth minister’s whereabouts than to the youth minister himself. But like a lot of areas in life, I think it’s important to avoid extremes when thinking about how often a youth minister should be in the office.

On one hand, if youth ministers are supposed to focus largely on mentoring, teaching, and working with teenagers, it doesn’t make too much sense for them to spend 40 hours a week in an office where no teenagers are present. Besides, it’s not like work can only happen in an office: just because youth events can be enjoyable doesn’t mean that they don’t also require a lot of work, and it doesn’t seem fair to require a youth minister to be in the office for 40 hours if you also expect him to spend a lot of nights and weekends at youth events.³

Fortunately, most churches (including, thankfully, my own) realize this and allow their youth minister to have a relatively flexible office schedule. Unfortunately, some youth ministers take advantage of this, gradually spending less and less time in the office until they reach a point where you never know when to expect them.

I think it’s important for a youth minister to work out a regular office schedule where, barring some unusual occurrence, other people can expect to find him there. The number of hours may vary from church to church, but it’s important for people to be able to get a hold of you, and since, as a minister, you are a visible part of the leadership of the congregation, it’s important for people who stop by to at least occasionally be able to see you.


This post has quickly become longer than I originally intended, so I think I’ll divide it in half and post two other criticisms later. In the meantime, what do you think? I know these are criticisms that are made, because I’ve heard them myself…do you think they’re valid?

• • •

1Lynn Anderson, “Why I’ve Stayed,” Leadership 7, no. 3 (June 1986): 76-82. Anderson goes on to talk about good and bad reasons for leaving a particular ministry but maintains that, as a general rule, ministers do their best work after they have been working with the same church for at least seven years.

2Youth ministry is difficult for a lot of reasons, but in particular, seeing teens in whom you’ve invested years of time and love make bad decisions and sometimes even abandon their faith is tough.

3For example, going to church camp each summer is hardly a vacation. Instead of working from 8AM-5PM, I get up at 6 in the morning and am responsible for the boys in my cabin all day (and all night) in addition to teaching class, preaching, coach, coordinating recreational activities, etc.  I always have a good time because I love working with young people, but if you’re comparing the level of stress involved, I’d take 40 hours in the church office any day. Same goes for for special trips that I am in charge of.