Youth ministers are relatively new among us. I grew up in a pretty large congregation in Fort Worth, and we never had a youth minister. Occasionally, in good churches, the associate minister was assigned to teach the “young people” Sunday evenings before Sunday night services.
Glenn Owen, probably right out of ACU, had come to our congregation because we were going to support him as part of the now-famous Brazil mission team which was scheduled to leave in a year or two. He taught us the missionary journeys of Paul, pretty standard fare for “young people” in those days, but especially meaningful because he was preparing for his own missionary journey. Glenn went on to be a great missionary, elder, preacher, and finally, the voice of the Herald of Truth all over the world. He was certainly one of my first heroes of faith.
Youth ministers now have their own degree programs at Christian colleges, their own conferences, and their own social media presence. But they don’t seem to be held in high regard. Let me tell you why I say this:
- Youth ministry is seen as entry-level ministry position in most churches and is compensated as such. Rarely are youth ministers part of the church leadership as a result.
- Youth ministers receive the most sarcastic remarks on Twitter—usually from other ministers.
- One prominent blogger/minister in our fellowship recently announced a series written by guest youth ministers—but it is anonymous, so that youth ministers can be honest about how they are treated by the Christians that hire them!
Would it make a difference if we believed that Jesus was a youth minister? Do we need to be reminded of the strong language Jesus used in talking about children:
- Matthew 18:3
And he said: “Truly I tell you, unless you change and become like little children, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven - Matthew 19:14
Jesus said, “Let the little children come to me, and do not hinder them, for the kingdom of heaven belongs to such as these.” - Mark 9:37
“Whoever welcomes one of these little children in my name welcomes me; and whoever welcomes me does not welcome me but the one who sent me. - Matthew 18:6
“If anyone causes one of these little ones to stumble, it would be better for them to have a large millstone hung around their neck and to be drowned in the depths of the sea.”
So why do these servants tend to be under-valued and under-appreciated in our churches? See if you think some of these might be reasons:
- Other gifts are more valuable to the kingdom than the gift of ministering to youth! Preaching is more valuable, administration is more valuable, eldering is more valuable . . . . I know they are more valuable because they are paid more and treated better.
- Other ministry positions are not viewed as stepping stones. Youth ministry is for guys too young to be pulpit preachers. The good ones might get to move up in a few years to associate positions.
- Youth ministers are sometimes the least trained person on the staff. They may or may not have a Bachelors degree in youth ministry, but just by reason of experience, they are often undertrained. Too often they are not married, or just married and no kids, or young marrieds with babies and/or young kids. All of their knowledge about young people comes from two places: their own story at home and their school books. Both of those have great value, but you want to put your kids in the hands of a pilot that has just read about flying a plane?
It is no secret that churches are losing more young people than they are retaining! Only 13 percent of them viewed religion and spirituality as important. And even among those who described themselves as Christian, only 18 percent said their religion was important to them (Taken from Thom Rainer’s book, The Millennials). I wonder if there is a correlation between our appreciation for youth ministry and the number of our children that continue to believe??
Wouldn’t it make sense to use our best, our most gifted, our most experienced to work with the people that we love most in this world? Shouldn’t those going into youth ministry have the best educational tracks, the best mentoring opportunities to make them the most prepared people for their ministry?
And then, wouldn’t we support them well, so that they can stay with their calling?? Wouldn’t we hire them, hoping they would stay for a whole generation of kids?
Jesus said, “See that you do not despise one of these little ones. For I tell you that their angels in heaven always see the face of my Father in heaven” (Matthew 18:10). If angels are God’s ministering spirits and the angels of children are always in His presence, then He must really care about the ministry to them!
Jesus was definitely a youth minister!
Mark's Blog 
I wish I could have signed in as StuffJesusWouldntSay but wanted to comment. Brandon is spot on for sure. Mark I appreciate your slant on still looking to the ‘professional’ to fill these roles in ministry. Its not just a baby sitting service we are asking but pastoral minded ministers who are passionate about the youth of this generation.
