Stu Crawshaw

I love a good van. I have had 2 VW kombi's myself. But this van is possibly the cleanest one I have EVER seen. Two mates from Brisbane have come up with a novel idea that has transformed a humble white van into a portable laundry for homeless people.

According to Buzzfeed, these young guys have found a great way to help people in need. They call it Orange Sky. The boys were motivated to find a solution to a problem that is often overlooked.

"We got started as a result of seeing the fantastic work that food vans and the like do for homeless people. Food, healthcare and support are all readily available yet there is minimal affordable access to hygiene services and we feel it is an area that is overlooked." Buzzfeed reports

The mates currently have 2 washers and 2 dryers, that can wash the clothes of up to 10 homeless people per hour. Their idea has inspired others to get involved too. They are yet to use volunteers, but to date there are already 100 applicants who have registered to help. 

The Australian Government has reported that volunteerism amongst Australian young people is generally lower than the national average. 

Young people tend to volunteer less (27%) than the Australian average (36%). This may be a concern for the future of volunteering and may effect an array of different organisations that provide important services in our community, including churches. United States research shows that in 2013, volunteering there reached new lows. According to Christianity Today, the majority of volunteers in the States are involved in the church. This decline in volunteerism is impacting on local church communities across the USA.

What is the picture for Australian churches? Christians in our local churches are often busy and time poor. Yet all churches rely on the enthusiasm and energy of gifted volunteers. They say that '20% of the people do 80% of the work.' If this is even partly true, then the trend of falling volunteerism may be putting some already committed church goers under more stress. Church leaders may also unwittingly put pressure on their most active members to keep filling their weekly rosters. But is there an alternative.

What can churches learn from a story like Orange Sky?

The first lesson I see is that not all new ideas come from the top. Orange Sky was started by a couple of young blokes from Brissy. New ideas that are practical, simple and effective can come from everyday people. It may be tempting for a Christian Pastor to feel that he or his core team have to initiate all the new ministry ideas at church. But sometimes the best ideas can come from the church members who are actually at the coal face of ministry. New ways of doing things can make church ministry easier and more fun too. A new idea from a church member may inspire others to get involved at church for the first time. And we should not just look to adults for ideas either. Young people can come up with fun new initiatives too. Just ask any youth leader.

The second lesson from Orange Sky is that sometimes it takes a while for an idea to get traction. The mobile laundry van was initially viewed with suspicion by homeless people in Brisbane. But after they saw that the guys were really trying to help them, they embraced the idea. We should not give up on a good initiative just because it does not work straight away. It is easy for us to complain when new things don't work and it is tempting to say 'I told you so'. We might view untried young people with suspicion and see their mistakes as validation for our conservatism toward change. It easy for older Christians to ask 'why should we?' rather than 'why not give it a go?' It is good to be optimistic and try new things. Some things fail and that is ok as long as no one gets hurt. Sometimes a positive initiative needs a positive attitude and the will to see it through, because all new ideas start a little messy.

There is an interesting article about the Hong Kong Student protests in mashable today. The students are protesting against electoral reforms that they feel will restrict their voting rights. They have adopted the umbrella as a symbol of their movement, as some students have used umbrellas to protect themselves from tear gas. One creative student protestor has even carried a Captain America shield during the demonstrations. This movement has got me thinking about how Christians view protest as a political tool.

The Umbrella Revolution has been disrupting down town Hong Kong with peaceful protest since September. There are still thousands of students occupying the streets there. In their latest demonstration, the students opened their umbrellas for 87 seconds to symbolise the 87 rounds of tear gas that were fired into their ranks a month ago. They now dub these cross roads, 'Umbrella Square.'  

Student protests have a facsinating history. The University of Paris strike of 1229 lasted for two years and saw the deaths of a number of students. The protest resulted in reforms to the medieval university and they marked the emergance of a student class. Closer to our time, the era of the 1950's and 1960's was a particularly heady time for students around the world. There were student protests in places like Bucharest, Poland, France, Australia, Britain and the USA. There is an interesting documentary series airing on SBS at the moment about the turmoil of the 1960's that is well worth a look called 'the sixties'.

