True Religion 3

94% of Millennials have a great respect for older generations, and want to be connected to those prior generations in mentoring relationships. They say they have a desire to learn from what has come before, to stay connected to older folks (particularly older relatives), and at the same time to "correct" the mistakes of prior generations (particularly in the area of family relationships—committing wholeheartedly to marriage, for instance, because so many of them have been through divorces in their own families of origin).

In terms of the church, that makes me wonder about the future of worship. We've been in this so-called "worship war" for a generation or two now, where some want traditional worship, some want so-called contemporary worship, and others want something somewhere in between. Though the lines are not as clear cut as we typically think, usually we associate traditional worship with older generations and contemporary worship with younger generations (though honestly what we call "contemporary" today really is designed more for Boomers or Busters than it is for Millennials). In our own church, we've seen those lines become blurred, though. Some of our older folks love the contemporary service, and some of our younger folks prefer the traditional service...and those who come at 10:00 like the 10:00 time!

But what does it mean for worship when we have a generation of young people who are looking for mentors, for older folks to help guide them in the way? What does worship look like for this upcoming generation? And, perhaps the more challenging question, how long will it take for the church to figure it out? When only 15% of Millennials say being a part of a church is important, how can we lead/design/plan worship that might just push that number up?

If you're in that generation, I'm interested in what you're thinking. What would "good, God-focused, meaningful worship" look like for you?

Comments

  1. I just read through the last three postings on Millennials. I have been asking many of the same questions about this lost generation (at least lost to the church). I also have been asking serious questions about what we call ministry. According to a study by the Barna Group 71% of young people leave the church once they reach 16. Only 11% say it is because they give up their faith in Jesus. The remaining 60% are basically feed up with what we call church and how we approach ministry. (Those are my words after studying their reasons given by the study.) So my question is, "If we keep doing the same thing over and over again and expect a different result what does that make us?" According to Einstein that make us insane. Insanity is a deranged state of mind. So when we are called to renew our minds based upon the completed work of Jesus and his example maybe, just maybe we need to look at the way we have been doing "ministry." While there are many forms of ministry, in my opinion if they are to be called Christian they must involve personal investment in the lives of others. Jesus gave up His comfort zone, identified with us even though our sin was a stench in His nostrils, became a willing servant to those who had rejected Him and sacrificially invested His life for us. How much of our programmatic approach to ministry includes that? If we look at this more invested approach to ministry it seems to fit your findings that Millennials are interested in being mentored by boomers. When the church puts more emphasis on personal investment in people maybe. . . just maybe the Millennials may listen to the Gospel that has been lived out before their eyes.

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