I’m ready to concede that Family Ministry might not belong on the list of “tipping point” trends that are emerging from our culture. I’ve been trading emails with some prof’s that I respect and have been building a longer view of family ministry. There’s been a long history of publishers that have attempted to capitalize on readiness of family ministry within the church only to be thwarted by customer disinterest. Or the customer only purchasing pieces aimed at children and ignoring the pieces that intergrated the learning across the family system.
Instead, the call for Family Ministry is has been, and should continue to be a prophetic function of the church. It’s the church’s job to vision cast for what the family should be– incubators of faith! Perhaps that’s why I’m encouraged by both the Orange Movement and Group’s current retooling of their family ministry efforts.
That being said, I do think that there are cultural trends that must be accounted for when designing a family ministry.
1) Xers and Millenials place a higher premium on family time than did their Boomer predecessors.
2) Institutional authority is more distrusted than ever.
3) Xers and Millenials place a high premium on expressing their individuality. (Look at how customizable Facebook and Myspace are.) Younger families will resist boiler-plate templates of what a family should look like. Instead they want principles and resources they can use to “Customize” their families.
4) According to the unChristian research, 16-29 year olds see the American incarnation of Christianity as being largely opposed to the teachings of Christ. Family ministry needs to emphasize how families can grow in service, compassion, and love (without giving ground on doctrine. Don Miller, I think, wrote that love is also one of the fundamentals of faith.)
5) Mass culture is dead. We need to give up on the notion that every family will attend every program that we offer. This creates that mandate that we pay attention to Deutoronomy’s mandates for an “as you go” faith. Families will dictate where they are going. It’s our role to encourage them to take Jesus with them.
