Okay. It’s time to get down to brass tacks. What would a better teen program look like?
Well, it would start with a better church. Teens can only grow up to be disciples in a church filled with disciples. Therefore, a church suitable for a proper teen ministry would —
* Be filled with grace.
* So much grace that the grace turns into love.
* So much love that that the love turns into commitment, service, and sacrifice.
A proper teen-raising church would be all about mission, “mission” meaning —
* Love for one another, expressed through service
* Love for others, expressed through service
In other words, the church would help those in need, proactively. It would have outreach ministries that genuinely help people in need just because they are in need. These ministries wouldn’t be programs created just so the church can check off “Has a benevolence program” in the list of requirements to be sound. No, the church would want to serve people, and its ministries would be outgrowths of its passion to serve.
Moreover, a proper teen-raising church would be mission-minded. It would support missionaries. It might have short-term mission trips, if it could afford them. But its missions would be about the mission, not about creating a great experience for the teens.
Therefore, in a proper teen-raising church —
1. Short-term mission trips would be adult originated and adult led in order to accomplish mission wherever they are going. A trip to Honduras would be about the Hondurans, with success measured by how well the Hondurans are helped. The adults would form strong bonds with individual Hondurans, and they’d go each year even if the teens didn’t go, because they are committed to the mission and to the people.
Teens would join the mission to learn from the adults how to be missionaries and how to serve in third-world nations. Teens would be expected to meet Hondurans so the mission could be continued when this generation of adults is too old to continue.
The teens would be expected to fall in love, not with mission work as an abstraction, but with the people of Honduras whom they serve.
The teens would learn from the trips that adult Christians love people in other lands so much that they give up their vacations and savings to go there and to make the love of Jesus real for them.
The teens would learn that there is joy in service and in learning from adults how to be good missionaries.
The teens would, as they grow up, be involved in planning and making arrangements. The adults would intentionally prepare them to become leaders of mission trips, realizing that Jesus needs experienced mission team leaders.
You see, the trips wouldn’t be planned to give the kids a “great experience” with adults there to make sure the kids “enjoy their experience.” Rather, the trip would arise out of passion to serve the Hondurans, out of love for the Hondurans.
After all, true joy is found in serving others. And if a teen program is about serving the teens, they’ll only learn how to be served, and not how to serve. They have to be called into service to learn the joy of service.
2. Just so, rather than heading off to a city 500 miles away to paint houses or serve the poor, the teens will go with the adults to serve the poor in their hometowns. Service isn’t about getting away “to form great relationships” with each other. Service is about serving others. And teens need to see this behavior modeled by adults.
Teens need to learn that mission isn’t a place you travel to but a way to live wherever you are.
3. I’d also have the teens do environmental clean up — such as cleaning a creek or even adopting a mile of highway. Teens care deeply about the environment, and this pleases God greatly, even if it doesn’t please all of your members. They’re wrong. But the teens would do this with the adults. It wouldn’t be a teen ministry, but an adult ministry in which the teens share and participate.
4. Parents would, of course, be a part of teen activities, but when it comes to outside mission, it doesn’t have to be parents. In fact, teens need to see that their parents aren’t just putting on a show for them — all Christians are servants.
5. I’d try to find some gray-headed volunteers to be a part of the program. Many teens need surrogate grandparents, and all teens need to see that they are loved by the entire church, not just parents and paid staff.
6. Every church needs better instruction on parenting, marriage, and personal finance. The best thing we can do for our teens is help the parents be better parents, better spouses, and better money managers. Repeat the lessons often.
7. Do joint teen activities with other churches — not just Churches of Christ. The more teens they see from school at these activities, the bigger their support network will be.
8. Music is an important part of teen culture. Don’t confuse your taste with what is righteous. Take them to concerts.
9. Teach Christian evidences without contradicting science. They need the comfort of sound apologetics. But the evidence really is for an earth that’s billions of years old. Don’t tell them that science teaches otherwise. It doesn’t. Don’t tell them science contradicts God. It doesn’t. God created science. Science teaches us about God.
10. Teach the Bible and don’t dumb it down. If you have to, have voluntary classes for kids who want to learn. Don’t let a few bad attitudes keep the rest away for solid instruction.
11. Teach the whole Bible. The Old Testament is part of the story, too.
12. Teach the Spirit. Kids can understand him much better than many adults.
13. “Mentors” has become more of a slogan than a reality, because it’s so hard to set up teen mentoring programs that works. The best mentorships don’t arise in the abstract. Rather, they arise naturally from the work. For example, a teen working with an adult to plan a trip to dig water wells will quite naturally bond with that adult — even if the adult isn’t outgoing at all. He may just be good with his hands and have a passion for service. If they are working together, they’ll bond and, when the teen needs a trusted adviser, he’ll talk to his friend who dug a well with him.
It could just as easily be helping an adult prepare a lesson for 3rd graders or helping to set up the teen room for a fellowship. Work shoulder to shoulder with someone, and you’ll grow closer than if someone named you “mentor.”
Now, I’m sure the readers have experienced other ways to upgrade a youth program. There are a lot of creative, scriptural ideas being tossed around. But I think any program that truly produces disciples will be others-oriented, that is, mission oriented — because that’s the essence of discipleship.
And the programs must no longer radically segregate teens from adults or the congregation. No longer may youth ministers form sub-congregations. Rather, the goal of the ministry is to show them how to become adult disciples through examples and by encouraging them to do those parts of mission they’re capable of.
It’s no different from teaching your daughter how to teach four-year olds. You prepare the crafts together and plan the lesson together, realizing that she won’t have much to offer but still needs to be part of the process. You then teach together and model good teaching skills. At some point, you let her try and you give her encouraging, loving correction and suggestions, and then you let her try again. Pretty soon, she’s a teacher.
But more importantly, she’s seen the passion for teaching that her mother has and she’s tried it and learned that she loves it, too. After a while, she can’t imagine a Sunday morning where she’s not teaching little children.
That same model works at all levels. You just have to think carefully about what behaviors need to be modeled so the teens grow into disciples.
