The founder of Young Life, Jim Rayburn, famously said “We believe it is sinful to bore kids with the gospel. Christ is the strongest, grandest, most attractive personality to ever grace the earth. But a careless messenger with the wrong method can reduce all this magnificence to the level of boredom.”
Well-meaning youth ministers have often co-opted these words to advocate for a juvenilized version of Christianity, with lots of fun and games and very little real Bible teaching. Some have mistakenly assumed that the Bible, or even the gospel itself, is intrinsically boring. What a tragedy for the students we serve if this is our approach!
The latest research—along with my own experiences in youth ministry—offers encouragement for youth ministers who know the value of Bible teaching. Perhaps contrary to our foundational assumptions about Gen Z, Barna’s research indicates that this generation displays a high level of openness to the Bible, if only the adults in their lives will take time to teach them how to read it.
Still, I believe gospel-centered youth ministers committed to teaching teenagers the full counsel of God’s Word would do well to heed Rayburn’s caution.
Of course, we should be wary of any ministry model offering “Jesus lite,” a watered-down gospel that is easy for teenagers to hear and attracts them to a faith not representative of Jesus’ call to come and die. Instead, the point many of us seminary types need to hear is that teaching God’s Word and presenting the gospel of grace requires not only serious study, but creativity to help it come alive for our students. Our aim as ministers of the gospel is to dazzle teenagers with the richness of God’s Word and its ability to judge “the thoughts and attitudes of the heart” (Heb. 4:12).
So let’s call it like it is: Making Bible teaching a mainstay of our ministries does not mean we have to be boring. Exploring the Bible should be exciting, compelling, and transformative for our students—but as youth ministers we’ll need to put in the time, both to hone our craft and to commune with the Lord.
Even with the best preparation and most creative presentation, only God, by his Spirit, can change hearts and awaken faith in Jesus. Following are five foundational approaches to pursue, trusting in him to enliven our Bible teaching at youth group.
Consider Attention Spans
The average middle schooler arrives at youth group on a Wednesday night having just spent up to seven hours of her day in school. For most of that time, she’s probably had to sit still and listen to class lectures or do some form of bookwork. And research shows the effects of such a long, sedentary school day can be even tougher on boys than on girls. All this to say, that if your church holds youth group midweek, you’ll want to be especially mindful of how much time teenagers can realistically sit and listen.
Through trial and error over years of youth group Bible teaching, I’ve found that most students can focus on up-front teaching for about the same number of minutes as their age—so I plan on about a 12-minute talk for a middle school gathering, and a 15-minute talk for high schoolers at the absolute maximum. On school days, I’d recommend aiming for even shorter, and only after starting with some kind of physical activity or game to release some energy!
For many youth ministers, the weekly youth group talk seems like the place to hone our craft in preparation for a larger platform (the pulpit, a conference, or a retreat, for example). This can lead us to be far too long-winded, cramming in more content than teenagers can possibly follow. We would be wise to lean into late Haddon Robinson’s idea of the “Big Idea” in preaching.” Teaching teenagers in this shorter-form style and emphasizing one main point are tools that not only benefit our students, but help us grow as communicators for adult groups as well.
Make Space for Conversation
After a short talk, teenagers (and adults) need a place to work out what they’ve heard and to internalize it. Small groups can be an incredibly effective way to help teenagers digest and apply teaching (and of course, they also foster relational discipleship). Consider holding small groups midweek, with no up-front teaching time. Have teenagers read a passage of Scripture together and work through a list of questions based on inductive Bible study (like Rooted’s Bible-based curriculum).
If you do provide up-front teaching each week, make sure that students have time to talk it through afterward. Behavioral science indicates that we internalize more from participatory learning models than from passive learning. This means that when we can engage our students in discussion, forms of praxis (e.g. praying together, serving others, etc.), or best of all, in teaching others, they will be far more likely to remember and to live out what they’ve learned than when they hear a talk. I don’t mean to suggest that we should dispense with up-front teaching; only that we ought to think about what other modes of learning we include alongside it in our ministries.
Get to Know Teenagers’ Questions and Struggles
Teenagers will be more inclined to listen to what you say about the Bible if it’s clear you have one foot firmly planted in their world. As Tim Keller has often explained, we want our listeners to feel as though we know their questions and can articulate them even better than they could themselves! As you read the Bible and study to teach it, ask God to help you think like a teenager. Which parts of the story will sound strange to their ears? What tension in the text will they naturally struggle with? What are they wrestling with in their own lives that this passage addresses?
As we demonstrate an awareness of the world our teenagers inhabit and the questions that confront them day to day, they will be increasingly interested in what we have to say. And more important still, they will see that the Bible offers answers to their most nagging questions and pressing problems.
Speak to the Outsider
The reality is that many teenagers in our youth ministries may not yet be walking with Jesus. They’re showing up from week to week either because their friends are there (if this is the case, praise God for a culture of welcome in your group!) or because their parents are requiring them to attend. Many may not be sure what they believe about Jesus, or whether they think the Bible is true.
One of the best things we can do to pique teenagers’ interest is to acknowledge the skeptic or doubter in the room. We can use language like, “Maybe you still have questions about this…we’re glad you’re here and I’d love to talk with you after youth group,” or “If you haven’t yet trusted in Jesus, I want to invite you to consider what he really said and did.” Including this kind of invitation in our teaching creates an opening for teenagers to be honest about their questions or misgivings. It also signals to believing teenagers that this is a place they could bravely invite a friend who has questions, because those questions will be taken seriously.
Point to Jesus
The Bible will make very little sense to our students if we fail to show them how it fits together as one story with Jesus at the center (Luke 24:27). Teenagers need to see that every story of Scripture (and even tricky passages like genealogies!) hangs together in seeing Jesus as God’s answer to the human problem of sin and the mission to dwell again with his people.
One tool we can use in this pursuit is Bryan Chapell’s “Fallen Condition Focus,” which helps us to see ourselves as needing a Savior in just the same way as the people we encounter. Instead of imagining the people in the Bible’s narratives as models for us to follow, Chapell recommends that we look for their foundational problems with sin—either the sin in their own hearts, or the sin of others that is done to them.
Once our teenagers see how the people of the Bible needed rescue in some way, they can understand how Jesus’ life, death, and resurrection answers these problems of human sin. Then we can more readily apply the passage to our own lives, since we have the same struggles ourselves. This approach helps the Bible’s one story to come alive for our students. By keeping us (students and leaders) from holding the gospel at a distance, this method invites us to apply its foundational message of God’s grace for sinners to ourselves.
God’s Grace for Bible Teaching
Youth minister, are you boring teenagers with the Bible? I confess that I have done this. Reflecting on my own years in youth ministry, I was regularly excited to present all the beautiful truths I saw in a given biblical text. But there were times I wasn’t thinking enough about the actual students sitting in front of me—their long school days, their questions, and their deep need for Jesus. Thanks be to God that he is constantly at work to refine us by his Spirit, and he gives us opportunities to begin again.
Let’s ask the Lord for mercy and creativity to meet our students in the midst of their development each time we stand up to proclaim his Word to them. By God’s grace, I believe we can have Bible-saturated youth ministries that are exciting, compelling, and anything but boring.
If you’re looking for more resources to help you teach the Bible to teenagers, check out Rooted’s Bible-based curriculum on Rooted Reservoir.
