Evangelism Handbook

The work has been chiefly amongst the young; and comparatively but few others have been made partakers of it. And indeed it has commonly been so, when God has begun any great work for the revival of his church; he has taken the young people, and has cast off the old and stiff-necked generation.¹

The above quote by Jonathan Edwards, a man of God and leader in the First Great Awakening, demonstrates the powerful role young people can have in the movement of God. But in our day we rarely hear this from church leaders. Instead, those outside the church often see the influence of young people spiritually. Note the following:

An awakening entails young people reinventing traditional rituals, making the faith of their forefathers their own. This isn’t just an observation on the MTV age—it’s been the final stage of every awakening before a national transformation is complete. To hit critical mass, it takes a youth movement.²

The above quote comes not from an evangelical “youth expert” but from an unbeliever, a secularist who spent a year among evangelical youth to study their passion and conviction. Lauren Sandler is convinced this movement of evangelical youth is having a significant impact. And she, being a leftist, is none too happy about it.

I have spent much of my ministry in churches the past few years with a focus on young people. In addition, I have spoken to college students on dozens of campuses. I love young people. The older I get the more I love them. What saddens me is that the most optimistic people I find regarding young people, and in particular those who follow Christ, are actually unbelievers. Not only Sandler, but Naomi Schaffer Riley, writing about religiously committed college students in God on the Quad;³ Andrew Beaujon, who writes about the influence of Christian rock music in Body Piercing Changed My Life;⁴ and the first of its kind, Millennials Rising: The Next Great Generation⁵ by generational experts Howe and Strauss all paint a positive image of many young adults, particularly those with religious convictions. Negative images of youth sell well at church youth events. But too few are those who believe in youth and challenge them to be radical, fanatical followers of Jesus! Certainly, there will always be more than enough youth in trouble, youth at risk, who need our attention. But I meet so many young adults who simply want to know their lives can matter, that Christianity is more compelling than doing their church duty, that Jesus Christ is who He says He is.

What might happen if the church began to see the potential of youth as a missionary force? What if we treated our youth in churches like young adults rather than like third graders as so many churches do? What if college students became a priority of ministry rather than a sidebar of the church? What if we turned our youth groups and their YMCA-like programming into youth ministries focused on penetrating public schools and universities with the gospel?

The news is not all good for this generation. It is the most unchurched in history. It will not be reached by merely hosting a youth rally and offering a paintball tournament. Some plant churches today to reach the increasing numbers of unchurched young adults. “It seemed that young people went to church with their parents but upon graduation from high school often dropped out of church altogether, with some returning once they were older, married, and had children,” Driscoll observed. “The Holy Spirit burdened me to start a church for the people who had fallen into that drop-out hole. Over the years, the statistics have further verified the need for this focus.”⁶ He noted Barna’s research finding that more than four out of five or 81 percent had gone to a Christian church, but a 58-percent decline in church attendance happened when these youth became ages 18 to 29. Thus, about 8 million 20-somethings who were active churchgoers as teenagers will no longer be active by their thirtieth birthday.

I am grateful that I grew up in a church with a strong youth group. Because of its influence, I was able to begin, with a Methodist friend, a Fellowship of Christian Athletes chapter and a Christian club at our public high school. I attended youth retreats that made a life-changing impact on my life. I participated in choir and mission tours across the country. Young people were important in our church, and we knew it.

I believe the greatest challenge confronting the church in the new millennium relates to youth ministry. We must address the issue of youth evangelism, both in terms of evangelizing teenagers and equipping students to witness to their peers. There is a critical need for youth ministry built on relevant, conviction-laced biblical teaching. The church has an open door to feed the idealism of youth with Christian truths and values.

I began to pay attention to youth ministry in particular when my son Josh, now nearly done with college, entered the youth ministry at our church. I eventually wrote a book on the subject, Raising the Bar: Ministry to Youth in the New Millennium, in which I argued youth should be treated like young adults entering adulthood rather than children finishing childhood.⁷ Response, especially from veteran youth ministers, has only confirmed my conviction. More importantly, Scripture and history weigh in against the modern approach toward youth as goofy and unable to make commitments. I speak annually to thousands of youth, who love the fact that a guy with a PhD will push them to believe deeply and live fervently. They long to be pushed, to be encouraged, for someone to believe in them.

