"The Youth Group vs. The Family"

"Unfortunately, more often than not there is a gap that exists between the life of a youth ministry and the life of the youth family. Familiar with that gap? Let me present you with two of the more common problems that families run into when it comes to the relationship between their church’s youth ministry program and their youth.

First, there is the classic lack of communication. Symptoms include: not knowing what’s going on, not knowing when things are happening, unaware of who’s in charge, or which adults will be working with or chaperoning your teenager, etc. This, no doubt, can be a very discouraging problem.

Second – another time-tested classic – the problem of competition. Oftentimes, families feel like their church’s youth program is competing against them for quality time with their youth. Usually, this is caused when youth don’t want to hang out with their families because they want to go and do something with the youth group...

Either way, when it comes to the youth group vs. the family, the family should win every time because the family (and not the youth group) is the God-ordained institution responsible for bringing up youth in the fear and admonition of the Lord. The youth group, on the other hand, is simply here to help."

I am in 100%, complete and total agreement with that last statement. I believe that the family (parents, that's YOU) is the God-ordained creation responsible for bringing up children in the LORD. Our student ministry simply exists to help. I hope that you'll let me know how we can help.

Read the rest of this great article here.