The underlying problem these parents are trying to grapple with is this: they have raised their kids for years and, now, as they begin to enter the youth group and youth culture, the parents are feeling an unspoken pressure to hand their kids over to youth pastors and a pervasive youth culture that they don’t really trust. I admit that during my years as a youth pastor, I’ve perpetuated this problem for parents. Sadly, most youth pastors are totally unaware of how they are perceived by parents in their youth ministry. And, even worse, most youth pastors believe it is their job to spiritually and emotionally raise these teenagers under their ministry. Worst of all, most youth pastors believe they are fully capable of actually doing it!

Let me propose a mutual challenge to youth pastors and parents of teenagers: When it comes to raising teens, let’s put parents back in the driver’s seat. As a youth pastor, I understand that it’s not my job to win the hearts of adoring teens and be their sole educator, mentor, and disciplinarian when it comes to all things spiritual. My role as a youth pastor is better suited to empowering parents and working beside them to provide an environment where they can confidently educate, mentor, and disciple their children. Parents, let me challenge you to reach out to your youth pastor. Let them know you want to not only volunteer for events but to actively take the lead in your child’s spiritual upbringing. Support your youth pastors. Let them know you care.

How do you think our youth pastors can “put parents back in the driver’s seat”?

If you haven’t seen this, I posted a 5 minute video highlighting me speaking to teens. If you want to know exactly why I do what I do with youth ministry, just listen to the first minute.

After listening, feel free to send any comments my way.

I’ve taken this philosophy in regard to people in general. It’s an overall observation I’ve made regarding …well, everybody at every age and from every walk of life.

We don’t really change over the years. From childhood to adolescence to adult years, at our very core, we don’t change. I’ve learned this mostly from observing my son. He’s 6 months old. When he wants something he cries. Sometimes he whines and sometimes he shouts but he always gets your attention. What does he want? Anything really. Sometimes he shouts just to make you look at him. Sometimes he whines because he wants you to pick him up or give him his pacifier. He cries when he’s hungry.

Here’s the thing: a little baby, like my son, is only aware of his immediate needs and wants. And, at his age he makes no distinction between a need and a want. He will cry, shout or whine to get anything he wants. Babies are selfish. Babies are generally unaware of others. Babies do not see the “big picture”.

As we grow older, I don’t believe we really change. We simply become more civilized. We learn manners. We learn not to shout or cry or stomp our feet when we get hungry. But on the inside we still demand others to meet our immediate wants and needs and we rarely make a distinction between those two.

On the inside, we are still the center of our world. We do not see the “big picture”.

My son doesn’t know that mom is trying to do laundry and I’m about to burn dinner and we can’t pick him up right now. So he cries louder. I feel like God hears our cries and thinks “don’t you see what I’m preparing for you? Don’t you see how I’ve already provided?”

Now imagine where teenagers are in this spectrum of behavior. Teens are still very deep in the childlike world-revolves-around-me mentality. But, their needs, wants, concerns, and sorrows have matured. In their teen years, they’ve become more angsty and have begun to move away from their parents emotionally -maybe even physically.

For teens, the wants and needs are still there and still just as immediate but altered. And, they haven’t fully developed the filters adults possess for navigating social scenes. Also, teenagers tend to withdraw from the very people who can understand and supply their needs and wants, their own parents.

The teen years -you’re not a child and you’re not an adult. So where do you fit? What behavior is expected?

We never really change over the years. We are all children. We simply learn different ways to not show it.

And, if you’re still wracking your brain over how to communicate the Truth of the Christmas season (once again) this year, you’re not totally at a loss.

The weeks leading up to Christmas will all to soon fly by and between the holiday parties, special church services, year-end staff meetings, teen’s Christmas plays, volunteering at the local shelter, egg-nog, mall shopping, online shopping, hosting the church food drive…etc…WHEW…

…you may be in a panic for solid lessons/messages to communicate the power and wonder of the birth of our Lord.

If you’re still worrying over how to make your Christmas lessons drive home the meaning of the season, consider these quick options:

1. Video/Documentary Story

This option requires the most prep of all the options. But, it can be a powerful visual and experiential tool for your ministry. You’ll need a few video savvy teens,  a camera, and a few hours on location. Give your teens the assignment to take a Saturday (or any free day) and create a video portraying some aspect of the first Christmas story if it happened today!

Just imagine if Christ were born today! To whom would the angels bring the good news? –the homeless, city sanitation workers…?

