Growing faith is at the core of youth ministry. It’s the ultimate reason people enter the field, and it’s the main mission God calls us to pursue. But where do you begin?
By breaking down faith development into smaller steps, the process doesn’t seem as overwhelming. May God bless you as you help teens build faith and grow closer to Jesus!
7 Simple Components for Growing Faith
Use the steps and ideas below to guide kids on a life-changing faith journey:
1. Teach kids to pray.
That’s an important first step. Then put kids in a position where they have opportunities to pray. For example, mission trips, evangelistic excursions, spiritual challenges, and so on.
2. Instead of another Bible lesson, tackle a tough, culturally relevant question.
For example, is homosexuality a sin? How do you feel about the Netflix show Thirteen Reasons Why? Get everyone’s honest thoughts. Then take kids through the Scriptures to unpack God’s raw and relevant answers. Finally, let the conversations begin.
3. At the end of every lesson, give students three challenges.
- Do something specific that week to apply what they learned.
- Share that truth with another Christian.
- And use what they learned as a Gospel conversation-starter with an unreached friend.
Then the next week (and this is the important part) ask teenagers to share how they took all three challenges specifically. Do that every week, and teens will begin to know that Christianity is more than just hearing the truth. It’s putting it into practice (James 1:22.)
4. Equip your students.
For growing faith, make sure teens know what it means to live in dependence on the Holy Spirit. Share why trying to earn God’s approval through a legalistic checklist is pointless.
5. Once a month, take teens out to share the Gospel with complete strangers.
Something about engaging people in evangelism face to face enables teenagers to really wrestle through and own what they believe (Philemon 1:6). Do you need training tools for equipping teenagers to share the Good News in a clear, loving way? Then check out our free faith-sharing mobile apps.
