Last week, Marko on the Slant33 blog asked the question of:

We have learned that teenagers live in a world isolated from adults, and unfortunately, most of our ministries perpetuate this.  How are you addressing this problem?

My thoughts:

Students in the American church are experiencing a loneliness epidemic known as systematic abandonment. So what are some responses when addressing abandonment?

In my youth ministry experience it has been my mission, joined with the Holy Spirit, to intentionally respond to this systematic abandonment issue. I have responded in two approaches: 1) Proactively assimilating students into the church body; and 2) Getting more adults in the lives of kids through the small group model.

I know this may seem weird but I am always worrying about what an unchurched student thinks when he/she attends a “church youth ministry program”.

For example, a few weeks ago, I observed two new middle school students attend and enter a church environment for the very 1st time in their life.  I just sat back and watch them process their 1st “church experience.”  They were really quiet and non-responsive.

I wondered:

-  What are they thinking?  Are they overwhelmed?  Do they think church youth group is stupid and irrelevant?

-  Do they think the Biblical message matters for how they live their life?  In fact do they even respect the Bible?

-  What do they think about the worship, especially the lyrics they are suppose to sing along with?

-  Do they feel included or judged?

-  What adults have greeted them and made them feel important? Did any other students meet and greet them?

I am learning more and more that it is okay to constantly be considering the unchurched student who shows up to our  church youth group environments.

As youth workers I think it is wise to be asking the question of:  How can our youth ministry create an environment that will be safe for a student who says No to church and No to God?

It doesn’t matter what youth outreach strategies you adopt: Inside/Out approach (go on to the unchurched students’ turf) or the Outside/In approach (unchurched students come to our turf (church)).  But what does matter is architecting places and spaces where unchurched students feel comfortable with Jesus following students and leaders.

When I was in Los Angeles, CA (circa 2004-2005) I was on mission to figure out how to architect warm, nonjudgemental, accepting and inclusive environments that communicated to unchurched students that they could BE in “church environments” and not feel weird or judged.  In my pursuit, I stumbled upon Mosaic Church (aka Erwin Mcmanus’ church) where I learned (by visiting Mosaic and taking a class with Erwin) how they were able to create spaces and places that highly encourage both believers and nonbelievers to fellowship together.  The major value that Erwin injected in Moasic’s culture was architecting places where unchurched people didn’t have to believe in order to belong. Erwin articulated that the church/youth group is often a 1st space where no outsiders are allowed.  The 2nd space is a generic set of relationships where not everyone is like you, yet there’s still relationships.  The 3rd space is where there’s no relationships, and there won’t be unless invited.

Third spaces are when nonbelievers feel included in “neutral” spaces.  Third spaces allow students to belong before they have to believe.

The problem is…..  we (myself included) immediately want unchurched student to behave before they “officially” belong.  I get it… it is so much easier not paying attention to the unchurched student because they don’t talk like us, believe like us, pray like us, behave like us, dress like us, and think like us.  Unchurched students make professional paid Christian church youth pastors feel real uneasy because unchurched students don’t know the church rules and their worldview and behaviors are way more risky.

But………

Could you imagine if students felt like they already belonged before they had to  behave? And these unchurched students were immediately  surrounded and greeted by adult who care?

Chap Clark writes in Hurt:

“Today’s adolescents are, as a lot, indescribably lonely.” (p. 69)

“Midadolescents believe that few if any adults genuinely care about them.” (p. 68)

“Adolescents have suffered the loss of safe relationships and intimate settings that served as the primary nurturing community for those traveling the path from child to adult… (50)

Today’s postmodern students long to belong!  They need places where trusted-committed adults genuinely care for them.

My point is:  create 3rd space(s) that communicate to an unchurched student they belong and that they will be cared for before they have to believe.  Create a place for others – where people different from us feel welcome.

How To Create 3rd Spaces in Youth Ministry:

-  make all service mission trips open to all students.

-  recruit and train leaders to be incarnational witnesses who unconditionally love and accept any type of student.  It is important to teach leaders how to think incarnationally.  Feel free to read my posts about the theological understanding of incarnational outreach and strategies in youth outreach.  I highly recommending reading Pete Ward’s book:  God at the Mall to better understand how to create environments that will engage any student.

-  look for neutral places and spaces in the community.  i.e. coffee shops, mall, school campuses, beach, bowling alley, restaurants

-  intentionally create time in youth ministry programs that acknowledges, affirms and invites unchurched students to belong.

