Youth Groups: A Good Idea or a Bad Idea?

Thanks for this one John and Jim for posting it. I think I had an unusually good youth group in my teen years and this has been my observation as well. From my perspective the biggest concern is what you alluded to about the infantization of teens. It seems crazy that a 17 year old young man cannot sit in an adult service but a year or two later he may be married and expected to lead a home. Likewise for girls who will also have tremendous responsibility. We should be expecting more from Christian youth, not less. Good article.

I remember the first time I read “The Trellis and the Vine” and youth groups were one of the first potential empty trellises that I thought of. I’d like to think that are some good and spiritually profitable youth groups but I still think that the whole church and the home are the best ones.

"Some things are of that nature as to make one's fancy chuckle, while his heart doth ache." John Bunyan

If you got rid of the moralism and “gross out games” and the like, would the concept be redeemable? I just had a bit of “fun” with youth group last night and I have to wonder, to be honest.

One big step that we ought to take is to make sure whoever is interacting with teens have some real training—I dare suggest that Bible college grads tend very strongly to that therapeutic moralism, sad to say.

Aspiring to be a stick in the mud.

No doubt, there are examples of “youth group” done well. Even then, I think, I would have my suspicions that not having a youth group would be still be better. I’m not sure how churches can structure youth groups in a way that doesn’t create a para-church-type organization within the church. Like you’d, I’d be interested in hearing how it’s been done, if it’s been done.

….when discussing one of the harder “anti-youth-group” theologies, the family centered church, it occurred to me that there is a clear example of a Biblical group that is sex-and-age-segregated from others, and it worked out pretty well: the Disciples. No? Not just within 4-5 years like youth group, of course, but worth noting. Jesus also never really spoke out against the synagogue system—against the theology of the Pharisees that they taught, yes, but against the “shul” itself, I can’t say that He did. (maybe I’m wrong, but interesting if I’m right, no?)

Aspiring to be a stick in the mud.

I remember hearing a critique from Mike Horton that resonated with me. He pointed out something to the effect of the hard transition youth groups can create between the young and adult members.
They hit their 20s and suddenly it’s, “Hey! Where’d my games, movies, and pizza parties go? I thought church was supposed to be fun!” And most of them don’t stick around.

Still working on a more pithy way to express it, but this is one of my personal core principles: Never dismiss as a bad idea what is actually poor implementation of good idea.

What youth groups did for me:

  • Gave me my first opportunities to open the word to my fellow believers
  • Gave me my first opportunities to encounter first hand, and think critically about, differences of interpretation
  • Gave me my first opportunities to experience non-familial Christian fellowship with people my own age
  • Gave me my first opportunities to see the difference, experience the difference, between the power of expositional ministry and the fleeting drama of revivalism

Views expressed are always my own and not my employer's, my church's, my family's, my neighbors', or my pets'. The house plants have authorized me to speak for them, however, and they always agree with me.

Aaron, that’s good advice. However, speaking of youth groups, I’ve yet to hear a compelling argument for why youth groups are a good idea. I fail to see the need to begin with. I’m sure that I’ve haven’t heard all the arguments for why youth groups are a good idea, though.

I posted while you were editing, Aaron. I’ve got to get to the church building, but I’ll read and respond later, maybe in agreement.

Fatherless children. It’s a less threatening way to reach out to them because they get to interact with their peers, and then they can interact with (theoretically) mature adults.

Aspiring to be a stick in the mud.

I don’t want to downplay the problem of children without a father in the home but if children are getting more Bible teaching at church and youth group than they are at home, they may indeed be “fatherless”.

"Some things are of that nature as to make one's fancy chuckle, while his heart doth ache." John Bunyan

No doubt, many could give similar bullet points of the ways in which their youth group was profitable. In fact, I could do so with even my mostly dysfunctional youth group. The thing is, as I read your list, there’s nothing there that can’t be (and shouldn’t be) done by churches that are intentional about training within the larger body the teens and youth that God has given them. It’s not that I don’t believe that youth groups can be profitable, it’s that I am unaware of any profit that requires a youth group. Why intentionally place obstacles requiring energy and effort to circumvent if the good can be accomplished without the obstacles? Youth groups tend to create problems in order to do good that could’ve been done without the youth group to begin with.

Why intentionally place obstacles requiring energy and effort to circumvent if the good can be accomplished without the obstacles?

Makes sense to me. But I don’t think there is any obstacle-free approach, and the few additional hassles involved in having a YG bring some additional opportunities as well.

I get the impression that we are not defining “youth group” the same way. What you described as an alternative to YG looks to me like pretty much the description of a YG….just not necessarily executed the same way as some churches do it.

Views expressed are always my own and not my employer's, my church's, my family's, my neighbors', or my pets'. The house plants have authorized me to speak for them, however, and they always agree with me.

For me personally, youth group was a very good idea. My family moved from Texas to Georgia right before I entered 7th grade, and the good solid preaching and doctrine I learned from our youth leaders still affect how I think and operate today. Interaction with the ladies on the youth staff changed me for the better in more ways than I can recount in one paragraph, and that’s interaction that would not have happened in just a regular church setting. We also had frequent small group meetings for prayer, accountability, and Bible study, that made it hard to disappear. My personality (and life circumstances) as a teenager would have made it easy for me to fall between the cracks without things set up the way they were. I have observed in other places youth group being done the wrong way, but for me, it was one of the biggest influences in my spiritual life.