How to Integrate Youth into the Greater Church Family

How can I help integrate students into the life of the greater church?

There are statistics that we hear all the time of how many students just fall away from the church and Christianity after high school. So I think it’s great that we’re realizing that we need to involve them in the church as a whole. We need to be teaching that these students, even though they’re in middle school and high school, are members of the church, and we need to constantly provide opportunities for them to be involved in the rest of the church.

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Getting them involved

Think through getting your young men involved in whatever men’s ministry is doing, and your young women in what women’s ministry is doing. Look for ways for them to serve, whether it be in the nursery or with senior citizens.

Brushy Creek Church, has a great deal where their senior citizen’s ministry, the “old folks”, are basically “adopting” high school students. It is such a cool way to blend the two ministries together. You’ve got these senior citizens who are taking these kids out to eat, giving them wisdom, praying over them, and then a couple of times a year they get together for a banquet and I think it’s just awesome.

It’s our job to help our students realize that they’re not just a part of this youth group, but they are part of the church.

Develop Like the Minor Leagues

There’s a guy who spoke at the Iron on Iron Conference a few years ago and shared a great illustration.

He said the youth group should be more like minor league baseball is to the major league instead of college football is to the pros. The goal in minor league is for these guys to get all the tools that they need so they can go into the majors. College football is trying to make a big team now, they don’t care what happens to you after you leave, it’s just about winning now.

Your goal is not to have a really big growing youth group, it’s to develop believers. Discipling young men and women so that they become Godly men and women.

Students need the Local church

Challenge your seniors to get involved in a local church when they go to college!

It’s the biggest step.

I can’t talk about anything without referring to something that Rob Conti had said before, but Rob was talking about how when he went to college, it took him a while to realize that you’re supposed to be a part of a local church. I think we’re doing a bad job sending students off. We need to make sure to equip seniors by saying, “Yeah, when you go to this college, make sure…” and then helping them. Calling around, finding a good church for them to be a part of.

Encourage them to join a local church when they go to college and follow up with them afterward.

Don’t just have your world focused on your youth group here and now, but have it focused on your students growing into Godly men and Godly women – Zach Mabry

Investing after they’re gone

Don’t forget that you can give your students mentorship even after they leave, pointing them toward being involved in local churches. I think that is the key we’re missing, they’re falling away because they’re moving away and allowing lethargy to set in.

It’a truly one of the biggest things I tell people when they go away to college. Find a local church to be involved in. Because it took me a couple of years to realize that that’s what I was supposed to be doing.

Campus ministries are awesome, but they’re not the church, right? So we need to challenge kids. Do you wanna be involved in campus ministry? That’s great! But you need to also be involved in a local church.

Zach Mabry is the worship pastor and one of the main teachers at Snowbird. He also directs our year-round Snowbird Institute program. He has a Master of Divinity from The Southern Baptist Theological Seminary and serves as an adjunct professor for Liberty University. Zach is a teaching pastor at Red Oak Church, a local church in the Andrews area.