-  create church environments that are relevant to any teen.  Think through your teaching style (especially your language) and environment athesetics.

-  visit a local young life club and observe how they program around the unchurch student.  Essentially their programming is centered around the non-believer.  Young life is brillant in how they create Third Spaces.  Their third spaces are highly relational.

-  do events outside of the church walls and invite every student in the community.  i.e. concerts, BBQs, bowling nights, dodgeball tournaments, sporting events, laser tag, arcades, etc. Remember the goal is building relationships with unchurched students not whacking them with Bible verses.  I love third spaces in youth ministry because it highly encourages FUN and CRAZINESS!!!!!!!!

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Questions I Want To Ask Youth Workers:

-  Do you also worry about what unchurched students think about your “youth ministry environments”?  What is the general feedback when an outsider attends your youth group?  How often are you thinking about the unchurched students in your youth ministry programming?

-  Do you also have a tendency to get students to believe before they officially belong?  Or do you allow unchurched students to fully participants in your youth ministry before they accept Jesus?

-  What other third places examples would you recommend that encourages the unchurched and churched students to intersect?  What are some neutral spaces in your church environment and in your community?

(middle school sign pic brought to you by:   Some rights reserved by mrjoro)

Over the years, I have really grown to love working in Middle School Ministry.  Middle schoolers have taught me an enormous amount about how to follow God.  Middle schoolers just have this tenacious way to ran after Jesus.  They simply just don’t care and have no problem expressing how they are feeling towards God.

I have immersed myself back in the Middle School ministry context and one thing is clear:   my knowledge and skills in middle school ministry are pretty rusty.

When I realized I was rusty, I immediately begin to (re) learn, observe and research how to best minister to early adolescence (11-14). Once I have observed and retained book knowledge; I begin to experiment and iterate (over and over again).

Everything is always changing in youth ministry and it is up to the youth worker to keep current and experiment or else you will also become rusty, flat and out of date.

In this post, I thought it would be fun to share what I am (re)learning about middle school ministry, so here you go:

 General info:

Middle school ministry evolved in 1970 and is extremely different than High School ministry (this is why it is important to separate each age group).  Middle schoolers are: concrete thinkers, very intuitive (they feel life) and super dependent.

(1)  Relationships

-  middle schoolers need consistent adult relationships because they are so dependent.

-  middle schoolers are emotional basket cases.  Their emotional world consists of many highs and lows.  So let the drama unfold and be the stable adult that anchors them in reality while affirming their crazy emotions.

-  when a middle schooler is stressed out they will most likely resort back to childhood behaviors.

-  middle schoolers need more adults to have more fun with.  The best way to build trust with a middle schooler is by demonstrating to them you know how to have fun at any given moment.

-  middle schoolers need adults to proactively contact them outside of church.

(2)  Environments

-  middle schoolers need a warm, structured, supportive, safe and welcoming environments.

-  middle schoolers need a lot of affirmation because they are just beginning to ask the questions of:  Who am I?  Where do I fit in this crazy world?  How do I matter?  Intentionally go out of your way to say something nice to a middle school student.  Make sure to use direct non-verbal behaviors.  I.e.  use direct eye contact, face them when speaking to them, smile, etc.  Middle schoolers need to believe you that you really believe in them and that they can really truly change the world.

-  middle schoolers need a family like environment.

-  middle schoolers need sugar in whatever church environment they are in.

(3)  Theology

-  middle schoolers need to know God 1) pursues them 2) values them and 3) loves them

-  middle schoolers need to experience the affective side of God’s character.  They need to feel Jesus, than just learning about Him.  This is why worshipping through music is such a big deal for middle school students.

-  middle schoolers adopt an outside-in approach to evangelism.  Basically middle school students will share their faith if they are at church.  Get a middle school student excited about their church environment and they will bring their non-Christian friends to church.  This is another reason why I love Middle School Ministry—- if they love church, then they will love inviting all their peers to church.

-   when teaching middle schoolers use NARRATIVES within the Bible, especially the many stories about Jesus and the stories Jesus told aka parables.  Try to stay away from using metaphors and analogies.  Try to communicate in black and white terms.

-  make sure middle schooler know that they are members of the Church body now!  Connect middle schools to the rest of the church body.

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I am always open for more tips and insight, so please feel free to answer these questions in the comment section:

-  What other musings about middle school ministry would you like to share?  What other great insights do you have about how to best minister and relate to middle schoolers?

-  What have you found NOT to work in middle school ministry?

