“What About The Children?”

As Helen Lovejoy so famously uttered in “The Simpsons”, “What about the children! Won't anyone think of the children?" In any discussion about a new paradigm of church, it is this very question that looms large: What about the children? What role should they play in a radical church?” We must answer these questions if we are to clear the fog on what a new, radical kind of church might look like.

Prevailing assumptions about kids and youth ministry make it difficult for an alternative vision of church to become a reality in the middle class suburbs that so many of us call home. The greatest desire for many a Christian suburbanite is to find a church home that will meet their family’s needs, especially their children. Traditional thinking says that this should be done by finding the church that offers the highest quality “youth programs.” To this end, traditional churches trip over themselves trying to provide the highest quality experience they can for the kids. Between fountains, mascots, songs, skits, and interactive lessons, there is always something in most church’s kids ministry that will hold their attention. And as a general rule, the larger the church, the greater the children’s experience will be on Sunday mornings.

This traditional view of children’s ministry is undergirded by several main assumptions. First, churches reason that if children enjoy coming to church, their parents will be much more willing to come themselves. Second, it is assumed that the impartation of Biblical knowledge that occurs along the way will result in a change in our children’s behavior; right knowledge, it is reasoned, naturally will result in right behavior. This is the underlying presupposition of Western models of learning. It is also assumed that a positive experience in children’s church as a youngster will translate into greater adherence to Christ and His principles as one grows older. As the book of Proverbs says, “train up a child in the way he should go, and when he is old he will not depart from it” (Prov. 22:6). As Christian parents, all of us share this desire, and as we seek to raise our children in the “nuture and admonition of the Lord,” we long to see our children continue in Christ as the years pass, which causes us to seek the best church possible for our kids.

As the traditional view of children’s ministry unfolds, our attention turns to youth group as they grow up. Above all else, we desire our children to spend their teen years in love with Jesus, on fire for His name and living the adventure that Christ has created them to live. In a world where drugs, alcohol, premarital sex, and the pressures of the world abound, our fears that they will abandon the faith of their youth loom large. Above all else, teens value relationships with and the approval of their peers, and without that Christian peer influence in their lives, how will they escape the lure of the world and live their lives with single devotion to Christ?

Certainly the answer must be found in youth group, we would think. If our son or daughter, in the formative teen years, is highly involved in a church youth group, it would seem, our fears will prove unfounded. With a solid mentor relationship with a highly trained youth leader, a peer group free from the influences of a godless society, and an entertaining, drug-free environment to attend each week, perhaps youth group will prove to be the antidote to the lure of the world that sidetracks so many in their younger years.

The emphasis we place on the importance of children’s and youth group cannot be overstated. The experience that a church offers one’s children is probably the number one factor that influences where a family will make their church home. But the emphasis we place on these youth ministries is only reasonable if our basic assumptions are correct: that today’s youth ministries are powerful and effective in producing kids who love God.

But are today’s youth ministries as effective as we might think? We’ll explore this question in our next post.