A Silk Sunflower
The Christian Post online recently published an interesting interview with Ken Myers entitled Is “The Culture” Really the Church’s Problem? Myers is the founder and host of the Mars Hill Audio journal, a bimonthly audio magazine featuring interviews with Christian thinkers in the areas of academics, politics, and the arts. Myers doesn’t believe that the broader culture in general is the biggest challenge facing the Church today. Rather, he believes that culture inside the church is the problem. Instead of being transformed by the gospel, many believers’ lives are conformed to the culture around them, as Paul warns against in Romans 12. It’s a thought-provoking interview.
Here is a provocative excerpt about the dangers of segregating people in the church by age:
“One of the biggest and most consequential forms of cultural captivity of the Church is the way Christians have accepted the rise in the mid-twentieth century of what we call “youth culture,” with its assumption that intergenerational discontinuity is the norm.
“Marketers have successfully entrenched the notion of youth culture by creating product lines that are intended to define adolescent identity as a deliberate rejection of parental expectations. Not only does this age segregation weaken the family’s ability to pursue the cultural task of moral transmission, it also weakens the understanding of the family itself. A proper understanding of the meaning of family is intergenerational in all directions.
I agree with Myers. I believe that a proper understanding of church family is also “intergenerational in all directions.” Unless younger generations and older generations interact with and mentor one another in the church, how can we hope to pass on genuine Christian faith and passionate discipleship?
Here is something for smaller congregations to consider: it can be a blessing not to be able to segregate people in the congregation by age. We naturally work and interact intergenerationally. We have to.
The Mustard Seed Journal 
Hmm, as a YA librarian, there is a need for literature and programs aimed at young adults. They aren’t developmentally where adults are. One reason that most YA books have absent parents is the kids are trying to find their own identities /values apart from that of their parent and communities. It’s like trying on hats. “Just cause dad always wears a baseball cap doesn’t mean I have to. I’m gonna try on a trilby, and a porkpie, and deerstalker, and a tam and most any other hat I can find.” On the whole this is a good thing. It’s one reason that slavery isn’t legal (altho still widely practiced) anywhere in the world today.
Most adults would get further with kids if instead of trying to impose their culture/values on the kids, they would listen and respect what the kids are going through.
I am not a digital native, my students are. I need to listen to what they need from me before I start imposing solutions.
Hey, Kathleen! Generations need to spend time together in order to learn about one another’s lives and needs and develop compassion, love and respect for one another. It’s definitely a challenge. Learning to do the work of love is a challenge. Yes, the generations are at different places developmentally, and we certainly do need to attend to that. But the small church is one of the last places in contemporary society where young people and old people actually cross paths with one another and interact on a regular basis. They have opportunities to serve alongside each other. Laura calls the older folks at Morton her “grandfriends.” I think it is a mistake to segregate the generations during worship and certain other activities of life in the church family.