teens have changed the world
i have been following a really good series of posts over at Out of Ur blog, about how teenagers and "Youth Ministry" have changed the face of the church as we know it.one of the big elements i see within these articals is that youth ministry has been allowed to innovate, to focus on relationships and is good at getting peoples attention.
as an example of how i have seen this at play in my own life... at one of my previous churches we used to run a youth program before our evening church... it was not to dissimilar to church but we innovated our buts off... we had license to sing different songs, have interactive discussion, do all sorts of cool stuff and we ended every gathering with a shared meal....
there were some of us leaders started to say things after this program like "Ok we have had church now lets goto the after party" (meaning the evening service.... )
now we said this in jest but i truly believed that our pre-church group was being more "church" than the evening service....
now unfortunately due to a number of reasons this didn't end up changing the church completely.... but it did change me... i truly hope that those lessons learned with a bunch of rough teens will shape how i am able to "do" church.... but i hope i will also be able to change and adapt as the next generation is ready to change!
Below are the links to the 3 part artical
How Teenagers changed the church Pt1
How Teenagers changed the church Pt2
How Teenagers changed the church Pt3
Labels: church, emerging church, youth ministry
3 Comments:
G'day Andy
As a student pastor I was priveleged to be mentored by a Senior Pastor who was in his 60's. His outlook on ministry was thoroughly centred on the next generation, not to the exclusion of others, but it was clear that the next gen were where our focus needed to be. He was one of these guys who was "young at heart" and the ministry reflected that. He had no problem attracting young leaders and inspiring them to get involved. I want to be like that when I get to 60! Heck, I want to be like that NOW!
Hey I used to be part of a youth group that sounds a lot like the one you described... ;)
perhaps you were ;)
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