The SY&FM Model

The Strategic Youth and Family Ministry Model

I am a believer in The Strategic Youth and Family Ministry Model. I stand by a multiplication discipleship strategy that focuses on mentoring and leadership development. I believe the outcomes should be a love for God that produces trust and obedience, and a love for neighbor that produces service and sacrifice. I believe those outcomes should promote unity in the body, evangelism of the lost, and the glory of God. This model is:

Biblical and Theologically Grounded
We believe God has ordained the institutions of the family and the Church, and that Scripture has articulated the cultural and evangelical mandates of these institutions. Our goal is to present a model that affirms the God-ordained institutions and pursues the divinely issued mandates of Scripture. While youth ministry, as we know it, did not exist in the Bible, it is an extra-biblical idea that grows out of the principle of reasonableness. Scripture mandates that we carry the Gospel to all people groups and in our culture youth represent a unique people group with their own language and customs.

Family Focused
God’s design for the family is one man, married to one woman, for life, with whatever children God blesses them. The Gospel is at stake in this model because of the represented relationship between Christ and His Church. Fathers are responsible before God to be the spiritual leaders of their homes and churches are to equip fathers and mothers to disciple their own children. This includes prayer, Bible study, family worship and modeling Christ-like living in the home. Pastors and their families are to model marriage and parenting for their congregation, not perfectly but faithfully and consistently.
The diversity of family situations is Scripture demonstrates that God loves, cares for and uses people of diverse family context. Though the intact nuclear family is God’s norm, in our society it is becoming a cultural minority. Therefore, any local church that, in function or principle, accommodates only intact families neglects its Great Commission responsibility to evangelize and make disciples. Churches are to aggressively engage people in all family settings for the purpose of evangelism and discipleship.

Missions Oriented
Local churches are commissioned by God to reach all people, in all family context, in every nation, with the Gospel of Jesus. Therefore, they must equip and encourage individuals to reach and disciple their own families while at the same time recognize the evangelistic responsibility extends beyond the doors of Christian homes. Various approaches have been effectively used by God to minister to people in multiple family contexts. Churches have developed various ministries (children, youth, young adult, women, men, recovery groups, etc) in order to fulfill their evangelistic responsibility.

Local Church Structured
God has granted authority and autonomy to each local church. While there should be an accountability to the unity of the Body of Christ, within biblical parameters, there is freedom for local churches to organize themselves in a variety of ways. We affirm a multiplicity of church styles and models as biblical and disagree with those who have declared age-graded ministries to be un-biblical. We therefore affirm and teach a “multiple ministers approach” to address the specific needs of various ministries and age-groups within the church.

Pastor Led
Churches should be led by biblical qualified pastors, according to Titus 1 and 1 Timothy 3, and Scripture affirms the ability of churches to appoint pastors to oversee various areas of ministry. In fact, the Bible encourages the delegation of responsibility to a multiplicity of ministers (volunteer or paid). The willingness of many churches to place unprepared, untrained, unqualified ministers in the significant leadership roles of the church has a negative impact on families, churches, and their influence in their respective communities.