-  Who has some really good insight about middle school ministry?  Any recommended book, magazine articule or blogs that I should be reading that are middle school ministry focused?

-  Why do you love/hate middle school ministry?

(Cultural Anthropology photo brought to you by:   All rights reserved by anthonyiz)

Youth pastors are dealing with an ever changing and diverse unchurch teenage population.  The forecast is that teenagers are becoming more and more unChristian.  Some regions across the US (west coast, pacific northwest, East coast) and already across the world (UK, Canada, China, Australia) are removed from Christianity/Christ/Church culture.

My proposed problem: There is not enough youth workers researching, studying and learning about the “other” types of students (who don’t attend our youth group/church).  In order to reach the “other” students, youth workers need to know everything about them.

My church employment theory:  The theory goes like this:  the longer you work in a church context the more removed and out of touch you become with the non-Christian teenage culture.  Remember teenage culture is always changing.  Once you think you have a pulse on what is happening in the life of the teen, it changes.  When a youth worker works at a church for more than a year, he/she will most likely get sucked into the church vortex so fast he/she will not even know what sucked him/her in.  The church vortex has it’s own culture, language, rules, values, rituals, people, clothes, and traditions.  Indirectly, the church vortex begins to dictate the youth pastor’s every decision, sermon, words, thoughts and even determines how he/she prioritizes their ministry time.

Youth pastors must know how NOT to be sucked into the church vortex.  One of the ways youth pastors avoid not getting sucked in the vortex—– is by getting out of the church office and studying the local student population.  The term that best describes this studying is: cultural anthropology.

Cultural anthropology is when a professional youth worker becomes a participant observer of the student societies and clusters that populate their community.  

I love the discipline of cultural anthropology because it requires immersion.  It forces a youth worker to immerse himself/herself in their local teen culture which will make him/her very uncomfortable. Unfortunately a youth pastor has to abandon their comfy air conditioned church office and post up somewhere else in the local community where teens are hanging out and just observe.  In order to learn, a youth pastor must immerse him/herself into the student culture.

For example, what is the fastest way people learn language? You practice it and insert yourself into the culture that speaks the language you are learning.

Youth pastors cannot be culturally clumsy.  Immersion is necessary.  As youth pastors ministering in a post-Christian context the best training is getting out there into the community and start learning first hand from the teens that don’t attend your youth group.

How To Conduct Cultural Anthropology In Your Local Community:  Youth Workers Exploring Teenage Land

-  select one place (in your local community) that is highly populated with teenagers.  (i.e. movie theaters, malls, skate parks, strip malls, beach, community center, coffee shops)

-  schedule 5- 4 hour hang out times where you observe, interact, interview, and hang with teens.  essentially you are studying the “other” teens for 20 hours in 5 different time frames.

-  it will be very awkward at first, but after a few rough goes it will get easier and students will start to warm up to you in their environment.

-  make sure to take a notebook and pen and record ALL observations.

-  you cannot police these students when you observe their bad behaviors.  you want them to talk to you about why they are doing what they are doing.  you need to stay very objective in your study.

-  don’t get all spiritual on the teens you interact with.  just be natural and blend into the crowd.  just listen and ask a lot of deep questions.

-  at the end of 20 hours, do a lab write up.  in the write up, reflect on what you saw and learned when you were interacting with the other students.

-  extrapolate 4 – 5 ideas from your lab write up that will make you a better youth worker in the town you minister in.  these 4-5 ideas should shed light on how to reach the “other” students.

The goal of cultural anthropology is getting “christian youth workers” to immerse themselves in unfamiliar teenage environments which will give them a better understanding of today’s teens and help them better contextualize Gospel centered environments for students to encounter and experience Jesus.

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My Cultural Anthropology Experiment: What I Learned By Spending 20 Hours At A Local Mall

-  teenagers can persuade any homeless person to buy them cigarettes and alcohol. they simply tip them a few extra bucks when the homeless person delivers their goods

-  teenagers were extremely comfortable talking about their raging hormones in public

-  parents want to quickly get rid of their teen by dropping them off at the mall and parents hand their teen cash to blow at the mall

-  teens were quick to make fun of the clueless christian teens in the mall

-  teens did not like the mall cop/security and repeatedly made fun of him

-  teens have a very distorted view of God

-  if you ask the right questions, most teens will open up and tell you what they are thinking

-  teens need to witness more adults being an incarnational witness.  basically more students need to see more adults model (not talk about) the Christian life

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I invite you to engage in cultural anthropology by observing teens for 20 hours on their turf.   I would also love to hear your conclusions and observations if you do decide to conduct cultural anthropology in your community.    

