It’s partly Matt Redman’s fault for making this discovery when he came back to the ‘Heart of worship’, but as a result many of us have adopted this phrase as something of a mantra.
Of course, it actually is all about Jesus, and that’s pretty much true whatever you make the ‘it’. The Bible is all about him; the whole story orbits around him, and his death and resurrection are its epicentre. History is divided either side of him; modern morality is derived from him; our lives gain their purpose from knowing him. In our heads, we know this to be true; even those who don’t believe he was the Son of God concur that he’s the most important man who ever lived. Yet there’s a strange disconnect between this knowledge and what we do with it. So often we stop at agreeing with this fuzzy generic sentiment, without asking ourselves what that actually means. If we realise that ‘it’s all about Jesus’, then what should we do as a result?
Even that question feels stale and overposed. We’ve all sat through a hundred conference talks where a strangely underqualified speaker who happens to work for a para-church organisation demanded our response to it. I’ve even been that speaker. I’ve asked you to ‘give everything for the one who’s given everything for you’. You’ve heard it all before.
So do something for me. Hit the reset button in your head. Pretend you’ve never heard that phrase before in your life, let alone been asked what you should do about it. In fact, go further: take every story you’ve ever heard about Jesus, from the miracles to the resurrection, and do the same thing. Imagine you’re coming to all of it completely fresh.
Just imagine a youth ministry movement that truly did have Jesus at the centre. Not egos, or leaders, or pyrotechnics, or cool online resources: Jesus
For the last couple of years, the word ‘crisis’ has been circulating in the youth ministry community. In truth, it’s getting a little bit annoying (and I’m fairly sure I started it). There’s been an awful lot of talk about funding cuts, closing ministries, job losses, great people leaving youth ministry and the job getting harder. All of these things are realities, some of them highly painful. What we haven’t heard a lot of, however, is answers. There have been a couple of new product launches and a couple of interesting events and new initiatives, but nothing that’s seriously going to change the game and throw the ‘crisis’ into reverse.
I’ve been thinking and praying about this question for well over a year now, and I find the answer that I keep returning to strangely awkward; embarrassing even. Because the one thing that I believe could change everything is not a new idea at all. In fact, it’s the same line every writer, speaker and songwriter has been churning out for decades.
The answer to our present difficulties does not lie in a new model, resource or emerging leader. Those things will help, but they’re really only window-dressing to the real solution. The real answer is this: it’s all about Jesus. Youth ministry has a shot at resurrection from its present flagging state, if it truly takes those words and puts them into practice.
And this is what that could actually mean. Youth workers focused on introducing young people to him, not showcasing our own talents as charismatic entertainers. Youth leaders who spend time, every single day, developing that old, lost, romantic discipline of reading about him: reflecting on the things he did and said, and the stories he told. Youth ministries that aim – above all else – to help young people hear about him, read about him, understand him and experience him by his Spirit.
This is the very core of what we have to offer young people. This is the transformational adventure to which we can call them, which blows away every other consumer lifestyle choice in comparison. This is what we carry: he is a fire, and he can spread like one if we’ll only unleash him.
Just imagine a youth ministry movement that truly did have Jesus at the centre. Not egos, or leaders, or pyrotechnics, or cool online resources: Jesus. Youth ministries that stopped focusing on the problems, or the junk-food solutions, but on the Son of God, raised from the dead, defeater of our sin and guarantor of our future hope. Imagine if we really did make it all about Jesus.
Forget that phrase. Forget everything you know about Jesus. See it all again, as if for the first time, and put Jesus at the very heart of your youth ministry. There is power in doing so that we cannot even comprehend; it has changed the world before, it will again.
