a youth report…

A few days ago someone asked me, “why don’t we hear any updates on the youth in our church from the front? (stage/pulpit)” Good question. I’ve never been asked to give a report on how things are going, especially since keeping strict tallies does not seem to be a value of mine, nor that of McKenzie Towne Church. But, I can completely understand and appreciate someone wondering about the students in their church when they’re often unseen? (Gratefully, I know the dear saint who asked me this was NOT thinking, “why are keeping this clown if I don’t see a sanctuary packed with students on Sunday?” – Hopefully, no-one is thinking that… Instead, she simply wanted to know, “what is God doing amongst the young people at MTC?” Well, here goes…

I’m don’t want to measure a ministry based on numbers (that’s a lesson God has been teaching and re-teaching me not to use as a measuring rod); even though numbers speak to the success of attracting people, it does not necessarily speak to what God values. What do I mean? Well, I could put up a sign every weekend saying, “free beer” and have a completely packed house -  we could write to our ministry partners and district saying, “attendance is climbing, and seats are full at every event! Giving has sky-rocketed since we’ve installed VLT’s in the foyer for newcomers and parents waiting to pickup their children. At the moment, our staff is searching for a counsellor to man our bar…” Okay, maybe that’s a big stretch, but hopefully I’ve made a point… Having said that, the pressure when reporting on how a ministry is going, is always to over-embellish the good stuff and fail to mention (understate) what is not going so well. You never hear a pastoral report saying, “I’ve been enjoying preaching, but people aren’t coming – I think they’re getting frustrated with my 6 month series in Lamentations?” So, what’s going well? Truthfully, to answer that, I need to speak to my heart in leading as much as I need to speak to how things are going… I am finding that I’ve lost my love for events. Don’t hear me wrong, my passion for students continues strong, but I’ve done every crazy youth event – every all-nighter and crazy game designed to engage students under the sun – I am tired of entertaining and it has been something I’ve been sharing with our youth leadership team the last few months. My heart is to disciple young people - speaking their language and culture is one thing, but spending my time strategizing a completely original use for duct-tape is not cutting it any longer… Gratefully, we have a phenomenal team of volunteers which has helped surround me and infuse energy into the necessary “events” we still do (I love our leaders, they are a treasure from heaven!). Also, I’ve been blessed to see our youth small groups grow. I don’t know why, but our boys groups are doing great! I’m so encouraged to see teen guys coming together in community to discuss God’s word and grow in faith. On a similar note, we have a small group of students meeting every Sunday between the 9am and 11am services to be challenged in their faith and intentionally pray for their friends who don’t know Christ (I absolutely love meeting with these students as they wrestle with living their faith out loud in front of their friends – I could do that all day, every day). I’ve seen a real heart for serving grow amongst our students as we’ve been participating in helping at the Jesus Loves You Society (a ministry to disenfranchised single Moms), and as we look toward our missions trip to inner-city Vancouver this Summer.

But what about the struggles? Truthfully, my heart has been troubled for the success of our girls small groups, as we’ve seen attendance waiver, and I find myself “out-of-my-element,” as I exactly can’t take on a girls small group? However, I’m blessed to have several gifted and passionate female leaders ready to pour into the lives of our female students, and I’m just eagerly awaiting and adjusting my leadership comforts to help them do so. We have a large number of fabulous teen girls within our church, and I’ve been wrestling with the question of how best to help them grow in Christ?

If I could sum things up in one thought, it would be that I’ve been thinking of families – a lot! How do we do a better job of assisting parents and families of teens? Moms and Dads, what do you need to know and hear as you entrust us (me?!) with your teens? If I could say one thing to every parent out there, it would be, “your words, actions, and opinions matter – so much more than anything I can do as the ‘professional Christian.’ Stop thinking your teaching doesn’t matter – it does!”

You know what, if you’re a parent of a teen and scratching your head asking questions you wished the Church could come alongside you on – what questions would they be?

Anyway, there you go – my thoughts and a little report in there, too.

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