slant33-blog

Andy Root

I’m tempted to just cut and paste a review from Charles Taylor’s Secular Age here. I won’t! My response to this statement is that it is true. God is dead! As Taylor has brilliantly argued, we have constructed societies and cultures where it is easy not to believe in God. What is interesting is that just a few hundred years ago, it was nearly impossible not to believe in God. Now, it sometimes feels like it is impossible to believe. Atheism really is an invention of modernity and, as Taylor would argue, modernity’s obsession with the self.

One of the most interesting things I remember about Taylor’s tome (an idea he actually stole from Max Weber), which I think relates to this response, is that our world has become disenchanted. For most of human history, God (not to mention demons, angels, and other supernatural forces) was everywhere. The forest was haunted; the lightning struck because of God; the rain came because of religious practice.

But since those days, our natural world has been turned inside out, revealing its mysteries through the instruments of science. Sure, maybe Pat Robertson or some other TV evangelist will make God the source of natural disasters, but many of us devoted believers tend to turn to the Weather Channel and its meteorologists for answers more than our Bibles or priests.

So, in how we have organized our lives, God is dead. It is amazing how long many of us can go without thinking about God or church or communion. We have a world, unlike the past, that is built beyond God. We live without mystery.

Or do we? Science killed God through the use of doubt. Science began doubting that our conceptions of God and God’s work matched empirical examination. Yet, what is interesting is that in our time doubt has grown and now has been turned on science. Not long ago it was assumed that science, while it used doubt, existed beyond doubt. Yet many of us are now coming to see that even science (maybe especially science) has its bias.

Many of the world’s mysteries may be explainable, but even so, there still exists within us a huge mystery, the mystery of our own existence, the mystery of why there is something instead of nothing. Our lives may be organized beyond God; we don’t need God to exist in our culture (where in the past it was impossible to live without God). But nevertheless, there remain deep mysteries that surround issues of life and death, mysteries about love and possibility.

One of the reasons I have focused so much on the place of suffering in ministry in my writing is that it is in the experience of suffering—the experience of coming face to face with nothingness—our hermeneutically imposed cultural lenses of living beyond the need for God come crashing down. And, of course, the God we find in suffering, questions, yearning, and need is never the God we imagined, never the God we’ve caged for our own use. Rather, we find this God, in love, weak so we can be strong; we find this God dead so we might live. In a world where it is so easy to live as if God is dead, “only a suffering God can help,” as Dietrich Bonheoffer uttered from his prison cell while Berlin lay in ruins in view from his cell window.

It may be true that we can live as if there is no God, that God is dead. I can fill my life with many things; I can work and entertain myself without any need for God. I can assume all mysteries are solved, or that my job is to buy and gratify myself. But up against the thinness of my being, up against broken love, lost dreams, fear, and need, I recognize that I’m neck deep in mystery that yearns for transcendence.

Dave Rahn

What an interesting statement! I could only wish that I were sitting at the coffee shop with a friend who had just uttered it. It begs interrogation.

I first want to know if it is intended to say that the way that God interacts with humankind somehow transcends or ignores culture. Such a position only makes sense if God is a distant deity. The Bible certainly does not present such a picture.

Culture is at least a derived creation of our Father, who loves diversity in his design. Even the climate differences on planet earth lend themselves to persons having vastly different life experiences together. Ice, cold, and long periods of darkness provide backdrops for human relationships that have little in common with life on a tropical island paradise. This natural dimension suggests that we be slow to assume that all aspects of culture are the result of sin’s fallout.

But that doesn’t mean culture is not often co-opted for sinful purposes—such as an arrogant people united together in pursuit of godless greatness at Babel. God always opposes such pride—for our benefit. In this instance, he responds with humanity’s first centrifuge mixer, and participants in the great tower building project are linguistically divided. Lest future generations learn other ways to bind their hearts in willful opposition to their Creator, the Lord confounds them with language differences.

Culture has been linked to language ever since. As language evolves to accommodate each people group’s distinct communication needs, culture continues on a trajectory that seems increasingly particularistic. There are even subcultures within high schools that hang together by using their own identifying lingo.

Fortunately for us, culture has also been used by God to deliver the hope of the world. The Lord God anchored his communication to the world he loves within defined cultural limitations. He chose a nomadic people to enter into a covenant relationship with him, one through which he could bless the nations. This people has had a unique history and been tethered to a smallish parcel of land that is, to this day, hotly contested.

Neighboring countries have had an impact on Israel’s culture. Prophets, poets, and kings left their imprint. Some stood as faithful messengers for the Lord God; others were case examples of how not to behave if you are one of God’s chosen people. Ultimately, into this nation’s script, God entered the Roman-occupied scene in this theatrical production as a babe born in Bethlehem.

To understand what the Lord has said—what we need to know—we must appreciate that there are cultural distinctions through which the Word of God has come to us. We can be saved because God delivered his redemption plan in and through culture.

But maybe that’s not the intent of this provocation. It could be that we’re being invited to critique the culture that is forming us today. This is no easy task. Culture is such a pervasive, life-forming ingredient that most of us have genuine difficulty even questioning how or if we may have been duped by the water we swim in every day.

Does culture bend us toward godlessness? Yes. But what should we expect? Our sin-soiled hearts are inclined away from the Father, not toward him. And culture is ultimately a sociologically understood phenomenon. We sinners collectively shape our culture.

What’s difficult for me to assess as a fellow water-dweller is whether the American space and time I’ve occupied for 57 years is significantly less friendly to the reality of God than other times/spaces/places in history. I suspect we’re spiraling down and away from the Lord today. One reason is that I think I’ve seen Romans 1 accurately describe the movement I’ve witnessed in my lifetime. I also wonder if we’re not reaping Enlightenment-born self-sufficiency as a macro-fruit that conforms to the eschatological story line of Scripture. Things will get worse before Jesus returns for his people.

By the way, God’s ultimate redemption will usher in the culture of King Jesus, no longer via minority witness, but through his triumphant rule everywhere. That’s cool!

Steve Argue

If God is dead to culture, we have a problem. The sacred texts we read, the creeds, art, literature—even .Slant33—are embedded in cultural forms of text, context, illustration, images, events, and community. It is impossible to think or dialogue about God apart from culture.

So, in this space, let’s frame this statement for a youth ministry context. Maybe a concern isn’t that God is dead to culture, but unknowingly, youth workers can become dead to culture. Atrophy toward culture grows through subtle statements I often hear in youth ministry discourse. Here’s what I mean…

“We just teach the Bible here.” While every youth worker must grow in the discipline of careful exegetical and hermeneutical study, no one can “just teach the Bible” as if immune to cultural forces. When someone approaches the Bible, he brings his own cultural assumptions into the text, causing him to emphasize certain things more than others. What a youth worker teaches, how she teaches it, what illustrations she uses, etc., say as much about her as they do about the text. To think otherwise is to be blind to one’s own cultural perspectives. Your gender, age, ethnicity, socioeconomic status, education, etc., affect your view of the text. Failure to see this claims a false objectivity and often results in a dangerous use of power. Be wary of this mentality in others and in yourself.

“Jesus did it, so should you.” A.J. Jacobs’s book A Year of Living Biblically highlights the beautiful and absurd with trying to live just as the Bible says. The challenge comes when one tries to connect pre-modern writings with modern/postmodern, 21st-century, western culture. If they’re honest, most youth workers self-edit passages that “don’t apply” today by turning them into spiritual metaphors—except for Jesus. Most of youth ministry practices and youth worker charges to youth are to do as Jesus did.

While I support the Christian call to follow Jesus, I don’t believe this means that Christians can copy Jesus’ behaviors because it’s out of reach. It’s impossible because Jesus is, well, God; and because one-for-one cultural transposition from 1st-century Palestine to, say, 21st-century Grand Rapids, Michigan, is rarely possible. Approaches that turn Jesus into a behavioral archetype create either a genie Jesus who fulfills all our needs (if we do what he says) or an oppressive big brother who’s an impossible act to follow (“Why aren’t you more like Jesus?” Poor James!). Jesus cannot be the trump card for youth ministry practices and behaviors unless youth workers are comfortable with following an acultural Jesus that contradicts his very incarnation and renders his followers (the church) irrelevant to this world.

Us/Them. Listen closely to youth worker conversations among themselves and with students, and you’ll often notice an us/them perspective with culture—saved/unsaved; good/bad; happy/sad; enlightened/lost, etc. I’m not suggesting that everything is up for grabs, only that nice, neat categories where one claims to have God on their side fails to appreciate life’s blurring reality. Things are rarely all bad or all good. People are rarely all right or all wrong. Christians don’t have their act all together, and non-religious types often act more Christian than Christians! Those who hold neat, clear lines between Christians and others fail to appreciate God’s story that is ringing in every part of our world.

Therefore, youth workers need to quickly move away from labeling things as Christian or secular—whether it’s books, movies, art, or music. Labels like these rob youth workers (and those they shepherd) from learning about the dramatic gospel story that springs up through multiple art forms. Humanity, longing, love, betrayal, relationship, sacrifice, community, faithfulness, struggle, and unresolved issues are part of our human existence—one that God chooses to engage, even enter. What we find is that we’re all in this together. Culture wars aren’t necessary, and there is always a we starting point somewhere, even if it’s simply our humanity.

“Jesus is the answer.” Youth workers’ desire to help students is beautiful, but I notice that their message often gets reduced to Jesus being the answer. The message goes something like this: Everything will be better; your problems will be solved; your situation will be resolved; your anxiety will go away…if you just trust Jesus. Certainly we want people to find Jesus trustworthy, but youth workers must be careful not to reduce culture’s problems to a generic solution, even if it’s Jesus.

What does it mean for Jesus to heal a son’s pain over his parents’ divorce; a school’s fear over the continual threat of violence; or a sophomore girl’s anxiety over her boyfriend pressuring her to have sex? Youth workers must be more articulate about how to help students find culturally specific good news. Let’s not offend students with generic Jesus answers to their specific needs and pressures that are relationally, emotionally, developmentally, and culturally complex. There is a specificity of the gospel that our cultures need, or it’s not good news at all.

Let’s listen to each other and encourage one another to understand the cultures of which we are a part. Maybe these reflections can serve as symptoms or warning signs for youth workers becoming dead to the cultures in which they are undeniably bound. We must pursue a maturity that appreciates the cultural complexities that transcends neat categories, or else we will become dead to culture, offering answers to questions no one is asking; proclaiming an irrelevant and insensitive gospel. May it never be.

Claire Smith

Interestingly enough, this question takes me back to a hymn from my childhood, a few lines of which I’ll share:

thy people owned thy goodness, and we their deeds record; and both of this bear witness; one Church, one Faith, one Lord.

It seems to me that the academy, as far as religious studies that are particularly concerned with Christianity and hence the church, is not separate and distinct from the church. Many members of this academy are part of local congregations and are often relatively active. Some institutions are denominational in nature, while others have their genesis in various denominations. Even while serving a wider cause, the mission of the church remains at the forefront. In thinking of the relationship between this aspect of the academy and the church. Therefore, it seems that in considering how we learn from each other, one of our primary tasks would be to hold each other accountable as proclaimers of the love and reign of God. Thus, it is a mutual, reciprocal relationship.