On December 22, 2010, I invited my youth pastor readers to participate in the Moralistic Therapeutic Deism Case Study:  Teens Telling Us What They Think.  This case study consisted of asking 1 Christian student and 1 Atheist student if they agree or disagree with the 5 Moralistic Therapeutic Deism statements. It was my goal to test the Guiding Beliefs of Moralistic Therapeutic Deism (Almost Christian, pg 14).

Total number of students participated:

15 Christian Students

+

15 Atheist Students

= 30 Students Responses

Student Responses To the 5 Statements of Moralistic Therapeutic Deism:

1. A god exists who created and orders the world and watches over life on earth.

Agreed:  100% of the Christian students and 53% of the Atheist students

Disagreed:  47% of the Atheist students

2. God wants people to be good, nice, and fair to each other, as taught by the Bible and by most world religions.

Agreed:  100% of the Christian students and 46% of the Atheist students

Disagreed:  54% of the Atheist students

3. The central goal of life is to be happy and to feel good about oneself.

Agreed:  53% of the Atheist students

Disagreed:  100% of the Christian students and 47% of the Atheist students

4. God is not involved in my life except when I need god to resolve a problem.

Agreed: 0%

Disagreed: 100% of the Christian students and 100% of the Atheist students

5. Good people go to heaven when they die.

Agreed: 46% of Atheist students

Disagreed : 100% of the Christian students and 54% of Atheist students

Conclusions:

- Christian students have a more or less solid understanding of basic Christian theology.  Their youth pastors are doing a great job of teaching the students the teachings of God.  In hindsight, our students may be in a better theological place than what the research is indicating.

-  Atheist students are theologically confused, especially about the after life.  Confusion tends to leave a lot of room for them to develop their own moral and spiritual philosophies for how to govern their life.  Our students live in a very existential culture, which gives them permission to write their own moral and spiritual code without any accountability or connection to history or tradition.  This is why the teachings of the Bible are very difficult for an un-churched student to swallow.  The Bible is authoritative and existential students don’t respond nor interact well with authority.  Having to believe and trust in an absolute truth is a tough task.  I have wrote about the direct implications of existentialism in student culture here.

-  Youth pastors need more “service” events that are designed to attract all types of students.  Kenda Creasy Dean argues for this missional mindset in her book:  Almost Christian.  She would like to see more youth ministries become outward focused.  This is why I strongly believe in the inside/out youth ministry evangelism approach.  I also wrote a post about: 20 Ways Teens Can Be Missionaries. The more inclusive our youth ministry programming becomes, the more possibilities we will have to engage in theological conversations with un-churched teenagers.  This notion falls into the ecclesiological belief that “You can belong before you have to believe.”  Belonging (before you believe) to a youth group establishes a solid relationship from which students can tackle tough theological topics together.  It is so important for our “Christian students” to be interacting with un-churched and non Christian students.  I have wrote about the having a proper theology of a high school meeting which will create an experiential space where everyone can belong before they “believe” without feeling judged.  The deism data indicated that there was a polarity of how students understand God.  This suggests very segregated student social clusters.  It appears each student social cluster does not have an influence on one another.  Essentially, Christian students only talk to the Christian students and Atheist students only talk to Atheist students.  I wonder why there isn’t more of an overlap of conversation happening between Christian students and Atheist students?  Clearly they come into contact with one another, but unfortunately there isn’t much dialogue between the groups about theological matters.

-  I was surprised to find out that most students believe God is an integral part of their life.  All the students believed God is at work in their life regardless of the positive/negative circumstances they find themselves in.  The great thing is: students do not necessarily see God as a genie in a bottle who grants them all of their wishes.

Questions For Reflection_______________________

Do you believe there is an inherent segregation between Christian students and Atheist students?  Are there opportunities of and for cross-pollination?

Are our Christian students “too” theologically informed and not reaching out enough to other teenagers in order to engage in theological talks?

Have you found that un-churched students are very confused about the afterlife?  I have found that some un-churched teenagers don’t know what to believe about the afterlife. The “best” answers they can think to point to involve karma and reincarnation.

Do you think that our Christian students are Moralistic Therapeutic Deists?  Or are non Christian/un-churched teenagers more susceptible to catching the Moralistic Therapeutic Deism bug?