A God of Community
We worship a God of community. Three in one, each expression unique, mysterious, and beautiful, working and communing together in perfect harmony. Man was made in God’s image, and from the beginning it was clear that it was not good for man to be alone. As the missional plan of God was revealed and recorded in scriptures, it was evident that the God of community desired to fulfill His plan through community — a community that would enjoy the benefits of being “God’s people” but with the expressed purpose of sharing with those outside the truth of God’s saving grace and love.
Two thousand years after the book of Acts was penned, God’s plan for missional communities has not changed. We know this and have experienced this in the mission of Young Life. As a missional arm of the body of Christ, our desire is to reach every adolescent with the Good News of Jesus Christ and help them grow in their faith. United as one mission around this passion and yet organized locally in thousands of missional communities around the globe — this is Young Life.
What a Healthy Missional Community Looks Like
Healthy Young Life teams have as their primary focus — Jesus, and not Young Life. These communities:
- Gather regularly to worship, pray, and open the scriptures together
- Make time for fellowship — usually around food
- Are intentional in asking questions that matter, with a desire to know others and the courage to be known
- Share laughter that unifies, not the sarcastic or crude humor of the culture that tears down
- Create space to linger and build friendships with people you might not “choose” as your friends
- Embrace adventure and surprises
- Allow freedom to be who you are and, within the right context, to share how you are struggling
And then there is the mission. Young Life teams get to go out together. Literally, a short-term mission experience happens every week. Individually scared, but scared together. Courageous together, creative together, awkward together, succeeding together, and failing together. The mission field becomes the fertile soil for the community to grow in dependence and love — for Christ and for each other.
The Threat to Missional Community
We live in a time where we are exposed to more counterfeit communities than ever before. Hours daily are spent building a virtual community on social media platforms that perpetuate constant comparison. We work with teenagers who have a thousand “friends” and yet are more lonely than ever before. If true community is water, the world has never been more thirsty. A healthy missional community is literally a stream of living water.
And yet, as the mission of Young Life continues in a season of unparalleled favor, one of the threats to our current and future health is the pull away from a movement of missional communities toward an organization of ministry programs. The lure of the latter fits nicely in the plans and strategies of man and might even give the impression of predictable success. That would be a mistake.
The favor of the Lord on the mission of Young Life has little to do with great leadership, beautiful camps, or prescribed program. Our favor rests in an individual and corporate love for and commitment to our triune God, a desire and commitment to go together, and a passion to know every adolescent who has not personally known the goodness of these gospel truths.
Our Invitation
As the missional community that has experienced God’s goodness through the ministry of Young Life, let’s not lose sight of our first Love. It was into a missional community that we were invited. Let us not fall into the temptation to make the programs, the properties, or the brand of Young Life into an idol or give them too much importance.
The world has set the stage for this to be true. Our invitation is to missional community: life and ministry together, wonderfully expressed through the ministry vehicle of Young Life. May God grace us with His favor in our communities, and may our Living God — not Young Life — get the glory.