The Failure of Traditional Youth Ministry

In our last post, we posed this simple question: do traditional children’s and youth ministries really produce children who love Jesus? One would think that the more time, effort, and money is spent in a church’s youth ministry, the better their kids’ long-term outcomes will be. But is this assumption really correct?

A few years ago, a major church denomination did an exhaustive study of their young people’s experience in church. The children studied were those “born under the altar;” they were in attendance at the church's youth programs since birth virtually every time the church doors were open. This denomination sought to know what percentage of these kids stayed in the church once they were free to make their own decisions regarding attendance. They found that at the conclusion of high school, 95% of these students left the church and never returned.

The findings of this study may sound shocking, but they are well in line with what other studies have revealed. The Southern Baptist Convention’s Council on Family Life reports that some 88 percent of children from evangelical homes leave the church shortly after graduation. To lay the blame at the feet of the “godless university” is unfounded; no statistical difference exists between those who attend college and those who do not. Similar research in New Zealand showed that 80% of students raised in youth group will abandon their faith in the first year after their graduation. George Barna’s recent research among twentysomethings revealed that only 20% of those in their early 20s who were raised in a youth group describe themselves as maintaining the same level of spirituality they had in high school.

In response to this data, the Barna Group’s David Kinnaman offered several insights. To quote Kinneman: "Much of the ministry to teenagers in America needs an overhaul - not because churches fail to attract significant numbers of young people, but because so much of those efforts are not creating a sustainable faith beyond high school. There are certainly effective youth ministries across the country, but the levels of disengagement among twentysomethings suggest that youth ministry fails too often at discipleship and faith formation.”

In contrast to these discouraging findings, however, a major missionary organization did a similar study, wanting to know how many of their kids (MKs),, raised in missionary homes in the missionary lifestyle, returned to the mission as adults. Bear in mind that these individuals had to not only return to a foreign land on their own, but raise their own support to do so as well. Much to the mission agency’s surprise, about 95% of their MKs came back to the mission as adults.

These findings are staggering. If children’s and youth ministries are really worthy of the importance we place upon them, one would expect a clear, almost linear relationship between church attendance as an adult and their experience in the church as children. Further, for those raised outside of the church, without the benefit of these programs, we would expect that their adherence to Christ would fade as a result if they are indeed as effective as claimed. Yet we find the exact opposite to be the case! How can children who are raised without the benefit of special youth ministries end up better off in the end?

It’s also no secret that surveys show no appreciable difference between the moral and sexual behavior of Christian vs. non-Christian youth. Research done by Campus Crusade for Christ shows similar findings. Based on their research, Campus Crusade’s Josh McDowell and Ron Luce have issued a joint statement: "Incredible as it may seem, ‘accepting Christ' and making a profession of faith makes little to no difference in a young person's attitudes and behaviors. The majority of our churched young people are adopting ‘a Christianity' but it is not true Christianity.” They found the findings of their study so compelling that they concluded: "We are at a crossroads where a fundamental change is required within youth ministry. We need more than a retooling—nothing short of a 21st century God-sent spiritual revolution will save this generation." Incredibly, 98% of youth pastors polled agree with McDowell and Luce's assessment.

For all the emphasis we place on kids and youth ministry today, we would expect different results than these. Perhaps programmed, Hollywood quality kids’ ministry isn’t quite the answer we’ve hoped for, and an entirely new paradigm is needed. But if kids and youth ministry in this country needs an overhaul, what should it look like? We will discuss this further in our next post.