A Theology for Youth Ministry

The mission of the church (ecclesiastical) is not to save the church (institutional). Youth ministry is not about making future church members who can save present church institutions from closing. Rather the aim needs to be refocused in terms of a Kingdom of God model. The young person can now be a member of the Kingdom of God which transcends institutions. The institutions as they are presently shaped do not seem to be missionally engaging with youth where they are to be found, but rather they often seek to attract them to their ideas of what they think non-Christian youth want. A Kingdom model may conceive various churches to be a resource but not as the answer to meeting youth incarnation-ally; seeking to meet them appropriate to their life situations. The most effective forms of mission may well be nothing to do with working from within churches. Mission in schools, clubs, youth groups, social work, welfare, advocacy etc may be the real arena to bring Christ to young people contextually.

A Kingdom perspective theology for Youth Ministry seems to need to be conceived along the lines that Jesus expressed it to a Samaritan woman:

“Our fathers worshiped on this mountain, but you Jews claim that the place where we must worship is in Jerusalem.” Jesus declared, “Believe me, woman, a time is coming when you will worship the Father neither on this mountain nor in Jerusalem. You Samaritans worship what you do not know; we worship what we do know, for salvation is from the Jews. Yet a time is coming and has now come when the true worshipers will worship the Father in spirit and truth, for they are the kind of worshipers the Father seeks. God is spirit, and his worshipers must worship in spirit and in truth.” (John 4:20 – 24 NIV)

A Kingdom theology for mission among youth needs to take Jesus observations seriously. Jesus’ focus was always Kingdom orientated. “Neither on this mountain nor in Jerusalem” may be a key mantra to embrace for youth mission in the Western Hemisphere. Jesus focuses mission to pin point itself on “true worshippers” who “worship the Father in spirit and truth.” This is not bounded by church walls. Rather the Holy Trinity seem to focus their mission in the hearts of youth who may come to authentically worship them. This time “has now come” as much as it had arrived when Jesus uttered these words.

What are the implications for this “now” time reality? First of all it means that it allows for many types of missional activities and communities. We may be talking about multiple missional communities. These can meet as they do with Reign Ministries “Crowded Costa” in Bicester England; in the coffee Franchiser’s branch “Costa”. In this instance a theology of multiple ways of contextually meeting with young people drives this fresh expression. It may be that young people will start to “worship . . . in spirit and truth” from there. The Father, Son and Holy Spirit may meet young people in this environment through their Kingdom community missionaries, who seek to embrace these young people outside of church walls.

Crowded Costa is part of a definitive ecclesiastical theology which is not seeking to create an institutional model of church but rather a social community in which incarnational relationships can lead to spiritual connection with the family of God.

Moreover, Social Trinity as the proto-community can shape the way that multiple missional communities can conceive of themselves in youth work. Peter Holmes Comments:

“Over the last few years I have been intrigued to realize the difference that a theology that understands God as social Trinity makes both to individuals and to faith communities. Instead of having an image of God as remote and individual (promoting a private one-to-one faith), it enables us to embrace a healthier image of Trinity committed to promoting harmonic relationship. As Christians we begin to love a God who is never alone.”

Holmes makes a critical observation. God is never alone because he is always in communion within his Trinitarian self. This is a perfectly transparent and loving self giving community focussing on the other in an eternal circuit of Agape (Greek term for God’s sacrificial gift love). Agape community expresses a Kingdom missional theology perfectly. God as primary community created a world in the first place to share in this communion (see on Genesis 1:26; 3:8). This communion was lost because of sin (Genesis 3:8). It is now restored as God’s all embracing grace which has a contextually driven mission of reconciliation; that may seek to engage young people through numerous fresh expressions (See on 2 Corinthians 5:18 – 21).

God’s Social nature is driven by gift love which Ephesians 1:8 calls Grace. Grace in terms of its Koine Greek derivative means a free gift offered for the complete forgiveness and salvation of every young person. This gift orientated grace welcomes young people into the Kingdom of Grace with wide open welcoming arms as a realised eschatology. Because the Kingdom of God knows no set places to boundary its free expression multiple missional communities can welcome young people into unconditionally welcoming Kingdom shaped grace communities. These communities need to be fluid in nature so as not to become bounded by a sacred space obsession once more. “God is Spirit” and those who may “worship him” in “Spirit and truth” may do so anywhere.

Michael Frost and Alan Hirsch paint an interesting picture along these lines:

“1. The missional church is incarnational, not attractional in its ecclesiology. By incarnational we mean it does not create sanctified spaces into which unbelievers must come to encounter the gospel. Rather, the missional church disassembles itself and seeps into the cracks and crevices of a society in order to be Christ to those who don’t yet know him.

