pastie
From unknown
22 December 2009 - 12:23pm
Hi guys
I am a Youth worker and i was wondering what is the best way on getting young people to attending church and becoming a christian them selves.
I am a firm believer in helping them to become christians but i find it hard to do this.
Open to anything
forever changed
From Glenabbey Church, Northern Ireland
23 December 2009 - 3:29pm
Well mate good to see you have concern, lotta people today don't. My advice from working with youth is that it is frustrating and rewardng, the young people you think that will be won for christ often dont, and the ones you would never imagine coming to christ turn out to be full on for Him!
Pray, pray and pray for them, history proves this, scripture proves this and i have seen the effects of groups of people praying for young people and communities. Dont rely on your own strentgh- it will fail you and you'll get burnt out, stressed and can come to blame God when you see no results.
Sometimes we can become obssessed about what we are doing- often I've found it takes me to go and sit alone, pray and think over scripture, worship and ask God to show you what He wants.
Get a group of your church to meet regularly, get into the Bible- relate it to your situation and then pray for the young people. Getting them into church wont change them- moralising them wont change them, keep praying, keep your own integrity, explaining the gospel, talking about Jesus, grace and the generosity of God and just rely on the Holy spirit to do what he wants in his time and power!
Thanks Very Much for that, very helpful in what the church in doing for them and so many of them just don't see it thanks very much for your support!!
Hi, as a young person myself, the thing that started to attract me to Christianity was actually the music. Having been to 4 different churches in my life, I've heard loads of different styles of worship and the songs that get you up on your feet or hands in the air, have helped me in getting my friends who aren't Christians, appreciating my faith a little more.
Music is a great way of showing your expression for God, and maybe that will get some young people involved in your church.
But the one thing my youth leader has told me over and over, is that if God wants something to happen- it will! I've heard so many times that if you pray (on your own or with your church) every so often, God will start to show up and start making some changes.
Hope it helps. God Bless.
My 2p worth would be not to focus too much on directly getting them into a church service - sure, it can work sometimes, but I've unfortunately often seen efforts like that completely flip on their head.
In my mind the most effective way is to just love them. Love them and reach out to them to the point that they start to question what's going on. For instance, if possible how about organising fun, regular (even if it's just once a month) evenings at the church every so often with free pizza, food, pool tables, air hockey - that sort of thing. Things that they'll come to because they genuinely want to - hey everyone enjoys pizza and pool don't they? :-)
No, not everyone's going to be instantly turned by this and some most likely still not at all. But it will get some people questioning what church is all about, it'll shatter other's beliefs that church is just a boring building where you read boring books and sing 100000 year old hymns and it could well start some great conversations. And if something sparks off there, it could lead to all sorts of things! Even if it doesn't get a million young people flocking to church every sunday morning, it most likely will build up friendships, good conversations and at least make people more open to the idea. In my books that's a brilliant thing - who knows what God will use that for further down the line?
I don't pretend to be some outreach expert and I don't lay claim to having thought of or done any of the above. Far from it. But I have seen people far better than me at such things reach out in ways similar to the above - and I was genuinely shocked (in a good way) about how successful it was!
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