In looking at the church, I’ll speak in terms of local congregations, where the concept of the church becomes more concrete. It seems at times that at the congregational level, the big push is to go out and act, to do something. This is especially so as many congregations face declining or stagnating membership in the face of rapidly changing neighborhoods and a world that has suddenly arrived on their doorsteps. The academy faces these realities as well and has to deal with them, though from the perspectives of its various disciplines. What the academy does is to help us to prayerfully pause and reflect and bring larger concerns to bear as we apply other frameworks—such as sociology, theology, biblical studies—to better grasp our realities. In this way our practice is considered rather than merely reacting to what we face.

I think here particularly of the missional church movement, which combines reflection on the church and God’s intention for it with practice. The congregations’ actions, therefore, become rooted in knowledge of missio Dei and God’s reign. The rich conversation between congregations and the academic discipline results in a more prayerfully considered and consistent practice.

The academy and congregations need each other for greater faithfulness to God’s mission. Youth ministry is one area that has made great strides in this direction of mutual encounter and learning. The more accessible nature of recent scholarly publications in this and other subjects suggests that the concern of mutual engagement is being addressed. The ongoing issue is not so much whether the academy and congregations are thinking about the same thing but how they can find a common place for conversation so that they are in an ongoing relationship, constantly learning from each other.

How does the congregation become aware of the academy’s research and findings in particular areas, and how does the academy better hear the concerns of the lives of the congregations so there is a greater dialogue between the two in which critical reflection and thinking informs and is informed by how the church encounters the world? Therefore, we need to ask, How do we serve together as proclaimers of the love and reign of God?

Chris Folmsbee

An acquaintance of mine named Bryan Bademan is the executive director of the MacLaurin Institute in Minneapolis. The MacLaurin Institute’s mission is to build bridges between the “church and university in the Twin Cities metropolitan area, bringing theological resources to the university and academic resources to the church. Our goal is to strengthen Christian intellectual life in this region by creating public space for leaders in the academy and church to address enduring human questions together.” (Visit http://www.maclaurin.org/ to learn more.)

When I was a youth pastor in Minnesota a few years ago, I was moderately engaged with what the MacLaurin Institute was doing. I went to a few events and forums with a couple of my colleagues, and that was about it. If I were back in Minneapolis today, I’d be more deeply occupied by what they are trying to accomplish.

More than at any other point in my life, I now think it is enormously significant that the church and university (academia) continue to seek meaningful ways to work collaboratively to stretch each other theologically, relationally, socially, academically, etc.

Here are five keys I think the church and university should consider when attempting to learn from one another.

1. Build on ideas. It is critical that both the university and the church trade ideas in a way that builds on the ideas of others rather than exchanging ideas for the sake of being right. The opportunity to exchange ideas for the sake of deeper levels of understanding helps push one another to a more full-bodied generosity that can often lead to deeper conversation and shared experiences.

2. Multiple perspectives. In the same manner that we might seek to build on ideas rather than settle on any one that is “right,” so too should we seek to allow multiple perspectives to influence the thinking and living of one another. Although it can be difficult to remain consistently open to others’ perspectives, it is critical in order to more fully understand each other as human beings. A commitment to embracing multiple perspectives can stretch us and mold us into people of open-handedness rather than people of close-mindedness.

3. Respectful debate. Building on ideas and allowing for multiple perspectives will inevitably lead to debate. There is a good chance that it won’t lead to respectful or healthy debate unless we are intentionally guiding it in that direction. I have noticed, however, that groups of people that allow for ideas to be built upon and allow for multiple perspectives grow closer to one another through steady conversation and inclusivity. Respectful or considerate debate that stimulates thinking or spurs one another on to more deeply comprehend a particular contrasting issue or even to broader realization of a shared thought is critical for the university and church to collaborate for greater learning opportunities.

4. Practicing situational thinking. I don’t have any firsthand experience with this as it relates specifically to the church and university. However, in my experience leading teams and working collaboratively with others, I have noticed that reliably positioning a thought or concept beyond where you currently are helps establish a forward momentum. Any time we can build scenarios or imagine for the sole reason of further thought development, I think it can help the dialogue to remain active and provide the energy for continued discussion when conversation seems to pause.

5. Practical and positive evaluation. Self-evaluation and peer evaluation in an encouraging and truthful environment are hugely significant. How do we know if we are growing in our ability to live generously, think more ecumenically, or be more accepting of one another and our individual ideas if we don’t practice evaluation? People will disagree with each other, no doubt. It isn’t about whether we disagree. It is about how we choose to disagree. Evaluation can mark our growth in thought as well as our expansion in how we choose to relate with others.

The church and the academy need one another to effectively engage the mission of God to restore the world to its intended wholeness. Consider your involvement or role in organizations such as the MacLaurin Institute. Is there a place for you to engage the conversation and help build bridges of shared theological and academic resources in your community?

Scot McKnight

One of my favorite pastors used to say something that irritated me, and time has only eased my irritation slightly. He used to say, “The dumbest farmers grow the best potatoes.” Our community had lots of farmers, and I’m not sure how any of them tolerated the pastor’s comment. Well, perhaps I do know: They too were caught up in an anti-intellectualism that often found its scapegoat in the professor. (I haven’t said this yet, so I’ll say it now: I’m a professor, and I take offense.)

The stereotypes, were we to use them of other jobs (say, a woman’s decision to stay at home or a Mexican immigrant working a landscape job or a Korean working at a dry cleaner), would require scorn and denunciation. But for some reason, one can insult intellectuals for being well-nigh useless or so egg-headed they are of no use to anyone but God and a few philosophers.

I happen to love knowledge and the intellectual life, and there’s nothing quite like reading a gifted writer who can in one paragraph tie together some intellectual heavyweights that both expand the mind and make intelligent readers aware that they are standing on the holy ground of the discovery of truth. My favorite writer like this is the Jewish writer Joseph Epstein, who has the singular gift that ties together breadth of knowledge, uncanny bits of juicy information, a cynical distrust of big claims, and a biting humor that turns the page on its own.

Which brings me to the first thing churches learn from the academy: critical distance. My own 25 years of leadership in the church leads me to think that the arena in which churchgoers are least capable of critical distance is politics, with one’s theology and one’s family tying for second place. Academics have learned to be critically distant. We can examine an argument and then present the alternatives in such a way that our students often clamor for what we personally think.

Every time I sort out some options for students—say, on how to understand the Lord’s Supper (real presence, sort of real presence, real “absence”—and we often call these transubstantiation, consubstantiation, and symbolism), and some student says, “Which do you believe?” I rock back on my heels momentarily and say, “Yes, critical distance permitted me to give each view its fair hearing so the student could sort it out.”

By the way, sometimes I refuse to tell the students, and sometimes I do tell them. It depends on the gravity of the issue. Recently we had quite the discussion about hell and universalism, and I sorted through some options and then said, “If you want to know where I stand, I’ll tell you, but you’ll have to ask me.” (Yes, a student asked.)

Which now leads me to what I think the academy can learn from the church, and I will use words that balance “critical distance” but which might not make sense until explained: uncritical proximity. One of the distinctives of the church is passionate commitment to the gospel, to God as Trinity, to the Lord Jesus Christ, and to historic faith—even, at times, when it isn’t completely obvious. And what makes the church durable is its willingness to stand with the church and let our “faith seek understanding.”

The academy essentially teaches us to believe only what we understand (and can demonstrate). The church teaches us to believe and that faith will open our eyes to even more understanding. C.S. Lewis famously said this: “I believe in Christianity as I believe that the sun has risen: not only because I see it, but because by it I see everything else.”

And there you have it: the alternatives that need to exist together. We need those folks who say, “I believe what I can understand,” and we need those folks who say, “I believe in order to understand.” We learn from the academy in the former and from the church in the latter.

I’m not sure we can put these together: critical distance in order to understand and uncritical proximity in order to understand. But as a Christian I believe in the gospel story about King Jesus, and it is through that story that the world and the Bible make sense. As an academic, I am compelled to make sense of texts and history and ideas through critical distance, but that form of knowledge will never lead to me to the depth or the mystery that uncritical proximity grants me through the grace of God’s gift to us in Christ.

Andy Root

So maybe one of the latest research movements that has impacted youth ministry is new discoveries in neurology and overall brain science. The latest big finding has been that teenagers actually have primitive brains—brains not fully developed—making certain forms of decision making and moral reasoning impossible—so says the research. And youth ministry people pick this up and go with assumptions that kids (especially the boys in their ministries) have animal-like brains. Lately this has led some youth ministry people to ask big questions, like, Can a young person live a life of discipleship before his or her brain fully develops? Is what we are calling them to be and do realistic? Can a teenager live a sanctified life, even?

I have to admit I’m not a big fan of this research. Not because I don’t think it might be right. Believe me, I’m no brain doctor. But I’m worried about the popularized perspective that many youth workers are drawing from because it holds the danger of perpetuating the ontological state of adolescence. If there is a teenage brain, if the young person’s brain is developmentally primitive, then we should keep young people caged behind the walls of adolescence. We should fortify teenage-hood. The problem is that this research so easily becomes reductionistic: Of course we can’t have young people fully involved in the congregation; of course we can’t listen to their theological voices; their brains are primitive! Which too often gets defined as “less than”.

Plus, this perspective is not only reductionistic in the sense of seeing adolescents as less than but also in the sense of ignoring the environmental impact on the brain. It may very well be true, and powerfully so, that when the hard sciences take pictures of the brain, exposing its dimensions and shape, the teenage brain looks different from the brain of a 45-year-old. But that static picture is all that can be seen in a laboratory. It does not take into consideration how the brain changes and what impact society and culture have on the biological organism.

We know for certain that culture does impact biology, not just the other way around. For instance, we know that girls’ menstrual cycles, not long ago, started much later (between the ages of 15-16), but in the last few decades, we have seen a significant drop in the age of a girl’s first period (around ages 11-12, sometimes even 9). All the answers for why this biological reality has changed point to culture. It may have to do with exposure to light, or hormones in the milk children drink and other dietary realities, or greater exposure to information. Whatever the reason, this illustrates that culture has the power to change biological realities.

The problem with the popular brain science that many youth workers are drawing from is that it sees the human brain as static, disconnected from social, relational, and cultural realities. We no doubt are beings with brains, but these brains are wired for social connection (as explored in object relations psychology) and culture (as studied in the sociology of knowledge, à la Peter Berger). And if you scratch beyond the surface of this popular brain science, what you find is that most theorists, especially those who have drawn brain science into interdisciplinary conversations (as does Daniel Siegel and Louis Cozolino), say that the human brain is plastic, changeable, because the human brain is social. These theorists, drawing from the best in neurology, have shown that our social relationships—our engagements with culture—have the power to reshape the brain. For instance, they’ve discovered that the brains of those who’ve experienced trauma or abuse look different than they did prior to the experiences.

So sure, culture and society may shape 12–24-year-olds’ primitive-looking brains, but doesn’t that only call the church deeper? It means we need to engage young people in social realities. Social realities, like life in a congregation, can quite literally reshape their brains. Youth ministry actually has the power (through the Holy Spirit) to change the shape of teenagers’ brains. That’s a pretty big deal, and that’s what the research implies. Rather than pulling back from what we give to or expect from teenagers, it pushes for us to open the doors of the youth room and get young people involved in the social/relational reality of the wider congregation. Because the brain is social (plastic), then getting their teenage brains engaged with adult brains will transform them.

Dave Rahn

True confession. I winced inwardly at this question, like an alcoholic might struggle when someone innocently asks which beer tastes best. Without totally dodging the question, I want to take advantage of this moment to tell my story and offer the caution of my experience.

