Youth

Hipster Churches & Indifferent Teens

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Two good articles note how the attractional church model isn’t working anymore:

‘Forget the pizza parties,’ Teens tell churches :

“Sweet 16 is not a sweet spot for churches. It’s the age teens typically drop out,” says Thom Rainer, president of LifeWay Christian Resources in Nashville, which found the turning point in a study of church dropouts. “A decade ago teens were coming to church youth group to play, coming for the entertainment, coming for the pizza. They’re not even coming for the pizza anymore. They say, ‘We don’t see the church as relevant, as meeting our needs or where we need to be today.’ “

The Perils of ‘Wannabe Cool’ Christianity:

In his book The Courage to Be Protestant, David Wells writes: “The born-again, marketing church has calculated that unless it makes deep, serious cultural adaptations, it will go out of business, especially with the younger generations. What it has not considered carefully enough is that it may well be putting itself out of business with God.

“And the further irony,” he adds, “is that the younger generations who are less impressed by whiz-bang technology, who often see through what is slick and glitzy, and who have been on the receiving end of enough marketing to nauseate them, are as likely to walk away from these oh-so-relevant churches as to walk into them.”

If the evangelical Christian leadership thinks that “cool Christianity” is a sustainable path forward, they are severely mistaken. As a twentysomething, I can say with confidence that when it comes to church, we don’t want cool as much as we want real.

I’ll comment on the loss of teens in a future post.

What do you think?

Help Cub Scout Pack 401…

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I don’t normally use Cerulean Sanctum as a forum for causes, nor have I actively solicited. But sadly,  due to their stand on moral issues, the Boy Scouts of America have lost some of their funding from public sources. Pack 401 checks out the local firetruckAs I’m in charge of PR for my son’s pack, I’m doing what I can to support scouting.

My son is a Bear Scout (a Cub Scout designation for boys in third grade) this year and has done well in scouting. Because we live in a rural area hit hard by unemployment and the economic downturn, not many families in our pack are well off, so most of what the pack can do in a year is determined by the proceeds from fundraisers, the biggest being the fall popcorn sales.

If you would like to support my son and Pack 401 of Ohio’s Dan Beard Council, would you consider buying some specialty popcorn? Of the profits on what you purchase, 70 percent  goes directly my son’s pack, so it’s a worthy cause.

To support my son and his pack:

1. Go to the Trail’s End popcorn site:  www.trails-end.com

2. On the right side of the screen is a box near the top that reads “You are supporting no one.” Click the “Change” link. The box will drop down a menu. The first text area caption reads “Enter Scout ID to support a Scout.”

3. Type in my son’s ID number:  3012076

4. Click the “Continue” button.

5. Select whatever you wish to purchase from the product list.

Your purchase will be shipped to you promptly.

The Boy Scouts of America celebrates 100 years of scouting in 2010, and with your support, we’ll enjoy another 100.

And may God richly bless you!

Equipping the Saints: Request for Reader Info

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The last couple months at Cerulean Sanctum have seen the discussion turn toward how the American Church makes disciples. In the days ahead, I hope to further unpack this issue and discuss ways that we can achieve better results, not only in leading people to Jesus but also in growing them deep in Him.

Below are a few questions about the nature of the educational process in your church, the larger question being, “How does your church actually make disciples?”

1. What is the general educational philosophy at your church? Has anyone ever stated this philosophy publicly so that the members understand the educational goals of the church?

2. What adult educational programs exist at your church? Which do you participate in? What types of educational  materials do those programs use? Have those materials been purchased from a third-party curriculum developer, provided by your church’s denomination, or developed in-house?

3. Does your church use a targeted catechism program to ensure that youth understand the basic doctrines of the faith? If yes, has it been purchased from a third-party curriculum developer, provided by your church’s denomination, or developed in-house? If no, what is your church using instead to ensure Christian maturity in their youth?

4. On a 1 to 10 scale, with 10 being the greater amount, how much would you say that your church relies on its members to be responsible for their own Christian education (or in other words, how much does your church rely on members to feed themselves spiritually)? In what ways do you believe this number to reflect a strong or weak educational philosophy?

5. What does your church do best in preparing people to be mature Christians? What do they do poorly? What suggestions would you make at improving the educational programs at your church (and please be as specific as possible)?

6. (Updated) How successfully are the members of your church putting into practice what they have learned? In what ways? Do you ever feel your church members increase in knowledge but don’t practice what they know?

Thank you for your time and the willingness to answer these questions. I hope to use them as the basis for my next post.

Have a great remainder of the week!