Instruct your teens to act out the story (or recruit their friends and family to get involved). Let your teens be creative with this and maybe even make a contest for best video!

2. Host a Birthday Party for Jesus

Everyone loves a party and Christmas seems to be the best excuse to have one! But, design a Christmas party that is obviously a birthday party…for Jesus. As cheesy and/or obvious as that sounds there is plenty of room for sharp lessons about the meaning of Christmas in the midst of all the fun. Christmas is all about presents under the tree, right? Well, what if the presents were for Jesus? What does a teenager give to Jesus for his birthday? Let your teens be creative and find out! And, maybe we all could take this opportunity to learn the phrase, “Christmas is not MY birthday.”

3. Teach Christmas Carols for Worship

Most of us know at least a few Christmas carols…but do we know what they mean or where they came from. I used this lesson last year and it really opened up the teens appreciation for the “same old Christmas carols” they’d heard for years. You can teach theology through them. I think of lyrics like, “Behold Him arise/King and God and Sacrifice/Hallelujah, hallelujah peel through the earth and skies.”

Also, consider changing your usual youth service schedule to present your message on carols at the beginning followed by worship using the very Christmas carols you talked about.

4. Bring Christmas to Someone

Plan to caravan your teens to a nursing home/shelter/halfway house and bring Christmas to them. Be sure to notify, discuss, and plan ahead with a contact or agent of whatever organization you think your youth ministry should visit. Coordinate snacks and Christmas-y food to bring if you like. Have your teens be prepared to “bring” Christmas to someone else rather than have another party given to the teens.

Let the love and attitude of Christmas be shown through your youth ministry to someone else in your community.

Just last night he sent me a Facebook message about an idea for my website. In the course of messaging each other back and forth, he laid down some real concerns for the teens he works with on a daily basis…and not just concern for the teens he works with but this whole internet generation. He told me how he’s picked up on a number of disturbing trends that he sees from the kids in his classroom everyday. Trends like ‘sexting‘, or digital piracy, or …worse. Now, my friend is not a prude so let me say that the worry, urgency, and concern he expressed in his messages to me communicated that the behavior and attitudes of these teens genuinely shocked him.

Shocked. Him.

It seems that every generation somehow finds the bar for decency lowered from the previous generation. Consider this: if a boy growing up in my father’s generation wanted to look at pornography, he’d have to go to walk/drive to a store that sold a magazine with that stuff in it. Then he’d have to buy it at the counter and bring it home to his mom and dad’s house. Then he’d have to hide it in his room. Today, if a boy wants to look at pornography he can find it online in about 5 seconds. And, when he’s done looking I bet most preteen and teenage boys know how to erase evidence of websites they’d viewed online.

The world has changed even since I graduated high school. A parent can be diligent in monitoring where their child is going and who they are hanging out with. But in today’s world that is only a fraction of the battle. Now you have to check what websites they’re visiting, what they are talking about across text messages, who’s ‘friending’ them on Facebook, and a myriad of other trends they could be falling into right in the safety of your own home.

Parents, please be aware of what trends and technologies your teen comes in contact with everyday. Know that there are tools available to you to help you know exactly what your teen is saying to their friends through text messages. There is a website that I use and highly recommend called www.CovenantEyes.com that will monitor all internet activity. I recommend this particular tool because it can’t be by-passed since its not a filter…it just records every sited that is visited and sends a report to a monitor/mentor of your choosing.

Realistically, your teen/preteen/child is going to be exposed to things and even take part in behaviors that you can’t control. But, you can develop proper attitudes and, most importantly, trust. Trust is achieved through establishing boundaries and then allowing freedom with in those boundaries. But you can’t establish boundaries or trust if you don’t know world these teens are living in today. Their world is very different then the one I, or even you, grew up in…because so much of their world exists digitally.

Relationships.

Arguments.

Love.

Flirting.

Bullying.

All happening on a digital playing field. And we might be none the wiser.

Digital. But just as real.

A few years ago, I ran into an old college friend who’d become a youth minister in the area. After the usual catch-up conversation we started sharing our experiences in youth ministry. We’d traded a few ideas and suggestions for each other to take back to our churches. But, the thing I remember him saying the most and unfortunately, will probably never forget was, “Aaron, when your preaching to the kids, remember — it’s 10% message and 90% fluff.”  According to him the teens couldn’t “hang on to more’n that.”

Shock would be a simple way of describing how I felt. At the time, I didn’t let on more than slight unease with his assessment of “preaching to the kids”.

