Keep on keeping on

It feels like only yesterday that he was winding me up and yet I look at the challenges that XLP faced, the attitudes to youth work, and also my choice of haircut, and it feels like an age ago. As Premier Youthwork magazine celebrates its 25th birthday, XLP turns 20 and it is illuminating to look back at what has changed and what still remains a challenge today.

CHANGE IN CULTURE

Culture has changed so much in the last 20 years; when I started XLP in 1996 very few people even had dial-up internet at home but today practically everyone has 24/7 access to superfast 4G on their phones. The knowledge and opportunity at young people’s fingertips is now incredible. However this means big challenges for youth work. Leave youth work for just a few months and on your return young people will be communicating in a way completely unknown to you. From MSN, to Myspace, to Facebook, to BBM, to Whatsapp, to Instagram, to Snapchat, young people are living online in ways that have rapidly shifted over the last 15 years. The internet has also brought with it easy access to porn, sexting and other online safety concerns. The challenge now is to keep up with the pace of change, to constantly adapt, and to learn to engage in the best way we can.

On the other hand, it has been brilliant to see a growing awareness of the issues around mental health. Twenty years ago, mental health was never spoken about or it was written off as a symptom of lack of faith or prayer. Thankfully that has changed dramatically. However, there’s still a long way to go: it was recently reported that on average it takes years for a young person with mental health difficulties to receive adequate help.

CHANGE IN THE CHURCH

The late 90s were all about the youth church. Church leaders were getting nervous as smoke machines and lighting rigs were appearing at their evening services and a lot of effort was put into being relevant to the new generation of young people. Youth workers were employed and new (non-worship) Christian bands were huge, all creating a new Christian youth subculture. I am very glad that these churches placed so much focus on young people but, I wonder with whether in doing so we neglected the real benefits that being part of church brings.

One of our most life-changing projects at XLP is our mentoring programme where we ask volunteers of all backgrounds and ages to set aside two hours a week to support, challenge and encourage a young person at risk of pursuing a destructive path. Its success lies in the love that is shown and through the time dedicated. The young people benefit from a role model with a completely different perspective. For a young person facing the challenges of growing up, relevance has nothing to do with clothes or language; a relevant adult is a caring adult. Authenticity has become our focus.

The Church is full of role models from a huge variety of backgrounds. Far from encouraging young people to separate themselves from church and create their own services, the challenge now is to invite them into the heart of church so that they can benefit from it and help shape it into something they feel part of.

CHANGE IN ENGAGEMENT

Twenty years ago, most outreach in schools consisted of a week of lessons culminating in a large evangelistic event. These events alone, with not much follow up, didn’t help our young people. Early memories of XLP are hard to shift: a young man who had punched a hole in his bedroom wall due to the anger he felt about his family situation; another young guy who was sleeping behind the Halifax in Peckham; a young girl who at 14 was aiming to be a single mum.

I think since then we have discovered that simply just preaching at these kids is not helpful. The culture of poor housing, addiction, poverty and absent dads was, and still is, making some young people angrier and angrier. I’ve seen the age of kids hanging out on estates getting younger and younger and it seems that the lines between what is acceptable and unacceptable is getting greyer.

The challenge hasn’t changed: to engage with the most broken kids who are not even on the fringes of church. Some have argued that in the last 20 years we have drifted too far away from the proclamation of the gospel and too far towards a social justice approach but I think this should never have been an either-or debate. Jesus cared about the whole person, both material and spiritual, and too often we try to separate these key elements.

My experiences have led me to believe that charity, without the development of long-term relationship, has the potential to do more harm than good. A more holistic approach commits to long-term relationship, seeks to understand the person behind the needs, and longs to introduce the God of love who cares so passionately about them.

I have seen Jesus completely transform young people’s lives. When I ask them how God was made real to them, I think it is no coincidence that their answer always seems to be the same: ‘I met this person who believed in me, who saw something in me that I didn’t see myself. They saw my God-given potential and they stick with me’.

I suspect it will still be the same in another 20 years’ time. By drawing deeply from the enduring love that God showed for us on the cross, we just need to keep on keeping on.