A Brief Book Summary from Books At a Glance
by Kirsten Birkett
Contents
Grab them with passion
Win them with love
Hold them with holiness
Challenge them with truth
Amaze them with love
General Summary
An essay about how faithful church ministry can reach the next generation.
Summary
People have asked the author his church’s secret to reaching the next generation without “going emergent.” His answer was to do nothing special, just be faithful. Church growth is potentially a sinful temptation and its secret is no secret. There are no tricks; you do not have to know everything about youth culture. “You just have to be like Jesus.” So it is both easy and hard.
Five suggestions:
1. Grab them with passion
Young people will not go to church out of social obligation any more; it has to seem worth their time, so we need to “follow Christ like we mean it.” Church should not be spiritually lukewarm; God must be “the all-consuming reality in our lives.” Passion is zeal fueled by knowledge (Rom 10:2). Know your faith and care about it. Preach the gospel with pleading. “They need to hear the message from someone who not only understands it but has been captured by it.”
2. Win them with love
Instead of trying to “figure out cultural engagement,” just love people. Do not try to imitate Gen-Z culture, because there is no such thing universally, and it will be out of date by the time we figure it out. Stop preaching “the false gospel of cultural identification,” just tell people about Jesus and love people – talk to them, notice them, invite them home. . . .
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