2. The missional church is messianic, not dualistic, in its spirituality. That is, it adopts the worldview of Jesus the Messiah, rather than the worldview of the Greco-Roman empire. Instead of seeing the world as divided between the sacred (religious) and profane (nonreligious), like Christ it sees the world and God’s place in it as more holistic and integrated.”

The church they conceive in their book can be a shoe shop, coffee shop, bar etc. They seem to be re-conceiving an epistemology of what church means. This re-conception may be portrayed as the original Jewish Christian community of first century Palestine conceived church (Ekklesia – Greek for Gathering). It was a community not located only in a place of worship, such as the Temple of Jerusalem (prior to 70CE), but in Pauline terms “Ekklesia” simply meant the gathering of a Christian community (See on 1 Corinthians 1:2; 14:26). This would often be in a house, but it also could be by a river; in Lukan terms (See on Acts 16:13). The early church consisted of many types of multiple missional fresh expressions which sought to get embedded in the “cracks and crevices of a society”. This conception formulates a new epistemology relating to Ekklesia not as an institution but as multiple expressions of social Trinities’ all embracing welcome to lost sinners into their creatively multi-shaped family.

This “welcome” into “family” argues for a relational theology. Relational theologians articulate the need to make all theology apply contextually. A theology which does not help the Christian community in its many expressions more able to engage in missional youth ministry will inevitably be useless. Men and women of this ilk seek to integrate their theological reflections to helpfully be applied to understanding the God of social and relational qualitative interactions; with every individual. In terms of missional and pastoral applied theology Charles Gerkin commenting on Anton Boison’s work makes a monumental statement:

“When Anton Boison first suggested that pastors should include in their preparation ‘the study of living human documents.’ He proposed an analogy the implications of which have never been fully developed. Boisen is generally considered the founder of clinical pastoral education in America and thereby one of the progenitors of the twentieth-century pastoral counselling movement. His concern, however, was only secondarily with pastoral counselling as such. More basic was Boisen’s concern that the objectifications of theological language not lose touch in the minds of pastors with the concrete data of human experience. His fear was that the language of theology was being learned by seminarians and pastors without that connection being made. Only the careful and systematic study of the lives of persons struggling with the issues of the spiritual life in the concreteness of their relationships could, in Boisen’s view, restore that connection. For Boisen this meant the study of ‘Living human documents.’”

A relational applied theology of youth ministry needs to engage in creative exegesis of the living human youth document. Just as Scripture needs exegesis in order to have its deepest meanings understood so the postmodern young person needs to be observed in his or her context to allow their contextual life situations, interests and deepest needs to speak for them selves. By exegetically allowing the present non-Christian young person to speak for themselves, in their terms, the missional Christian youth worker may incarnate with them on their wave length. This in turn will naturally lead to building a reciprocating set of relationships based on deeper mutually owned understandings that may welcome such young people into one of the multiple missional communities.

The sole aim of the social Trinity may be described as their desire for all forms of Christian community to build up the church of Christ. This argues against saving church institutions that seemingly exist to build their own little Kingdoms. God’s Kingdom theologically transcends all boundaries eternally and universally. Christ needs every knee bowed to him as the one and only universal Lord worthy of worship. Paul seems to give the final word for God’s plan to win all people into his loving family:

“And you also were included in Christ when you heard the word of truth, the gospel of your salvation. Having believed, you were marked in him with a seal, the promised Holy Spirit, who is a deposit guaranteeing our inheritance until the redemption of those who are God’s possession–to the praise of his glory. For this reason, ever since I heard about your faith in the Lord Jesus and your love for all the saints, I have not stopped giving thanks for you, remembering you in my prayers. I keep asking that the God of our Lord Jesus Christ, the glorious Father, may give you the Spirit of wisdom and revelation, so that you may know him better. I pray also that the eyes of your heart may be enlightened in order that you may know the hope to which he has called you, the riches of his glorious inheritance in the saints, and his incomparably great power for us who believe. That power is like the working of his mighty strength, which he exerted in Christ when he raised him from the dead and seated him at his right hand in the heavenly realms, far above all rule and authority, power and dominion, and every title that can be given, not only in the present age but also in the one to come. And God placed all things under his feet and appointed him to be head over everything for the church, which is his body, the fullness of him who fills everything in every way.” (Ephesians 1:13 – 23 NIV)

Further Reading:

Gibbs Eddie & Bolger Ryan K., Creating Christian Community in Postmodern Cultures, SPCK, London, 2006

Moynagh Michael, emergingchurch.intro, Monarch Books, Oxford, 2004

Fiddes Paul S., Participating in God a Pastoral Doctrine of the Trinity, Westminster John Knox Press, Louisville, 2000

Roxburgh Alan J. & Romanuk Fred, The Missional Leader, H B Printing, USA, 2006