The problem I see, as a youth pastor for 10 years and executive pastor of Family Life for 2 years, is that we keep driving a larger and larger stake into the ground of ‘We nee youth ministers, we need children’s ministers’ ‘pastors just don’t understand’ and so on. We need more people who understand the beauty of Matthew 28 is not just meant for adults nor is it just for youth and children. I am not sure where or who decided the stake’s being driven on the ‘tent of kingdom building’ were meant to be pulled up to try and drive into other ministry areas as ‘not relevant’ or ‘not as important’.
Would Jesus be a youth minister? No. He was the Messiah coming to divide and unify those to the true beauty of the Kingdom. Jesus, didn’t do youth ministry, he incranationally loved on the children of God (age 0 – death). He made declarations of what faith could/should look like for these children, he had teenagers following him (teenagers who were married and held jobs supporting their families) he also had old foggies walking along side him as well.
Is youth ministry important? absolutely!!! Is it the kingdom? no and I pray the divide & conversation of both needing more youth ministry, needing less youth ministry becomes less of the focus for the Body of Christ and the attention draws back to How do we go and make disciples for the beauty of the kingdom of god…
Thank you for your comments, Brit. I appreciate your drawing our attention back to the bigger picture. Especially your last sentence grabbed me! Whatever kind of niche ministry we might find ourselves in, isn’t this the question that would drive our mission: how do we go and make disciples for the sake of the Kingdom of God?
Thank you for sharing.
Mark
The negative or low view of youth ministry that I am aware of can be traced back to negative, low-performing youth ministers.
The corrective is for youth ministers to hold higher expectations of themselves and accept the responsibilities that earn trust in the congregation. They should preach, teach adult classes, and engage in vision and mission discussions.
Youth ministry isn’t done any favors when youth ministers act and are treated like children. They don’t need a different dress code, less education, less study time, anonymous blogs and bean-bag chairs. They need to be competent ministers with a heart for making disciples of students.
Good post!
You are, of course, absolutely right about youth ministers and their performance requirements. Greater influence proceeds from greater competence, doesn’t it! Our churches who hire or keep youth ministers who are anything less than mature and competent and doing great harm.
Thanks, Brandon!
Good article!! I think many missionaries are also treated as less than clergy. However, I think the big problem is that the early church did not have “youth ministers”, etc. Ministers ministered to everybody. You aptly show how Jesus did this, and I think it’s also noticeable in the ministry of Paul. Perhaps if we treated youth as deserving of a regular minister (rather than quarantining them in youth ministry and Sunday school), and if we paid and respected ministers who work with youth as regular ministers, we would find it easier to keep the youth in our congregations. I’ve had suspicions about Sunday school for years. I am not yet dogmatically opposed to if, but it always felt contrived. The only Sunday school classes I ever really liked were taught by elders and preachers: straight from the Bible, no expensive workbooks, no gimmicks. I think they helped me treasure the Word of God more and feel a part of the church; they were instrumental in my decision to be baptized .I also wonder why deacons are not doing more of this work, whether paid or volunteer. We need fewer businessmen, fewer costly materials, programs and gimmicks and more teachers teaching straight from Scripture. It’s actually very exciting!
To return to your article, I don’t think any kind of business model that relegates one ministry to “entry level” and another as “senior partner” is either Scriptural or good for the Kingdom. Thank you for raising awareness about this.
Jesus may have been a youth minister, but He also knows that to keep youth faithful the very best thing to do is reach their parents with the gospel and enlist them in the task of helping. The vast majority of our youth converts whose parents do not come to Christ will soon leave the church. Those whose parents also submit to Jesus and choose to follow have a much better chance of staying faithful. The kindest thing that a youth minister can do for his teens is to reach their parents!
Mark — These are great thoughts. As a youth minister I have seen a lot of Christians behave badly and reinforce many of these ideas. But I have also encounterd youth ministers who have been in ministry 30+ years. Elders who support their youth ministers and guide them. Churches who care deeply about their teens. I have hope that we are starting to learn this lesson slowly.