Ok, so I was quoted in the recent book Hipster Christianity as saying these words “Youth Groups Destroy Children’s Lives.” Putting aside the issues I have with the book itself, I admit I was quoted accurately by the book’s author Bret McCracken.  I often use the pedagogical tactic that starts out by saying something provocative and then, after I’ve gotten myself into some trouble, and acquired some people’s attention,  I try to explain myself. It’s a bad rhetorical habit. Nonetheless, it works. This time it seems to have attracted some attention so let me take advantage of it and explain what I meant.
I think youth groups often do things that work against the formation of our youth into life with Christ and His Mission. They also soak up huge time and resources in ways that are a detriment to the community life of the church. I think it would be good for parents seeking churches to think through these issues.

Prototype youth groups are built on the worst of modernist assumptions concerning the way human beings develop as cultural beings. They play into the worse impulses of parents who don’t get what is happening right before their very eyes when their children start to take on the moral formation of the ubiquitous culture at large. (Parents want young hip experts to save their kids – UH THAT DON’T WORK!!). They think the answer is to somehow get their children to a place where the youth culture attracts them and somehow makes Christianity attractive to their age group. All these things, I argue, work against the child growing up into a vital and real relationship with the living God and what He has done in Christ for the world.

I offer the following three comments – all three of which have been said many times by people much smarter than me on these issues. (I now prepare myself for the onslaught of backlash I am sure to get for this post).

1.) YOUTH GROUPS FOSTER PEER ORIENTATION. Youth groups segregate the youth from the adults creating programing geered towards them as a separate culture. This creates a gap between the youth and the adults culturally. This then leads the youth to look to their peers for orientation into life. This I contend works against the discipleship of youth into Christ. I contend this peer orientation is disasterous for the lives of our children.

Of course our culture at large already does this. And our parents generally eat it up. It’s a fact that, due to the economic and cultural changes of modern society, children/teenagers have been segregated in school classrooms, and targeted as a separate niche consumer market by culture industries. As a result, they look increasingly to their peers for a sense of right and wrong, for values, identity, codes of behavior. They have less connection with adults either in or outside immediate family (you need both) as role models for life. This undermines healthy development and  fosters hostile and sexualized youth culture. Children lose their true individuality, become overly conformist, desensitized and alienated. Being “cool” matters more to them than anything else. This is American culture! In the words of child psychologist Gordon Neufeld (a book I’d recommend), peer orientation undercuts the necessary parental connection in that parental nurturance cannot get through, is always insecure, cannot bring the child to rest, and is unable to be fulfilled (closeness unmet). As such peer orientation crushes individual development.

Youth groups that play to this peer group dynamic create the playground for all of the above developmental issues to explode. This leads to the next observation.

2.) YOUTH GROUPS UNDERCUT WHOLISTIC COMMUNITY FROM WHICH A CHILD CAN LEARN FAITH IN CHRIST AS A WAY OF LIFE/RELATIONSHIP, NOT JUST INFORMATION SLICKLY DELIVERED.

As Neil Cole has put it so well here (click on “What about kids in Organic Church?”), children learn about the living God by being in living relationships within a community where God is present. Once Jesus becomes infotainment, once it becomes a program, detached from real relationships, it loses its reality. It takes on the character of a learning experience in competition with other learning experiences. That’s a competition I’m just not interested in. In the midst of all these learning programs, children are consistently learning their allegiances from real life interactions with adults they respect. They sense insincerity and/or lack of integrity immediately. The life in Christ becomes attractive through the irresistable love of Christ that is shared visibly in and around our life together. If children are not immersed in this world, chances are they will find church boring and irrelevant. They will not withstand the discipline necessary to be shaped into something more than immediate gratifications. They will not have the wherewithal to give it time and learn what “Jesus is Lord” means as that reality by which we live our lives into His Kingdom.

3.) YOUTH GROUPS TOO OFTEN TRY TO ATTRACT YOUTH PLAYING TO THEIR WORST INTERESTS.

It’s a mistake to try to “attract” youth to discipleship with either social occasions that play on their sexual insecurities or music entertainment that plays on their desire to be “cool.” There will be times I am sure to attend the occasional rock concert or have the occasional social time together. But what the church should do for its youth most of all is foster spaces for meeting God where they can be trained to listen for God and commune with Him in silence, in prayer. Mark Yaconelli does a great job explaining this basic thing. I have seen this basic concept transform youth groups overnight in churches of some of my students. I also think the other best thing we can do for youth is organize mission trips to places in need around the world where youth come together to sacrifice and make a difference for the kingdom. This kind of mission trip (as opposed to a resort-like vacation) is a spiritual practice we must regularly encourage and fund in our churches. Again, I have singularly seen this practice transform the lives of youth in churches I have observed or worked with. Generally speaking, we need to be involved in mission in our everyday lives and take our children with us as we minister in our everyday lives (the other day I suggested to someone take their children to the hospital with them in praying for the sick – this was not a good idea because evidently our children bring germs that adults don’t … oh well).

In closing, I believe the youth ministry of a church is vitally important. But we must discern carefully what we are doing. Whether we have three youth or fifty, we need youth leaders to do things to foster authentic adult relationships with the youth. Let us make the community aware that we ARE A COMMUNITY and we have to treat our youth as among us and indeed take responsibility to love them, pray for them,  watch over them, initiate them and model Christ before them and with them. Let us foster safe spaces for them to ask all their questions and learn how to listen for God in their lives. Let us do mission trips and bring them with us in all the ways we participate in Christ’s Mission in the world. ! At Life on the Vine, these are the things we’re ever working on.

That’s my two sense, no doubt there are many who could add wiser counsel here. Let er rip!! Comments please.