Are you thinking big enough?

Heavy on my mind today is growth. Growth is almost a cuss word in youth ministry circles… so let’s discuss that cuss word. I hear a lot about youth pastors who are feeling the pressure to grow their youth groups. There are two types of pressure, one legitimate and one illegitimate.

1. Church politics pressure. Pressure is put on you to grow in order to justify your job or your budget. That is understandable pressure from a business perspective, but not God-centered.
2. Reality driven pressure. Pressure is put on your youth ministry to grow because the need is so great. It’s not about you doing a good job or your ministry looking good, it’s about being significant in your community. This is God-centered.

For me, the reality is that I live in a community where about 4% of students attend church or youth group more than once per month. So if my students are in a class of 25… they are likely the only one who knows Jesus as their Savior and Lord.

And I am fighting hard to fight the culture of comfort. My students have a natural inclination to think that we’re big enough. But with 96% of students left unreached, I am forced to lead them where they don’t want to go… to grow.

So right now, I’m doing something that takes a lot of faith. I’m asking a youth group of 15 to invite 2000 people to an outreach. Why? It’s not because of internal political pressure or making myself look good or feel good… it’s because the need is so great in our community that we want to take ownership of the solution.

So what about you and your ministry? Are you feeling the pressure to grow for a God-centered reason?

This entry was posted on Thursday, April 10th, 2008 at 10:29 am and is filed under Questions. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.