New protest movements emerge during times of cultural change, and  Christians can find themselves right in the midst of the turmoil. Sometimes Christians themselves are the protestors, as they were in the times of the Reformation in the 16th century. The word 'protestant' actually means  'protestor'. Protestant, is the name given to Christians who have protested against the authority of the Church in Rome. 

Alternatively, sometimes Christians find themselves immeshed in someone else's debate. They may find themselves on one side or another, depending on their conciense. This would be in line what Paul teaches about disputable matters in Romans 14. In some instances Christians don't agree with either side of a debate and think of a 3rd way. For example, in the turmoil of the student protests in the 1960's, young Christians in San Francisco found themselves in the middle of an emerging generation gap. 

Some student Christians did not want to stop following Jesus, but they understood the angst of their own generation too. They may have disagreed with some traditions of their parents, but they also disagreed with new values toward sex and drugs of their own generation. So they found a 3rd way. They started coffee houses where they played songs about Jesus, with a sound their generation could relate to. This was the birth of the Jesus Movement and a new form of Christian communication, Jesus Rock. This was a controversial but effective 3rd way. The Jesus People shared the love of Jesus with their generation and still remained connected to the Church. 

It is exciting times as we are gearing up for our next new adventure under God, growing connected communities.

God has been very gracious to us. We launched Soul Revival as a new Anglican Church Plant in the Sutherland Shire in 2012. Since then, we have moved from a lounge room, to meeting in a Factory. We have gone from a launch team of 30 adults, to over 200 adults and kids who call Soul Revival home. We have gone from having no staff, to almost paying 2 full time pastors. People have become Christians, people have grown in their faith and people have enjoyed serving Jesus together as we continue to reach out to the 96% of people who do not go to any church in the Sutherland Shire. 

We are not celebrating a new church but we continue to celebrate all the people who will come to know Jesus in this new church.

We have seen so many of our prayers answered. Under God, we have reached the first stage of what we set out to do together in mission together. We are a Christian community that is reaching out into the community of Kirrawee. But there is so much more to do.

Soul Revival currently meets together on Saturday night. We have a youth community that meets on Friday and a new play group that meets on Tuesdays. Last week we launched a brand new 5-6 kids community. We have about 12 community groups meeting during the week and we are active in our local primary and high schools. This is a great start and last Sunday we met as a church and set out to make 2015 our next new era of ministry together under God.

Our new vision for the next stage of our ministry together is to make Saturday night the Nexus (or gathering point) of an expanding ministry.  Our first new gathering will be on Friday nights.

Last Sunday we started to get excited about continuing to grow our church using the Bible. We talked about being a place where Christians are growing, where we are growing more disciples and we are growing more connected communities with Gospel values. We are going to start new gatherings. This Wednesday night at our Synergy Community Forum, we will begin to start working out the nuts and bolts of what this might look like under God in 2015. We appreciate your prayers as we begin this new era together at Soul Revival Church.

Tonight will be the first chance for our Soul Revival youth community to meet at the new Kirrawee factory. It will be awesome to see how the young crew enjoy the Factory for the first time.

The youth have been meeting in the homes of various Soul Revivalists for over a year now. The youth leaders have been amazing. Each week they rock up with energy and enthusiasm to encourage and teach the teenagers about Jesus. Now we are about to see what happens as the young people have a more stable place to meet. But it is not just the meeting place that gives the young Soul Revivalists continuity. It is the desire of many of their leaders to teach teenagers to read the Bible for themselves in the context of long term, low key commited relationships.