First, I am wired by the Lord to be logical, analytical, and strategic. I love solving problems by applying skills of intellectual reasoning. Lots of my friends are inclined to use their minds; I tend to wear them out. Some of the most significant disciple-making influences in my young Christian life—I put my faith in Jesus when I was 16—were books. Before finishing high school I had read Francis Schaffer’s True Spirituality, Watchman Nee’s The Normal Christian Life, and Josh McDowell’s Evidence That Demands a Verdict. Whatever else was true for me, following Jesus made sense.

Without benefit of much self-reflection and being evangelistically zealous, I began leading a campus life outreach ministry as a college freshman. Over the next 13 years, my role in the organization expanded. And I led on the strength of my diligent activity driven by strategy. How can I reach that particular kid for Christ? Which school should our ministry expand into next, and why? Who are the young staff members I need to bring on the team so we can grow? What activities do we engage in that distract us from doing our best? How can we make our programs, our wrap-ups, each relationship more effective? In the midst of this experience I slipped away for a year and got a master’s degree, fortifying my conviction that thinking well would lead me to greater fruitfulness in ministry.

When I migrated into a college teaching role, it seemed like a natural and strategic use of my gifts. I could leverage this new job for continued influence in the kingdom. After getting a PhD from Purdue, I realized I had something strategic to offer our little Christian college. If I were turned loose to do research that concentrated on the practice of youth ministry, Huntington College (now Huntington University) could stake out a distinctive niche in a young academic discipline. We could emerge as contributing leaders by serving through research.

This focus seemed to fit me perfectly. While I distributed my energy equally between big-question research problems and life-on-life investment with my students, the strategic noisemaker for the college was clearly our published research. I still believe that research can make incredibly important contributions to the body of knowledge in youth ministry, especially because our common practices have lacked rigorous tests of effectiveness. Youth ministry has been largely shaped by a process of trial-and-error experiences that get interpreted and passed along through a conference/workshop delivery system. It’s not that such insights are not valuable; it’s just that we are vulnerable to biases of interpretation that will mislead us without proper scrutiny.

As I approach nearly 40 years of doing youth ministry, I find myself leading the national ministry strategies of Youth for Christ, an organization of evangelistic missionaries that has very little patience for research. Far from imposing my own values on our efforts, I am coming to reckon with the limitations of my own über-strategic inclinations. I have realized that being strategic has made it harder, not easier, to pray with childlike dependency; that transformational love is delivered to lost kids one at a time by people who know they are well loved; that the power of God’s Word to change lives is downright mysterious and resistant to research-based understanding; that observable, fruit-producing unity is unattainable without heart-hidden humility leading the way.

In a fascinating way I feel like I am standing at a moment in my life where I gain the benefit of a backward-looking fresh explanation of how my ministry has been fruitful. It’s like I’m living in the “reveal” moment of The Sixth Sense, discovering that the storyline I have used for years to explain how I have been effective might be masking the truth. What the Lord wants to do in and through me has met considerable resistance from the research-oriented, strategy-crafting side of my soul.

Had I chosen to answer this blog’s question in a straightforward way, I would have given a shout out to the fabulous sociological research done by Christian Smith and team that maps the adolescent landscape of spirituality and religiosity in America. I also would have tossed a bone to the world of distinct domains research, inaugurated by Elliot Turiel in the late ’70s. He and others have made timely contributions to understanding the common structures we employ as we construct meaning for making moral judgments, explaining how teens and parents, for instance, arrive at different conclusions around all kinds of issues. My friend Denny Howard has made a discovery during his clinical counseling practice with more than 3,000 ministry professionals that has allowed him to predict what the major crisis issues will be, based on ministry experience and age. His sample of 400 constitutes a strong pilot study that he hopes to expand into a wonderfully robust research project with immense benefit to the care of ministers.

I still value research very much. In the master’s program I lead, graduates make original, research-based contributions to youth ministry as part of their final projects.

But to guard the progress that seems to be taking place in my own heart, I refuse to personally camp out in the research forests any more. As a matter of conviction, searching through research for solutions is a slippery slope that requires me to be tethered to soul-guarding friends before I traverse its terrain.

My apologies if I’ve disappointed any readers. I’m sure my blog was a “slant” that was not anticipated by those writing a worthwhile question. For what it’s worth, my heart is a bit lighter as I’ve offered this unsolicited testimony. God is good!

Mike King

A paper titled “Brands: The Opiate of the Nonreligious Masses?” has been published in Marketing Science 1. The research team was made up of scholars from Tel Aviv University, Duke University, and New York University. According to their data, they claim that religiously minded people are less interested in consumer products that are branded by a major brand name. In the study, those who claim to be non-religious are much more reliant on well-known brand products, especially when they have the financial means to afford major brands.

The research team theorizes, “Brands and religiosity may serve as substitutes for one another because both allow individuals to express their feelings of self-worth.”

“‘Brands are a signal of self-worth,’ Fitzsimons 2 said. ‘We're signaling to others that we care about ourselves and that we feel good about ourselves and that we matter in this world. It's more than I'm hip or cool,’ he said: ‘I'm a worthwhile person, and I matter, and you should respect me and think that I'm a good person, because I've got the D&G on my glasses.’” 3

The Christian faith is to be lived within a community of practice. Being connected to a faith community says a lot about who people are and what they value. If we don’t know who we are in Jesus Christ, and if we struggle to make meaning out of life through faith, then certainly Apple, Juicy Couture, Gap, or Urban Outfitters are more than willing to help fill the void by providing some sense of meaning or self-worth, right? Some marketers are actually attempting to attach religious overtone to their brands in order to attract consumers looking for meaning, identity, and purpose in life—think True Religion.

Andy Root, at a recent youth worker training at Youthfront, pointed out that young adults are selecting and creating identities for themselves. One can create a profile and craft an identity based on what one buys, wears, and consumes. This increases the importance of a renewed and vigorous emphasis on Christian formation and an intentional theological exploration of what it means to help adolescents form identities rooted in Jesus Christ. A theology that focuses on what it means to live a cruciform life is essential in the midst of our consumerist cultural realities.

This study is very interesting for those of us involved in ministry to adolescents and young adults as we engage in dialogue about what brings meaning to our lives. The researchers’ claim that those who are identified as “religious-minded” people are less likely to be enslaved by major status brands is encouraging to me. Embracing an ethos that Jesus Christ is enough will help us counter the script that suggests we find meaning through the creed I consume, therefore I am.

1. "Brands: The Opiate of the Non-Religious Masses?" Ron Shachar, Tülin Erdem, Keisha M. Cutright, Gavan J. Fitzsimons, Marketing Science, articles in advance, Sept. 24, 2010. DOI: 10.1287/mksc.1100.0591
2. Gavan J. Fitzsimons; R. David Thomas Professor of Marketing and Psychology; F.M. Kirby Research Fellow; Duke University
3. http://www.dukenews.duke.edu/2010/09/brandreligion.html

Chris Folmsbee

Below are nine considerations youth workers might employ to provide a more family-oriented approach to youth ministry.

1. See the bigger picture and start younger. A more family-oriented ministry cannot happen unless we work hard to start when our youth are children. This requires youth workers to have a broader perspective and definition of youth ministry and to be intentional about creating harmony with the church’s work with children.

2. Develop and commit to a theology of formation. A youth ministry that does not have a theology of formation often lacks the ability to see how others in the church might help them guide students into spiritual formation for the mission of God. I'm not referring to a programming structure as much as I am a pathway for developing teens and families toward becoming more like Jesus. Your programs can help this, but they can't do this. You need a theology of formation to guide your efforts.

3. Understand family systems. Every youth worker does not need a degree in sociology or psychology. However, every youth worker does need to seek out and develop a working knowledge of how healthy families function and then help other families embrace those traits.

4. Lead by listening. Listen well. How aware are you of the various needs your families have? There will be many, and they will be unique, and you may need to ask.

5. Resource families with tools and practices. One of the easiest yet most helpful things you can do is provide tools and practices for families to use to engage spiritual formation. For example, my family has a prayer cube that we use before each meal. It was given to me by my youth pastor years ago.

6. Schedule fewer events/services and encourage the families in your faith community to use the extra time for family gatherings. You may want to offer suggestions for families of ways to use their time. My experience has been that families want to do this but don't know what to do to engage all their children, who may be at various age levels.

7. Develop a team of parents who represent various families from various backgrounds. Let families speak into your ministry. This will help ensure that you are engaging families right where they are. This is hard to do for many reasons, one of which is age. If you are a younger, less experienced youth worker, you may want to delegate the leadership and coordination of this team to a more mature staff person or volunteer while you sit back and learn.

8. Create opportunities for the youth and families to experience the youth ministry together. This does not have to be elaborate or even often. However, your effort and willingness to do this will most likely be viewed by parents as helpful. Most will be grateful.

9. If you have a family yourself, lead your own family well, and others will learn from you. I know too many youth workers whose families come after the youth ministry. That sucks. Lead your family well and model family formation, and you will help others do the same.

Watch for Barefoot’s new Parent Journey series, the first component of which is scheduled to release spring 2011!

Jim Hampton

There has been a move in youth ministry toward becoming more “family oriented,” which I celebrate. This move has been made because of the simple reality that parents are intended to be the primary spiritual caregivers for their children. Yet, as I talk with youth workers around the United States, I am still seeing a lot of youth ministries that, for whatever reason, tend to ignore parents or, at best, send them an occasional newsletter to keep them in the communication loop.

If we want to really make a difference in the lives of teenagers, we have to reorient our ministries to allow parents to become participants in youth ministray rather than just observers. Here are three suggestions for how youth ministry can become more family oriented.

1. Involve parents. I know it seems simplistic, but it’s just not happening. As Mark Senter points out his in his excellent book, When God Shows Up: A History of Protestant Youth Ministry in America, youth ministry approaches are often regionalized. And in my extensive travels, I’ve found that there does seem to be a lack of real family-oriented youth ministry in certain areas of the United States.

Part of the problem is that youth workers have developed the sense that, because they are the trained professionals, they are the ones who will make the biggest impacts in the lives of teenagers. That is a falsehood! Every study over the last 50 years shows that parents are still the number-one influences in their kids’ lives. Why would we then attempt to divorce our students from the very people who have the opportunity to most influence them for the gospel?

Find ways to involve parents in the youth ministry.

(While I am talking primarily about Christian parents, I think it is also important for us to reach out to non-Christian parents and find ways they can contribute to the youth ministry. This will expose them not only to what the ministry is doing for their children but also to Christian adults who can speak into their lives in profound ways.)

2. Resource parents. There is no tougher job in the world than parenting, especially when teenagers are in the household. We in youth ministry have been trained to understand developmental issues, spiritual formation of adolescents, family systems and counseling, and many other areas that assist us in our ministry to youth. But think about what types of training parents receive. Most have none, other than replicating the way their parents raised them.

The church should be a place that seeks to bring together parents of adolescents in order to resource, encourage, and challenge them in their sacred task of parenting. Consider how you could implement some of the following ideas:

• Bring in an expert on parent/teen communication for a weekend seminar.
• Create a 13-week Sunday school class for parents of teenagers focused on helping them understand the culture in which their teens are engaged.
• Develop a support group where parents can support, encourage, and pray for one another.
• Develop a parents’ council to help give guidance and support to the work of the youth ministry.

3. Celebrate Parents. The reality is that many parents feel they do a bad job of parenting and are regularly disappointed in themselves. If the church could find a way to celebrate their roles in the lives of their teenagers, this would not only affirm them but help them better understand the real impact they can have on their children.

