Home Youth Leaders Articles for Youth Leaders Why Mormons Do Youth Ministry Better Than We Do

Why Mormons Do Youth Ministry Better Than We Do

When I look at the Mormons I think to myself, “They believe. I want to believe like they believe.” Now don’t get me wrong. I don’t want to believe what they believe. Mormon theology is far from what the Bible says about Jesus, God, sin and salvation. It is, by no means, a truly Christian religion.

Having said that, Mormonism pushes their kids harder and takes them deeper and farther than even the most ardent of evangelical youth ministries would ever dare.

Can you imagine a youth group that challenged every teen in the youth ministry to meet at 6am every day of the school year for a class on Christianity? That’s exactly what Mormons do with their high schoolers and their belief system!

We get excited if once a year at 7:15am, while Mormon teens are coming back from their daily seminary lesson on Mormonism, our teens gather around a pole and pray.

I’m not saying that we copy the Mormons specific strategy. I can’t foresee our teenagers racing Mormons to the door in a battle of the bicycles. Nor do I believe the answer lies in a daily early morning class. We don’t need to copy their strategy. We do, however, need to adopt their philosophy.

We need to push our teens. We need to turn them into active activists. We need to build consistent opportunities for service, outreach and training. We need to equip them to share their faith and then go with them, leading the way. After all, we are youth leaders.

Somebody may accuse me of looking at this as some sort of competition. It is. We are in a competition with Satan for the souls of our young people. And we are getting our rears kicked.

My problem is not with the Mormons. It’s with us. Let’s learn from the Mormons and turn our kids into missionaries. Armed with the power of the true gospel our teens could mount a comeback and help us win this thing.

Game on.”