I have been really excited to be a part of launching a new youth community for the second time. My first experience was when I was a part of launching a youth ministry in 1992. This was the year we came up with the name Soul Revival. It was the era of 'grunge' and Gen X angst. The year before, in 1991, Nivarna released it’s classic album Nevermind. Coincidentally, 'Smells Like Teen Spirit' just came up on my music playlist as I write this post!

From the early days of Soul Revival, we wanted to find new ways to contextualise the Gospel into Sutherland Shire Youth Culture. But instead of just relying on a cool beach side vibe, we took a different tact. We decided that from the beginning we would seek to clothe ourselves with Christ and to learn how to love God and love others as Jesus commanded in Matt 22:37-40. That meant we focused on teaching the Gospel in the context of long term, low key relationships. We looked for ways to share the love of Jesus, person to person, generation to generation.

As youth leaders, we wanted to share our lives together and share our lives with the young people we led in appropriate ways. We sought to mature them in Christ using the Bible and to be committed to discipling them right through their High School years and beyond. In the early days we were constantly trying to work out what this looked like. But the basic idea was that we wanted to be leaders who were friends for the Gospel and be a peer group that the young people could grow up into. That was the genesis of our Saturday night hangouts that continued on without a disruption for the next 20 years. Every Sunday, as young adults and teenagers we also attended the evening church gathering and we were excited about being part of our local church long term. We were keen to make relationships with adults across the church as well as growing relationships with the young people. We were a kind of relational nexus, helping 80 year olds mix with teenagers in appropriate ways.

Today we meet as a church on Saturday nights. Some of our members first joined in the early 1990’s while many others have joined recently in the last year or so after we launched Soul Revival Church. On any one Saturday night there are always some of us going to a party or a wedding or an other event after the formal gathering finishes at 6.30pm. At the same time, others are hanging out at the Factory over dinner and then hanging out into the night while asking their friends along. At the first night at the factory last week some of the young adults did not go home till 1am!

The Soul Revival gatherings on Friday night and Saturday nights have become a kind of a third space. The first space people live in is their own home. The second space is where people work and the third space is a place where people gather together to spend time with others outside the first two spaces. While it is important for Christians to live out their faith in all three secular spaces it is also valuable when they can carve out a christian third place too. An open Christian community where Christains gather around Jesus and God's Word and invite others to come along. Soul Revival is a fresh expression of a community on mission every week.

I am struck by the contrast between the safety and stability of Sydney, to the dire situation in Syria right now. While my local Christian community is busy setting up a new factory to meet in, Christians in Damascus are just trying to stay alive. But in the midst of their troubles they are praying to God.

This article from Christianity today gives a personal insight into the situation from the perspective of one Christian Mother Hanna. She is really struggling.  "Sometimes it seems like there is no end to all this misery. I know God is in control, but sometimes I feel so hopeless. I regularly fall on my knees and cry out to Him about why all of this is happening," Hanna, said.

The article goes on, "Open Doors USA, which is providing help to Syrian refugees, noted that at least 120,000 people have lost their lives in the past three years in the war between President Bashar al-Assad and rebel forces determined to take down his government."

While I am serving for the Gospel here in Australia, I am also convicted of the need to personally support Gospel work overseas too. Today, I am reminded of those who are living in the midst of the nightmare of war. Open doors is one organisation I trust. You can read more about open doors here. You may be inclined to support them personally, as they support Hanna and people like her.

It was exciting to welcome lots of visitors to the new Soul Revival Factory on Saturday night. There was a warm and friendly atmosphere. It was great to have so many different ages mixing together.

The message on Saturday night was from 1 Corinthians 15. This chapter is the climax of Paul’s letter to the Corinthians and in it he focus’ on the Resurrection of Jesus. It was a great opportunity to focus us on the Gospel or good news about Jesus.

One of the highlights of the night for me was when we heard from 5 Soul Revivalists who talked about how Jesus has changed them. It was exciting to hear from Emily who has only just started gathering with the church for the first time this year after making a commitment to Jesus at beach mission. Her joy encouraged everyone.

