There are a lot of myths I’ve heard over the years.  Some I know for a fact are false and don’t even give the time of day, others I like to imagine are true and turn a blind eye to thinking of how unrealistic they are, and some may possibly be true, but the thought of looking into finding out the facts kind of freaks me out. 

In student ministry the same occurs.  You hear myths all the time: myths of student ministries being sued for a kid’s salvation, myths of thousands of students in small groups, and then there are the statistical myths.  These are my favorites!  Seeing as every time I’ve heard a statistic the number has been different, and 67% of statistics are made up on the spot, you have to take them with a grain of salt.  The most infamous statistic is the one the shocks/angers/impassions/confuses all youth workers when they hear it.  The myth that upon graduation, 95% (80-99% depending on who’s talking) of all teens from your youth ministry will step away from the church!  What?!  How can this be?!?!?!  Not from my ministry!!!  This always makes me laugh.  I must admit, when I first heard it, I went through a slew of reactions: anger, denial, confusion, excitement…and then I started thinking.  I looked back at the students that I graduated with, and the classes that followed me and realized that my church must be the one exception, because that wasn’t the case in my experience.  Then I got off of my high horse and realized that it wasn’t that my church was the exception, and that the statistic was probably skewed.  My pastor/friend/boss had the same thought, and pursued it a little further, learning that the statistic was very skewed, basically loosing all validity and shock value at student ministry conferences.  But for a while, it did its job.  I don’t think that statistic is shared to scare youth workers, but to cast vision, encourage, and charge them with exactly what their job entails, leading students to Christ.  The problem is, I think that there is some truth to be gained from this skewed thought. 

When I heard this, my reaction was to step up my game.  I wanted to make my ministry the most fun, loud, exciting, talked about, infamous student ministry there was!  I wanted it to attract thousands of students, being the ‘cool place’ around town.  I began to work overtime to make my ministry the best.  In my mind, if we made it fun and interesting students would want to stick around and fall madly in love with Christ.  Through highly developed programming, a line up that kept them on their toes, and a weekly “wow-moment,” I thought we were bound to make a joke out of that statistic.  I think that a lot of student ministries strive for this: the hyper-creative, over the top, best on the block student ministry.  The problem is, that isn’t what the church is about.  Looking back, my heart was in the right place, but my head wasn’t.  My competition went from the Enemy to the church down the street.  Comparing my ministry to others, ours was on top, and that’s the way I liked it.  My fear is that I am not the only person who has had/has this mentality.  I worry about those hyper-creative ministries, that they are too busy focusing on the creative, and not on the Creator. 

Now don’t get me wrong, I thrive in the creative.  I love expressing whom Jesus is in a new way, I strive to find every way that will point people to the cross.  I am a part of an amazing creative church; I value that very much.  But more than the creative, I value the true purpose of the church.  My issue is that, while this statistic may not be true, are we setting our students up to fail?  When we define church as this pre-programmed show with moments of awe and interest, and not as a body of believers coming together to learn, grow, encourage, support and build up each other and the community, our students leave with a false-expectation.  When we don’t take the time or value the need to balance the creative with the discipleship, students leave our churches and walk into a Bible-believing church that has their thumb on exactly what the church is supposed to be, but because they don’t have intelligent lighting, our students walk away.  And when we compete with other churches, our students walk away looking for a church just like ours, but when we have intentionally eliminated that option, our students are left out to dry.  I fear that too often we forget to mention who Jesus is and His purpose for the church, and our students couldn’t know what a good church is if it bit them on the butt.  This is not a knock at the creative church, I LOVE the creative church, and I think Jesus does too…as long as it is a church.  As a woman called to student ministry, I have a charge on my life to do all that I can to tell the students of the world who Jesus is.  So does every other person who claims the title “Youth Ministry Leader/Worker/Pastor/Volunteer!”  It is our job to make the message clear, that Jesus Christ is the only truth, and His church is our rock.  However we choose to express this is an individual choice of each ministry.  Choose to be straightforward, choose to leverage the creative; whichever you think is best for your ministry.  As long as the heart and mind is right, and the Word is being shared, go for it.  But remember this, Jesus is the only truth, and your only competition is the fallen angel.