As of late, I have been thinking a lot about why doubt needs to be an integral apart of our youth ministries.  During the Orange Tour, Joiner has been talking about the insane importance doubt plays in the spiritual life of a teen.  He concludes that where there is faith, there is doubt.

The book Sticky Faith, authored by Dr. Kara Powell and Dr.  Chap Clark from the Fuller Youth Institute, discusses how some studies have shown that those who face their questions and doubts emerge with stronger faith in the end.  Stronger faith does not happen when a students stifles doubts or pretends it does not exist. Students need to know and feel like that at any point they can ask any question about life, the Bible, church, Jesus, theology, Christianity, other world religions and God.

(Faith/Doubt photo brought to you by:   All rights reserved by Joe Cavazos)

Getting our students to doubt their faith is not only backed by research but it is being accepted as a common practice in youth ministry.

This is so liberating.

I still remember very clearly back in 2004 when I gave my 1st youth group sermon on doubt.  I was so scared to give the talk.  I felt like a heretic because I was encouraging students to question their faith.  Students loved it but parents hated it.  The parents were worried because their son or daughter were asking questions they didn’t know how to answer.  P.S.  If you need a great series on Doubt– XP3 Students has a most excellent series that will get your students to embrace doubt, which will pave the way to belief.

The philosopher Soren Kierkegaard, whose questioning approach to the deep notions of existence and knowledge help keep us and our youth ministries halfway humble.   This is why we have to train our students to have a deep questioning approach to their faith journey.  It not only keeps us humble, but us on our toes.

Here are 10 questions youth workers need their students asking by 10th grade:

(10)  Why Do I Have To Listen To A Sermon?

(9)  Why Is Church Important?

(8)  Why Is There Evil In The World?

(7)  If We Can’t Work Our Way INTO Salvation, How Can We Work Our Way OUT?

(6)  How Can We Escape the Love of God?

(5)  How Can We Identify Christians if We lgnore God’s Law?

(4)  Is Profession of Faith Enough, or Do Our Acts Also Count?

(3)  Does God Answer Prayers of Sinners?

(2)  What Can Possibly Interrupt Christ’s Dominion?

(1)  Why Shouldn’t Christians Become Civil Rulers and Enforce God’s Law?

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Do you encourage doubt in your student ministry?   If so, how do you do it?

What doubts do your students have?

Do you have a difficult time answering your students questions?

Do you doubt when your students doubt?  How does doubt fit into your spiritual growth process?

How do your parents respond when you teach on doubt?

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In my previous church context the local Mormon youth group was killing it.  They had a strong youth program with solid students.  They had a well-established community and displayed remarkable character.  I was confused why a few of our students were so drawn to Mormonism and why the Mormon youth group was so effective.  I decided to do some research so I could figure out why the Mormon community was so attractive.  I was determined to find out why Mormons did better youth ministry than the Christians.

This is what I found in my sociological Mormon youth group research:

-  Mormon students really knew how to be inclusive, communal and still knew how to have fun without alcohol

-  Mormon students didn’t really know what the Mormon doctrine was really really about

-  Mormon students tended to confuse the Christian students about Jesus and the Bible

-  Mormon students exhibited a lot of great behaviors and were extremely nice

-  Some of my Christian students were ok with dating Mormon students

-  Mormon students were not afraid to share their faith

-  Mormon students were relentlessly inviting any type of student to their activities

-  All Mormon students we interacted with in our town had two parents who deeply cared, loved, and supported them

I concluded that the Mormon students were demonstrating more of Christ’s character than our youth group community was demonstrating.  This was a painful reality to admit, but it made sense to me.  If you have an accepting, loving group of people who practice what they preach, more people will want to be a part of it.  No hypocrisy, strong inclusive community, and character were the key ingredients that made the Mormon youth group so effective.  

