There seems to be a lot of resources on youth ministry websites that provide youth workers with practical ideas and effective ways to inspire, encourage, and equip parents in your ministry. So I want to suggest something that probably won’t be on a list of 10 things you can do to help the parents of the youth you minister to.
Here it is: Make sure you have a parent prophet in your faith community to tell parents the truth about parenting adolescents. It will probably need to be someone other than you, the youth pastor. If you are a 25-year-old youth worker without children, it is impossible to be the truth teller concerning parenting. Until you’ve experienced parenting (especially parenting of an adolescent), it is wise to have another pastor, parent, adult youth leader, or all of the above serve in the role of speaking truth to Christian parents in your faith community. If you aren’t old enough to serve in this role, you can definitely provide resources, information, and content to your parent prophet(s). The prophetic message that needs to be heard by parents is sometimes one of encouragement and sometimes one of exhortation.
As Vicki and I began our family back in the early '80s, we were firmly entrenched in a Christian culture that held the view that spiritual marriage relationships would be perfect if you put God first (you won't even argue or disagree with one another), and as long as you follow the rule book, you will also raise perfect kids who will never wander from faith in Jesus Christ.
Our culture overall and our church cultures specifically have created an unrealistic expectation that parents have a responsibility to raise perfect kids. Even if we could produce the perfect kid by the cultural standards of academic achievement, moral excellence, economic success, and productive citizenship, this certainly doesn’t mean we have nurtured and shaped disciples of Jesus Christ.
Too often Christian parents are made to believe that if they follow a specific formula, they are sure to raise spiritual giants. If you don’t raise a spiritual giant, well, it’s because you aren’t a spiritual parent, so goes the logic. This view of Christian parenting is a lie and is not consistent with Scripture. Too many Christian parents live in insecurity and shame over what is perceived as their inability to serve as guides for the spiritual formation of their children. We were not made to parent alone without the help of a community of people committed to being the people of God.
While I believe that we parents have a crucial role in the Christian formation of our kids, we have taken on too much responsibility with the idea that we are the ones who transform them. We resort to desperate tactics and rules we hope will somehow turn them into the kind of young adults who believe and do the right things. We often overlook the role we have of nurturing the environments where God’s Spirit transforms them.
We must help the parents in our faith communities quit living under the guilt of trying to parent successfully and embrace the concept of parenting faithfully. In January, Christianity Today featured a cover story written by Leslie Leyland Fields.
She stated, “We are not sovereign over our children—only God is. Children are not tomatoes to stake out or mules to train, nor are they numbers to plug into an equation. They are full human beings wondrously and fearfully made. Parenting, like all tasks under the sun, is intended as an endeavor of love, risk, perseverance, and, above all, faith. It is faith rather than formula, grace rather than guarantees, steadfastness rather than success that bridges the gap between our own parenting efforts, and what, by God's grace, our children grow up to become.”
Parent prophets can encourage the parents of the adolescents we minister to and help them through the challenging task of raising their kids.
On the other hand, parent prophets must also be willing to exhort and challenge parents. One of the most alarming trends I see today (as a youth worker for 36 years, a father for 30, and a grandfather for 4) is the emphasis parents place on preparing their children to excel in sports. I love sports. I play sports. I follow sports. However, there is something terribly dysfunctional about parents pushing their kids to excel in sports by investing in personal trainers and jumping from one competitive sports season to the next in an endless pursuit to raise the next LeBron James, Tiger Woods, or Andre Agassi. I know college is expensive, but the likelihood of training your child into a college athletic scholarship is about as probable as winning the $200,000,000 lottery.
I am disappointed that many Christian parents aren’t more zealous about making the Christian formation of their teenagers a first priority. Where are our values as Christian parents? I wonder what parents who define themselves as practicing Christians would choose if they could pick (with a guarantee) between a) my kid will be a major, successful, and wealthy sports star, or b) my kid will love Jesus Christ and faithfully live a life glorifying God?