On Saturday night Soul Revival will meet for the first gathering in the new Factory site at 40a Flora St Kirrawee. It will be an exciting moment for our little church as we embark with Jesus on yet another new era together in the 4th location since we started in Feb 2012.

This gathering will be a soft launch for the factory. While we will cut a cake, we will leave most of the festivities for the formal launch latter in the year. In reality, this weekend will look a lot like last weekend, only in a new location. We will still start at 5pm for coffee and the kids teaching time. The hour formal time will start at 5.30pm and go till 6.30pm. This week we will have the kids with us for the whole hour. After this we will have a BBQ starting at 6.30pm. The Factory will be open till late for those who would like to hang around. As always visitors are very welcome!

This will be our 4th move in 2 years. One great thing about the Soul Revival Church plant moving around so much has been that it reminds us that the local church is the people and not the building. As much as we are all looking forward to a new home for our community, we will be remembering this weekend that we are gathered together in the name of Jesus around his word, the Bible.

On the ABC tonight, there was yet another story of doom and gloom for the Australian environment. But I saw something positive in this particular story. The report was an update on the incessant march of the Cane Toads. The South American toads were introduced into Queensland cane fields to control the Grey Back Cane Beetle in 1935. Unfortunately they have been spreading across the top of Australia at the rate of about 50 km a year ever since. Their conquest has taken them across Kakadu and the Northern Territory toward the West Australian boarder. Soon they will reach the Kimberly.

But there are people who are not giving up in despair. Community groups continue mobilising, even after Government funding has been withdrawn. Local residents who live in the path of these marauders go out at night collecting as many toads as possible. This is slowing the advance and giving native carnivores more time to adapt to the poisonous ferrels. The story has reminded me of the old environmental adage, 'think globally, act locally'.

In a recent blog, I shared my revived conviction that as a Christian it is important for me to be a good steward of God's world. God's world includes the natural environment. I will be writing more about this in future blogs. But for now, I have been convicted that I might be able to make more of a contribution in my local area to help to sustain bio diversity. Providentially, on a recent trip to Melbourne, I was introduced to the cause  of the eastern quoll.

On arriving home from Victoria, I found the following helpful info from  wikapedia. "The eastern quoll is generally about the size of a small domestic cat, with an adult male averaging 60 cm and weighing around 1.3 kg. Its thick coat is covered by white spots, and ranges in colour from a light fawn to a near black, with an off-white belly." Once Quolls were abundant in NSW. But they are now extinct in the wild on mainland Australia. The article continues, "The last mainland eastern quoll specimen was collected as roadkill in Sydney's Nielsen Park, Vaucluse on 31 January 1963." The last wild quoll in NSW died in Vaucluse of all places.

Happily though, the story does not end there. I have been discovering that there are a number of people in NSW who are working to help re-introduce  the quoll into the wild (and Vaucluse presumably). There are groups like the Aus Eco System Foundation that breed quolls and the Blue Mountains World Heritage Institute. 

The most exciting news I have found to date came today from the Blue Mountains World Heritage Institute. They put me onto a recent announcement from the NSW government.  "The NSW Government has announced an innovative new project under Saving our Species to reintroduce at least eight mammal species that are currently extinct in NSW to the State’s national parks. Under the project, locally extinct mammal species could once again call NSW home, including the bilby, numbat and golden bandicoot." AND guess what? This also includes the eastern quoll!

Amongst the various troubling news stories this week, was a very sad and poignant announcement. Squeezed between updates on the search for the missing MH370 flight, troubles in Crimea, Manaus Island and ongoing strife around the world was the report that some Australian scientists have recently resigned many native species to a category of 'living dead'. In other words there are now so many species are on the brink of extinction, that we may not be able to save them all. Scientists are debating about whether or not we should begin 'triaging' species. Rather than trying to save all those that are endangered we might have to start determining which ones to save and which ones to let go. In the midst of the many devastating realities in the world at the moment, this one is also definitely worthy of our attention. This story has troubled me all week.

