What Students Want vs. What they Need
Recently Rick Lawrence of Group Magazine published the results of a survey of 20,000 plus teens answering the following questions:
- What would you like to do More of in your church’s youth ministry? (these results were published in the latest print version of Group)
- What is your biggest challenge in growing deeper in your relationship with God?
- What is your biggest regret in your relationship with God?
- What is your biggest hope in your relationship with God?
- If you could change one thing about yourself, what would it be?
I found the published results to the first question to be mostly bothersome and frustrating. It seemed to me that there was too much emphasis on games and activities, hang out time, and other similar types of things. What was encouraging was what came in at #1 even if only by a little bit…Learning about Jesus. This isn’t the story though. The story, in my opinion, is what is found in the rest of the survey published online here.
As a dad for the last 13 years I have slowly learned that what my child wants is much different than what that child needs. Is it really surprising that students want to have more fun? No, of course not. What is surprising is the number of parents, youth pastors, and leaders that listen to this and go no further. Teenagers are adolescent minds that have not fully developed. This does not discredit their answers; it just means that those of us with fully developed minds (some more than others) should take this into consideration when reading these results. Example:
- The #1 answer regarding what they want more of may be learning about Jesus, but Help in understanding the Bible (our primary source regarding Jesus) doesn’t show up until #12 followed by learning about the New Testament, sermons that focus on the Bible doesn’t show up until #36, a Bible study that focuses on a book of the Bible doesn’t show up until #38.
America has been blessed and teens in America have seen the blessing but not the cost. Because of this and other cultural factors they often see what they want, but don’t realize what is required. This survey brings this perception to the forefront.
The most significant question asked was “What’s the biggest challenge in growing deeper in your relationship with God?” The answers were no surprise. The top 3 answers can be boiled down to two: schedule and parents. Even busyness is a parent issue. Parents model the importance of spiritual things by how they manage their time and it is the parents role to help students learn to manage their time.
There are many other significant observations that could be made. I think this survey is important and should be read and gone over by every youth ministry professional that can get their hands on it, but I want to end by bringing things full circle.
Students may want to learn about Jesus, but don’t want to study the Bible, they want to go to church because it is fun or because their friends are there, but they don’t want to listen to good teaching. Some may want to be more spiritual but aren’t willing to participate in spiritual disciplines. The job of the Youth Pastor is to help students fall more in love with God. That doesn’t mean we don’t do the fun stuff they want, but it does mean we often do things they need, but don’t necessarily want.
So what? Well, that is up to you as a parent, youth pastor, or youth leader. As we think about our philosophy of ministry we could ask these kinds of questions:
- Am I giving students enough of what they need?
- Am I helping students understand what is required in order to get what they want?
- How do we give students enough of what they want (keeping it attractive) and at the same time make sure they are getting what they need?
- What is it that students need? What is the most effective way to give that to them?
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