Part of our problem comes from how we look at young adults as a group. There is no notion in Scripture that advocates the idea of adolescence as seen in American culture, at least in terms of the low expectations of youth. My colleague and Greek scholar David Alan Black, in The Myth of Adolescence, noted three categories in the Bible for people: (1) childhood/pre-adulthood (ages 1–12); (2) emerging adulthood (ages 12–30); (3) senior adulthood (ages 30-death).

He noted that these stages could be seen in the life of Jesus (Luke 2:41–52; 3:23; and the remainder of the Gospel, respectively), and in the persons John describes in his first epistle (little children, young people, and fathers). It is also true that in the Old Testament youth could not fight in war and do certain other duties (like give an offering on one occasion) before age 20, but the distinction hardly rivals that of modern day adolescent thought.

The view of adolescence practically speaking has led to an assumption in and out of the church that teenagers go through a lengthy process (much longer than puberty—roughly ages 12 to 18 or 19) where they are expected to be silly, love games more than learning, and play more than being serious. This view has led our culture, both in the church and outside, to become systematically organized to fabricate two myths about youth. First, it encourages teenagers to behave like grade-school children instead of young adults. Second, it perpetuates the notion that the teenage years of necessity must expect rebellion, sarcasm, narcissism, and general evildoing. “Sowing wild oats” has become a popular term for what is expected of youth, including churched youth, during their young adult days. Certainly hormonal changes and rapid maturation over a brief time open the opportunity for such behavior if left unchecked. But that is my point: we must not let the bar of expectation be set so lowly. I have had two children, a boy and a girl, go through puberty. I have watched the mood swings and the physical changes. But we act as though such a transition lasts for many years rather than a much briefer time, and often we use such changes as an excuse to allow bad behavior. We pattern our attitude toward youth more from MTV and less from the Word.

Look at the young people who stood valiantly for God, often at critical times in the history of God’s people: Isaac respected and listened to his father when Abraham almost sacrificed his son (Genesis 22); Joshua served as Moses’ assistant as a young man; Samuel as only a lad heard the voice of God when His voice was rare in the land; David killed Goliath as a young man; Jeremiah served as a prophet and Josiah led a revival while young; Daniel and his friends were possibly middle school aged in Daniel 1 when they stood up for their convictions; on and on the examples go. In fact, in the Bible the examples of youth who were knuckleheads are far more remote than examples of young people standing for God.

One of the overlooked features of modern spiritual awakenings is the vital role played by young people. While significant revivals were cited earlier, the following survey examines specifically the role of youth in these acts of God.

Pietism, the experiential awakening of the eighteenth century, grew through the impact of students who graduated from the University of Halle, then spread the experiential emphasis to points across the globe. Zinzendorf graduated from Halle. The 100-year prayer movement begun through his influence at Halle was essentially a movement among young people.

The role of youth is abundantly clear in the First Great Awakening. Jonathan Edwards, commenting on the revival in 1734–35 under his leadership, referred to the role of youth in its origin: “At the latter end of the year 1733, there appeared a very unusual flexibleness, and yielding to advice, in our young people.”⁸ This happened after Edwards began speaking against their irreverence toward the Sabbath. The youth were also greatly affected by the sudden death of a young man and a young married woman in their town. Edwards proposed that the young people should begin meeting in small groups around Northampton. They did so with such success that many adults followed their example. Concerning the revival’s effect on the youth, Edwards commented,

In England, the Evangelical Awakening featured such notable leaders as the Wesley brothers and George Whitefield. Their ministries grew out of a foundation built in college through the Holy Club. Whitefield was only 26 when he witnessed remarkable revival in the American colonies. These young men never let their youthfulness hinder their impact.

