This week’s post is a continuation of our series that is exploring the digital side of student-led youth ministry, where we are releasing a new chapter of Youth Empowered for free, right here on Focusing on Jesus! Tune in each week to read a new portion of the chapter as we explore Empower Teams through a digital lens.
Teaching Empower Team
In Youth Empowered, we established that the
opportunity to teach in the pulpit is one of the most spiritually weighty
places to conduct ministry within the church. While this would not always mean
that it is necessarily the most influential or most powerful place to conduct
ministry within the church, it certainly is one of the most outward-facing
areas (and oftentimes, one of the most
scrutinized). Should we add in the element of the internet, then this reality
becomes amplified. Not only can a sermon be posted and viewed by almost anyone
in the world, but we also must live with the haunting reality that the internet
never forgets. Should any complications arise with a sermon or if someone takes
particular offense to a teaching that is shared on social media, then the
church may find itself receiving unwanted attention from outside influencers.
Nevertheless, allowing students to teach is an essential
element to a student-led youth ministry. The youth ministry has the unique opportunity to be a training
ground for students to utilize and hone their spiritual giftings, and the
spiritual gift of teaching is no exception. Even if a student says something slightly
awkward or something in a tone that could have been said a little less
abrasively, we must not be afraid of these scenarios. We must not sacrifice
opportunity at the altar of perfection. Indeed, it benefits the church
long-term to acknowledge that we all have to start somewhere (When I reflect on
my own beginnings, I sincerely hope that no one remembers my first sermon…it was
absolutely disastrous!). By keeping a long-term perspective on your church’s vision,
the guidance of you and your Teaching Empower Team Leader could train up the church's next generation of small group leaders,
pastors, youth ministers, evangelists, and Sunday school teachers simply by offering
more chances for students to share the word of God in front of others.
Yet in the context of a high-tech world, what can be
especially exciting is that a digitally-powered student-led youth ministry can arguably
have more opportunities for students to teach than a youth ministry model that meets
only in-person. While students may feel awkward or intimidated to speak in
front of others at an in-person youth service, the concept of speaking in front
of a camera on an electronic device doesn’t seem quite as foreign to today’s youth.
Naturally, one or two students could speak in place of the youth pastor during
one of the youth ministry’s normally scheduled online services. However, there is
more of a chance for the youth to be able to reach their peers and impact their
online community through shorter videos posted to social media. By partnering
with their Empower Team Leader and the Social
Media Empower Team, five-minute sermons, small devotionals, youth ministry
Bible studies, and even testimonies can be delivered by the Teaching Empower
Team to a captive audience that is looking for content on their social media
feeds that is life-giving and relationally
true.
When you meet with your student leaders and your fellow
youth ministers next, ask which of the two scenarios are more likely to cause a
teenager to pause and view the video that is posted on the youth ministry’s
social media account: A devotion read by the youth pastor, or the same
devotion that is read and discussed by one of the students within the youth ministry?
While a youth pastor sharing a quick devotion or their latest sermon on social
media is certainly truth-filled and life-giving, it may not have enough of a
relational component to it in order to cause a student to pause and listen. Our
students follow hundreds (sometimes even thousands!) of other individuals on
social media. With a limited amount of time to scroll through their feed
between classes or before bedtime, they will more likely view
the content that possesses the level of relational truth that they are seeking within their social media consumption. Even though a youth
pastor’s video can certainly be used by the Holy Spirit to pierce the heart of
a student who is seeking answers, it is just as likely (if not more likely) that the combination of information,
application, and a powerful testimony of a fellow peer can strike a resonant chord
within the hearts of our youth as well.
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