Providentially, this week I was also attending a Sydney Re:Thinking Conference. I had the privilege to listen to a series of lectures by Miroslav Volf. One of the most profound moments for me at the conference was actually a tangent of Miroslav's. He paused during one of his lectures to reflect on a question. Why in Genesis 2, did God put the tree of the knowledge of good and evil in the middle of the garden of Eden? Surely he could have placed it anywhere, but he positioned right it in the middle. Miroslav postulated that there was a good chance that the tree was in a place that would have been regularly in view. While Adam and Eve could eat the fruit off any other tree of the garden, this one tree was forbidden and there it was slap bang in the middle of the garden. Miroslav was thinking out loud about this and mused that the tree's position in the garden may have actually made it abundantly clear to his human creatures that the rest of the garden was a gift to them. Rather than being taken for granted, all the other trees in the Garden should be seen as a contrast to the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. While there was a tree that was forbidden, there was all this other delightful abundance that was given them by the God who created them and cared for them. The response to this gift of God to them is...... thankfulness.

When we started our church plant a couple of years ago, our motivation was to start a mission to people who did not already go to church. Steve Timis’ advice to us was to not celebrate the start of a new church but to celebrate all the people who will come to know Jesus through the new church. That pretty much summed it up for us. But what would the new followers of Jesus value? We hoped to encourage people about being excited to be disciples and not just become Christian consumers. We wanted to gather people around Jesus and not just a new form of church.

Our early launch team discussions showed us the benefits of having multiple generations thinking together about mission. We talked about being Biblically-defined, learning from Christian history and the need to be culturally aware of our present context. We were not setting up a church for ourselves but were seeking to be outward looking.

Ed Stetzer stresses the importance of studying the culture so that a church plant may reach people in any particular context. This is the contextualisation of the Gospel. Stetzer says that “culture itself is not evil, but a composite of good and evil (as understood biblically) values and vocations, customs and creations, beliefs and behaviors that characterize a particular people in a particular place.”

Jonathan Dodson agrees with Stetzer regarding the importance of contextualisation but warns us to avoid superficial contextualisation. He calls on churches to be missional, not superficially contextual. He points out the danger of just reaching out to the white middle class. Some ‘contextualisation’ looks the same regardless of a church plant's location. These kinds of gatherings are predominantly white, suburban and middle class. The danger is that we can end up with cookie cutter church plants. This superficial engagement with culture can result in a Christian consumerism.

Dodson argues that this superficial contextualisation has its roots in the church growth movement and the homogeneous unit principal (HUP) of the 20th century. One of the leaders of this HUP strategy was Peter Wagner. He wrote, “try not to allow diverse social and cultural elements to mix on the congregational level any more than necessary. Churches must be built as much as possible within homogeneous units if they are to maintain a sense of community among believers.”

According to Dodson the resonance of this thinking continues when church planters gather people around church forms and not around Jesus. They seek to appeal to consumers with a cool song leader, edgy venue, anti-religious messages and some feel good social justice messages thrown in. This form of church gives people what they want instead of what they need, namely repentance and faith. He writes “Underneath superficial contextualisation lurks a consumeristic impulse that gathers people around church forms instead of Jesus Christ as Lord. This misuse leads us to contaminate both contextualisation and the gospel. We try to get people to buy in to a new form of church instead of dying so they might live for Christ. This is troubling.” 

A benefit of an all age all stage church is that there is a built on the expectation that the church is not just offering an expression that suits me. What is cool and hip in one generation is uncool to another. It would not make sense to try to market a single form of church that would be appealing to all ages. We minimise the potential for being a cooky cutter church plant by not even attempting to produce a product that’s geared to attract a particular targeted demographic.

By not holding to the homogeneous unit principle we are teaching Christians that is ok if things don’t meet all their perceived needs because what we really value is that we are all growing in our faith. Because we are reaching out to various cultures and ages, it is Jesus and his Gospel we gather around not a particular style of church. As more and more new people join our church we will continue to look different in our practical expression. 