Find ways to celebrate with parents the major milestones of their parenting lives. While these milestones are often celebrated with family, the church tends to be absent in these times. Parents earnestly desire to know that they are doing a good job and that others recognize it.

Here are some potential ideas to help with this:

• Many youth groups have a special ceremony to welcome new sixth or seventh graders into the youth group. In addition, consider having a special ceremony for the parents of those teenagers as a way of reminding them of how significant they will be during their kids’ teenage years.
• When teenagers make significant faith decisions, send letters to their parents, thanking them for their faithful lives and their desire to see their children grow in Christ.
• During confirmation (as part of both an opening and closing celebration), find ways to involve parents, celebrating their part in getting their children to this point.
• At a graduation banquet, allow the teenagers to give thanks to their parents for helping them navigate their teenage years.

If we can learn to really engage parents in sharing the faith formation of their teenagers, then we will really have succeeded in our jobs as youth workers.

Andy Root

It’s been a few decades now since youth ministry started adding “family” to its title. I’ve never done any real research on this, but my hunch is that this add-on came from the academy. The addition of family to make it youth and family ministry came nestled within the same unfolding of youth ministry programs in colleges and seminaries.

Now, this is good. I think youth ministry professors and researchers looked deeply at the research in the social sciences and saw clearly how important family is to adolescents, that family was the major element in so many outcomes—whether faith commitment, education performance, or avoidance of risky behaviors. And it was clear that most of youth ministry on the ground had not taken enough account of the family. In many ways, one could argue that youth ministry ignored the family and wanted very little to do with it.

Para-church youth ministries—the para-church ministries that set the terms for so much of twentieth-century youth ministry—almost always functioned outside of contact with the family. Adolescents seemed, at least socially, to be living in government institutions (like the high school) and the peer groups formed in these institutions. Being a teenager seemed to be a radical step away from the family, so these para-church ministries did the missional thing: they focused on where young people could be found—outside the home and in the school. And of course it was more than just this because the young people encountered through the para-church had no familial contact with the para-church; the para-church was solely a youth-driven entity. Besides needing a camp signature, parents and families were excluded from this religion-based peer fraternity.

When youth ministry migrated from the para-church to the local congregation, the adolescent-centered, family-excluded perspective migrated with it. Though the congregation was a family-centric reality (besides needing a few volunteers), youth ministry was practiced inside the congregation beyond the family.

So adding family to youth ministry has been a good move. It acknowledges something both ecclesial (that the church is made up of families and is intergenerational) and something anthropological (that young people as full persons are bound within families, forming identity and meaning from within the family).

But here’s the rub. And every one of you who works with families knows this: No matter how much you believe it is important to minister to families, it often feels impossible. One of the reasons the early para-church folks steered clear of the family was because of their read of the culture, and even today (and maybe more so), there are deep cultural changes that make it very, very difficult to work with families. You could actually make an argument that we are living in a post-family era.

Of course, we still have “family,” but families are changing and transitional; from step-families to blended families to kids bouncing from one to another, it’s hard to know what family means to people and to have any family ministry without stepping on a mine somewhere. Family has become more multivalent and porous, making it inappropriate to assume what is and what is not a family. So turning our attention to families is much more difficult than adding family to our job titles.

But the picture I’ve just painted with my historical brush is mostly in youth ministry from the mid-twentieth century on. And that’s usually where we start when we think about the need to get the family back in focus in our congregations. We often think that if we could just get back to the golden era of the 1950s, all would be good. But this is a misconception; I don’t think the church had any better idea of how to do ministry with families in this black-white, sitcom era of high Americana. It seems to me that the church has been treading water on how to do ministry with families not just since the 1950s but since the Victorian age of the early nineteenth century. So to make you depressed, it’s not that the church has been out of touch in doing ministry for the last 60 years but for the last 200.

Why? In the Victorian age of the nineteenth century, the family became what historians call a separate sphere. In other words, for the first time, most people left home daily to go to work, returning from the competitive workforce to find solace in the family. Women were no longer central to the work of the family as an economic reality (as Abigail Adams was in colonial America) but were now in charge of making this private sphere comfortable and safe for working husbands and vulnerable children. So the family became private and separate from the rest of life (you can read more about this historical change in my new book, The Children of Divorce, chapter one).

Very practically, what occurred is that the church was now no longer given voice inside the family—it was private, after all. For most of western history the church spoke directly into the family, especially in the medieval age. The church was the notary (legal representative) of family unions, judging who could marry and merge wealth and land. The church ruled (through marriage as a sacrament) who could be married and who couldn’t and how those marriages should function. Of course, this left open the possibility for a great deal of abuse. But it did mean that the church was involved in the family.

However, since the Victorian age, the pastor needs to be careful not to cross boundaries and will be told—when she/he speaks too much about parenting—to mind her/his own business. Because now the family is no longer the church’s business, it is no longer public—though it had been for centuries.

And this is what makes adding the family to youth ministry much easier said than done. It’s difficult for us to know how to do family ministry when, for most people, what happens in their families is their own business, and nobody (particularly you young, gel-haired youth workers) has a place to tell me what my kid needs and how I should parent her.

I’m tempted to stop here and let the depression just spill over you—for after all, this is a really difficult situation we find ourselves in; family ministry is very hard. But maybe that’s where we should start—by communicating to parents that we know what they wrestle with every day; that parenting their children is really hard; that confusion and fear are all around them. And with the family being private, parents can often feel stuck and fearful about how to express the difficulty and confusion parenting can bring.

So maybe the way we break through the tall walls of the private sphere of the family is not by providing advice and counsel but forums for parents of young and old children to express their fear and confusion. Maybe the work of the church in our time is not to have the moral high ground to “fix” family problems but to provide spaces for parents to connect with each other and share their stories and, through their stories, open up themselves and their families to each other.

Good luck, because I think family ministry is darn tough!

Respond to this statement: The church has become consumeristic.

Steve Argue

Youth Ministries need warning labels. I’m serious. And these warning labels shouldn’t be like the auctioneer speed-talking heard at the end of cholesterol-reducing commercials that promise that you can eat ribs and still lose weight, or the fine print on leasing the car of your dreams that you can’t afford. It should be right in the middle, in plain sight for everyone to see and understand that the gospel we’re attempting to live into will mess everyone up.

For parents… Warning: Sending your child to youth group has the potential of derailing your family’s priorities and will challenge you to articulate your own faith to your kids.

For youth workers… Warning: Serving in this ministry is essential for your own spiritual formation. You need these students as much as they need you. Doubt, insecurity, struggle, and pain will disorganize your neat life should you dare to enter in.

For students… Warning: If you participate in this youth group, we’ll show how far the rabbit hole goes.

We have a problem, however. Youth ministries need people to legitimize their existence. As a result, most of our recruiting toward students rides on sound bites of “fun.” Most of our communication with parents comes out of spin-doctor techniques that seek to impress parents in order to pay for our retreats and, let’s be honest, our salaries. Most of our recruiting for youth worker volunteers markets to support-a-child techniques, where “If you just give five hours a week to this child, he will worship you, leave her life of crime, and not end up in hell.” And if you think I’m exaggerating about any of these points, check out the product tables at most youth ministry conferences.

Now, I recognize that the issues I’m pointing out have, in some way, been perpetuated by my own ministry practices. So I’m calling all youth ministry types to own the problem with me. How have we, likely through good intentions, perpetuated a consumeristic culture within our churches and youth ministries?

Is it possible that ministry has conditioned students, parents, families, adults to church shop and use Priceline.com techniques to find the best returns on their giving dollars? Again, if you think this a generalization, simply look at the work of Christian Smith (Souls in Transition) or Tim Clydesdale (The First Year Out) and recognize that most religiously oriented young people who have gone through their adolescent years have adapted an American form of religion that is fueled by consumerism, self-fulfillment, and individualism. It’s a hard question to ask, but could this be the fruit of our labor?

The response to this question isn’t regressing to just preaching the Bible, or talking more about sin and hell. But it isn’t blindly repeating what we’re doing either. Rather, I’ve been inspired by the works of James Fowler and Sharon Daloz Parks to recognize that faith isn’t merely something we possess, get, acquire, gain/lose, or consume.

Faith is something we do. It is something that is dynamically changing as each person learns to navigate her/his connection with self, others, life, and God. It calls for all to be invited to participate within a community where everyone faiths together. One must make time. Value it above other things. Be willing to grow, even to change. All of these are the antithesis of consumerism.

Warning labels must also be placed all over the church too.

Podcasts… Warning: Thanks for listening to our messages, but it’s only part of the narrative our community proclaims. Only listening to this (without action on your part) will produce spiritual malnutrition.

Pews… Warning: If you sit here, you will likely be moved down one seat, across the world, or toward someone you don’t know or like.

As Annie Dillard puts it, “It is madness to wear ladies' straw hats and velvet hats to church; we should all be wearing crash helmets. Ushers should issue life preservers and signal flares; they should lash us to our pews” (An Expedition to the Pole).

Straw hats, flip flops, lattes, smart phones, retreat commercials, volunteer guilt trips, fun, convenient downloads. These are not bad things in and of themselves. But might they be symbolic for a consumer-laden faith we’re passing on? If so, what are we willing to do about it?

Maybe we have to reintroduce warning labels to stem consumeristic hegemony in our faith communities. Have more? Please share…

Lilly Lewin

Ya think? Our culture encourages us to buy, not to borrow. We are encouraged to buy our own rather than sharing something with others. We are encouraged to buy extra because we might run out.

We are trained to consider ourselves and our needs before the needs of others, unless the others happen to be on the other side of the world in a global crisis. Thus, we miss loving our neighbor next door or around the block, and we miss sharing our abundance or receiving the generosity of others.

How quickly we in church land get caught up in the mentality of the mall. We get caught up in spend and consume rather than the basics of the kingdom. Jesus invites us into a different kind of world, where the last shall be first and the least will be greatest. Jesus, and later Paul, invites us to get rid of the stuff that so easily weighs us down. Yet we’ve all seen it, and many of us have gotten sucked into the vortex of money=power=success, or bigger is better.

Bigger churches mean more givers and having bigger youth ministries. Bottoms in chairs equals success and might even get you a raise. In American church land we’ve been encouraged to consume—to find the best teaching, the best music, the best children’s ministry. As a youth pastor the first question I’m asked is, “How big is your group?” rather than, “How solid are your kids in serving the poor?” or, “How are your kids’ prayer lives?” We all know that’s not what God looks at. He doesn’t look at the outward appearance but at the heart. God’s kingdom invites us to give, serve, love, be thankful. And when we serve the least of these, we are actually serving him.

How did everything get to be about the Benjamins? How did church become about money, getting people to give more to the building fund, or even to missions, but not necessarily giving of themselves? We don’t want to actually get our hands dirty. Going downtown is too dangerous. These are excuses we’ve all heard.

In consumer land, we are successful if we have lots of stuff. And so it is in church. In church land we are honored for having more stuff, or if our church parking lots are filled with nice cars and SUVs. The people on the board tend to be the upwardly mobile and part of “the buck stops here” crowd. And just look at many of our church buildings. They have become bigger and better and filled with more choices, from Starbucks or fair-trade coffee and food courts, to WiFi and gyms; some churches are mini malls of activity. In consumer land, we’ve come to expect the best, so we expect our churches to be polished and to provide us with the coolest experiences possible. We expect world-class music, whether it’s from a choir or band. And shouldn’t our band sound at least as good as Crowder? Sadly, this all leads to performances rather than worship, but that’s another post.

