At the end of school last year, we held an event for our community’s public junior high school teachers. We wanted them to know we appreciate their work with urban young people in North Minneapolis. Through the generosity of members of our congregation, as well as one of our partner churches, we were able to hand out gift cards to more than 200 teachers.
Some of the teachers were shocked that a church would put on such an event. A few have begun attending our church, and we have gained greater credibility to come into the schools to minister to the kids.
Jesus’ Holistic Approach
Youth ministry has sometimes been limited to focusing on young people accepting Christ as Lord and Savior and then following up with a series of church-based Christian education initiatives. I’m not saying this is a bad thing. But without a holistic approach to urban youth ministry, we may miss some of the crucial issues young people are struggling with.
What do I mean by holistic approach? In Matthew Chapter 9, we see Jesus healing, having meals with sinners, casting out demons and teaching on the Kingdom of God. I use this as a framework for how youth ministry should look in the city today. There must be more than Sunday School, youth choir and mid-week youth group for the lives of young people to be transformed.
This approach expands to the creation of ministry models addressing the whole person: spirit, soul and body. That’s what led our church not only to have a full-time youth director, but also to create a separate Community-Development Corporation called The Sanctuary CDC, which includes a hip-hop academy, a developmental and support group for girls and tutoring and mentoring programs. We have also worked to build a bridge with our church-based youth ministry.
More Than Evangelism
I can remember the youth pastor at my church when I was a teenager coming to visit my school cafeteria once a week to eat with us. This was a way for him to connect with us beyond Wednesday night youth group meetings, as well as build relationships other kids to invite them to church.
I also remember as a teenager a focus on evangelism, on equipping young people to reach their peers for Christ on each of their campuses. This parachurch model centered on individuals coming to know Christ and then reaching their friends for Christ.
However, in today’s cities (and I believe to a degree also in the suburbs and rural areas), there are systemic issues that call for ministry models that are more communal.
As an example in North Minneapolis, where we do ministry, less than half of African Americans graduate from high school within four years. This past school year, six schools were closed in North Minneapolis alone. This leads to teachers losing their jobs and high turnover of principals.
When you take all of this into consideration, urban youth ministry must be holistic because there must be compassion, justice and mercy components.
As Jesus Walked
This is why we have appreciation events for teachers in the public schools—because if their morale is low, it impacts how they teach our young people. This is why we have after-school programs in the public schools—because we want to address dismal, racially specific graduation rates.
What I’ve learned is that when urban public school districts are desperate, they are very open to the church partnering with them if we bring a holistic approach of youth development to the table. (This has also led, by the way, to some of those teachers and principals becoming members of our church. Praise God!)
Schools face specific issues, challenges and barriers that not only provide broader ministry opportunities for urban churches, but also bring us closer to the ministry approach of Jesus when He walked the earth.
Efrem Smith is the senior pastor of The Sanctuary Covenant Church (sanctuarycovenant.org) and the founder of Unity Storehouse Ministries (unitystorehouse.com). He is the author of Raising Up Young Heroes and The Hip Hop Church (with Phil Jackson). He also hosts the radio show “Time for Reconciliation.”
