Youth ministry out of control - part 1

The title above came from a short video promo for youth ministry that I came across a few years ago. It spurred my foray into youth ministry on a large scale (because it was both inspiring and had a hot looking chick in it..:-) ) Ironically,it also describes how I see youth ministry these days.

When I look at youth ministry as it is done today, it is indeed out of control and definitely not in the positive vernacular of the phrase which the promo intended. One area of concern is the direction of which youth camps are conducted in general.

Youth camps…ah, what can one say about them? For some, it was the first time they committed their life to Christ. Cynically, I’ll then say and the next time round, recommitted again, and again, and again….

For others, it was a time of dread. One only has to read the excellent graphic novel “Blankets” by Craig Thompson to empathise with the loneliness and sense of exclusion suffered by many amidst the hypocrisy and regulated nature of a Christian youth camp. I know as many of those turned off Christ in a camp as those who turned to him as Lord and Saviour.

But I digress. What’s my beef? Here it is.

I think the concept of camps today is all wrong. Totally.

Camps are marketed as a place where you will get an ‘experience’. It’s also going to be ‘fun’, and the worship will rock your sox off ‘cause Lord knows we can’t get that at our church, right? You’re going to be able to spend time with God undistracted, save for the activity packed schedule. Maybe you can fit in some quiet time between brushing your teeth and changing into your pyjamas.

And wait, I haven’t even mentioned the speaker. Last year, they got this amazing speaker who spoke in a loud voice and made us laugh. Now that’s the spiritual test of a good speaker – they make us laugh (wonder where that is in the New Testament?) Of course, these days with our attention deficit disordered generation, we rely on something we can take back in experential terms which validates our attendance. How about….signs and wonders? Nothing like a personal prophecy to let me know that I didn’t blow 3 days of my leave and a hundred bucks to sleep in a cold, smelly bunk with people I don’t know.

I admit I was a tad sarcastic above. But tell me I’m wrong. Be brave and let me know you got the most boring speaker this side of Saddleback for your camp. I’ll bet even if he or she turned out to be a person who loved Jesus like nothing else mattered, and gave up all just to speak to people about his fame, I won’t be seeing him speaking anytime soon at your camps.

Why? Because you care about what the participants are going to write on their feedback form. You care about the senior pastor ragging you about numbers being down this year compared to last year when you got Mr. Rock Star speaker working the crowd. You care about your reputation in church, among the congregation, the youth..anyone else but the one to who matters.

At the end of the camp, when everyone is giving each other their last hugs and promising to see them on Facebook; they’ll reflect and go “ What a great time!”

Yes, it was. Because you went to Disneyland

In Disneyland, they want you to have a good time. That’s why grown men and women put on animal suits to amuse you by dancing and making funny sounds. See the parallel here? Heaven forbid that you should leave the theme park all sad, that would be bad for business.


Their training was bloody combat
And their combat was bloody training
- A Jewish historian commenting on the Roman Legions-

How do you prepare someone to sacrifice their life for the gospel if you give them three hot meals, five kick-butt worship songs in two sessions a day? How do you teach them to contend the word if all they get is a few photocopied pages from the latest insipid bestseller from a Christian bookstore to discuss in an hour? How do they learn to pray like Martin Luther when all they do is pray that they have a nice upper middle class life, so that they can go to University, get a boyfriend or girl friend, marry him or her and drive a Toyota Vios with a fish on the back?

Camps should be tough. Not brutal and sadistically tough for they breed hate, not love. But tough in the sense that when athletes enters the Olympic training center; they know they are not there to watch TV and order room service. They are there to train, to their utmost limit and the aim? To win the gold medal, or the crown, as Saint Paul would have written it.

At the end of the day, consider this fact. We sometimes forget that Paul constantly made many references to going into training and beating the body. Believe me, hard training in those ancient days was light years from the pansy body-pump sessions at your glitzy fitness studio. This may have something to do with the fact that maybe he knew the terrible price that the followers of Christ would have to pay one day in terms of persecution for that decision. To sugarcoat it would have been a lie.

If you enjoy camp too much, you keep wanting to go back to it. Like Disneyland. But it takes money and after a while, you get sick of the rides and you want to punch Goofy in the head. And when you’re seventy, it’s not for you. Your dentures may fall out on the Magic Mountain. After a while, even the initial perceived vastness of a theme park becomes too small. Maybe it is as their song goes; “it’s a small world after all”. Yes, it is. Their world is small

But it’s a big one in the real one outside.