We’ve created and become gourmet Christians. We choose churches based on our favorite flavors and our current appetites. We are used to choices in every other area, so when it comes to going to church, we can choose to worship on Saturday night at the mega church up the street because they have the best worship band; we can go to the fill-in-the-blank church on Sunday morning because their pastor is the best Bible teacher; and head off to the local Episcopal church on Sunday night to experience a Taizé or U2 Eucharist service. And we might add a small-group Bible study on Wednesday night because we need more food and fellowship.

As gourmets, we enjoy the flavors of the moment, but then we see only the great meal provided and miss out on the messiness of the preparation and cleanup that are the real life of a church community. As gourmets we don’t necessarily have to commit; we just consume.

Do we need more things? Do we need more to buy? Really? Why is it that selling everything and giving it to the poor seems like a nice idea but way too hard in 2010? Did Jesus really mean it? And as I pack to move, I sure have a lot of coats. What about that “have two coats, give one away” verse?

In consuming too much, we lose sight of being grateful and content with what we already have. We need more things to make us feel safe, current, relevant, and cool. I’m guilty. I like my iPhone a lot. I like to shop at the Gap over Goodwill. I wasn’t trained or encouraged to live simply. I battle having expensive taste with the knowledge that so many have very little. Compared to Warren Buffet, I’m nothing, but compared to 99.9% of the rest of the world, I’m a millionaire.

I admit that I need help. We all need help to get out of consumer land. Can we help ourselves and our church communities get into living in the kingdom? What if we thought smaller rather than bigger, better? What if we started with loving our neighbors next door and sharing our stuff with them—like the lawnmower or a ladder or even a vacuum cleaner? Could we borrow rather than buy the things we need? Especially items we only use once or twice a year? Could we adopt a family all year long, not just at Christmas? What if we started a thankful list, writing down things we’re grateful for and at the end of the week take time to read them all out loud, either on our own or as a family?

What if we encouraged each other to stay in the homes we have, rather than upgrading to larger ones, in order to help someone else who doesn’t have a home or who needs help with home improvements and cannot afford them? We can all spend less, serve more, and be grateful for what we do have, even the small things, and even if it’s not as great as the guys next door.

Brooklyn Lindsey

There seems to be a lot being said on the consumeristic nature of the church. I read a lot about being less consumeristic, both as an individual and as a church. I hear the more recent call of David Platt, Shane Claiborne, Zach Hunter, and others. I can’t shake the life and message that Mother Teresa gave to us. They all say in different words that our love for God should be manifested in how we respond to the “other” in our lives. Then there’s Jesus, the most compelling voice for us to turn away from the tendency to be consumerist and to love sacrificially.

But I work in a church, and I attend churches every week (including my own) where our goal is to provide comfort. It’s not included in our mission and vision, but it’s inherent in our conversations. We don’t want parking to be bothersome. We can’t have too many bodies in the hallway. We need to call the paper we hold a worship folder (not a bulletin). Our series need to appeal to our audience. The website should have a certain level of immediacy and up-to-date graphic design.

We do these things so people can be connected to the hope found in Christ—and I’d say that most of these things are good. At the same time, we tend a culture where if someone isn’t happy, they simply find a church that makes them happy. I struggle with this. I have struggled in churches, and I’ve left them. I am the consumer culture, and I’m a pastor.

I have more questions than answers. I don’t know how to have meaningful conversations about this, conversations that yield change. I would say that I love to speak justice language, as long as it means I can still have an iPhone, iPod, and YouVersion Bible. As long as we can still have passion-like worship services, AC, and coffee in the foyer. This is me being honest.

Can you tell I’m confused?

My husband and I did our internships in a large Nazarene church in Campinas, Brazil. It was an experience I’ll never forget. Over a thousand people gathered each Sunday. It was a large building with good pastors and good people helping out. But the thing that spoke to me most was how they shared the gospel without a parking lot. They didn’t purchase surrounding buildings to be able to tear them down and create space for cars. They simply expected that the church—if it’s truly the church—would find a way to worship regardless of the amount of land they could acquire. It spoke to this heart, just beginning in ministry, and I’ve wrestled with it ever since.

Nearly three years ago, Pastor Craig Groeschel posted a blog in a series on the future of the church, titled More Missional, Less Consumeristic.

He states, You might ask, “What is a Consumer-Christian?” In our church, it is the person who “church shops” for a church that meets his needs. Church is all about them. When the church doesn’t work for them anymore, they shop for another one.

He later goes on to share what the church will be like (or should be like): The future church will be made up of believers who:
• Are sick of living in material comfort while millions starve to death.
• Make money to give more than to consume.
• Believe in the power of prayer and fasting.
• Are willing to suffer for the cause of Christ.
• Will be engaged in missions both locally and internationally.
• See it as their role to lead people to Christ.
• See it as their role to help people in need.

I read things like this knowing that other cases are being made every day to be a kingdom church, not a “me” church.

I want to respond to this “future church” and say with my whole heart that I am a part of it. It’s just taking me some time to figure out how that can happen.

There isn’t much closure for me here. This sacrificial and others-minded life grows up as we walk with Christ, and it infuses purpose in the here and now, even if my current here and now seems a little bit far from the future I hope for. But isn’t that the very essence of our walk with Christ?

Christians should be known for their ability to become. We should be known for the ability to assess our situation in the light of Christ and respond.

Maybe not having an answer is a good answer as long as we are obeying the call of Christ that’s spoken through the Word of God, reinforced in the light of tradition, shared in the body of Christ as we celebrate and pray and reason together with the intellect that God has given to us all. And there’s even room for God to come in and speak to us unexpectedly, to illuminate our understanding with his Holy Spirit. Wow, thank God for the help we have!

The church is consumeristic. But we are also forgiven, growing, becoming, and being sent every day to change and respond to God in our world. Little steps are good steps. Big steps are good steps. Responding to Christ with total abandonment is good. Regardless of where we are, God is there with us, helping us and giving us peace when we don’t have answers.

Lord, I cry out to you as a young pastor who knows little of what you want for the church. My prayer is that you would help us be a church that loves, that will continue to serve those who are far from you as well as those who walk close to you. Help us grow in our knowledge of who you are so we can better understand who we are. Forgive us when our consumer hearts consume us. Replace those desires with your desires and we’ll respond in your strength. Help us think of others in our language, in the use of our time, in our planning, in our spending, and in our giving. We want to be transformed.

Suggested Reading: Freedom of Simplicity (Richard Foster)

What are healthy and unhealthy ways the church is responding to culture?

Danny Kwon

In considering the church’s response to culture, I am reminded about how those not directly related to our youth ministry at our particular church respond to our students and our youth ministry. Since our particular church is relatively conservative in its theology and ecclesiology, there are those who find the way the students dress, talk, and even worship as strange, disrespectful, and even downright wrong in comparison to their views of what church should be. At the same time, there are those who try to understand the way the students dress, talk, and worship. Moreover, in trying to understand them, they are building a bridge for greater relationships and mutual respect and learning.

Considering this latter group of people in our church makes me wonder why they are trying to understand and dialogue with the students in our church. Similarly, it somehow reminds me that contextualization is one key and vital element to how the church can respond either in a healthy or unhealthy way to culture. One well-known pastor put it this way: “To over-contextualize to a new generation means you can make an idol out of their culture, but to under-contextualize to a new generation means you can make an idol out of the culture you come from.” Let’s unpack this a bit.

If we under-contextualize culture and don’t begin to make the church’s message relevant, then the church’s message will become just that…irrelevant. This is something youth ministry does well, and I am still a proponent of the foundations of relational ministry because relational ministry seeks to understand the context of our students, have empathy for them, and build relationships so that in God’s time, the gospel would impact their hearts.

Similarly, as I recently returned from a mission trip to Haiti last week, I realized another way that the message of the church can contextualize with a new culture of believers. In serving with young adults and students, we considered the idea of tithing, and while I still hold to this biblical teaching, I felt it was worth considering their questions of what place the tithing of time and talents has within this teaching. Similarly, this younger generation of believers asked whether spending a week in Haiti serving the Lord while sacrificing vacation time and a week’s salary is not a form of tithing. New generations of believers are going to ask and seek biblically centered questions and answers, and the church needs to consider and be able to contextualize them.

On the other hand, if the church contextualizes too much, the ministry and message of the church can get lost in that, and subsequently, we will not be confronting or calling people to the message of the church. And most importantly, that will make the church’s message irrelevant also.

I have certainly seen a shift in how youth ministries are functioning. The days of games, fun, and even just hanging out with students are now intentionally focused to be more than just a way to contextualize the students’ lives. Rather, youth ministries complement these activities with a more intentional focus that is ultimately headed toward a deeper spiritual and biblical center.

Hence, not lost upon us is that the church is ultimately the gathering of Christ’s people and not just a gathering. Moreover, if the church is not in the service and love of others to eventually call people into a loving relationship with our Christ, then exactly what is the function of the church? The church, in its attempts to contextualize, must never lose the core of its message.

Ultimately then, I am reminded of another quote from the pastor I quoted above. He notes that “the gospel makes you humble enough to listen and adapt to non-believers but confident and happy enough that you don’t need their approval.” Hence, if the church is to be healthy in responding to culture, we must contextualize but not lose the message of the church.

Mike King

This is a critical question. I could easily use all my words just to scratch the surface of the complexity involved with trying to define the meaning of culture. For example, in the book Culture: A Critical Review of Concepts and Definitions, by Kroeber and Kluckhohn, the authors flesh out more than 150 definitions of culture. On the other hand, poet T.S. Eliot, who wrote a book entitled Notes Towards a Definition of Culture, stated that culture could be described simply as “that which makes life worth living.”

The issue of what posture to take toward culture (even the posture toward defining culture) has been one of the most dominant and important conversations of the church for 2,000 years and will be for the next 2,000 years. How the church throughout history has defined and reacted to culture (in whatever particular context it finds herself in) has significantly determined the course of history in both healthy and unhealthy ways. Tragic periods of church history involving inquisitions, pogroms, and political abuse were linked to cultural ideals. Beautiful periods of church history involving the creation of art, architectural advancement, and care for the sick, poor, and marginalized were fueled by the church’s posture toward cultural engagement.

Often, the desire to “change the world” has fueled unhealthy behavior from Christians through attempts to gain political influence and efforts to “redeem” the culture. James Hunter, the Labrosse-Levinson distinguished professor of religion, culture, and social theory at the University of Virginia and executive director of the Institute for Advanced Studies in Culture, has a new book called To Change the World: The Irony, Tragedy, & Possibility of Christianity in the Late Modern World. In the book, Hunter critiques all the misguided attempts that Christians and churches engage in to change the world. According to Hunter, the various strategies to impact culture and ultimately change the world are driven by tragically ill-conceived concepts of culture and cultural influence. Hunter examines the political, sociological, and theological paradigms of the Christian right and left, along with the Anabaptist approach of Hauerwas and Yoder, showing them all to fall far short of anything resembling broad culture-changing realities.

Andy Crouch, senior editor of Christianity Today and author of the book Culture Making: Recovering Our Creative Calling, recently reviewed Hunter’s book. Crouch writes, “Christianity in America, as Hunter sees it, is very much on the periphery, for all its numerical strength. Its institutions, such as they are, tend to be weak, they tend not to be in culturally central locations, and they tend to address the "lower and peripheral areas" of culture—secondary education rather than university research, popular culture rather than high art, ministries of mercy rather than public policy. At their worst they glory in their marginal status, feeding a subculture that churns out substandard cultural products for consumption by other Christians, simultaneously the most energetic and the least effective culture-makers you could imagine.”

