I had the unique opportunity during my college days to work for a couple of summers at an enormous Procter & Gamble paper mill near my hometown. The factory was an huge operation. On one end of the massive complex, loggers would deposit their semitrailers loaded with felled trees from the northeastern Pennsylvania forests. Out the other end would come a wide array of Procter & Gamble products ranging from Bounty paper towels to Pampers disposal diapers. The process this company went through to turn timber into paper was amazing. The logs were made into pulp, and the pulp was then turned into an assortment of paper products.

I have often wondered about this process as an illustration of local church youth ministry. At one end we receive undeveloped and immature early adolescents – called junior highers. Out the other end of our “factory” comes the finished product – high school graduates. Of course, I understand that this analogy breaks down in places. The natural resource we work with is the lives of individual teenagers (along with their families), which makes our task of molding hearts and lives vastly different than the inanimate process of turning wood into paper. Yet I do believe that we must begin to think intentionally about our product as well as the process by which we turn out graduates from our ministries.

Our grand mission, certainly, is to produce spiritually mature believers for a life of service for Christ. (See Ephesians 4:11-16 and 2 Timothy 3:10-17 for a clear Biblical explanation of this goal.) Our God-given window of opportunity to accomplish this objective is usually six years – seventh graders through high school seniors. Sociologically speaking, our students enter our ministries as children, and they leave us as adults. Along with their parents and other God-given influencers, we shoulder the responsibility of producing graduates with the spiritual maturity to live for God throughout their entire adult lives.

That’s why it is so discouraging to hear the alarming statistics that are getting so much attention these days. The number one time for people to quit going to church and, in fact, give up living for God is immediately following high school. The numbers range from somewhere around 50% to a high close to 75%. This truth is staggering. Kids who were once active participants in our youth groups are walking, indeed running, away from church. (Youth workers, I have done a significant amount of research on this particular topic that includes some practical and proactive solutions for the church on this matter. If you are interested in the subject of preventing youth from leaving the church following high school, I strongly encourage you to attend one of our Next Generation seminars. Get more information about these seminars by clicking the “Next Generation Seminar” banner above. I’d love to see you in one of these seminars this year!)

I am not trying to be a critic or skeptic, but I am convinced that one of the reasons so many teenagers are walking away from their faith is that so many youth ministries do not work intentionally to produce students who know the Word of God. I’m not speaking here of rote knowledge – a grasp of sterile facts and figures. Quite the contrary. Our teaching ministries must emphasize Biblical truth that is alive and active so our students can readily apply it to their day-to-day lives. I’m afraid that we often fail to clearly and confidently teach students clear theological (systematic and contextual) truth so that they leave our youth groups with an unshakable assurance in what they believe.

My experience tells me that it’s often in early adulthood when people are confronted by some particular issue that smacks against what they have always heard. It may be in Bible college or at a major university. It may be in the military or in the workforce. But somewhere along the line, our students are going to come face-to-face with something that rattles the very core of their personal belief system. They’ll hear something in class, read something in a textbook, or hear something from a friend or peer that will make them face the tough questions of life. At that moment, they’ll have to ask themselves, “Do I really believe that?” This scenario is precisely why we must be very intentional about teaching correct Biblical doctrine to our students.

Youth workers, let me ask you something. Do your graduating students know what they believe? When push comes to shove, will your students have the ability to stand up for what they believe? Or will they walk away from church and maybe even their faith, doubting the very fabric of what their churches and families have stood for throughout their entire lives?

Just this week I talked to a veteran youth pastor who told me that his students did not need “more Bible”; instead they needed more practical experiences to live out the truth of what they already knew. However, I know something about the church in which he serves. Yes, it is a strong Bible preaching ministry. Historically, his church has the reputation of standing for truth, and over the years this church has retained its traditional approach to ministry. I’m sure that the students growing up in this church have heard solid teaching in Sunday School, church services, and various other ministries. Yet I decided to corroborate this pastor’s claim that his students already knew the Bible. With the youth pastor’s permission, I met with some of his teenagers. He handpicked a group of his sharpest kids to meet with me privately. I gave them a brief survey of Bible knowledge (i.e., how many books in the Bible and other basic Biblical literacy questions). The students, for the most part, did quite well in this aspect of our interview. But then I asked them a series of basic doctrinal questions, like how do they know the Bible is inerrant and inspired, and how do they know that Jesus is the only way to Heaven? These students struggled with even simple answers to this line of questioning. They had a basic knowledge of Scripture, but they lacked confidence in what they believed theologically. In some areas they could parrot some of the distinctives of their church, but in most cases they could not articulate or defend what they personally believed from the Scriptures.

I realize that this is a complex issue with a myriad of possible solutions. However, I encourage all readers to take a careful look at my last post (just keep reading the next article below) for some practical ways to incorporate a doctrinal approach into your teaching ministry with teenagers. I also want to ask youth workers to submit some suggestions or ideas of ways other youth workers can teach theology to teenagers. I’m sure that there are many, many youth workers out there who work hard to develop a doctrinal emphasis in youth ministry. Please take a few moments to post your ideas below. This may be a much-needed encouragement to other readers. Thanks for your help. I’ll continue my discussion of this topic in my next post.