Youth Ministry

[Thousand Hills]

and of course a "New Members Class" (Which is almost an imperative to me, especially for new believers or those wanting to join the church

Agree with you personally, but oh boy that's another can of worms you don't want to open here on BB. :smilewinkgrin:

 

[Salty]

..I am for 3-4 Sunday school classes in church with everyone from 5th grade or so on up attending one of them. You can have different topics: one class going through I Samuel, one class doing a NT survey, one class doing the Doctrine of the Church, another on Mark, and of course a "New Members Class" (Which is almost an imperative to me, especially for new believers or those wanting to join the church

Why do you wait until the 5th grade - why not 1st grade?

 

[Marooncat79]

1st grade is ok!!

:applause:

 

[JohnDeereFan]

How much of an emphasis should a church have in youth ministries, if any from all.

It depends what you mean by "youth ministry".

Currently, it usually means pizza parties and lock-ins, and group trips to the Michael W. Smith concert (or whatever terrible Christian music the kids are listening to these days). Maybe some games, a morality lesson, and a "won't you please accept Jesus as your personal Lord and Savior? He's really bummed that you won't return His texts"-type altar call.

There's no discipleship at all going on.

This is why we see poll after poll that says that kids leave the church as soon as they hit college.

The modern church tries to attract kids with shallow, worldly things and then acts surprised when kids decide the world can do it better.

Our church split from a church that was heavily into this mindset and we saw the damage up close.

For that reason, when we planted our church, we decided to do things differently.

For one, we match children up with older saints for mentoring and discipleship.

For another, we treat them as if they're adults. That means that, if they've been accepted as church members, then they're encouraged to receive the same training and study as the adults, and are subject to the same discipline.

Essentially, our "youth group" ends at around 12-13 years old and, even that, we wouldn't have, except that some things are a little over the little ones' heads.

So we end up not attracting as many kids as we would if we had pizza parties and a cool rec room, but we are building the next generation.

We currently have three young men who are planning to go into full time ministry, a couple who is being mentored for marriage, and two of the captains on our evangelism team are under eighteen.

 

[Marooncat79]

It depends what you mean by "youth ministry".

Currently, it usually means pizza parties and lock-ins, and group trips to the Michael W. Smith concert (or whatever terrible Christian music the kids are listening to these days). Maybe some games, a morality lesson, and a "won't you please accept Jesus as your personal Lord and Savior? He's really bummed that you won't return His texts"-type altar call.

There's no discipleship at all going on.

This is why we see poll after poll that says that kids leave the church as soon as they hit college.

The modern church tries to attract kids with shallow, worldly things and then acts surprised when kids decide the world can do it better.

Our church split from a church that was heavily into this mindset and we saw the damage up close.

For that reason, when we planted our church, we decided to do things differently.

For one, we match children up with older saints for mentoring and discipleship.

For another, we treat them as if they're adults. That means that, if they've been accepted as church members, then they're encouraged to receive the same training and study as the adults, and are subject to the same discipline.

Essentially, our "youth group" ends at around 12-13 years old and, even that, we wouldn't have, except that some things are a little over the little ones' heads.

So we end up not attracting as many kids as we would if we had pizza parties and a cool rec room, but we are building the next generation.

We currently have three young men who are planning to go into full time ministry, a couple who is being mentored for marriage, and two of the captains on our evangelism team are under eighteen.

BINGO SIR!!!

Very well stated. Stay the course.