From the hit Netflix series Adolescence to Gareth Southgate’s recent lecture, it’s clear from the headlines this week that young people in the UK need much better role models. Andy Mossop says it’s time for more churches to plug the gap left by funding cuts and invest in opening new youth clubs. It will bring you and your church numerous benefits, he says
As a youth worker in East London, it was heartening to see Ezra Collective become the first jazz band to win “Group of the Year” at the Brit Awards. In his acceptance speech, their frontman, Femi Koleoso, remembered with gratitude the youth clubs that first put instruments in their hands and encouraged them to dream.
It could be an instrument, a sport or simply a safe space to commune with other young people and hang out with some supportive adults, but there’s no doubt that youth clubs make a massive difference to young people, perhaps especially those growing up in working class communities.
Yet, this era of cuts to youth services run by local authorities has left young people without the option of youth clubs and the opportunity of being guided, encouraged and occasionally protected by trusted adults in their enviornment.
If your church is in an area with lots of housing estates or a large working-class community, running a youth club for local young people could be a powerful way to show the community the compassion of Christ.
Youth Clubs Aren’t Rocket Science
When I was training as a youth worker, I read a report by NACRO (National Association for the Care and Resettlement of Offenders) that really stuck with me. It essentially said that a youth club doesn’t have to be complicated - merely providing teenagers with a safe, welcoming space, supervised by sympathetic adults, can be transformative. Surely, as churches, we could do this?
In many middle-class areas, young people already have safe spaces. They have dining rooms, studies, and bedrooms big enough to host friends. They’re often doing well at school and have access to extracurricular activities. But what about those who don’t? What about the young people whose only option is to meet their friends in stairwells of their blocks? If we’re serious about reaching them, running a youth club could be one of the most practical ways to do it.
I can think of three main benefits…
1. You get to help the needy
Jesus calls us to love our neighbours as ourselves. This isn’t an optional extra - it’s central to following Christ. Just as we celebrate the influence of Christians who abolished the slave trade or set up orphanages, we should celebrate churches who are trying to help young people find a positive path in their lives.
It’s also part of our corporate witness. People notice. At our carol service last Christmas, an older woman named Tasha was proudly telling everyone how she had been a member of our church’s youth club, as was her son, and now her grandchildren are. She was even looking forward to her great-grandchildren joining one day.
2. You get to build strong relationships
Some argue that churches shouldn’t run “mercy ministries” that only help people practically, as they can encourage dependency. Well youth work is a mercy ministry to die for! The whole point of youth work is to build strong relationships and encourage growing independence and responsibility!
Over the years, I’ve lost count of how many adults have stopped me to say how much they appreciated our church’s youth club. What I remember as battles over discipline, they remember as a formative time in their lives. Many credit it with helping them gain confidence, focus on school, or choose a better path, Femi and the Erza Collective are an example of that.
And the good news? There are often secular grants available to help fund this kind of work. As long as the goal is genuinely to serve young people, rather than just creating an audience for a gospel talk, external funding can stretch a meagre church’s youth work budget. For the last 20 years, we have always received some form of grant that has helped us stretch our finances to employ a youth worker, not just for the young people in our church, but to support and reach those outside it too.
3. You get to share the gospel
This is the added bonus of running a youth club. The relationships that develop in a good youth club create natural opportunities to share the hope of Christ. Young people are far more likely to listen to you, once they believe you’re on their side and genuinely care about them. As you listen to them, they listen to you.
Young people come to you with queries from an RE lesson at school, wanting to test you and see if you can answer the hard questions. We’ve had long-into-the-night gospel discussions after some of our Christmas dinners! Many of our youth club members, including Muslims who make up a large proportion of our community, have come to evangelistic events run by the church, who humanly-speaking I can’t imagine would have come otherwise. We’ve had youth club members join our church youth discipleship group for extended periods too. And even now there are a handful of ex-youth club Muslim guys who are in regular 1-1 Bible Study / discussions with us.
Some people worry that we shouldn’t spend so much time caring for our neighbours’ social needs, when what they really need is the good news about Jesus. But it’s often as we love our neighbours, that we get great opportunities to share our hope for eternity. As we take seriously the parable of the Good Samaritan, we find opportunities to put into practice the parable of the Sower.
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