The Second Great Awakening featured powerful revival movements on college campuses. Hampden-Sydney, Yale, Williams, and others serve as bold reminders of what God can do in our day as well. Churches could not have experienced the depth of revival they felt apart from youth. Bennett Tyler collected 25 eyewitness accounts of pastors during the Second Great Awakening. Twenty of these revival reports described the important role played by young people. Ten accounts noted that the revivals began with the youth, and five documented the fact that revival in their area affected young people more than any other group. Only one account out of 25 asserted that no youth were involved.¹⁰

Colleges experienced revival in the 1857–59 Layman’s Prayer Revival as well. One pivotal feature of this revival in relation to young people was the impact it had on Dwight Lyman Moody, who was 20 years old at the time. In 1857 Moody wrote of his impression of what was occurring in Chicago: “There is a great revival of religion in this city. . . . [It] seems as if God were here himself.”¹¹ Biographer John Pollock reports that “the revival of early 1857 tossed Moody out of his complacent view of religion.”¹² Moody went on to make a dramatic impact for Christ during the rest of the nineteenth century.

An aspect of Moody’s influence regarding students that cannot be overlooked was his leadership in the Student Volunteer Movement. Although this movement’s roots have been traced to the Second Great Awakening and the Haystack Prayer Meeting of 1806, it was Moody who invited 251 students to Mt. Hermon, Massachusetts, for a conference in 1886. As a result of those meetings, highlighted by A. T. Pierson’s challenging address, 100 students volunteered for overseas missions. In 1888 the Student Volunteer Movement was formally organized with John R. Mott as chairman. Over the next several decades, literally thousands of students went to serve as foreign missionaries.

According to J. Edwin Orr, the Welsh Revival of 1904–1905 was greatly influenced in its beginning by a church in New Quay, Cardiganshire, and the testimony of a teenage girl. Pastor Joseph Jenkins led a testimony time in a service in which he asked for responses to the question, What does Jesus mean to you? A young person, 15-year-old Florrie Evans, only recently converted, rose and said, “If no one else will, then I must say that I love the Lord Jesus with all my heart.”¹³

Her simple testimony caused many people to begin surrendering to Christ, and the fires of revival fell. The revival spread as young people went from church to church testifying. An itinerant preacher named Seth Joshua came to New Quay to speak and was impressed by the power of God. He then journeyed to speak at Newcastle Embyn College. The next week he spoke at nearby Blaenannerch, where a young coal miner named Evan Roberts, a ministerial student at the college, experienced a powerful personal revival.

Roberts felt impressed to return to his home church to address the youth. Seventeen heard him following a Monday service. He continued preaching and revival began there. The revival spread across the country, and news of the awakening spread worldwide. Many colleges reported revival. A good example was the revival reported at Denison University in Ohio.

Many colleges witnessed revival in the 1950s as well. In Minnesota, Northwestern School, St. Paul Bible Institute, and the University of Minnesota were touched. The year 1951 saw a notable spiritual stir on the campus of Baylor University. President W. R. White commented favorably about revival at this school.

A powerful campus awakening was experienced at Wheaton College in February 1950. After numerous prayer meetings were inaugurated by student leaders the previous fall, the revival began when a student shared a testimony of his changed life in an evening meeting. Others began testifying, and this continued for more than two days. Asbury College in Kentucky experienced revival as well.

Finally, the Jesus Movement described was actually a youth awakening. Many of the leaders of churches, denominations, and parachurch organizations were touched by this revival. A significant number of evangelistic pastors and other leaders trace their zeal for the Lord to the impact of the Jesus Movement on their life.

Students are perhaps the most fertile field for the working of the Spirit of God. If only churches would tap into the zeal of youth!

I would submit at least two things must happen before we can reach the massive numbers of young adults in our day, whether in secondary schools or universities. We must retool youth ministry with a perspective of raising an army of missionaries instead of creating a culture of games with a little Bible sprinkled in. Second, we must find effective ways to reach youth while they are young.

