I'm four and some small change years into the full-time church youth work game. From the day I started until this very day I continue to face questions of "So when are you going to become a real minister?", "Any plans for ordination?". Nothing used to frustrate me more, probably because it was a question I used to ask myself, but I'm becoming more and more content with the idea of youth ministry as a career, at least for now.
The proposal doesn't come without its challenges, questions of growing out of the hip 20-something stereotype of a youth worker, questions of raising a (hypothetical) family on a youth worker's salary, or simply of being able to keep up with the energy of teenagers on those long hour, late night weekends. But I'm more and more convinced that we need youth workers willing to stay through the awkward in-between years, the "not an older brother/sister, not yet a mother/father" figure years.
Youth ministry is most certainly something that I believe we grow in, we get better at, and the cycle of 18-21 year olds on a gap year, although bringing much needed passion and vibrancy to their roles and ministry as a whole can, I believe, do damage to the way young people see themselves, as a tester-ministry, where the kinks are worked out in the work habits and lives of their pastors before they get let loose on the people where it really matters.
One study claimed that 85% of people come to faith before their 18 birthday, so why do we treat ministry to young people as one for leaders still working with their stabilisers on?
This post isn't a commitment to staying in youth ministry till the day I die. I don't know what the future holds, where I'll end up, but I do know that I don't want to treat this current season as a trial run. I want to be the best I can be, thinking through the things that I do and the reasons I do them. I want to see those 85% come to faith. But more than that, I want to see them becoming followers committed not just for their school years, but through university, work, their own family life and beyond. A faith that will last for life, not just till they leave the youth group sofa and giant Jenga behind.
I want to think through what we as youth minister's do. Purposeful actions leading to long, passionate, faith informed lives of those we lead.