Having different kinds of people in the same gathering replaces consumerism with a kind of creativity as we develop new ways of doing things. Tim Chester argues that it is important to have a balance between consuming and creating as Christians. He says that we are not to be merely consumers of culture but creators of culture.

We are planting in suburban Sydney which has the potential to be a cultural dessert where no new things are created but only imported from elsewhere. Maybe with a little confidence we can leave behind some consumeristic forms and stretch out toward a more intergenerational, creative expression, where we can express our identity in Christ.

We can get excited about being servants. We have to be careful not to outsource all our ministry to the paid staff. The professionalisation of ministry leads to church members lacking the confidence to make a real ministry contribution. We like to give members at Soul Revival different path ways into serving Jesus together. We seek to grow our church both numerically and in Godliness. We seek to mature Christians in Christ using the Bible. Consumerism in churches can create grumbling when high expectations are not met. But maturing discipleship can grow a culture of thankfulness. 

Bringing the generations together to think through mission in a changing world

Change is a challenge to the post-modern church. The culture we are on mission to is constantly changing. New technologies come and go. Just as we adjust our practices to take into account a change, yet another new shiny device comes along that changes things again. I think that an all age all stage church can help us to adjust to change more rapidly. It brings young and older Christians together regularly so they can have an ongoing conversation about how to approach each new change as they happen. In this environment change can be an opportunity for new mission.

In a previous post I talked about the benefits of creating spaces for the generations to have a conversation together about mission in a changing world. Obviously young Christians have a lot to learn from older Christians but they can make a contribution in the local church as well. Young people are not just the church of tomorrow, they are the church of today. They are often on the cusp of cultural change and so have the potential to have a sharpened awareness of how to effectively communicate the Gospel in new ways to a changing society. For example young people can help churches think through how to use social media more effectively. Facebook is already 10 years old and yet some churches have only been using this technology relatively recently. Many young people are already abandoning Facebook in favour of other social media tools like instagram, snap chat and twitter. If we create spaces for young and older Christians to talk about this together, the church might be able to have the flexibility to start using these social media tools in appropriate ways as the cultural change is happening. Otherwise, it might take the church another 10 years to adapt.  A conversation between young and older Christians about the use of social media will result in a quicker but careful response to this change in the culture.

Despite the positive contribution young people can make to church, Mark Senter points out that churches often do not listen to the ideas of young people until they become adults. There may be an attitude here of ‘you cannot put an old head on young shoulders’. Young people’s ideas may be viewed with suspicion, or even be perceived as a threat to the status quo and the stability of a church. This kind of attitude effectively slows down the pace of change of a local church and results in missed opportunities for mission in a rapidly changing world. When different generations work together they can come up with new, effective and exciting ministry expressions faster.

Soul Revival is seeking to be a flexible church in our mission practice. We know that Jesus is the same yesterday, today and tomorrow. The timeless message of the Bible is as relevant in this generation as it has been to every generation. But there are aspects of our culture that are redeemable. As long as we keep an eye on the lessons of the past and keep the Bible as our authority, we can seek to listen to young people’s ideas too. 

An all age all stage gatherings create spaces for the generations to get together to have a Biblically based conversation about change and our missional response  At Soul Revival, the generations have an opportunity to get together every week. Our church has put our weekly gathering on at a time that suits most ages for this reason. We have found that in our area, the 5.30-6.30pm time slot works for most ages.

We have added some community time before and after our one hour service too. If people have time and they would like to get to church a little earlier, we have a half hour coffee time before the service while our kids have their teaching time. After the service we invite people to stay for dinner if they like. The dinner in particular has been very popular. Kids and adults have a good shared time. We sometimes have group conversations during dinner with an open discussion about Biblical perspectives on current topics like Christians and war and homosexual marriage. These have been popular with Christians and people who do not have a faith alike. The discussions have helped us to see ethical issues from a Biblical framework. We have found that people form relationships quickly when they can make the dinner time after church. Importantly the different ages get an opportunity to listen to each other in these times.