I have spent years (literally—years), I mean in real time—years, talking about church and culture and gospel, and yet I still find the question this week perplexing and challenging. Even though some declare that I have a good intuitive understanding of how to engage culture, I will acknowledge that this question is so important that I must adamantly admit that I don’t have an answer. But I’m committed, as all youth workers should be, to immersing myself in deep theological, sociological, economic, and political reflection and dialogue about what it means to engage meaningfully with and in culture. This conversation is so important for discovering what T.S. Eliot describes as “that which makes life worth living.”

Promoting To Change the World on James Hunter’s website is this paragraph: “What is really needed is a different paradigm of Christian engagement with the world, one that Hunter calls ‘faithful presence’—an ideal of Christian practice that is not only individual but institutional; a model that plays out not only in all relationships but in our work and all spheres of social life. He offers real-life examples, large and small, of what can be accomplished through the practice of ‘faithful presence.’”

Crouch declares that this important work by James Hunter will “be provoking better Christian conversations about culture for years to come.” I hope this is true because—God help us—we need more healthy conversations and behavior vis-à-vis the relationship between church and culture.

Andy Root

This has dogged youth ministry and youth-ministry-type people for a while. Those of us who work with people who seem obsessed with their own and/or popular cultures (if there is a difference) have often struggled to figure out how we should engage culture. After all, it seems that young people and culture are inseparable. And I think in many ways this is true. I think young people are obsessively bound in culture—but no more than their parents; no more than anyone.

To be human is to be a cultural animal. There is little to no escaping it. Of course, this anthropological reality heightens the stakes when it comes to ministry because, though we can’t escape some kind of culture, we do possess (as human beings) the ability, while stuck in culture, to reflect on it. Therefore, we can aesthetically and morally judge it. We are bound to culture, but even in our boundness, we can resist and disdain much of it.

So as Americans, we are stuck in a culture of reality TV, low-cut jeans, a fetish for youthfulness, and a dogmatic passion that anyone can make anything of himself. You may not understand much of this, or you may find it banal or evil, but those are the cultural waters in which we all swim, even in resistance. Even in resisting consumption culture, we have to buy a whole lot of crap to get off the grid and live green.

So how should we respond to culture? We can begin by recognizing that we can never escape it! Many young and hip evangelical Christians have helpfully realized this, stopping the conservative Protestant game of beating culture like a piñata, only to realize that it’s made of steel. So instead, these young and hip evangelicals have turned from culture bashing to culture constructing. I guess this is a good move…I’m just not sure how it happens and how it escapes just Veggie-Taling everything, giving popular culture some kind of Christian morality or aesthetic. I know, I know, that’s not the cultural construction they’re pushing for, and I know that Christianity has been a force for culture creation. Believe me, I’ve heard of Abraham Kuyper and how this theologian changed culture by engaging it theologically.

But I guess this is the problem. Such a perspective of culture building often has an innate theology that contends that God’s action in the world happens through the unfolding of cultural realities; that the will of God is found in culture. So now you have these young thinkers looking for all sorts of Christian themes in movies, video games, and music. So because God acts through the unfolding of culture, we are stuck trying to find God’s action in episodes of The Hills or Coen brother movies. It starts to feel weird to me.

But more than weird, it has a theological problem. I, in contrast, to Kuyper (and the neo-unaware-Kuyperians), don’t think that revelation happens as a cultural construction. I don’t think God is somehow inertly pushed into our context through the waves of culture or societal structure. I think the God of Israel breaks into our world, thrusting our cultural conceptions of God into question, showing us how culture always makes idols. I, in a more Barthian flavor, don’t think culture can ever hold the act of God; I don’t think we can look at cultural creations to reveal the otherness of the action of God.

Okay, but I guess then, game over, no reason to care about culture (this perception is often people’s disdain for Barth), and if that’s true, doesn’t it make all the crap I just said about the anthropological necessity of culture inconsistent? I don’t think so. We are cultural beings, no escaping it, and we use culture to make meaning and form identity, but simply Christianizing it isn’t going to do any good. A Christian culture (like those pre-WWI and WWII in Europe) doesn’t guarantee that we will participate in the action of God, just that we’ll make God into an idol to justify our culture (hence, the whole problem with Christendom).

So maybe the way we engage culture is not to try necessarily to create it or enfold within it a Christian story/message but to listen deeply to it, to crawl next to it so fully that we can hear its deep cries for meaning, its deep longings and despairing questions. I actually think we should engage culture—not necessarily to find God but to find our neighbor—to see, hear, and act for her (and yes, there is a little Tillichian flavor to my Barthian read). In doing this we close the circle. When we engage culture to encounter the humanity of our neighbors, we are drawn into places where God’s revelation does meet us—in encounters with humanity of the other.

So this gives us both a constructive and critical way to engage culture. Where cultural constructions open us up to otherness, we shouldn’t label these as revelations but as helpful ways of seeking God by seeing the humanity of our neighbors (where the revelation of God is found). But where cultural constructions stereotype, abuse, and objectify (like the way porn is becoming pop culture), we should resist it. This takes deep cultural engagement that respects the creator of the cultural text—it forces us to try to understand what the songwriter, director, etc., is trying to communicate, not just baptize it with some trite Christian meaning.

So the revelation of God is not bound in culture but next to my neighbor, and at times the cultural construction or text (songs, movies, video games) can help me see my neighbor. When it does, it has become a gift.

How should we view and interact with media (especially social media)?

Lilly Lewin

I’m in the process of moving and cleaning out old files. I found some old youth group newsletters from the late 90s, run off on bright-neon paper.

Back in the dark ages—just 10 years ago—every month, I took the time to write, copy, fold, address, and stamp an actual letter with all the dates, times, and encouragements that I hoped would be read and posted on the fridge door. That seems so ancient now that we can text an event or word of encouragement in an instant! An upgrade from the printed newsletter, the email newsletter is now just great for parents, but as you know, way too old school for most of our students.

Most students I know don’t even check their regular email unless they are required to for school or a particular class. They use Facebook and IM, but most of all, they text. Thanks to being in youth ministry for a long time, I’ve actually been on Facebook longer than my teenage sons. It’s a little scary to be friends with some of their friends, but I believe that social media—with good boundaries—is really the way we can best communicate with our students because that's where our students really live. We have to be good at communicating in their world and understand how they receive information, not expecting them to relate to our world even if it’s not much older than their own. And we need to be able to use and understand these tools as well as they do!

Sadly, this isn’t the case for some in ministry. They are still fighting the Internet is of the devil battle and are thus losing the ability to just keep in touch and build relationships with their students, much less help students connect with God.

A couple of years ago, I spoke with a youth worker from North Carolina who was banned from Facebook because her church leadership felt it was not a godly form of communication. She wasn’t even supposed to have her own Facebook page, much less use online communication of any kind for her students. I asked her what they were so afraid of and realized they were burying their heads in the sand, avoiding and/or denying the major cultural shift that has taken place in the last few years.

While I’m not a big fan of how much time we all can spend getting sucked into vortex of the Internet, especially Facebook, I do know that in order to communicate in a relevant way, these are the tools we need to use because, whether we like it or not, Facebook and the cell phone are how students connect, and if I’m honest, it’s more likely to be by phone through texting than even on the computer.

I decided to do a little research among my youth ministry Facebook friends and see how they’re using Facebook, etc., to communicate with their students. Here’s a sample of what they said:

Patty Kernstock, Lutheran youth pastor, writes:

I use both texting and fb. I have a giant whiteboard in my office telling me who has what (because not all kids have either or both)! I find fb very effective, particularly in a large congregation, for last-minute events, where things have to be publish ready really early in the week. Example: We did a laser tag day (nothing says Christian fellowship like let’s run around in the dark, shooting each other!), and I got 2 students from the bulletin and 23 from the fb announcement. We don’t have a youth page, per se, but I do have one for our students doing a particular trip.

Jim Holland, youth pastor in New Orleans, writes:

We have a Facebook page and create events using FB. It connects with about 70% of the active teens. We also use a mass text system (http://www.txtsignal.com) to broadcast important information for our events. But that only works if they sign up for it. Teens don't read email at all anymore. We can send out messages to all members through FB as well. We do not encourage anyone to sign up for FB. But since teens are using it and are going to use it then I'm not going to ignore it out of principle. It's a way for us to connect. But, I expect parents of church kids to know what their kids are doing on the Internet (thus help them to protect their personal information and be aware of predators).

Like Jim, I believe it’s our job as leaders to help our students learn to use the Internet and their cell phones in responsible ways. We need to help them see the power of these communication tools and how this power can be used for good or can be abused. We can also help them see the differences between online communication and real, face-to-face relationships. We can and we need to help students learn to communicate and build real friendships, not just Facebook ones; and help them understand the importance of community in real time, not just in the virtual.

And don’t forget all the great ways we can use the tools online and on the phone to help them connect with Jesus in a new way too…like my student who texts me and 60+ friends a Bible verse and thought each day, or my friend who texts “I’m praying” to all his students at a specific time each day.

Also, check out some of my favorite websites, just to name a few:

Sacred Space

Sacred Gateway

Bible Gateway

ReJesus

24-7 Prayer

Danny Kwon

I would not say that I am a novice when it comes to social media, but in no way am I an expert either. However, as a person who wants to be a continual learner about the effective uses of social media, I believe I can offer some voice about social media and its uses for ministry. From this perspective, I also hope that I can speak to those people who are less sophisticated about the uses of social media, as well as those who are more sophisticated, and perhaps give them more of a layperson’s point of view so they can have compassion and sympathy for us plebeians. So, here is my take on social media.

For starters, most are probably familiar with the term social media but may need some help coming up with a precise definition. I have to admit I had to go online to find a definition. From Wikipedia, I found this: “Social media is a term used to describe the type of media that is based on conversation and interaction between people online.”

Second, as part of an older church that is more conservative in its theology, I often have interactions with folks who think various things are sinful or inappropriate for church use. One of my favorite verses is 1 Corinthians 10:31, where Paul says, “Whether you eat or drink or whatever you do, do it all for the glory of God.” As I examine the context and words of Paul, I understand him to be saying that more than what you do, it is about how you do things, for the glory of God. Hence, when parents tell me their children are on the Internet too much (which is probably true) then ask whether they should cut off Internet access at home, I always remind them of the positive uses of the Internet at home (such as for homework!). Essentially, I am telling them that it is not so much the Internet that is the problem but how it is being used. In that same way, as I see social media, I would not say we should view it as evil or good, but we should look at how we can use it, particularly for the glory of God.

This reminds me of something I just read. In the winter 2010 issue of Leadership, there is a quote by Michael Buckingham, who notes that “the Internet isn’t powerful because it connects you to information but because it connects you to other people.” Thinking further back in the history of youth ministry, I remember a thought contrasting relational ministry vs. programming, which noted that programs are just a means to an end. We may take this latter thought for granted now, but there was a time when youth ministry had forgotten that programs were just means to deeper relationships. Ultimately, these are just examples that make me think about social media and how someone like me—stuck between being a novice and expert—can use social media for the glory of God.

Ultimately then, in having used and in continuing to use social media for the glory of God, I really believe it has blessed our youth group in this—connections to people. In other words, in light of Michael Buckingham’s quote above, social media has really helped our youth group connect. About two years ago, I challenged myself and our volunteers to write Facebook posts on at least five students’ pages a day for one year. I don’t know how that may sound to some of you (crazy, stupid, madness), but I can tell that the daily ritual of writing to them was a true means to an end…which led to many deeper responses, deeper conversations, and deeper connections. In other words, Facebook became a way to connect more deeply to students.