So I went back to the drawing board and started planning a strategy for how our youth group was going to address, equip and educate our youth group students about Mormonism.  Here was the strategy I came up with:

 (1)  I would constantly be communicating and demonstrating the high value of respect towards the book of Mormon and Mormonism.  I intentionally wanted to show my students that we were not judging the Mormons, rather we were learning from them and respecting what they believe.  I really wanted to dispel the myth that Christians are closed minded and arrogantly judge other holy books.  I wanted to move towards treating other religious students (who had differing religious beliefs that Christians) with respect while still claiming Jesus as the way, the truth and the life.  There is a fundamental difference between respecting and accepting theology.  I worked very hard for our youth group not to judge the Mormon students as we educated and equipped our teens about Mormonism.

(2)  Get students to move away from narrow-mindedness. I strove to make my students feel like they were learning about other religions, namely Mormonism without being closed minded.  Holding to Christianity as the ultimate truth is not narrow-mindedness.  Narrow-mindedness does not attach to what you believe, but how you believe it.  If our youth group refused to learn about any perspective, any religious book, or any philosophy which disagreed with the Christian doctrine – then that would be narrow-minded.  No matter what you believe there will always be opposition.  Learning about Mormonism was going to be a learning experience for everyone involved.

(3)  I committed to visiting a few local Mormon temples.  During the weeks I made multiple stops at the local Mormon temples.  During these visits, I would see if I could gather literature, multiple books of Mormon, and sit down and talk with one of the elders.  I wanted to simply befriend other religious leaders in my community and learn.

(4)  Teach on Mormonism and other holy books.  I really wanted to show how Mormonism and Christianity are drastically different.  You can explore my post about how I addressed the other holy books here and my teaching notes for how I talked about Mormonism here.  My goal was to get my students to critically and objectively think about how Mormonism and Christianity are not the same.  I wanted them to use their own brains to think.  I wanted them to process the information so they were able to have their own objective convictions about Christianity and Mormonism.  I did not want to see confusion in my students any longer.

(5)  I decided to invite an Ex-Mormon elder to come speak to our youth group.  One of my youth pastor friends had a connection to an Ex-Mormon elder, Tom Hall.  Tom was a Christian, a bit older, and a very wise ex-Mormon elder.  He spoke at youth group and had many great stories about his eldership in the Mormon temple.  Tom wrote a book titled:  Mormon Chronicles of Deception:  An Ex- Mormon Elder’s Journey to Biblical Truth.  Tom was awesome and totally connected with my students.  He gave each student his book for free and truly bestowed an inside perspective about Mormonism.  Tom initially got involved in Mormonism because he fell in love with a beautiful gal who was Mormon.  It took him a long time to be fully exposed to true Mormon theology, and he didn’t like what he learned or saw.  His journey back to Christ and Biblical truth was incredible and something the kids completely connected with.

(6) Supply students will resources.  A great historical book about Mormonism that I recommend to students was:  Under The Banner Heaven: A Story of Violent Faith.  Dare 2 Share also has some great Mormon resources for students here and here

(7)  I committed to inviting Mormon missionaries into my home so I could learn from them and ask a lot of questions.  I wanted to check out how much Mormon missionaries new about Mormonism.  I wanted to hear why they felt convinced to be Mormon.  I also was really curious about why evangelism and being on mission was so important and why they sacrificed 2 years of their lives to serve their district temples.

(8)  I asked my students to keep befriending, loving and respecting Mormon students.  I simply wanted my students to keep demonstrating the Kingdom of God.  I wanted to remind my students of the bigger Kingdom picture and not get confused as we explored Mormonism.  My hope is that all of my students will always be seeking Jesus and Truth while being the Kingdom of God here and now.

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Do you have a high Mormon population where you do youth ministry?

How do you deal with the growing influence of Mormonism in your youth group?

Are your students confused and drawn to Mormonism?

Do you agree or disagree that Mormons tend to do better ministry because of their strong inclusive community and character?

(sin photo brought to you by:   All rights reserved by Trudi Esberger)

Why Do Students Struggle With The Idea Of Sin?

I have had countless conversations with junior and senior high school students about their habitual sin patterns.  These older students tend to think if one cannot fully stop sinning, then what is the point to stop?

These jr and sr students have said the prayer, gone to camp, sang the worship songs, read their Bible, frequently attended church and youth group and they still have not seen any life transformation.  Their desire to stop sinning is dead.

