It is not uncommon in church youth ministry circles to hear folks talking about YoungLife or other parachurch ministries stealing kids from the church or only targeting the in crowd. “They talk about integrating students into the church, but we haven’t seen that yet!” I’ve also heard my YoungLife friends talk about the boring, frozen church that continues to teach a dry gospel and entertain holy huddles of students. At their worst, the church often can fail to launch outside of its own walls, and the parachurch often can lack the desire to partner with the local church. There is truth in all these statements, yet true partnership is happening more than we may realize.
Starting Point: Churches and parachurch organizations have the privilege of participating in kingdom work with some of God’s most inquisitive, passionate and challenging creations. The words of Jesus found in Matthew 9 are ringing in my ears as I write this, “the harvest is plentiful but the workers are few.” Churches and ministries such as YoungLife have wisdom, resources and strengths that must be shared; and in doing so, the kingdom and more young people win. Youth ministry is overwhelming, and doing so alone is unhealthy.
Partnership: A youth pastor letting a parachurch leader simply borrow a projector only scratches the surface of partnership. Shame on the church for seeing the loaning of equipment as the fullness of partnership and shame on the parachurch for not asking or expecting more. Mark DeVries uses a powerful image of a web when describing a sustainable and life-changing way of reaching students for Christ. First, Mark draws stick figure people on a white board who represent parents, youth workers, teachers, parachurch leaders, neighbors and coaches. Then he draws a line to and from each of these people creating a web. When a young person pulls away from his or her parents, the prayer is that they run into the other God-fearing adults represented in the web, who then play a vital role in the kingdom and in the lives of students. If the people in the diagram don’t partner together, then no web is formed and the family of God loses opportunity after opportunity. Next to a teenager’s parents, youth workers from churches and parachurch ministries potentially can be the biggest players in orchestrating the web for a wide variety of students.
Better Hand-Offs: A common event in the Summer Olympics is the relay team that is predicted to crush the competition based on the individual gifts of the four runners, yet they frequently drop the baton as they attempt a hand-off. Churches and parachurch groups have a similar problem.
The church could do a much better job of giving and receiving students. We often connect with students for a period of time, and then we send them off to college, the military or the workforce. The job of the web is to help connect students to a living, growing body of faith in the next stage of the journey. A more important job of the web is to work diligently to give each student repeated opportunities to experience Jesus in tangible ways. The web is called to demonstrate what following Christ looks like on a daily basis. The parachurch could be better at hand-offs, as well. We (the body of Christ) must take a more holistic approach to student evangelism. What is the best way for parachurch ministries to help students stay strong in their faith after high school? High priority must be placed on connecting students with as many Christ-centered adults as you possibly can find, strengthening the web.
Parasitic relationships happen between ministries where there is little vision and a lack of passion. If churches or parachurch groups were to take their ball and go home, the kingdom would miss out on the spiritual depth and width that comes through intentional evangelism.
Symbiotic relationships involve trust and require loads of intentionality, but they are a better reflection of the body of Christ.
