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Dreaming about an axiom

(Photo by Jeff Myers)

I'm dreaming about an axiom I can use to sum up ALL of the beast known as student/youth culture! I'm pretty sure that's an impossible task but it would make our jobs in student ministry a little easier.  I wish there was a concise or condensed way to sum up what we are to understand about this generation as we try to reach and communicate with them. I think it's more than just understanding the lingo, and knowing what they like, I think in order for us to REALLY  tap into how to best help them see Jesus clearly, we need to shrink the beast into something more manageable so that we can get "specific and practical" (to use some Granger lingo) instead of being all over the place in our approach.

I feel like most of the music, fashion, and movie industry has student culture pegged...or at least they know how to set trends...how is the church doing?  Seems to me that we're following whatever trends they set and then we're trying to make that adaptable to what's "appropriate" for ministry.

I'm not bashing those industries at all, I actually wish I could sit in a planning meeting with the creative minds of those industries and pic their brains...but I am saying that I'm hoping we find a way to BECOME the trend setters for society again.  (If you're saying "that's not possible", you should probably get out of student ministry because that's what it's going to take!) Anybody got any thoughts or fuel to add to the fire?  Comment below.