"Divided"- is modern youth ministry really helping kids?

Bob T., good point, you forgot the air conditioning, none of that either. PLewis, what you will find in describing the particulars in the FIC movement is that everyone will say “that is not how we do it” and “our church is not like that”, “don’t lump us all into one group”. It is very similar in that way to the emergent church. I find it hard to believe that they can lump ALL youth groups, etc. into one monolithic evil in the movie divided, and then say, do not apply the same generality to us though! I was in a FIC church for a few years and exposed to them for several years before that. It is very attractive from the outset, families together, dads leading, all that stuff Susan R has listed. Here is how it looked where I was; only the Sunday AM service during the week so families had more time together, the fathers also called heads of households administered communion to their own families ( the father got the cup from the elder/pastor and then gave it to his family). If you did not have a father/head of household present you would need to be included with a family who did in order to participate. So to answer the question of how singles/widows/single moms would fit in, in theory a family from the church would “adopt” them and then through them participate, as a result there were very few, and there were no non churched kids there, those who did not have a family present. There was no S.S., the fathers were to do that at home. No nursery, no youth group, although in practice moms with fussy/crying children would all sit somewhere in a room together (it took me along time to figure out what’s the difference if there are 5 moms in there and if they each took turns 1 week then the others could sit in the service) and after the service a group of youth (not THE youth group) would form and play various games or talk with each other. There was no outreach the the unsaved, I suppose it was up to each individual family. One the upside there was alot of very nice people, but if you think about it all were homeschooled and there were many things in common. On the downside there was no solid doctrine held as there were different views on all the “ologys” (soteriology, etc.) so there was not any solid preaching. I know this is where the FIC proponents will say not at our church. If you will look at the NCFIC list of churches they are all over the place doctrinally, so they may say we are Christ centered but their statements do not in effect show it to be so. Look at the NCFIC “confession” listed above, where is the Gospel? Homeschool and family are front and center, not Christ and the cross. Much more could be said.

I say the above to caution you before you either try to create division in your church or jump ship looking for the “perfect” church because it is not, and if you will carefully study it out with your Pastor/shepherds (your churches leaders) I think you will find it is not even the right model. Another comment on the movie divided, if you hold to a leadership structure in the church and you wish to see something changed should you not present it to the leadership/Pastors of a church first and not go around behind them to the congregation? What if, in a family, a group or individual wanted to change how your family does something and instead of going to the Father/parents they take it around behind them to the kids directly to bring about the change? Is that right, is it right in the church? Is that what this “movie” does? Only it is OK in the church right?????

I have never attended an FIC church - have known a few families that have been involved in them. Even invited to one ( which honestly was granted as an honor of sorts). Though after much discussion and looking into it my husband and I decided not to visit. I live in South Central Texas .. home to Vision Forum (at least it WAS here) ..

I’ve been researching this for the past couple months because “age integrated Sunday School” has come up in our church conference .. it sounded strange as described and appears to be an attempt at some kind of compilation .. I am trying to see the pros/cons of both sides .. and since there is no straightforward “Thou shalt” or “Thou shalt not” on the subject am trying to come to an understanding.

It will be profitable to go back and read the lengthy comment from Steve Doyle on the

Divided

Vimeo page…just before they closed comments. It is very thoughtful and balanced.

The film is a propaganda piece, not a documentary, with a series of very disturbing misuses of Scripture. One they didn’t mention was Neh 8:2

Then Ezra the priest brought the law before the assembly of men, women and all who could listen with understanding, on the first day of the seventh month.

So, who was watching those without understanding?

Steve Doyle wrote 6 sentences describing what he “liked” [his word] about the movie (4 of those sentences had to do with the videography, not the content) and then he wrote over 9 paragraphs detailing what he “didn’t like” [his words].

I’m not part of a family-integrated church and never have been. I went over to vimeo expecting a balanced review from this pastor whose church was formerly FIC, but was disappointed. His review was as balanced as the presentation in the Divided movie.

I went over to vimeo expecting a balanced review from this pastor whose church was formerly FIC, but was disappointed. His review was as balanced as the presentation in the Divided movie.

By balanced, I meant well thought out, reasonable, without invective. His comments were to the point, clear and accurate.

Here is a dictionary definition: “mental steadiness or emotional stability; habit of calm behavior, judgment…”

If that’s the preferred definition of balanced for this discussion, then the Divided documentary was balanced. It was well thought out (they spent months working on the movie; Steve Doyle spent a few minutes writing his comment) and reasonable (they clearly presented their argument, built their case from history, and interviewed a variety of people; Steve Doyle presented only his opinions and thoughts) and were not invective (it wasn’t abusive or violent). I agree that Doyle’s comment was without invective.

So, you believe that Doyle’s points were accurate. I’m guessing the people who produced Divided believe their points are accurate as well. I’m not casting a vote one way or the other.

I was using balanced in terms of having weight equally distributed. As for Steve Doyle’s mental steadiness or emotional stability, I really am not one to make a judgment regarding that based on reading only one comment from him.

I don’t quite understand why you’re so narrowly focused on that one word in my post. I thought Doyle brought to the subject, and the film, a mature judgment which was unfortunately lacking in the film itself. I thought his comments were more helpful than the article by Tim Challies recommended in an earlier post, though I had no problems with Challies. I think the strength of his persoective is that he knows the FIC world from having been part of it, and he agrees with key aspects of the criticisms of modern youth groups, etc.

In my opinion the film was not well balanced in either sense of the word, certainly not well reseasoned. The techniques used in the film were built on emotionally front-loading the subject with the (somewhat amatuerish) manipulation of images and disconnected ideas. These are methods that would disturb us greatly if they were used against something we believe in.

Yes, I believe Doyle’s points were accurate and the film’s points were often not accurate. That does factor in to my evaluation.

But I would call your attention to the more important matter of the misuse of Scripture in the film, which is a common problem in very insular movements. I am not against FIC. I am against claiming everyone else’s way of doing church is clearly compromised by Darwinian, Socialistic, secular thinking.

As Doyle pointed out:

Having been inside FIC for a while I saw other problems, many of which are brought out in this film. These include, but are not limited to, a tendency to judge those who do church differently, and a tendency to make the Bible say much more than it really does about age-specific ministry.

I don’t quite understand why you’re so narrowly focused on that one word in my post

It’s because that was my point of disagreement.

I agree that the Divided documentary was not balanced (in the equally distributing weight sense of the word). But, neither was Steve Doyle’s comment balanced (in that same sense of the word). The FIC has an agenda, if you will, and so does Steve. I’ve run into Steve’s comments against FIC on other blogs (I think it might have been Justin Taylor’s blog). He tends to show up in various places to refute the FIC when it is being promoted.

I wasn’t trying to persuade you to agree with the FIC or Divided. I think we simply had a misunderstanding about the word “balanced.”

Tim Challies tweeted this video. Might be helpful to the conversation.

http://vimeo.com/26844660

The NCFIC was disinvited from the D6 Conference last week even though the purpose of the conference was “to explore biblical discipleship solutions that address the mass epidemic of today’s youth leaving the church and abandoning the faith.”

The sponsor of the conference who decided to disinvite them admitted “that he had not viewed the film.”

http://www.charismanews.com/culture/32020-divided-film-banned-from-yout…

One of the interesting things is that Voddie Baucham (who appears in the Divided movie) was one of the speakers at the conference.

someone’s toesies got an ouchie.