I enjoy watching The Techology Show, a video podcast by a number of Wesleyan pastors which covers a fun mix of technology and church-related stuff. Today, the guest speaker was Matthew Deprez of Frontline Community Church in Grand Rapids, Michigan, and the conversation was about integrating all generations into a singular, more effective congregation. It was an interesting discussion, especially considering the stir caused by a new film criticizing modern youth ministry as a failed experiment in segregating the generations (read about it here).
I would be lying if I said that our church is effective at reaching young people in particular, but this conversation gave me hope for a couple of reasons. First, probably most important, Deprez and Frontline, an undeniably large church, were finding increased effectiveness at building long-term faith in teens in particular by including them in the rest of the church rather than constantly separating them out into specifically targeted ministries. Our small church has done this, more out of necessity and by default than design, and I know of a lot of small churches that are in the same boat.
Second, it provided a little more substance to the argument that youth ministry can’t be something done by just a particular person or team in the church. It is everyone’s responsibility to build connections to other generations because, regardless of what generation we’re in, we need the others. Each generation has something that it can teach the others, and we need them all.
And third, it provided more evidence for a ministry philosophy that I’ve had for a long time: the church can be – and should be – a cross-section of all generations.
All of this is really neat because, as I noted above, in many small churches, it’s something that just happens. We don’t have enough Sunday School rooms for separate youth classes, so we all meet in one place. We don’t have enough volunteers for a dedicated youth service. We don’t have enough youth to go on a youth-only missions trip. So we have to do things intergenerationally. We’ve always had to do things intergenerationally.
And while that’s not to say that small churches are automatically good at it, let alone deliberate about it, it is to say that it feels good to have our method of necessity validated by the discovery of some big churches.
So be encouraged! You can be effective, even if you don’t have a dedicated youth-whatever. You’re not behind the curve; you’re actually ahead of it!
Matt Deprez is the real deal!