We need parent prophets to speak truth into the lives of parents in our faith communities. What if Christian parents invested in the Christian formation of their children as passionately as some parents invest in the athletic training of their children? I believe this kind of investment in the spiritual development of the emerging generation of young people is desperately needed.
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How do we know if we’ve been effective in this area? There are the occasional thank you emails, voicemail messages, or, if we find ourselves blessed enough to remain at a church for any length of time—the obvious results of great Christian parenting made visible in the students themselves over the span of middle school and high school years.
Knowing that a teenager’s faith importance is closely linked to the faith importance of their parents1 , it’s non-negotiable that we continually address this need—especially since it’s so easy to overlook or underestimate in the practical work of youth ministry.
So near the end of the post, I’ll share some things that have worked for me in being a helper to parents as they guide their children through adolescence.
However, one lesson I’ve learned more recently needs to be shared from a parent in a culture different from my own. His name is Joelson. He is from Brazil and is the father of four beautiful children—two grown, two still in school. I met Joelson while studying for ministry abroad. He graciously hosted my husband and me in his home while we stayed in Rio de Janeiro. I noticed that his parenting style was different from what I’ve observed in the States. But more recently, I’ve been able to observe it again because he is currently staying with my in-laws in Ohio to learn English for a few months.
On a recent trip to Ohio, I watched “Papa Joe,” as the family calls him, take my eight-month-old daughter to the ground (he’s 6’10”). He sat with her on her level. He played with her closely and gave her personal attention for at least an hour. In our culture, many times our attention to time constraints keeps us from making it to the floor and spending the one-on-one time with our children that they need, myself included.
Joelson was asked to help coach the high school basketball team. True to form, he pays little attention to what society says about getting to know a student. He told my husband’s parents, “I want to go to every boy’s home and meet his parents.” Their caring response was, “Maybe you should talk to the head coach first about your plans.”
A genuine desire to help and be a support to others can be hindered by the fear that we aren’t doing the right thing, asking for the right permission, or getting the appropriate signed waivers. Joelson doesn’t seem to care what the head coach thinks in this situation. He wants to care for the guys on the team, and going to their houses to meet them where they live is a part of that process, so he’ll do it, regardless.
I’m learning from Joelson that we shouldn’t be paralyzed by “what ifs” when seeking out families in our ministries. If we desire to help them, then we must get to know them. If we desire to love them, then we must open our doors—or encourage our leaders to open their doors. Encouraging, equipping, and inspiring parents begins with a passion to know them, and to know them means to understand them, and to understand them means to respond to their needs with help.
Now what that looks like is going to be different for every family we meet, every culture we encounter, and every hardship or blessing we experience in the process. And of course, the Holy Spirit will help us. We aren’t left standing to figure it out on our own. The divine paraclete—the comforter who walks beside us—also walks with us to the front door of our youth ministry where parents and teenagers stand waiting, sometimes broken, sometimes confused, sometimes simply needing a refreshing word to keep doing what they are already doing so well.
So my advice below might be helpful, but following Joelson’s example might be even better. Meet the parents. Go on. Do it. And see what happens next.
1. Listen. Give parents in your ministry your personal attention when they come to you with a concern. I may not have the answer they need, but I’ve found that listening and paying attention are often the best gifts you can give. Most of the time I find that parents end up answering their own questions. The ones who can, oftentimes just need a little nudge in the right direction. For those who face issues or challenges much bigger than we can address, walk with them in referral until they find the person who can help them best.
2. Provide solidarity. Give parents designated space to talk, mingle, and share stories. When they begin sharing with each other, many realize that they aren’t the only ones facing an obstinate daughter or dealing with a kid who can’t seem to make it home with his homework. Offer a parent connect time once a month. Provide coffee or brunch before a worship service. Make it easy for them to join and easy for them to leave.
3. Offer training on felt needs. Each quarter, offer a discussion group on needs that you sense are hot for parents in your group. Encourage parents to share their ideas with each other and offer up your expertise. You can do this with many areas of needs or just one.