The logic of these older high school students are:  I love Jesus and I love to sin.  Somehow they think it is okay to live this dual lifestyle.  This is a very confusing logic for any adult youth worker to understand.  The problem is that these students don’t know how to live out the text of Romans 6 and 7.  They think that living the Christian lifestyle is near impossible.  They don’t know how to answer the question of: how can I pursue righteousness and be sinful at the same time?

The Goal Of Youth Ministry:  How To Work With Students Who Love To Sin

Many of our youth ministries have relied on “sin management” (a term coined by Dallas Willard).  If we just get our students to be good, then our youth ministries are all good, which as a result gets our students to think their relationship with God is all good.  This is a classic case of behavioral modification.  We are all guilty of trying to engineer perfect behaviors in every teen that walks through the door of our church.

Mid to late adolescents brains are like a ferrari car without brakes.  Their neurons just don’t know how and when to stop. So it is expected students are going to make a lot of dumb decisions and mistakes.  

The goal of middle and late adolescent ministry is making disciples,[ Matt.  14:20] who are authentically walking with Jesus Christ within the context of Christian community.

This goal has four implications:  Student must 1) know 2) love 3) trust, and therefore 4) obey Jesus.

1. Students know Jesus Christ.  This is where Bible study fits and a strategy for increasing knowledge.  Student cognitively really know HIM.
2. Students love Jesus Christ which compels them to express their love for Him.  They have no problem showing affection towards HIM through prayer, worship, evangelism, service and spiritual disciplines.
3. Students trust and therefore, obey Jesus Christ.  Student needs to be obedient to Christ.  Faith (greek word:  Pisteuo) literally means to trust.  The key to growing in Him is to trust Him.  IT IS ALWAYS ABOUT TRUST and obedience falls under trust. 
4. Our students obedience means that they desire to follow Jesus Christ and participate in His Kingdom work here on earth.  You know a student gets it when he/she says:

I love Jesus Christ who directs my life  which means I am going to love Him and love and serve others.

The problem with the Christian student (who loves to sin) is that they only KNOW Jesus.  They haven’t trusted, obeyed, and followed Him yet.  More than likely they haven’t had an opportunity to fully trust Jesus with their baggage.  They haven’t invited Jesus into their messes.  They have compartmentalized their dual lifestyle of faith and sin. Somehow they have been led to believe that the the Gospel puts more weight on their shoulders rather than take the weight off.  This is why the goal of youth ministry is to get students walking authentically with Jesus. Youth ministries are doing their job when we are cultivating environments that encourage full reliance on Jesus.

So how can our youth ministries put students in an environment that encourages trusting Jesus?  

** If you want read all 10 of the Top Ten Theological Questions Teens Ask click here

( The Reason For God picture:  Some rights reserved by The Doctr)

Both unchurched and churched teens would ask this theological/philosophical question all the time (especially after their evolution unit in Biology class):

What are some arguments for the existence of God?

Getting students to grapple with the arguments for God is a cool thing to do because

-  it allows them to intelligently dialogue with other unchurch students-friends-family- teachers about God’s existence without using the Bible

-  gets them to use their brain before they leave youth group and enter a philosophy/logic or human evolutionary class in college

-  challenges them to take a deeper ownership of their Christian faith

-  makes them aware there are different and godless worldviews out there

-  encourages them to see how science and faith are compatible.  Science answers the HOW questions, faith answers the WHY questions.

5 Reasons For God’s Existence (That Make Sense To A Teenager):

(1)  Archaeological (the fossil record) – Fossils have confirmed the people, animals, time periods, events, and places that ancient documents and  the Bible talk about. I highly rely on the the Cambrian Explosion to explain some of the unique fossil record that supports the Christian worldview.  During the Cambrian Explosion — anywhere from 50 to 80 percent of all animal phyla to ever exist on Earth appeared. The traditional evolutionary explanation argues that life should transition from simple to complex in a gradual, branching, tree-like fashion. On the other hand, such explosive appearances are exactly what should be expected if a Creator is responsible for orchestrating life’s history.

(2)  Cosmological – The world could not exist on its own so there must have been a first cause that brought it into being.  Something cannot come from nothing — this notion goes against the 1st law of thermodynamic, which God created.

