Great article about Youth Ministry and Family Ministry

JIM BURNS, PRESIDENT

YOUTH BUILDERS

DANA POINT, CALIFORNIA

I work for the National Institute of Youth Ministry/Youth Builders. We're changing our name on June 1 to Youth Builders.

We are a ministry that has existed for 15 years. We come alongside youth workers, and we train them and equip them. We support them and pray for them. We encourage them and come alongside them.

Part of our youth ministry is changing. It's now called Family-Based Youth Ministry, which focuses on how to help families succeed.

We go in front of a million people a year. We have 500 trained associates here in the United States who do our training for us. We are in 14 countries and 23 ministry centers.

Our largest ministry center is in Quito, Ecuador, and our second largest work is in Eastern Europe. So we have focused on areas outside of this country.

Then, recently, we have been doing things more and more in the United States. We train youth workers, provide resources, conduct parent forums in churches and put on student leadership events.

Family-based youth ministry. We are beginning to see a paradigm shift. I think a lot of times in Holy Spirit movements that you see things coming, but it doesn't happen immediately. In the past, the church really hasn't done a very good job of doing family-based youth ministry.

Several years ago, Mark Dubris wrote Family-Based Youth Ministry, and we said, "This is it!" This book described the paradigm shift, but did not give us the specific how-tos needed to make the shift.

We are realizing that kids can get saved and healed, changed and transformed, but we are putting them back into families that are really a mess.

In youth ministry, we are not trying to change our total job descriptions. Rather, we are recognizing that the foundation for youth ministry is the family. So, we must serve the family. The question we're asking today is: How do you help families succeed?

Facilitating families. Today, youth workers need to help families succeed. That means we're assisting parents by putting on seminars and doing family counseling. We are informing the parents of what's happening in youth culture. As youth workers, we are probably better students of the culture than parents are.

For example, if a young person is listening to Marilyn Manson CDs, then we need to help the parents understand what Marilyn Manson stands for as opposed to some of the other CDs.

I think we need to encourage parents. Parenting is a hard job, especially with teen-agers. We also are involving parents in the work of the ministry, because kids need parent role models so badly.

Family times together. The Mormon Church has family night. They close down their church on Mondays, and nothing takes place because the families get together.

We in the evangelical, charismatic and conservative churches have not done a good job in this area. We are busy all the time.

Probably the biggest problem in America is overcommitment and the resulting fatigue families feel. So maybe it's time for us to begin to teach families how to have quiet times.

Christian education at home. Christian education belongs in the home, not just in the church. For so long, families have delegated Christian education to youth ministry and children's ministry and whatnot. I think we need to equip homes to do it.

We need family-based training based on Deuteronomy 6. Biblically it is the family's responsibility to bring up their children in the Lord.

In youth ministry we must ask questions such as: How do you help parents talk with kids about sexual abstinence? How do you help parents talk with their kids about drug and alcohol abuse?

Frankly, it has not been happening. Five percent to 10 percent of Christian kids say they have not received any kind of good, positive, value-centered sex education from home.

They don't really think they're getting much from church, so they're getting their training from whoever the latest, greatest media star is and, typically, the stars' message is, "Do whatever you want."

Spirituality in the home. I have to say that the same thing is true in terms of why Kathy is in my life. We weren't raised in the church. We became Christians in high school.

One of the reasons we're probably in youth ministry is because of that. We didn't have the role models to show us how to bring God into the family, so as we started doing family devotions, we chose a weekly family worship time.

We're not asking for some traditions as in the orthodox home with morning prayers and evening prayers. We're just saying: "Pray with your kids, but then once a week come together and have a family worship time together where you pray together. Parents, take the lead on spiritual things, and the kids will participate."

Family ministry vs. youth ministry. We are seeing both models, and in 10 years we'll have the answer.

One of the models is to erase children's and youth ministry and literally make it all-around family ministry. This model has some of the same elements, but youth pastors are not called youth pastors anymore. They are called ministers of the family or family ministry people.

The other element is that the children's ministry and the youth ministry begin to work together, and they include families into some of their activities.

So now there is a family retreat, or now the students and the parents go away together, or there are some intergenerational Bible studies, or some intergenerational Sunday school classes, not every Sunday, but sometimes.

There are special Sundays that are programmed just for families. There is ministry within the church where we are literally giving them those devotions. With most families you say: "Great! Go do family devotions," and they say, "So, what do we do?"

There are ministries in the church that are handing them good resources. They are learning what all the good resources are. More resources are coming out now, and that is a good thing.

Intergenerational learning. Intergenerational learning means you are putting kids and adults together to learn a concept. Frankly, it's hard because kids think differently.

Kids have attention spans in one direction, and adults have attention spans in another. What we like to do with intergenerational stuff is to center on topics. Is it OK to listen to rock music? What about movies? Where does God fit in?

We tend to think that intergenerational means not just one of us talking. But kids and adults learn best when they talk. So you are bringing in interaction and discussion. Unfortunately, there is not a lot of "curriculum" out yet, but there really is some stuff we can use to get families talking.

In intergenerational learning, you'll have some resistance from youth who don't want to meet with their parents. Frankly, the parents may not be happy being with the kids. But if they are encouraged to risk meeting together, they will discover they have much to share with one another.

Some churches make the mistake of doing everything intergenerationally. Kids need their own time with kids, and adults need their own time with adults.