4. Plan ahead. Meet with parents before their teenagers go through major transitions. John Wooden used to say that preparing for an opportunity when it arrives is too late. Prepare before it comes, and you’ll teach parents to be successful.
5. Pray. Pray for your parents. Pray without ceasing. Pray for them when you feel led. Pray for them when you’re at odds. Pray and you’ll find ways to encourage and inspire that you never dreamed of before.
[1] To read more on this correlation read: Soul Searching by Christian Smith. Oxford University Press, 2005
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Warning: this is my most concrete, practice-driven post ever! You may not recognize me…
Parenting is hard work! I think we all know that, but to know the depth of the difficulty, you really have to be a parent. I used to think, before I had kids, that I had a pretty good idea of what it would take to be a good parent, and I thought (and I know this sounds a little cocky) that I would be a really good parent. I had, after all, spent a number of years working with young people and had read a truckload on children and adolescents.
I remember watching parents in public places have their less-than-best parenting moments and being able to deconstruct and reconstruct what they should have done and what difference it would make for them and for their children. Watching parents appease their crying kids in Target with a face full of candy swiped from the aisle mid-tantrum, I used to shake my head in disapproval – until it was my own kids melting down and it was me shoving Gummy Bears down their wailing throats.
Parenting is hard work, and most parents feel pretty defensive. We feel like most days and weeks we’re just barely holding on, and honestly, the last thing we need or want is some punk youth worker telling us all the things we’re doing wrong. We know there are many. A lot of them have to do with shortage of time, which zaps patience, so your little parent training event seems like just another thing on my to-do list that will make me feel worse than I already do, so forget it! That’s honestly how I feel, and I’ve been a youth worker and now spend my time training them, ironically, to care about families and see young people as inextricably bound to them.
So despite feeling like that, here are a few things to think about when it comes to relating to, inspiring, encouraging, and equipping parents.
First, approach parents as a broken advocate, not as a specialist. You may be the youth pastor and maybe even have a seminary degree, but you’re no parenting expert. Plus, even parenting experts are rarely welcomed into the family’s private space. Especially if you’re young and childless yourself, don’t approach parents like you have something to teach them. Rather, approach them as someone who wants to help, someone who wants to be a listening ear. Encounter parents as someone who wants to be with them, sharing their place as they go through the ups and downs of parenting.
From the perspective of a professional expert, you have no right to confront or tell parents difficult things, but as someone advocating for them and someone who is in deep relationship with their children, you actually do—if you approach them as someone who cares for their children. Think of it this way. Don’t go up to a parent and say, “Hey, I heard you’re divorcing; I would really like to get together and share with you some of the negative ways divorce affects children and then provide you with a sheet of ten dos and don’ts to keep in mind as your divorce unfolds.” If I were that parent I would want to kick you right in the you-know-what.
But if you approach a parent and say, “Hey, as you know, I’ve been spending some time with Gwen, and she mentioned that some really hard stuff is happening in your family. I can’t imagine what this must be like. I know she has some worries that she’s expressed to me; is it all right if we talk at some point?” This statement is hard in its own right, and feelings of defensiveness may come, but instead of being a judging expert, you rather simply a sympathetic advocate.
The second thing we can do is create a space for parents. In many ways it’s amazing that parents who spend time in congregations don’t feel supported as parents. The congregation is one of the only places in society that allows space for people across the parenting landscape (some with infants, some with grown children, some with teenagers) to encounter each other, learn from each other, and be supported by each other’s stories.
This should be one of the concrete practices youth and family ministers do—create a parent storytelling space. Don’t make it a parenting “mentoring group” or parent “passing the wisdom” group. Let that stuff just naturally happen. Have no agenda; just the invitation to all sorts of people to tell their parenting stories. I guarantee that wisdom, advice, and concrete practices will follow, but they will follow from the story and from encountering each other, which has a much deeper impact than a seminar or book.
So, in other words, the church already has the resources it needs to support families. It is a yearning, searching community; we just need to allow space for support to happen.
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