To put it plainly, the message is what youth ministries need more of and not less. Our youth ministries need more than dodge ball and loud Christian music in the speakers. If teens just wanted another pizza party or a place to just be distracted by the “fluff” they’d get it somewhere/anywhere else.

Your teens need to hear the truth of the Good News and not a watered down mantra of pluralistic humanism. Teens need to hear that the Great Commission was commanded to them too. Teens need to hear the tough sayings of Christ. Teens need to hear that the world is not all about them. Teens need/want to be challenged to better their community…and you, dear Youth Worker, are in the very position to communicate all these things.

So don’t water the message down.

And frankly, by the time most teens have reached high school in this country they are ready for something more than the “milk” we tend to feed them in our youth ministry sermons. If our teens can devote hours to school athletics, humanitarian clubs, and online forums to help-save-the-world-one-cause-at-a-time…why can’t we believe they’ll follow along if our message gets above a 3rd grade level?

Lastly, I ask you to consider the future of our teens when they graduate our youth ministries if we don’t begin to feed them more meat in the message now. You don’t have to hypothesize what society will be like generations from now – just imagine 2 years after graduation: your teens will be entering their 20′s and deep in the working world or the college path. They will have met people who don’t believe in their God and they’ll debate very logical reasons for their doubt. Your teens will meet kind and intelligent people who will see no need for God’s saving grace in their life…what will your teen’s response be? Will their hearts and minds be prepared to claim their faith as “the evidence of things unseen”?

Will you give your teens and your youth ministry a deep foundation to stand on? Message or Fluff? Meat or Milk?

Be sure to check out more resources and thoughts on youth ministry at my website www.shaversrazor.com

I remember a veteran youth pastor speaking to me years ago addressing some questions I gave him about my youth group and some of the obstacles with I was facing with a group of teens who were indifferent to their church and their faith. With wisdom, he calculated the problem in the youth group as the  a lack of “ownership” among the teens. They didn’t feel the youth group was their youth group.

Initially, I didn’t like his suggestion that the teens needed to feel a sense of ownership about their church and their youth group. Frankly, I was a little offended.

I guess I just didn’t like the word and what it implied in my mind. Ownership -as if these teens should own/control/claim what God was doing for them. But, I soon realized the true concept of ownership is not so much to be feared. Basically, it’s a sense of investment and responsibility toward whatever you are “owning”.

Little secret: this is where the term “Student  Ministry” began to be used more in place of “youth group” -ministry sounds more purposful than group and it implies that the students are the ministers  to their peers thus, student ministry.

Ownership gives a sense investment and responsibility. But, the flip side of the coin is that it  also gives a sense of entitlement.  Also, ownership is a very inactive word – it’s a state of being not a state of doing.

Ownership vs Stewardship

I’d like make the arguement for implementing stewardship rather than ownership as the behavioral model for your youth group student ministry.

Stewardship signifies that what is in your care is not yours but you are just as responsible for it.

Stewardship asks, “what are you doing with the gift given to you?” Take, for instance The Parable of the Talents found in the book of Matthew. The servants in that story were trusted with talents/money/resources that they did not own. But they were give authority and resposibility over how it was to be used.

The master set expectations for how the servants were to steward the talents given them.

The master empowered the servants with his authority to use and multiply his talents.

The master rewarded the faithful servants with more talents, more authority, and more responsibility than they had earned themselves.

Our youth ministries need stewards in the leadership and steward-leadership in the teens. Stewardship is Biblical. Stewardship doesn’t allow a sense of entitlement. Stewardship causes us to return to the Master to give an account. Stewardship calls us to cultivate, develop, and multiply the Kingdom rather than build borders around the plot of land that we think we own.

Discover the difference in your youth ministry when your teens are called to stewardship. Discover how their walls of isolation and indifference will fall when they are called to stewardship. And see if they don’t learnto  live their faith actively in their community and in their church.

I want to  let you know of  a transition that is already taking place on this blog.

Last week I announced the launch of  my new website www.shaversrazor.com. The new website is  the culmination of my desire to minister to youth and serve local churches. I’ll be using the new Shaver’s Razor website to post cool videos, answer teens’ tough questions about life and God, and share amazing links and resources for youth ministry.

BLOG TRANSITION

The Shaver’s Razor blog will now transition into more posts covering the topics of youth ministry and I intend the blog to act as a help to youth workers and churches with youth ministries.

“But, Aaron,” you may say, “is this new and revised blog something I’ll wanna read?”