Similarly, social media has allowed our group to connect by sharing prayer requests, Scripture, and encouragement with one another through different pages our youth group has made together. Moreover, it has been a good tool to welcome newbies to our group and get out the word about events and activities of our youth group (and to parents too). I know there are so many more uses for it, but even in these ways, social media has been a great tool for our youth group.

Finally, a few quick thoughts deal with some cons of using social media. First, some students (believe it or not) still may not have social media outlets. Thus, you have to consider how you can connect with them. Second, students (and parents) may not be consistent about checking it. Thus, you have to have ways to make sure your social media outlet is connecting with them. Finally—and I have heard this from many students and parents—there are parents and students who check the social media outlet of their youth group, but youth workers are not consistent and committed in their use of it. Hence, if you set it up, make sure to be committed in your use of it so people will have a reliable source of interaction and information.

Paul Sheneman

The timing of this question is appropriate as Facebook's marketing team is reeling from the backlash over privacy concerns. Couple that with the buzz in the blogosphere over a rumored mass exodus of users from the social networking giant, and we are afforded the perfect time to discuss the essence of and engagement with social media.

We should begin by viewing social media as a technology. Blogs, microblogs, vlogs, glogs, forums, video sharing, picture sharing, and wikis are just a few of the social media technologies. As a technology, social media promises to enhance human functions or traits. It specifically seeks to improve human relationships by virtualizing interactions and collaborations. Social media, along with advancements in hardware and wireless communication, breaks down the barriers of time and space, allowing for instant and constant communication between people.

It is easy to observe that social media has delivered on its promised enhancement. Our current adolescent generation is growing up online. They talk about their "social network," which refers to people they know strictly through the Internet (Have you seen that creepy Microsoft® Kin commercial?). They give social gestures such as link, friend, dig, tweet, tag, add, like, and follow in an instant to people all around the world. They upload stories, images, and videos of their life in real time. They can give running commentary on a plethora of activities and events that are happening thousands of miles away from them. As youth workers, the question that follows is, What are our students learning from their use of social media?

Naming the Unreal: The prophets had the difficult task of naming the unreal to those who believed otherwise. For Israel, Amos declared that their religious practices, which were believed to be a sign of faithfulness to God, were actually hollow acts because they did not lead to justice for the oppressed. For our students, we must point out the "unreal" which social media peddles. Specifically, they believe social media produces community, connection, and relationships. However, the unreal is that all interactions produced by social media are disembodied or "virtual community."

The problem with virtual community is that it is not human community. We cannot hope to separate the self from the body and believe that what results is authentic humanity. Our bodies ground us in a specific place and provide us the means of interacting with people. Social media provides us with a technological buffer. It promises interactions with other people, but what we actually get are interactions with technology. Therefore, it provides a way for a person to collaborate with content and interact with objects. It does not provide a human (self and body) encounter with another person.

Practicing the Real: We cannot simply stop at naming the unreal for students, though. We need to move on to experience community as God intended. So we attempt to cultivate practices which open us up to being community. Hospitality, prayer, singing praise to God, keeping Sabbath, and other Christian practices are means by which we learn authentic human relationship.

Extensions of the Real: Though community cannot be realized through social media, I do believe that students can extend Christian practices through social media. They can participate in the virtual community in ways that point to reality.

Three elements to aid our discernment of social media practices are Christian practices, relationality, and contextuality. First, Christian practices inform our imaginations in discerning ways to interact with others. For instance, what implications does keeping Sabbath have on constant tweeting? Second, relationality emphasizes the need for social media practices to have their origin and end in a community. In other words, are our teens sharing stories and images from their days to keep up with friends, or are they trying to "meet" people? Finally, contextuality emphasizes the need to see social media practices, like any practice, as being embedded in God's story. Thus, we should be asking ourselves, Is my social media practice a participation in what God is doing in the world?

Paul is a youth pastor at Grandview Church of the Nazarene and is well versed in technology. He has been involved in youth ministry for 10 years and lives in Kansas City with his wife and their newborn son.

Where is the future of our culture going?

Steve Argue

I’m no futurist. Some are, and I think there’s something valuable about trying to anticipate the future if for no other reason than to step back to critically reflect on our assumptions. Regardless, futurists and non-futurists alike must critically reflect on their assumptions lest they be lulled into autopilot, youth ministry programming (and living) filled with tremendous busyness but little direction. In other words, the future of culture isn’t going anywhere that we don’t send it.

That said, the future is coming, ready or not. Attempts to resist the future or preserve the familiar past are as productive as stopping gravity. We are being propelled into the future, and the horizon is filled with both the beauty and the ugliness we are creating in the present.

Therefore, if we are to critically reflect on our assumptions and if the future is coming (ready or not), maybe adolescents can serve as oracles for the future of culture.

Adolescents as Mirrors
Research from the National Study of Youth and Religion and Fuller Youth Institute (along with others) points toward the idea that adolescents are not the problem in our society/culture but are a reflection of it. Often, criticism of adolescents fixates on how we need to change them, get them back into church, or change their deviant behavior. What if we were to view adolescents as merely reflecting what has been taught and modeled to them from their own cultures? Is it possible that they have adapted pluralism from us; consumerism from us; survival of the fittest from us; or prejudice from us?

The answer points to yes, and this challenges adults to reconsider what needs to change in ourselves before we seek to change adolescents. The future of culture is being written on adolescents’ lives right now, by us. What we see is an unfiltered reflection of us and a preview of where we’re sending it.

Adolescents as Prophets
Detweiler and Taylor’s book, The Matrix of Meanings: Finding God in Pop Culture, offers a helpful thesis that pop culture may be doing a better job of articulating the drama of human existence and therefore, the gospel narrative, than most faith communities. They suggest that the Christian story must be told in a way that connects with a culture asking different questions as it seeks to understand what good news really means.

Adolescents are steeped in pop culture. They live in it, breathe it, create it, respond to it. We can judge whether that is good or bad, or we can discipline ourselves to watch and listen closely to what adolescents are resonating with as they adapt certain styles, listen to a vast array of music, see certain movies multiple times, or how they use their disposable money and time. This is more than trying to be hip and trendy youth workers. It’s about actively seeking to understand what adolescents are saying through the language of pop culture before we dismiss it.

If we do this, we may discover that adolescents are the prophets of our age, pointing to the ways in which the church is connecting or disconnecting gospel with good news. In Matthew 25, Jesus frames the gospel not in theoretical terms but in ways defined by those who long for it (hungry being fed, naked being clothed, homeless being welcomed). Maybe prophetic adolescents are asking through pop culture language, “Does your gospel reach all the way to what is good news for me?” The future of culture for the gospel must express tangible good news. This challenges faith communities to consider whether they are willing to get close enough to neighbor or adolescent for them to understand gospel and good news as synonymous.

Christians/Culture
We cannot look at culture separate from it. The Scriptures are embedded in culture. Faith communities live in culture. All of us, the faithful included, swim in culture. Therefore, when we ask where culture is going, we must assume that we’re going with it. As a result, youth ministry must live with the tension of faithfully embodying the gospel narrative passed onto us while thoughtfully interpreting/improvising what gospel and good news looks like for each future generation and culture(s). This is where adolescents can help us. They are our windows, our mirrors, and our prophets, who help us critically reflect on our own assumptions, helping us remain true to a resurrection-fueled gospel that perpetuates a future of hope over a future of fear. And this is indeed good news for the future of each of our cultural contexts.

Chris Folmsbee

I’m not a futurist. I, like most of the general public, have guesses about the future direction of our culture based on the intuitions I feel when I watch the news, read social media, listen to NPR, chat with strangers or engage in conversations with close family and friends.

Actually, all of that leads me to ask, does anyone really know where culture is going? Here are some uncalculated and unscientific thoughts on where culture is going (or not going).

1.   Cultures will continue to grow more diverse.
Even though some of the large corporations are trying their best to place homogenized entities (Pizza Hut, McDonald’s, Wal-Mart) in every city, there are certain things that make every culture different from the next. For instance, the methods of communication, the pace of life, family structures, religion, environmentalism, biology, plus a plethora of other factors that all contribute to the uniqueness of a particular culture.

This uniqueness adds to the ever increasing diversity of our world. This is especially seen in global youth culture. With the quickening pace of globalization via such avenues as the Internet, youth are able to surf the multitude of options out there to find their niche—even though that niche might be the localized community of a Japanese break-dancing team and that youth might be a Hispanic teenager living in Denver, Colorado. Our world is becoming smaller and smaller and more and more fractioned with each rotation.

2.   There are certain elements of culture that never change.
Every culture has knowledge, language, norms, values, beliefs, social dynamics and status. Yes, these parts might look different from one culture to another, but nevertheless, they are components of every culture. So it seems to me that a historical view reveals culture never straying too far from where it has always been. People will continue to acquire culture, become members of certain cultures and contribute to the whole of their cultures. As Solomon said, there is nothing new under the sun.

3.   There are certain elements of culture that always change.
The specific expressions of cultures change overnight. Music, movies, food, clothes, political leaders, innovations, catastrophic events, war, etc.

So now when Ashton Kutcher has a big weekend, we’ve got it on our phones through Twitter. And that big fundraiser your youth group wants to raise awareness for is only a few clicks away on Facebook. Bands are constantly found and rising to success through MySpace. Pandora widens our musical knowledge. Netflix’s instant watch keeps us entertained at night. And in five years, this same list will house a new host of options.

We have never seen a more rapid change of pace in our culture than there is today, which only seems to imply that culture will continue to evolve and transition as it has been doing since the beginning of time.

4.   Culture is a big word that can take on many angles of thought.
When we use the word culture, we often don’t take time to think about its immensity. Culture is an all-encompassing word that is really used to mean a way of life. Whether simple or complex, the word culture ultimately refers to the way people live. In other words, culture is what people make of the creation that is in front of them. That’s why we need a big definition of the gospel. A small gospel doesn’t reach the masses. We need a simple gospel and a complex gospel, one that accounts and gives credence to the way people live in any one particular culture.

5.   The elements of your culture will most definitely rub off on you.
We become people who are shaped by the cultures in which we live. This is why the make-up of our culture is so important. If we are made to be what others cooperatively make us to be, then we must insist on making our cultures into societies that resemble kingdom living. I realize this isn’t a new way of thinking, but take a moment to think hard about (1) the culture making you, (2) the culture making those around you and (3) your contribution to making the culture resemble kingdom living—a society of salvation and justice, hope and healing and peace and blessing.

So where is culture going? It is going nowhere and everywhere, just like it has done since the beginning. The church needs to be culturally sensitive to the diversities, to the elements that change and don’t change, to the “bigness” of culture and to our contribution to making a culture that produces the kind of people God intended would participate with him in his mission to restore the world to its intended wholeness.

Claire Smith

By now, you’ve probably heard the name Phoebe Prince. USA Today carried an interesting online article that put the case, her suicide, and the issues surrounding it in context. The article is titled “A ‘Watershed’ Case in School Bullying?” It is troubling, to say the least. Fifteen-year-old Phoebe Prince is one too many. Any teenage suicide, particularly one that is the result of the behavior of peers, is one too many. So, it is troubling.