(3)  Teleological – The universe is greatly complex by design so it must have been designed by a great Designer — God.  For example:  The earth is finely tuned.  Astrophysicists determined that if the value of the coupling constant for electromagnetism on the earth were four percent smaller or larger than what we observe, life would be impossible. In the case of the coupling constant for the strong nuclear force, if it were 0.5 percent smaller or larger, life would be impossible. Essentially the earth has the perfect amount of gravitational pull to sustainable life. If it was off by .5 of a percent we would all be dead. I would much rather argue that God designed this perfectly fined tuned and complex systems that govern earth than saying the universe randomly formed out of nothing.  ( I got this example from Hugh Ross’s Finely Tuned Earth lecture on reasons.org)

(4)  Moral – Without God morality would be impossible. There must be a Lawgiver (God) who developed and stands by moral law. A universal moral law cannot exist accidentally. There must be a basis behind it—namely God.  In my opinion, the moral argument for God is the strongest!!  There is no way getting around morality without God.  There has to be moral absolutes that define what is good and what is bad.   When morality is relative than anything can be considered justifiably good.

(5)  Personal - Simply talk about how Jesus changed your life.  No one can argue with your experiences.  Make God real as you talk about how He really touched and impacted your life.  I have never seen someone debate whether or not God actually redeemed someone’s life.  Just talk about why Jesus is King of your life.

Here are some other great apologetic websites:

Standtoreason.org – is headed up by Greg Koukl who trains Christians to think more clearly about their faith and to make an even-handed, incisive, yet gracious defense for classical Christianity and classical Christian values.

Reasonstobelieve.org – Hugh Ross the founder and president completed his undergraduate degree in physics (University of British Columbia) and graduate degrees in astronomy (University of Toronto).  He has an amazing book titled:  Why The Universe Is The Way It is

I would also recommend Tim Keller’s book:  The Reason For God

** If you want read all 10 of the Top Ten Theological Questions Teens Ask click here

How did we get the New Testament Canon?

Marcion//

The single most significant factor was Marcion (AD 85-160).  Marcion got brave and constructed what he felt was the right canon. Marcion didn’t like Paul and the Old Testament.  Marcion wanted Luke, Romans, 1 and 2 Corinthians, Ephesians, Philippians, Colossians, Philemon, 1 and 2 Thessalonians, and Galatians out of the Bible.

Marcion’s canon was the first canon but obviously it was problematic.

In 180AD church leaders wanted to put a stop to Marcion picking and choosing what texts were in and out of the canon.  The church leader formed a council.  In early 200s, Origen listed all twenty-seven New Testament books, but indicated 6 were still being questioned.  The council of Laodicea in AD 363 stated that the Old Testament, along with the apocrypha, and 27 books of the New Testament were to be read in Christian churches.  The council of Carthage in AD397 was the final decision that concluded the New Testament canon would consist of 27 books, which were both inspired and authoritative texts.

What were the Church’s fathers methods to picking the New Testament books?

Their basic guidelines were:  texts that appeared early, authored by apostle, edifying, and widely accepted.

1. We know that the Holy Spirit, who inspired the New Testament writings, made it possible to appropriately select what texts would appear in the New Testament canon.  We also have to believe in God’s providence and the preservation of the Bible throughout time.  We have evidence from archaeology, the 400+fulfilled prophecies, and of course changed lives throughout the centuries.
2. The texts needed to be adaptable and stable.
3. The New Testament texts needed to authored either by an apostle or be an apostolic associate.
4. The texts need to be edifying, valuable, and be consistent.
5. By 200AD at least 21 of the books had been accepted universally.  Basically all of the churches were in agreement that each book was essentially saying the same thing.
6. The letters were all written before 100AD, so basically 50 to 70 years after Jesus’ death.  THIS IS HUGE!!!!!  No other western literature text appeared so early on after it was written.  For example,  the Persian wars or the movement of Alexander the Great were given to us by only one source.  Plato’s writing appeared about 1,400 years later after he wrote them.  Historians have 14,000 copies of the New Testament and the writing appeared only 50-70 years after Jesus’ ministry and death.  For more on this point please visit here.