If you are the parent of a teen(s)…

If you have children who will one day become teens…

If you were once long ago a teen and can relate…

If you are involved in a church that has a youth ministry…

If you are part of  a church staff and want to develop you youth ministry…

If you are a youth pastor who wants to grow and develop your youth…

THEN, THE NEW BLOG WILL BE FOR YOU.

Be sure to check the new website at www.shaversrazor.com and find the link to the blog on the RESOURCES page.

Two weeks ago, I turned over the keys to my office at the church. The new Middle School Youth Pastor at Smyrna Assembly stepped into the recently emptied office that was now his. We’ve known each other and worked together in youth ministry for years so it’s an understatment to say I was excited about his transition into leading the middle school ministry.

During the transitional period we sat down for numerous conversations on teens, parents, ministry, church policy…etc.

As I prepared to share with him key points for his transition into pastoral leadership, I realized these were also key points I would take with me to the next place of ministry wherever it may be. Maybe you can open a new door of leadership with these keys too.

Here are 5 keys

KEY #1. Youth ministry is about the parents as much as it is about the teens…maybe even more so. Never forget the family. Don’t try to minister to the teen alone because they don’t live with you. They have to return home to their family environment which projects more influence on them that their youth pastor. Minister to the parents and you gain allies while also tending to their spiritual needs. For more on this, see my earlier blog here.

KEY #2. Communicate not only vision but expectations to your team. Vision gives inspiration and direction to begin the race. Expectation tells us when to start running and how fast. Don’t forget to communicate either. You can read more about my shortcomings in this area here.

Key #3. Your greatest frustration/crisis/obstacle always has the potential to become your greatest achievement. Successful leaders can attest to this. In my own experience the change from one singular ministry for the youth at Smyrna Assembly to the split model of specialized ministries for the Middle School and High School seemed, at the time, an impossible transition. I had never led such a change in an organization and the deadline to implement seemed unattainable. But, I count it as one of my most successful seasons of ministry as well as when I felt most valued and utilized by my fellow pastors.

KEY #4. Never fail to give your team enough encouragement. In retrospect, I wonder if I gave enough encouragement to my team. An “atta boy” can go a long way to build up people. It can also give credibility to the times you need to correct/question/admonish a team member. And, those times will come. So be sure that  your hard words of correction aren’t the only words your team will hear from you.

KEY #5. Your personal faithfulness is …key. I’ve saved the best for last. Entire chapters of the Bible focus on faithfulness and so should we. Your personal character must develope into faithfulness that would make Our Father proud. No matter what slick team strategy you have rolling around in your head or what shiny toy you can pull out of your bag of tricks…the lack of faithfulness can kill it. But, the reward of faithfulness is that you will find that God is NOT on your side, but you ARE on His.

What are some keys you’ve acquired in leadership?

During the Wednesday night worship service with our middle school students I found myself, as I had  several weeks in a row, very frustrated.

Why? I felt like the students didn’t GET worship. It seemed they didn’t care to focus on a great God who loves them. Or the middle schoolers didn’t appreciate what an amazing worship environment the leaders and I had created for them.

I found myself agonizing over the lights (dim or full-up) , the music (too loud/soft), …My mind wandered to every distraction that was present in the room that could steal away the attention of our middle school students during these few precious moments of worship. Why!?!  Why were they so distracted? Why, week after week, does it take so much effort for them to sing in adoration to our God.?

BAM! I hit the wall ….

After that night, I got honest and expressed my concern with my leadership team. It was in that meeting that we discovered together that our responsibility is NOT to make these middle schoolers GET worship …or make them fall in love with Jesus while we sing praise choruses. We don’t carry that responsibility because we, as humans, can’t change their hearts.

I do, however, have another responsibility to those students as their pastor:  TO CREATE AN ENVIRONMENT

What does this mean?

It is said among doctors and physicians that their skill and responsibility is not  to heal because they cannot heal; the body has to heal itself. A doctor’s responsibility is to create an enviroment for the body/within the body to allow it to heal itself.

My team and I discovered that we cannot change the hearts of these middle schoolers. We are ultimately responsible to create a consistently holy environment where they experience His holiness.  Our hope and prayer is that these teens will learn from the example set before them.

Since then, I felt a burden lifted. Truly, the burden to change the way these middle schoolers engaged in worship  - it was never my burden. Knowing that has allow my team to redirect our focus on what we are actually capable of changing.

Are you trying to change hearts or create a holy environment where He can change hearts?