I have written much about how to reach and keep the next generation. However, before you or your church do anything, pray. And after you and your church have done everything, pray some more.
Regardless of where your church is at in reaching the next generation, you should pray. Perhaps the high-speed train is rolling and your bringing in the next gen by the cart loads or perhaps the train isn’t even on the track because you don’t have a train to reach the next generation with. No problem. Wherever you are, begin and end in prayer.
Strategies are important, but even strategies should be saturated in prayer. One strategy I have been using as of late is called “Seven Sundays of Focus” and it comes from www.reachingnextgen.com. I have adapted the strategy some, but my church’s “Seven Sundays of Focus” looks like the schedule below:
First Sunday – Pray for Students in Preschool (Ages 0-5)
Second Sunday – Pray for Students in Grades 1-5
Third Sunday – Pray for Students in Grades 6-12
Fourth Sunday – Pray for Students in College/Career (Young Professionals)
Fifth Sunday – Pray for Leaders of Preschool, Children, Youth, and Young Adult’s
Sixth Sunday – Pray for Parents of all students from cradle to college.
Seventh Sunday – Prayer about where we are and where we are going.
In practice, I spend three to seven minutes talking about each group and then praying over each group. You could bring groups to the front, have them stand, or simply raise their hands before praying over the group.
Churches need to be made aware of the times we live in. Churches need to understand how culture and theology work together. Churches need help in understanding who the next generation is (Milennials and Gen Z are not the same), but more than anything, churches need help in praying for the next generation.
If you do a good job of promoting the “Seven Sundays,” you can expect a spike in attendance. But realize more feet is not your ultimate goal. You are there to do serious business with God because you believe prayer is vital and you believe you need God to answer your prayers.
What will the results be? I think the results will be different for every context. However, I am believing in faith that my small church is going to baptize three or four more young people this upcoming year. For a large church, that number may swell to thirty or forty more and for a mega-church, that number may balloon to three or four-hundred more.
All I do know for sure is that Christianity is on hard times in North America and that the church needs to pray. Next generation leader, this starts with you. Approach your pastor about this strategy or another and I pray you get his blessing. But before you knock on his door, pray!