A similar question: how much time do you spend reflecting on, and analysing the effectiveness of, your youth work? When do you sit down and honestly appraise how it’s going: the strength of your relationships, the ‘fruit’ of your work in the lives of young people, where you could do things better. How often do you check whether you’re really hitting your aims?
In the relentless busyness of youth ministry, the truth is that many of us just never get round to this kind of self-reflection. Generally speaking, we youth workers are great at being creative and rubbish at evaluation. We’re so busy building the next thing – whether that’s a whole new initiative or just the following week’s programme – that we never look back or, indeed, very far forward.
The trouble is, that’s just not good enough. It’s an ill-disciplined way to approach the vitally important and urgent role with which we’ve been tasked: to help young people discover life in all its fullness through Jesus. It’s akin to working with one hand tied behind our backs. If we were working like that in industry, never stopping to dream big for the future or learn from our mistakes, most of us would be fired within a month.
This month’s edition of Premier Youthwork offers a perfect opportunity to ask some of the tough, much-needed questions about our own youth work, as well as the national picture of youth ministry. While far from perfect, the data collated should prompt hundreds of discussions in churches and youth organisations around the country.
The survey prompts some pretty big questions. Should church chiefly be a place of ‘family’ for young people, or a source of spiritual connection and growth? Which is truer of your church? How much time are your young people spending in personal prayer or reading the Bible away from the group, and how could you help them with both? Why does evangelism seem to be such a low priority (or a source of fear) for our teenagers, and how can we model it better?
For those of us who find evaluation and reflection difficult, this issue of the magazine is a gift. So let me encourage you: take it, digest it, and organise some time within your youth team, church or organisation to talk about it together.
GENERALLY SPEAKING, YOUTH WORKERS ARE GREAT AT BEING CREATIVE AND RUBBISH AT EVALUATION
As you do so, I pray that you’ll be encouraged by the good things that God is doing in your youth group: the work that he’s blessing and the lives he’s transforming. I pray you would be emboldened by the task ahead rather than discouraged by the culture around you. May you be able to tell each other good news stories of how young people have been challenged and changed through your work, of how God has been quietly at work in the background or powerfully present in your midst.
I pray too that you would be overcome with vision for the future; that together you would hear from God and know exactly what to change, where to innovate and where to invest. I pray you would have the courage to stop the activities that deep down you know aren’t really working, and ask for help in the areas in which you’re not so strong. May you see new opportunities to serve and share the gospel among the young people of your community, and be united as a church and team in your pursuit of them.
Finally, imagining that these conversations are taking place right across the UK, I pray that collectively we would have a vision for youth ministry: one that is much bigger than ourselves. That we would take seriously again a Great Commission that calls us to aim big and not settle for mediocre, that we would call young people to a radical life of faith and adventure that demands much more of them than their attendance on Sunday.
June’s Youth Work Summit event asked the question: what’s the way back for youth ministry? The answers won’t be found in a national conference, but in small rooms in local churches up and down the country as passionate people like you and I take time to reflect, seek God and dream big dreams. So may you make space in the busyness, may you be unafraid to ask the really big questions, and may you meet with the God who loves young people so much in the midst of it all.
