In part one, I shared why the days of just “playing games with the youth” have ended. If you missed the article or need a refresher, I recommend reviewing it online at www.observernewspaperonline.com. In this second part, I’ll address how parents and guardians, the primary disciple-makers in leading their children to become fully devoted followers of Christ, can effectively partner with youth pastors through the art of quitting.

Jack Klumpenhower, author of Show Them Jesus: Teaching the Gospel to Kids, writes, “We’ve been dispensing good advice instead of the Good News,” which is to say the cultural narrative over the Biblical narrative: be happy, healthy and moral, be a good person.

“Live a good life and things will go well for you. Find the right spiritual resources and you’ll be blessed. Ask Jesus into your heart and you’ll be saved,” says Klumpenhower, who added that, however, “whatever they learned about Jesus did really change them. They never saw Him so strikingly that He became their one, overriding hope and greatest love, never convinced that Jesus is better — a zillion times better, than anything else.”

And so, Klumpenhower explains that “a frightening number of kids are growing up in churches and Christian homes without ever being captured by the Gospel of Jesus.” 

As a youth pastor, not a pastor in training, but a real pastor with a specific calling to develop the spiritual lives of students, I ask parents and guardians to quit doing the following:

• Quit introducing false idols. I knew of a student that was being faithfully mentored and on track to be a leader within his youth ministry. However, for his 16th birthday he was gifted an expensive and trendy vehicle that quickly became the source of his identity. It became his idol. He eventually left the church for worldly pursuits. Parents and guardians, this isn’t to say you can’t provide for your child, but a reminder that anything elevated above God — even family — is an idol. I know you may feel ignored at times, but your children are adopting the things you value. It’s why, for example, skipping church consistently for youth sports is a big deal: everything speaks. Your child needs some iron-sharpening-iron friends and those relationships won’t develop when there are seasons of church hiatuses for an idol.

• Quit playing God. While I recognize the paternal instinct to guide and protect one’s child, many parents and guardians are doing so to the detriment of their child: meeting their child’s every need and every want. There is a beautiful thing that happens when we realize that we are wholly dependent on God and that He alone is the one who will ultimately fulfill our needs — and then does! However, many parents are unwittingly removing their child’s need for a savior as they dawn their cape and rush in for the save. Next time your child has, let’s say a problem at school, instead of trying to solve the problem on your own, go to Scripture and prayer and allow God to drive the conversation.

• Quit outsourcing discipleship. If I can be blatantly honest, the reason many homes introduce false idols and the parents or guardians assume the role of God is because they themselves are not a fully-devoted follower of Christ. And whether the parent or guardian recognizes it or not, they are making a disciple, another “mushy-middle,” lukewarm Christian seeking the cultural narrative of be moral over the Biblical narrative of be Christ’s. You can’t pass along to your child what you don’t have yourself and, with the ever increasing rise of secularism, a child seeking God (only when it’s convenient) will never be captured by the Gospel of Jesus.

Again, Dr. Jean M. Twenge believes we are “on the brink of the worst mental health crisis in decades,” and students are leaving the church in droves. To learn how to quit the aforementioned, feel free to contact me directly, because we, youth pastors, desperately seek to partner with you, the parent or guardian, in helping your child become a fully-devoted follower of Christ, and it’s an urgent plea.

C.J. Wetzler is the NextGen pastor at The Church at Deerfield Beach. Before transitioning into full-time ministry, CJ was a commercial airline captain and high school leadership and science teacher. For questions or comments he can be reached at cj@dfb.church.

It’s by no accident you’re reading this article. I pray that what I’m about to reveal to you expands your awareness of what’s happening in the youth culture, and also provides practical ways for you to cultivate a healthier relationship with your youth pastor. What follows is the secret confession of a youth pastor.

To start, know that accessibility to technology and the prevalence of information — real or fake — has significantly altered this thing we call student ministry. 

Young teens are sexting or filming themselves performing sexual acts, which they post to social media. They take polls asking their followers to vote on what “stupid s***,” they should do on Snapchat, like destroying property or pretending to have a mental illness. They play beer pong — at least the 12-year-olds substitute alcohol for Monster energy drinks, and, of course, they light things on fire. 

The older students self-inflate their status, hoping to feel more important as they strive to live up to society’s unrealistic athletic or academic expectations. 

In short, it’s the f-word, rebellion, confusion and rejection manifesting itself in the form of social media attention-grabbing. They are painfully attention-starved and insecure, and their new drug is follower engagement, “likes” and such.

It’s a new frontier. The days of “playing games with the youth” have ended. As a matter of fact, if I’m being honest, some days I’m with students from morning until evening, living in their new world, trying to help them navigate their wounds and baggage. It’s those days you might find me lying on the floor of my office, gathering the energy needed to drive home.

But that’s okay. Because it’s there, on the carpet where Domino’s icing dipping sauce has been thoroughly trampled into, that I’m reminded to be wholly dependent on God myself and that I’m not alone; I’m co-laboring with others to show these students Jesus. 

I say “co-labor,” because student ministry is a partnership. While the position of youth pastor may have once been to “babysit” the youth while the adults do the “real” ministry, I can assure you, student ministry is real ministry and needs to be connected to the adult congregation.

Studies show that students who experience intergenerational worship are significantly less likely to “graduate” from their faith and walk away from God after high school, as they feel connected to a local church body that continues to love and support them even while away from home.

The reality is that this is a generation crying out for help, but has no idea how to receive and accept the help when it arrives: imagine a drowning victim trying to swim away from the responding lifeguard. 

Paul writes in his letter to the Romans to not “copy the behavior and customs of this world, but let God transform you into a new person by changing the way you think” (Romans 12:2). And that’s where the battleground exists for our youth: their minds. Author Dr. Jean M. Twenge, in her book iGen: Why Today’s Super-Connected Kids Are Growing Up Less Rebellious, More Tolerant, Less Happy—and Completely Unprepared for Adulthood—and What That Means for the Rest of Us, asserts that this rising generation is “on the brink of the worst mental health crisis in decades.” 

God has placed us in their lives to love and “direct [our] children onto the right path, [so that] when they are older, they will not leave it” (Proverbs 22:6).

Next month, I will share practical ways you can co-labor alongside your youth pastor to help the students run their race well — to run the narrow path and not leave it. In the meantime, this is the back-to-school season. Make a commitment, as a family, that no matter the academic, athletic or arts schedule, that you will not forsake time with “[those who are] continually devoting themselves to the apostles’ teaching and to fellowship, to the breaking of bread and to prayer” (Acts 2:42).

The youth pastor is not your child’s primary disciple-maker. You are.

C.J. Wetzler is the NextGen pastor at The Church at Deerfield Beach. Before transitioning into full-time ministry, CJ was a commercial airline captain and high school leadership and science teacher. For questions or comments he can be reached at cj@dfb.church.