As one reads this article, there are some behaviors of some of her fellow students that emerge. Note that some of these overlap:

·   Name calling.
·   Fear and ostracism of the stranger.
·   Adults’ denial of the potential harm of the students’ behavior.
·   The inability of officials to connect the dots and see beyond their own individual sphere to the larger picture and the good of all.
·   The ubiquitous and relatively anonymous nature of the Internet.
·   The willingness to throw physical objects at another human being.
·   A callous approach to life and lack of remorse.
·   The propensity toward the extreme.
·   Lack of accountability and collective responsibility.
·   Lack of culpability and sense of moral responsibility.
·   The gang/mob mentality.

Does this sound familiar? Are there other places where we have seen this happening recently? Have you heard of these in any other context?

In opposition to this, we hear the words of Scripture as Jesus speaks in Matthew 7:12: “In everything do to others as you would have them do to you; for this is the law and the prophets.” Throughout the Bible, we are encouraged to care for, to look out for the weak, yet in case after case in our time this is not happening enough and happening too late. Think about it: Where would the young people in your student ministry have been in this situation (not where you think they should be)?

The list I put above is too long, but it is real. The behaviors are harmful and destructive, not just to the individuals who die, but also to the unnamed others who are affected by it, including the perpetrators. It is a clear and strong signal that there are fundamental questions that need to be addressed about our self-understanding, our view and value of life, our understanding of community, and the inter-relatedness of the human family and the need for respect, accountability, and humility to admit wrongdoing.

After writing this blog, I came across an article by John E. Mitchell titled “Bullying is Everyone’s Fault,” in which he talks of the intimidation that is prevalent and the need for responsible adult behavior. It’s worth a read.

I firmly believe that the behavior of youth is a mirror of our societies. Youth neither create nor rear themselves. Where is the future of our culture going? Take a look in the mirror at what’s happening with our youth. You tell me.

What is your cultural context?

.slant

Steve Argue

When one thinks of culture, it’s easy to default toward focusing on ethnicity, and though a salient perspective, culture cuts through many storylines, including gender, socio-economic status (SES), language, age, etc. Attempts to understand people in a cultural context are often done with generalizing descriptions (e.g., parents are out of touch; adolescents are having more sex). While such descriptions may raise awareness of potential themes associated with a particular cultural context, generalizable descriptions may also create stereotypes that do violence to the uniqueness and complexity of each individual. All races, all ethnicities, all genders, all adolescents, all youth pastors are not the same, which makes defining cultural contexts complicated.

Anthropologist Clifford Geertz has been helpful to me as I have reflected on my own and others’ contexts. First, he has reminded me that it is impossible for me to describe a cultural context objectively. In other words, I cannot observe something there without bringing the here of my own embedded culture into the experience. Thus, all descriptions have a there/here dynamic to them. This challenges me to reflect on my own assumptions and cultural frames, raising sensitivity for how these affect the way I see the world.

As for me, I am a white, Euro-American, male, married, middle-class, midwestern heterosexual. I have known privilege economically and educationally. I am a child of divorced parents, and I am a brother, a father, a husband, and a friend. These frames shape what I notice, what I miss, and how I interpret both. They help and hurt my ability to understand others.

Geertz has been helpful to me in a second way. His work challenged ethnographers to pursue a thick description of the cultures they chose to represent. A thick description does not merely describe others’ actions but seeks to understand the meanings behind them. Seeking thick descriptions, then, cautions me from making generalizations or judgments on others’ actions based on my perspectives. Instead, it challenges me to understand others as unique individuals who frame their world on their terms, not my limited generalizations.

This has dramatic consequences for the way one does youth ministry. Misunderstanding of the multiple, complicated cultural frames and poor self-reflection of one’s own cultural biases mixed with religion can create a dangerous cocktail of oppression. Often, parents are perceived as the enemy (thus blamed or ignored), and adolescents are seen as unspiritual (and thus coerced and manipulated in Jesus’ name). The youth worker must remember that with any encounter with the other (especially adolescents), he is entering into a cross-cultural experience. She moves from teacher to learner; leader to fellow journeyer; life-changer to the one whose life is changed. The there/here encounter of one to another brings about transformative change in both, allowing the youth worker to be a faithful advocate of adolescents.

And so my cultural context is continually changing as I interact with others. The there/here is perpetually familiar and foreign to me, thus requiring great discipline for me not to default to my unchecked assumptions. As an adult, I’m committed to understanding children and adolescents, resisting the urge to superimpose my adult history, perspectives, and thinking upon their existences. This requires the study of sociological and developmental issues and slowing down long enough to have a conversation with each of them.

As a Euro-American, heterosexual male, I’m committed to being more sensitive to the reality that, as my Taiwanese friend said to me (rightly), “the world was made for me.” Most of what I have accomplished has been supported by social structures that have set me up for success. And so I’m committed to learning more about what it means to resist systemic inequality as I learn from the stories of others’ ethnic, orientation, and gender perspectives.

This is as much of a confession as a commitment. For I know that in the midst of my good intentions, all these cultural perspectives slip off the radar when I get tired, want my way, or when I’m afraid to enter into another’s world. While a blanket confession doesn’t do justice to the people I have failed, I hope it’s a promise to continue to see each person as created in the image of God, worthy of being understood and valued as an individual.

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Danny Kwon

When I consider my cultural context for ministry, my initial and consistent response is that it is youth. In other words, teenagers are my cultural context for ministry. In fact, I have always been a proponent of the idea that by definition, youth ministry is across culture.

Culture is often defined in relation to the values, beliefs, norms, and symbols that are common to a specific group of people. Other aspects in defining culture are the shared qualities that make a group unique, or customs and the way of life of a group of people. Using this definition, one can easily understand that teenagers are a unique culture in themselves.

This was something I realized again recently as I was trying to get a better grasp of the values, beliefs, norms, and symbols of my youth group students. Similarly, even as an 18-year youth worker, I still fall short in completely understanding youth culture. For example, in some recent time with our youth, I thought I was so “hip” in talking about Lady Gaga until I realized that she is not even on the radar for many of them. Similarly, in talking to my students about America’s Best Dance Crew, I realized I was talking about season 3 when they were discussing the most recent season 5.

All this is not to say we need to be experts about youth culture. That is a tall order. Rather, in considering both a missional and missiological perspective, I believe it is important to at least have an empathetic understanding of youth culture and to have a compassion and acceptance of their values, beliefs, norms, and symbols. In doing so, we take a great step forward in loving and ministering to our students by hearing the stories and narratives of our teenagers and letting them find a place of acceptance and connection with ours. And ultimately, in nurturing this connection, we participate in God’s work of connecting God’s story to the stories, narratives, and culture of our teenagers.

While understanding youth as a culture is a most vital aspect in considering my cultural context for ministry, I cannot deny the importance of my cultural context of ministry from an ethnic heritage point of view. Moreover, when one considers cultural context, many people are probably thinking of it in these terms, whether consciously or unconsciously. Ethnicity most often deals with identity with or membership in a particular racial or national group and the observance of that group’s values, beliefs, norms, and symbols. Hence, being the son of immigrants from South Korea and serving in the local church context at a Korean church, the ethnic identity and culture of being Korean is a big part of racial and cultural makeup of many of our youth and adults. This ethnic distinction forms a big part of our culture as a people and church, as well as impacting and affecting our Korean youth group students in distinct and unique ways as far as the issues they deal with.

Ultimately, what is the importance of all this? First, my wife and I always resonate with the words attributed to Martin Luther King Jr, who noted that eleven am on Sunday is the most segregated hour in America. Hence, even at our Korean church—and especially within our youth group comprised of many Korean students—we hope that we would not be just an ethnocentric ministry. This means basically that our Korean ethnic context would not place our ethnic context at the center of our world, thus consciously or subconsciously preventing us from understanding and ministering to people of other cultures. Thus, within our youth group, we are intentional to minister to students from the local community and schools from diverse backgrounds.

For youth ministries and youth workers, I would just ask you to consider this as something to cherish and value. Moreover, if by 2050, according to the U.S. Census Bureau, minorities will be the majority population in America, then being open to people of diverse backgrounds is becoming a necessity. Hence, if you see a person of a different ethnic heritage come to your youth group, be sure to value and endear yourself to the values, beliefs, norms, and symbols that have shaped their narrative and story, both as a teenager and as someone of distinct ethnic heritage. Ultimately, in doing so, we are not just learning about their cultural context but also loving our neighbor and participating in God’s Great Commission. Moreover, we are modeling an eschatological view of God’s kingdom for our students that will hopefully lead to seeing God’s “kingdom come on earth as it is in heaven.”

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Dave Rahn

The question of cultural context is, essentially, a question of awareness. As such, I find it slightly insufficient and generally uninteresting. Why is that?

I suspect it’s because I’ve hung around too many circles where participants unpack cultural context for one another with dispassionate objectivity. They’re like Joe Friday on Dragnet: “Just the facts, ma’am.” It’s an exchange of academic knowledge, too often disconnected from any personal obligation.

But we followers of Jesus at any moment in time are accountable to be faithful to that which God has taught us. So my boredom evaporates when I get the chance to scrutinize those particulars of cultural context that are relevant to my assignment from the Lord.

Years ago I led a Campus Life outreach at a large local high school in Indiana. The school was the only one in the county, the result of a recent consolidation that was pretty controversial for some residents. My ministry was only mildly effective, in part because I was inclined to see my work with and through the 50-60 meeting attendees rather than the 2,000 who attended the school and the thousands of others who were stakeholders in this educational enterprise.

For each of my next three Campus Life assignments, my sense of clarity about what I was called to do drove me increasingly deeper into the cultural contexts of the respective schools. At rural Norwell, I learned to get in touch with how the wider school population lived; these were, after all, the kids I was trying to reach with the love of Christ. Elmhurst was an ethnically diverse blue-collar city high school without much community pride. When I began South Side’s inner city ministry, I encountered more racial and economic division than in any place prior. Each school had kids who needed to know Jesus, and though they were within 25 miles of one another, they each represented extremely different socio-cultural worlds. And I cared about understanding those cultural contexts because I was convinced the Lord wanted me to concentrate my mission efforts at those locations.

As layered and complex as those contexts were (and are), the assignments at least seemed doable. By pounding the neighborhood pavement, hanging out in the parks and fast-food places where kids were drawn, moving through the schools, and getting connected to community activities, businesses, and churches, I could get immersed enough in the local culture to identify with those God had called me to serve.

But the Lord also opened up my eyes and heart to a wider vision, and the leadership range of my life and ministry kept getting bigger. As I took on responsibility for ministry in five counties, I realized that when it came to particular cultural contexts, I had to defer to the expertise of those who were already embedded in their communities. My own relevant questions of culture began to shift in accordance with the scope of leadership to which I was being called.

Nowadays, I hang out at airports and LaQuinta hotels and rental car agencies. My sense of local connectivity and context has never been lower. My wife and I feel the loss of natural community that comes with such a life. But as before, I am trying to understand the cultural context that is most relevant to the assignment I have from the Lord. So I work hard to get to know both the landscape of church and youth ministry in America and the culture of Youth for Christ/USA, the national organization which I help lead.

I know that the Lord’s current call on me is to multiply empowered leaders who are called to lead the charge on behalf of Jesus’ love for lost kids in their own communities. They get to concentrate, to dive deep, and deal in particularities. In my national role, I can offer limited observations about whatever common cultural contexts may exist. Perhaps I can point out general patterns that are helpful or wrangle in public discourse about issues important to our mission. But it is their expertise that needs to be cultivated and unleashed in very specific locales if our evangelistic mission is to be effective.

I sure hope that my contributions make a difference to those distributed leaders and staff I serve because—to my way of thinking—they’re having all the fun.

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