As a young pastor who came to Trinity fresh out of seminary, I fell into a role that many young pastors who are called to serve program size parishes do, ministering to youth and young adults.
In my first two years here, my priority went to the youth as it seemed that they were the most in need of organization and of being fully re-integrated into the life of the congregation. In that time, a few really strong leaders have emerged and while there have been struggles, there has been amazing ministry done by these youth and a lot of re-integration has happened. And so, after updating the Sunday School roster for this year, I realized that there is a critical mass of young families in this congregation (by the end of this year there are going to be 28 children age 2 and under!!!) and so I am implementing a plan to use those strong leaders from the youth to take on more of a leadership role for me to oversee while I shift more of my direct efforts to young adults and young families. This way, I will be able to give more equal attention to both youth and ya/yf while raising up leaders from both of those groups.
Then about 10 days ago, someone told me how happy there are they I am shifting my ministry focus to the ya/yf population of the church. "Youth aren't really the future of the church, you know...it's the young adults who are returning with their young children." I responded to the person that I disagreed because both groups represent the future of the church, but in different times and ways. I didn't have the time to give rationale, but I've been digesting this interaction for the past few days and wanted to share some thoughts.
I do firmly believe that youth are the future of the church...I have believed this for a long time.
I also believe firmly that young adults are the future of the church and have believed this for a long time.
Youth are most certainly the future of the church, they are the ones providing leadership in places that we don't often see. Very few adults have the blessing of being able to see youth at work on mission trips, at synod assembly, in youth group and confirmation. They are willing to take on tough issues, face down adversity and frustrations and persevere through disappointments. The youth of this current generation, for the most part, love better than we adults love and they are more accepting that most adults are. They see through the bull&*^& that we produce when we say that folks should behave one way and then we ourselves act another way. But they are also under attack...from bullies, from a sex saturated culture, from colleges that tell them that they need a certain number of extracurricular activities to be able to think about applying to that college, from their own doubts and questions, and sometimes from their churches. And so to make sure that the youth remain the future of the church and become those young adults who bring their children to church is to engage them, invite their questions and doubts and tell them they are allowed to struggle. Give them a place to rest and re-create both physically and spiritually. Help them to see that God loves them no matter what and put scripture in their hands and a language of faith into their hearts so that they can profess what they believe when people challenge them...and so that they can profess what they don't believe or what they are struggling to believe in. And most of all, drop the fake crap, stop pretending we're cool when we're not and just love these youth for who they are, for who God made them to be.
Young adults are also the future of the church. They are the ones that are getting married and having children, thus, increasing the membership numbers of a congregation. There are strong leadership roles that these folks play too, Sunday school teachers, ministry team members (I don't like the word committee, sounds boring), event planners, bible study leaders. But this group is also faced with its challenges...wedding planning, working overtime, finding work, going to school, sick kids, kids who don't sleep through the night, kids school and sporting functions living in a different city or state than family, finances, etc. Like the youth of our congregation, the young adult/young family set is also over booked. I remember when I was in high school, my mom had a dry erase calendar by the door and it was constantly packed with events that the three of us kids had between Sarah's softball, Chris' rowing and my band and choir stuff. And they are struggling with the same questions youth face, but they look at it with a different lens than youth do as they are at a different place in their lives.
We need to find how to engage these young adults and young parents...how do we as a church provide them with a safe space to discuss the parts of scripture they question? How do we as a church provide them a place to discuss the struggles that young people face with finding jobs and managing finances? How do we as church help provide sabbath to young parents so that they can have time for themselves and/or for their significant others/spouses? How do we engage them when they are tired from not having slept the night before because of crying children or working on their dissertation or any number of other things that keep young adults burning the candle at both ends?
Youth and young adults/young families are all the future of the church...
Strike that...they ARE the church! They are the church now and here.
Are you ready to embrace that change, church? it's happening right now
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