Think back to the last time attendance at your youth group was truly dismal.
For me, this happened last year in between Thanksgiving and Christmas. We had our normal Sunday night youth group and only about a fifth of our usual crew turned up. You better believe that I was questioning what in the world was going on. As I was throwing myself a pity party the next day, the other pastors on our team reminded me of families who were sick, folks who were out of town visiting family, the band concert, and the athletic event that night. This helped me pull out of my funk; however, there was still a bitter taste in my mouth from so many kids’ not being there.
If you’re like me, you think about which students missed the gathering, and you wonder why. Are they too busy, or did they have too much homework? What sporting events are they involved in and does their practice coincide with youth group? Sometimes, we can even spiral down the route of wondering whether our programs are good enough, whether the kids like us, or whether our ministries are effective at all. I confess that I have struggled with these questions and fears.
While it’s natural to feel disappointed with students and their families when they consistently miss youth group, spotty church attendance also seems to be becoming more of the norm. Teenagers may be busy with sports, homework, or other activities. Others may choose not to come because their friends no longer attend. Some students may lack any sort of encouragement from their families to participate.
As youth ministers, our Great Shepherd has given us responsibility for our students (Heb. 13:20; 1 Pet. 5:2). One day, he will call us to give an account for our sheep, including the wayward ones. This can sometimes be a scary thought, especially when we see kids who are missing youth group week after week.
Here are several considerations as we lean into our calling to shepherd the students in our ministries who attend only sporadically.
Consider your church-wide philosophy.
Does your church consider church membership and attendance to be of paramount importance for God’s people? Do the pastors who primarily preach and teach on Sunday morning communicate the essential nature of regular and faithful participation to the congregation as a whole? If our churches are not teaching the importance of consistent participation in the body of Christ to our adults, then we shouldn’t expect our teenagers to understand it either.
I want to encourage you, though, that this is not a new problem. The first century church must have been struggling to prioritize gathering together, since the writer of Hebrews reminded the believers to regularly meet together (Heb. 10:25). Moving your church in the direction of understanding the importance of church attendance and participation must start from the top down. We need to realize that if the adults in our churches don’t prioritize church, it’s unlikely their kids will. I encourage you to strategize with your pastoral staff about teaching the importance of church membership and participation in the body. Lord willing, you will notice a trickle-down effect in families as the church encourages all its members to make attendance a priority.
Consider your partnership with parents.
To partner with parents specifically, one easy win is to meet with parents one-on-one, encouraging them to prioritize church attendance for themselves and their kids. You might hold these meetings after service or before youth group, or perhaps even over lunch during the week. Take every opportunity that the Lord gives you to connect with parents.
While these take some time and work, parent-pastor conferences provide a win for your ministry. Every August, we hold our own version of parent-teacher conferences, in which parents sign up for 30-minute time slots after the Sunday service. I lay out our student ministry philosophy, give updates on calendaring, and then discuss how I can best minister to and serve their family. These are great opportunities to encourage parents as they disciple their teenagers. As part of that conversation, I get to hear how I can help to encourage students to participate in our ministry more regularly.
Consider your weekly programming.
Now, strap on your seatbelt for this last suggestion because I know that this is a bit unconventional. Are Wednesday nights the best night for youth groups? Simply opening this conversation can cause some strong feelings to arise in your church. But if the teenagers in your ministry are struggling to attend regularly, I want you to truly consider this question.
Several years ago, my church was walking through this struggle with attendance. We noticed a decrease in participation among children’s, youth, and adult classes on Wednesday nights, so we talked with families. Almost all of them told us how difficult it was for them to get to church midweek. They described how kids and parents arrived home from school and work tired and hungry. Parents then had to figure out whether to throw dinner together at home or grab something on the way to church. Teenagers, especially, were rushing from after-school activities straight to church. Typically, they didn’t have time to eat dinner, and they described feeling distracted by the pile of homework waiting for them. In addition to these concerns from families wanting to prioritize attendance, the sad reality is that some kids will choose sports and school activities over church on Wednesday nights.
These conversations led our church staff to the conclusion that we needed to move youth group away from midweek. So we shifted our gathering to Sunday nights. We saw more kids come to church and families seemed less stressed out.
Now, I realize this schedule may not work for every church. When we decided to make this change, a whole mess of strings were pulled that we had to untangle in terms of our programming and staff resources. However, it’s worth discussing among your church staff what changing the schedule could look like in your context. I don’t want to cave to culture, but I think we can all agree that the important thing is for our churches and youth groups to meet together beyond Sunday morning worship. The day and time of these additional meetings are relatively arbitrary.
Consider how to stay in touch.
The simple fact of the matter is that our teenagers are busy. They have school, sports, band, orchestra, jobs, families, friends, and so much more. None of those things are inherently bad, in fact I believe we want our kids to be well-rounded as they reflect Christ in the world around them, and these activities can be a part of that mission. So if a teenager is playing a spring sport or participating in a play that is taking up a lot of their time for a season, it’s important to communicate that we have not forgotten about them.
What we don’t want to do is heap guilt and shame on kids by asking “where were you tonight” but a simple text reminding them that we are thinking about them and praying for them can go a long way. We can also show them that we care about them by meeting them where they are. Take opportunities to show up at an event or drop by their place of work. We don’t ever want kids to feel like they are forgotten or that don’t matter to us. And this leads to the final piece of encouragement.
Consider the teenagers who are showing up.
Don’t forget to shepherd the flock that is among you. We should pursue the kids who are on the fringes. At the same time, don’t get so caught up in tracking them down that you neglect the faithful kids who participate every night. On those poorly attended evenings, it’s easy for us think about who isn’t there rather than seeing the kids who are there. Too often we put our foot in our mouth by asking the kids who are there “where is everyone?” as if those who bothered to show up don’t count. For our faithful kids, it’s clear that the Lord is working in their lives. So let’s join in what he is doing, continuing to disciple them. Let’s put our best efforts into helping them grow up in Christ, rather than looking past them to wonder where “everyone” else is.
Youth minister, on those discouraging nights when many of your regular kids are missing, don’t forget to preach the gospel to yourself. Our God is good, gracious, and sovereign. The beauty of the gospel is that we aren’t good enough, but Jesus is. Ultimately, you can leave attendance up to the Lord. Don’t get caught up in your own guilt or think that you’re being unfaithful. Take the opportunities that you have to connect with teenagers where they are. Encourage them to attend, but remember that at the end of the day, you can only do so much. The Holy Spirit will continue to work in ways you can’t yet see. So remember to receive from the Lord the grace you preach to teenagers.
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