What They Want: Ministering to Millennials
I have always loved working with university students and young adults. Probably because after growing up in a Christian home and going to a Christian liberal arts uni, I began to question a lot of what Christians believed. Not finding adequate answers, I made very small and seemingly insignificant decisions to stop pursuing God, church and his plan for my life. These baby steps in the wrong direction put me miles away from Christ (figuratively speaking) and I felt I had very little hope of finding my way back. I was the prodigal daughter that nearly all parents fear raising and only by the grace of God did I eventually turn back to Jesus 16 years later,
This I believe is true for most Millenials. Once they reach their late teens and move away from home and their local church to attend college or university, they begin asking questions about the way they were raised, what they believed and why. They start asking tough questions and finding few answers. It was in part because of this experience in my own life that our family chose to settle in the university town of Heidelberg, Germany with Pioneers. We wanted to get to know students and young adults, evangelise those who were lost, disciple those who were seeking to follow Jesus and finally send them out on mission.
We used spiritual background surveys to start conversations on campus:
- What is your spiritual background and who in your opinion is Jesus Christ?
- On a scale of 1-10, how good are you?
- If Jesus were to ask you why He should let you into heaven, what would you say?
Knowing that the backgrounds of most European college students was some form of Catholicism and works-based religion, we wanted to face that head on and talk about Jesus, God’s grace and our desperate need for the Holy Spirit in our lives every day. We believed if we could get them thinking and exploring the truth claims of Christianity - and if that led to them truly being born again - that they would then desire to be discipled and grow in a local church which would prepare them to take the gospel back home and eventually to the rest of the world.
We heard a lot of interesting answers. Most people we talked to were captivated by the tough questions and grateful to have someone listen to their answers. They told us that growing up with their parents’ religion left them uninterested in following the same path. Still their answers to our questions showed a deep interest in spirituality. We invited over fifty young people from around the world to work with us in Germany. We wanted them to experience the German culture, the language, serve the local church and help us do surveys with their peers as an opening to sharing the gospel. We held coffee house type socials focused only on answering tough questions about Christianity.
In time, we discovered an important fact: Millenials want to be reached. They want us to talk to them, make them think, disciple and pray for them. They want to be mentored by someone older. They want to discover the authentic Jesus and serve Him wholeheartedly. They want to change the world.
Go and talk to one about Jesus and see for yourself.
Photo by Isaiah Rustad.