Wes on Youth Ministry

My good friend, Wes Baker, has some good thoughts on Youth Ministry. He writes,

The goal of youth ministry is to prepare our children for service in Christ’s Kingdom. This involves a process of spiritual formation in which they are molded and shaped into the image of Christ. The child’s will, intellect, and emotional life must be conformed to the will, intellect, and emotional life of Christ, and dedicated fully to His service. This process will not happen automatically. We must intentionally cultivate in them all of the moral, intellectual, and emotional virtues to make them well rounded, fruitful, and faithful citizens of Zion.

The church cannot do this without the parents, but neither can the parents do this without the guidance, support, and active involvement of the whole body of Christ. It is an error to think that youth ministry can make up for parental negligence. Discipleship is not something that anyone else can do for the parents. At the same time however, the opposite error is to think that parents are self-sufficient, and equal to the task all by themselves. As Christian parents we must raise our children together, in mutual dependence on one another, making full use of each other’s gifts, not least of which include the guidance, direction, counsel, and instruction of our ministers and elders.

Check it out here.