1. The elderly people are exiting the church's back door.
2. The younger people are not entering the front door.
This means the numbers are declining. If something isn't done about it soon, the church will be facing a crisis in the next twenty years unlike anything the American church has ever seen. At a pragmatic level, it will mean a dramatic reduction in budgets ... I could go on. The more pressing issue is speaking the gospel to a new generation.
What will we do about it? Call for a conference. What are we doing about it? Here's what I think we need to do:
Before I say a thing: What do you think we should do?
Here's my suggestion: Increase the budget for, and focus our attention on, youth ministry [and young adults]. From the cradle to 35 years old. Not just the cradle to high school. We need a focus on youth and I'm using "youth" here for anyone who isn't yet "married with children of four or five years old." [There is no intention to ignore single folks either. What we're getting at is that from about 18-35 we're seeing precipitous declines.] If the numbers I'm hearing are right, that means from the cradle until about 35.
Disclaimer: I'm not suggesting ignoring the 50 or 60+. I'm suggesting we begin to focus on the future (survival) of the church.
That is why I'm keen right now on reading what is going on with youth ministry. I just read Mike King's new IVP book called Presence-centered Youth Ministry: Guiding Students into Spiritual Formation
and I like it.
This book won't tell you everything, and it won't give you a new-fangled "program" that will solve all your problems. It aims to get to the heart of what youth ministry is all about: leading the youth (I still mean 35 and under) into a spiritually formative relationship with God, into following Jesus, into spiritual practices, into centering life where God would have us center it. It aims at authenticity. Instead of looking to the immediate fix -- invite some special speaker or a hot band -- Mike King looks to the long haul. "This takes commitment," Mike says, "to a lifelong journey of faithfully seeking the face of God and living in the way of Jesus."
Mike King is old enough to have washed ashore with all the trends in the last 40 years or so in evagelicalism; he's been there and he's already done that. He's tired of the programs and the catchy theories. He calls us back to the center, to knowing God, to being known by God, and living -- and ministering to youth -- out of that knowing and being known. And because he's washed ashore with all the trends, his analysis of evangelicalism is deadly serious and alarmingly insightful.
With pastors like Mike King we've got glimpses of changes that will speak the gospel into the next generation.
Here's my suggestion: Increase the budget for, and focus our attention on, youth ministry [and young adults]. From the cradle to 35 years old. Not just the cradle to high school. We need a focus on youth and I'm using "youth" here for anyone who isn't yet "married with children of four or five years old." [There is no intention to ignore single folks either. What we're getting at is that from about 18-35 we're seeing precipitous declines.] If the numbers I'm hearing are right, that means from the cradle until about 35.
Disclaimer: I'm not suggesting ignoring the 50 or 60+. I'm suggesting we begin to focus on the future (survival) of the church.
That is why I'm keen right now on reading what is going on with youth ministry. I just read Mike King's new IVP book called Presence-centered Youth Ministry: Guiding Students into Spiritual Formation
and I like it.This book won't tell you everything, and it won't give you a new-fangled "program" that will solve all your problems. It aims to get to the heart of what youth ministry is all about: leading the youth (I still mean 35 and under) into a spiritually formative relationship with God, into following Jesus, into spiritual practices, into centering life where God would have us center it. It aims at authenticity. Instead of looking to the immediate fix -- invite some special speaker or a hot band -- Mike King looks to the long haul. "This takes commitment," Mike says, "to a lifelong journey of faithfully seeking the face of God and living in the way of Jesus."
Mike King is old enough to have washed ashore with all the trends in the last 40 years or so in evagelicalism; he's been there and he's already done that. He's tired of the programs and the catchy theories. He calls us back to the center, to knowing God, to being known by God, and living -- and ministering to youth -- out of that knowing and being known. And because he's washed ashore with all the trends, his analysis of evangelicalism is deadly serious and alarmingly insightful.
With pastors like Mike King we've got glimpses of changes that will speak the gospel into the next generation.
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RJS asked "What needs do you think a church should meet, and what is the purpose of church?"
I think it varies too much to have a simple answer.
In the campus churches I attended, the major needs were community and help figuring out what it meant to lead a christian life. Most of us were in a very unsettled place in our lives, and could make major changes. The church was the setting in which we looked at how god factored into those decisions.
I guess I still view those as important things a church should provide, but I've now realized that explaining the nature of god and helping people develop a loving relationship with him precedes them. Right now, I am in a church that is helping me recover my affection for god after I lost it during several years under a calvinist preacher.
At the campus churches, it seemed we could take for granted that we all saw god as worth following and had latitude to make important decisions. Neither of those seems to be true in the community church, to the extent that I now see community church's first role as healing people of their bad experiences with church, their fear of god, and their belief that they aren't free to make changes in their lives -- in short, as getting them back to the state they would have been in at a campus church, so they can go on from there. What a sad waste of everybody's time.
#72 Amen to your comment Sue Van Stelle. If that is just two cents worth I want to hear more of what you have to say.
I've not read the 79 previous comments, so if this has been said already I apologize, but my thoughts:
What we "save" them by, we "save" them to. Churches that seek to "appeal" simply to youth and there culture are like people that try to get dates simply on their looks. Now looks don't hurt, but eventually there has to be some substance unless the other person is just as shallow.
The purpose of the church is not to fill up the pews with certain age-groups. The purpose of the church is to preach Christ, an offense to some, a stumbling block to others, but the only way to true salvation and real satisfaction. If a church tries to take out the offense, or remove the stumbling-block, they are preaching a different Christ.
That being said, the balance to this is to make sure that we don't add our own offenses or stumbling blocks to Christ's message.
Scot,
Is there a source for the some of the stats you're mentioning here?
THE Lord Jesus Christ and the apostles were grown mature men.The qualifications for elders,deacons are Men. Get Back to the Bible or continue to sink we have clearly strayed it it clearly evident.
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