The New Normal
Monty Lysne
I’ve been a part of youth and family ministry for a long time, and it feels to me like something has shifted over the last three years as we’ve navigated our way through Covid-19. It seems to be increasingly difficult for families to commit—to much of anything. Most mainline churches have been fully aware for years about participation trends that might be approaching, but something I can’t quite put my finger on seems to have intensified it all. I’ve caught myself taking it personally and doubting my skills and experience in ministry but have also tried to remind myself of some of the basic ideas we have focused on at Faith Inkubators over the years.
Let’s look at some old-is-new-again reminders of our philosophy regarding the future of the church and the future of youth and family ministry:
“Team vs. I” - Youth workers will no longer be facilitators of programs, but teachers and trainers of small group leaders. The responsibility will be to train, equip and send out teams to do ministry. Youth workers will be educated in understanding family systems and management rather than song leading and lesson planning.
“Time vs. Money” - The most valuable asset people have today is not their bank account, but their calendar. Most families won’t bat an eyelash at spending $800 to send their child to basketball camp, but if you ask for volunteers to work at your spring youth lock-in, you’d have a lonely sign-up sheet. Families need to have a vested interest in being a part of a program. Actually, let’s get rid of the word “program” and replace it with “relationship.” If we pay special attention to the relationships we build with families we won’t be able to keep them away.
“Basic Needs vs. Meta Needs” - For so long in youth ministry the emphasis has been in terms of the “meta needs” of children. Meta needs deal with knowledge, goodness, beauty and truth. While these are wonderful goals of understanding, we’ve completely missed the boat in terms of attending to the real needs of children. It’s like we’re trying to build a house starting with the chimney. The “basic needs” of people deal with safety, belonging, love and self-esteem. If we don’t concentrate on these needs, we will never have a foundation for getting to the higher levels of understanding.
“Topical vs. Contextual” - In the realm of study, we’ve long been under the assumption that simply because the Bible is the Bible, kids should automatically be able to understand and apply it. Young people yearn to know about their place and role in this world. Relationships, ethics issues and real-life examples of faith alive in the scriptures are what really interest young people.
“Mission Field vs. Church Home” - Jesus never said, “Stay here and make disciples!” He said, “Go and make disciples!” Our churches can give thousands of dollars to mission work, and evangelism committees can hold four-hour meetings to decide on the guest speaker they’re bringing in to talk about mission, but unless we go out in the communities and bring the message of God’s love through Jesus, we are in trouble. Martin Luther defines sin as turning in on oneself. The trend will be to stop thinking of churches as the place where mission occurs and use it as the base to launch out into the real mission field: the world, both near and far.
It could be that we are still working our way back to “normal” as we emerge from our pandemic-induced physical and emotional distancing from one another. It could also be that we have a new “normal” on our hands. No matter which, the same basic philosophies apply now as much as they did years ago. Challenge yourself and your people to be proactive in the approach to the future church.