First, we need a reformation in student ministry at the youth and college levels. Some have gone to the more extreme approach of abolishing youth ministry altogether, creating “family integrated churches” that focus more on the family unit than a separate youth ministry. While that may be a viable model, I believe there is hope for youth ministry, especially as it relates to reaching unsaved youth and their families. In fact, if your youth ministry is not focused on penetrating the youth population with the gospel, I wonder why you have it. A youth group is focused on the churched youth and is inward focused. A youth ministry emphasizes reaching students who need Christ. A youth group is institutional and easily becomes boring. A youth ministry seeks to advance the movement of God among the youth in a community and is compelling. Such a youth ministry can actually help fuel the flame of evangelism throughout the church body.

Youth ministry as we know it today came of age over the past generation. Focusing on activities and separation from the life of the church, it has hardly as a movement turned a generation of young adults into missionaries to their generation. Over the past three decades the number of vocational youth ministers has grown while at the same time effectiveness in reaching students has declined. This is not an indictment of youth ministers, but it may indicate that the growth of youth ministry as an entity of its own has helped to take young people out of the mainstream of the church. In many churches with significant youth ministries, the only time young people are noticed is when they return from camp or when a youth emphasis is scheduled during revival services.

Here are some fundamental elements for effective youth ministry from my book Raising the Bar.

1. Recover the Biblical Place of Parents (Deut 6:4–9)

For Christian families, youth ministry should be gravy, nothing more. Youth should learn by teaching and by example how to follow Christ from believing parents. Should youth ever be segregated? I believe so. But I also believe most churches segregate too much. When do we segregate youth? First, when it can be justified biblically. You can have a youth meeting focused on issues related to students, for instance. Second, it should be limited to those times when absolutely necessary. That would not include a separate Sunday morning worship experience that turns youth ministry into a parachurch ministry on the church campus. Third, when it occurs parents and other key adults should be encouraged to participate as much as possible.

This is a fatherless generation. Young people crave godly adults. As a young lady said on the back cover of my book Raising the Bar: “We know how to be teenagers; we want the church to teach us how to be adults.” One of the reasons I have such a great rapport with youth and spend much time on Facebook answering questions is so many do not have a father, and I represent at least a glimpse of a father figure. I minister often with my whole family to students, and in particular with my son Josh as he drums in his band. That means a great deal to the students to whom I minister.

The acrostic SOAP—Significant Other Adult Person—is used to note the importance of only one adult in the life of a troubled young person. Adults who demonstrate a proclivity for Christian maturity and also relate well to youth should be active in the youth ministry. Adolescent adults who never grew up (I have met men in their thirties who act like they are in their terrible threes) should not be the sponsors on the youth trips. As I am writing this, I am responding via Facebook to a young lady who by age 20 had been molested, raped, contracted a STD, and cut herself many times. She has met Christ and has begun a wonderful process of growth, but she really needs some adults in her life who will not use her. These students are everywhere, and it is time to get outside our youth rooms and into the lives of these precious young adults.

2. Building a Foundation for Youth Ministry, Not a Youth Group

Sadly, the greatest hindrance to moving a youth group to become a youth ministry is the group of parents of the churched students! Four keys to developing a youth ministry focus on reaching lost students:

(1) Biblical Truth—young people do not hate preaching. They hate preaching that is either condescending on the one hand or fails to challenge them on the other. They can handle the truth! Games are fine in their place. I love roller coasters and games. But after more than 50 DiscipleNows, dozens of youth camps, and hundreds of rallies, not to mention immense time interacting personally with youth, I am more convinced than ever that youth hunger for truth that is taught in a way that helps them to apply it to where they live. Present compelling truth, the great idea of the faith, not just a first-grade version surrounded by games.

(2) Passionate Evangelism—youth pastors must ask the sobering question of whether they are passionate for the lost students in their area. Teach youth to witness, take them out into the community. Call them to accountability to share with their friends, and be willing to go with them.

(3) Authentic Worship—young people hunger for God. Worship means more than a few posters of the latest “Christian” band and background music. It means teaching them to encounter God corporately and personally. I take a wonderful worship band with me because I know the role of corporate worship that connects with students matters much. Too many adults sadly confuse their preference in music with biblical truth and are sacrificing the future of their children on the altar of their musical preferences. By the way, young people do not hate hymns, just the way many of us sing them!

