Q&A: How to Reach the Youth Culture? - Steve Lawson

Question: How to reach the youth culture?

Steve: The student minister asked,

how do we reach college students

and these two extremes?

And I'm sure the secret is

there is no secret.

It's the reality of the
power of the Gospel

and the reality and the power

of the Person and work of Christ

unleashed by His Spirit from the Scripture

upon the lives of students.

And the fact is,

so many of these students are unconverted.

And their parents are wanting them to come

and they're not saved,

so they don't have a new mind,

they don't have a new heart.

They have a heart of stone

that's resistant to the things of God.

Their eyes are blind. Their ears are deaf.

So most churches just resort to

a bowling alley or a concert or whatever

just to entertain them.

And that's a very challenging
position to be in, Mackie,

because you get a mom and a dad saved

and they come to church,

but all their kids are not necessarily

yet regenerate.

And how you hold their attention,

I think you just have to,

by the grace of God,

every time you are with them

and you minister to them,

again, I don't think there's any secret.

I think you just have
to have such a reality

of the living Christ in your own life

and in your teaching and in your preaching

and in your love and
your outreach to them,

and pray that God in His sovereignty

will lay hold of them

and arrest their attention.

But I just refuse to turn this into

a glorified club.

And I totally understand

a neo-Puritanical -
I'm interested in that,

but they're not interested in that.

And I understand that. I wasn't either

when I was that age.

But I remember when I was in high school,

I grew up in a liberal Methodist church.

I never even heard a Bible message.

My parents led me to Christ

and I had enough there that I was saved,

but I remember in high school

going to certain ministries

outside of my church,

that when I saw and heard

and felt the reality of what was going on

in those circles,

my heart was just drawn to that.

I remember just meeting
in living rooms like this

and little parachurch ministry things.

And it was so simple.

Someone stood up and led us in singing,

and there was a Bible message.

And there were snacks
afterwards in the kitchen.

It was simple, but it was authentic.

It was real.

I think that somewhere in that

is the reality of first
century Christianity.

And it may not succeed.

And I'll have to accept that.

I can't adjust the course for this ship

if people are not hopping on board,

but I don't have a martyr's complex.

I'm not trying to shrink this.

I'm wanting to enlarge this.

I have a positive approach,

but it's just who we are and what we are

and it's like there is
no other play to call.

I mean, either God's going
to get them on board,

or they're just not going to be on board,

but we're not going to
become a different ship

and cater to this.

I would try to get the parents involved.

And I'm coming right back to you -

I'd try to get the parents involved

and have their emotional support -

not just be dropping them here,

but to reinforce what we're doing

as best we can.

But really, what works in big church

is what works in little church

just with some adapting.

But that's a tough question.

Everybody I think around the country

is wrestling with that.

And yeah, there is this
kind of new movement

within reformed circles -

the young, restless, and reformed

and wanting to be salty
and edgy and crass.

I'm not going down that path.

I think there is a standard of holiness

and purity and integrity

that we've got to maintain.

And I'm not trying to be

a shock jock with young people

where I've got to shock them

by my edginess to get them interested.

The power is in the Gospel.

It's in the message, not in the messenger.