Another way we have helped young people have more of a voice in our church is to include them in our Synergy meeting that meets 5 times a year. This meeting is an open forum where Christians can enjoy a discussion about the culture, discipleship and mission of our church. Added to that we like to see young people being a part of our elected representative council as well.

Reaching people who do not fit into the boxes Christians create

Soul Revival Church is only 2 years old but we are already starting to see some benefits for mission of meeting together as an ‘all age all stage’ gathering. This week I will begin a short series looking at 4 particular benefits we have experienced so far. Today I will share about the benefits for mission to the whole family and not just individuals.

One train of though suggests that a new church plant should focus on reaching out to a particular demographic of people. A ‘targeted’ church plant may choose to engage with young families by starting a church meeting at a time that suits the kids and gives the parents a chance to meet with other parents that are at their life stage. Other Church plants go for a hipster expression for 20 somethings, attracting young adults to a gathering that has modern music and young preachers. Still others plant churches in retirement villages giving seniors the opportunity to come to a traditional service that they feel more at home with. 

Our new church has set out to plant a gathering that is a little different. It is not targeted at a particular group of people, but is open to anyone to come along. Having gatherings that are not reaching out to only one particular demographic has opened up new opportunities. It may seem counter intuitive to some, but here is the first of 5 benefits for mission that we have seen from an all age all stage church plant. 

Mission to the whole family. 

Despite being designed to maximise mission, targeted gatherings can actually restrict some opportunities for mission. For example successive surveys have shown that lots of Australians make a commitment to Christ when they are young. I have seen young Christians from non-Churched families excited to share their new faith with their unbelieving parents. But if their church only offers targeted gatherings, they may feel awkward bringing their parents to church. For example it may be hard for them to invite their parents to either an evening youth service or a morning family service that they have never been to and where they don’t know anyone.

A gathering that is open to all ages means that young Christians can invite their parents, grand parents, aunties and uncles, younger brothers and sisters to church and know that they will not feel out of place. Grand parents know if they ask their grand children to church there will be other young people attending. An all age all stage gathering can connect with the whole family. It brings the generations together with the opportunity to go on mission together.

This week I had the privilage to teach for one afternoon at the 2014 Anglican Youth Works Intensive in Sydney. We had a great class talking about the different ways people view adolescence. While some adults see the teenage years in negative terms, we discussed some of the enormous positive contributions that young people have made in history. We looked especially at the wonderful fresh expressions of Church that young Christians have initiated over the years. 

Youth Ministry Author and Professor Kenda Dean sees that the Church can learn from the experience of young people. I agree. Young people are often at the leading edge of cultural change in society. Young Christians are uniquely placed to pioneer fresh expressions of Church that engage with their culture. A good example of this is the Jesus Movement that began in the late 1960's. The Jesus People used rock and folk music to engage with the emerging Baby Boomer generation. Some of their new ideas eventually found their way into the established church. 

I call this the shock absorber effect. Ever since the Industrial Revolution 200 years ago, ministries to young people have been among the first to respond to cultural change and pass on their lessons to the broader church. Youth Ministry is like a shock absorber in a car that absorbs the bumps and pot holes on the road and allows for a smoother ride. New youth ministry expressions can absorb the initial shocks of cultural change and transfer them more gradually into the rest of the church.

However it can take quite some time for adults to learn the lessons of youth ministry. Initially the guitars and drums of the Jesus movement were viewed with suspicion by concerned adults who were used to singing only traditional Hymns in Church. It was only after a number of years that rock music became normal in many churches. A problem with the shock absorber is that by the time the church has responded to a cultural change the broader society has already moved on to the next new thing, meaning the church becomes perpetually out of date.

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