(4) Bold Prayer—challenge students to pray boldly for lost friends, to pray God-sized prayers. Let them see their leaders as men and women of prayer more than organizers of events.

This kind of youth ministry can be a formidable force for the gospel in a given community. At the same time, we should be aware of effective ways to reach youth.

The first step in reaching youth is simply this: try to reach them. Is it possible that we have lost ground in evangelism in America because we are always playing catch-up? Do we work too hard to gear worship services to adults, provide materials for adults, and focus all our energies on those who pay the bills while neglecting the younger generation? No doubt this is true of college students, who are almost totally neglected by most churches. If you are a youth pastor or a pastor for that matter, how much time, effort, and energy do you give to reaching lost students?

We must see technology as our friend in evangelism. The Internet affects this generation of youth the way television affected Boomers. Throughout history, the church at its best has been at the forefront of technology. Think of how the printing press was used to publish the Bible and how trade routes helped in worldwide missions expansion. In recent history, we have lagged behind. I have been privileged to lead someone to Christ through the Internet. The technology is available. Compare TV evangelists to MTV in terms of influencing culture! The Internet may become one of the most viable tools for reaching the Millennial generation. Facebook, Myspace, and other social networks are filled with students. This can become a vital tool for connecting with and reaching out to students.

We must use the media and the arts in biblical ways to declare Christ to this generation. If we are going to reach this generation, we may have to sing the gospel to them. Can we not use the arts to reach this group? Must we only expect them to like our music when so many portals allow for an amazing diversity of musical styles in which to connect with them? There is a reason I take a band with me to do youth and college events who are themselves young people. This provides another means to connect with students.

Hold to the cross and the truthfulness of Scripture. Young adults today are immersed in a sea of relativism. An uncertain ocean requires a strong hand and a sound rudder. We must confront the pluralism of the age with courage, not compromise.

Demonstrate intimacy with God and people. Youth crave intimacy. The Millennials are a fatherless generation. We must minister to youth, and to college students for that matter, in the context of the many difficult families in which they have lived. Young adults yearn to be around and to see families who love each other. Strong families involved with students can be a powerful demonstration of the gospel.

The numbers of fatherless children (homes with no father present) grew from 14 percent in 1970 to almost one third by 1993. Further, the percentage of mothers, with school-aged children, who work outside the home has increased from 39 percent in 1960 to 70 percent by 1987. Today, 50 percent of marriages end in divorce.¹⁴ The crumbling of the home, coupled with the rise of youth gangs, points out the desire for intimacy.

Churches must place a higher priority on youth. They are not the church of the future; they are the church of today. Churches need both the wisdom of mature believers and the zeal of youth. During the Jesus Movement and the years following, youth choirs filled hundreds of churches. They were a focal point of the service and a source of great inspiration. Surely there are ways students can be brought into the heart of church life.

Your church bears a responsibility to guide students. Mature Christians should help young people channel their zeal in ways that honor Christ. We can affirm their concern for unsaved friends and encourage them to maintain convictions. The True Love Waits campaign is a beautiful illustration of the multitude of godly young men and women who seek to honor God with their bodies. The author is grateful to God for a church that affirmed and encouraged him to make a radical commitment to Christ as a teenager. In your church, delegate responsibilities to mature youth in the worship service. They can help take the offering, lead in prayer, and do dramatic presentations. An occasional word of affirmation from the pastor in the service is very affirming.

Finally, those of us who are older can listen to young people. They, too, can hear from God. At times they are more sensitive to the voice of the Spirit than many of us. May the following words remind us of the importance of youthful zeal, regardless of age:

If we look at the ranks of middle-aged men and women we observe that there is all too often no spiritual fire, no urge to achieve things for God. That condition does not suddenly come upon people at that age; you need to be on guard against it now, whatever your age. It is when one has found his niche that imperceptibly zeal flags and lethargy creeps in. Oh, to keep burning brightly to the end!¹⁵