A Crowd

I hate Youth Group marketing scams. A ministry uses catch your ear words like "Join us and hundreds more as we" kind of phrases. The kind of phrases that make Youth ministry less about God and more about a giant social event. I know that teens are social beings and that that is an important part of Youth ministry, but it seems that a lot of youth ministries have chosen to take the numbers approach to ministry, the more kids there are, the better the odds of saving some. But to be honest, if you do not have a proper support system set up, which most mega-youth programs do not, than they can be doing more harm than good to these kids. Teens need their friends, but it is important for me to note that they need God more. They need discipleship more. They need to see Christ at work in their leaders personal lives more. Ministry is not about being cool or trendy, ministry is about leading others to Jesus and making real disciples and you simply cannot do that with a big, loud band playing covers, or an energetic, charasmatic teacher giving a motivational speech. It takes more. Those things are fine to have, but what about the support, what about when they graduate out of your program, where do they go? What then do they do with their lack of discipleship and their caffeine sustained faith. We need substance, they need substance, we need to teach them life skills so that they will know how to stand when the wind comes. Numbers simply will not do that, a crowd attracts a crowd and attracts more crowds, but none of those will make a disciple.