‘Preach the gospel in and out of season’ might have bigger ramifications for our practices than we realise.

I believe the unfortunate buzzword for the last six decades of youth ministry has been ‘relevancy’, a word that I think we only have a cursory understanding of at best.

What we usually mean by relevancy is relating what we do to what young people do. So, by immersing ourselves in the world of young people we chase the winds of youth culture in order to keep our work on trend, up-to-date, and suitably relatable.

At the heart of this, however, there is an interesting conundrum. What happens when we are not relevant or up-to-date? Does the gospel suddenly lose its impact upon young people’s lives?

The gospel is the great uniter, but relevancy (as we tend to understand it) is the great divider. By simply appealing to popular trends you will always exclude many who don’t swim in them.

To back-peddle a little, I believe there is certainly some merit in a pursual of surface-level relevancy. It’s helpful to know what young people are struggling with, it’s useful to have initial common-ground conversation starters with young people, it’s important to value what they care about, and we should provide experiences that they can enjoy safely and easily. The issue is not seeking this kind of relevancy, it’s when this sense of relevancy drives our content.

Letting relevancy in the driving seat

Let’s do a thought experiment: It’s getting close to the beginning of a new term, you have gathered your leaders and asked them what young people are currently dealing with and what they’re currently into. This effectively gives you two lists like this:

• Stress
• Identity
• Peer-pressure
• Cancel culture
• Sexuality
• Bullying
• Relationships

• Divergent
• Ed Sheeran
• Billie Eilish
• The Umbrella Academy
• Conan Gray
• The Mandalorian
• TikTok

This, in turn, using some creative matchmaking, gives you a potential series:

• Divergent Movie night on Identity
• Cancel Culture from Billie’s perspective
• Big pressure questions with a TikTok duet danceoff

Etc.

Does this sound familiar? It’s what happens when we lead with culture and let relevancy drive our work.

At one level, fine. Many young people will probably engage with these sessions, and they will provide you important opportunities and hopefully helpful conversations.

The problem, however, is threefold. First, you’ll end up recycling the same basic content dressed in different social clothing. The movie night on identity using Divergent, is probably exactly the same basic message you gave to the same group a few years ago on Twilight. Second, you’ll exclude young people who don’t like Ed Sheeran, watch The Mandalorian, or use TikTok. You’re casting a wide net, but a net with big holes in it. Third, you’re implicitly and subversively suggesting that Christianity is not relevant. If the ‘Christian bit’ is always a slave to the ‘culture bit’ – if it’s always wedged in later – then it implies that it’s not strong or unique enough to hold its own.

It’s this last issue that troubles me the most.

Changing out the driver

If, instead, we were to begin with young people as hungry, desperate, fearful, brilliant, and unique human people, and start by asking the question ‘what does this kind of human always need’ then we would come up with a very different list.

The need the gospel. They need to know they are fearfully and wonderfully made in God’s image, beaten up by the fall, and beset by a struggling world.

They need to know that Jesus, the one who knit them together piece by piece, saw them hurting, lost, and alone and came into their world.

They need to know that Jesus lived a life fiercely pursing radical justice through immense love, that he was rejected by his people, cast out by his family, denied and deserted by his friends, and went to the cross.

They need to know that Jesus became the ultimate, pure, and perfect fulfilment of everything that has ever been written about knowing God, and that He sacrificed Himself, on our behalf, for us, in our place.

They need to know that as a human Jesus paid the ultimate human price for the human mess, but as God, he made that payment work eternally for every human that has ever or will ever live who say yes to Him.

They need to know that Jesus is God and that He didn’t stay dead. He has defeated the biggest, scariest enemy we have.

They need to know that Jesus is alive and right now is on the throne of the universe – a throne that they will get to play on one day.

They need to know that Jesus forgave those who rejected Him, cast Him out, denied Him and deserted Him. He even forgave those who held the nails.

They need to know that this Jesus hears every single word they say – and He is always, always with them.

They need to know this.

Culture is what gets wedged in later – as fun embellishment, or teaching examples, or helpful metaphors. Relevancy begins with the human, then moves outwards towards culture.

We need to get this in the right order.

I recently spoke to a youth worker who is doing a three-week series with his youth club to, in his words, ‘correct gender identity misinformation.’ Three weeks! Now that’s an important topic that should come up, whatever your perspective on it. If you’re giving healthy room for conversation and q&a, then I’m certain it will come up. But taking almost a whole month out to do it is totally leading with culture.

That, to me, sounds like someone who is fearful of culture and sees it as their job to fix young people’s thinking and save them from a corrupted world.

That. Is. Not. Our. Job.

Our job is to just lead them to Jesus. Of course, we will talk about these things and we should, but as carriages pulled behind the Jesus train. Jesus is strong enough to pull every issue, and unique enough to be relevant to every context. We just need to know Him and share what we know of Him with them.

If you have an hour with young people – tell them the gospel. If you have a week with young people – tell them to gospel. If you have a year with young people – tell them the gospel!

You can use cultural examples to help you teach it, you can use cultural styles to help frame the setting, and you can use cultural struggles to set up the need. But culture should not dictate the pace, the content, or the passions of your work.

Tell young people the gospel. It’s what they need more than anything.

Photo by Joshua Earle on Unsplash