We view social networks differently than youth view them, and for a few more years this will be the case, as youth pastors didn’t grow up with social media the way our youth have and are.
My interest has been piqued by the recent upsurge in Youth Ministry blogs talking about using Social Media in Youth Ministry. I feel like I could point you to at least ten posts in the last three weeks dealing with this topic, and I have to say, I am disappointed.
Firstly, I am disappointed because along with this upsurge in Soclai media posts on youth ministry sites, it seems to be a symptom of a problem with Youth Ministry blogs, many are getting away from Youth Ministry and getting into secondary, less important matters. It feels like today, in order to have a successful “Youth Ministry” blog, you have to give things away, point others to freebies, and not talk much at all about Youth Ministry, but rather just add to the bottom of a post “Wouldn’t this be great to use in Youth Ministry?”
Secondly, I am disappointed because many articles I have read go about “Social Media” in a completely wrong manner. Let me ask you this, when was the last time you heard a student in your Youth Group say “We should connect using Social Media?”
And here is the simple problem of why these posts go about it all the wrong way: We are not web 2.0 Natives.
Some back story:
My freshmen Year of College was 2005, and here is something that many Youth Pastors will find completely foreign; I remember being asked to sign my name on an email to send to Facebook, because we needed to have x number of people wanting Facebook for them to add a network for Trinity Christian College. Facebook was Brand stinking new, it wasn’t even available to all the colleges. At this time, we were still using Myspace. When I got my first Job as a Youth Pastor that year, I remember it being such a big deal that one of the girls in my youth group had a myspace, and she was a senior, and the only reason she had one was because she met a cute boy at a college visit who asked if she had one.
It wasn’t until 2008 that Facebook became open to the general public, and since then, it has grown.
But think about the students in your Ministry and their views of Facebook, because it is completely different for them than it is for us. For them, Facebook has been around for “forever” it seems, because even the Sr.’s have probably had one for at least all of High School. For many Youth Pastors, Facebook is relatively new on the scene; Yes, it seems like its been around for forever, but we can also remember what it was like before Facebook.
So fast forward to today, and add in the fact that many Youth Pastor Social Media “Experts” use social Media for promoting a blog, and you get a messed up view of Social Media being using in Youth Ministry.
I think Facebook can be a great tool for Ministry, and it is one. But can we accept the fact that the way we look at it is not the way our students do?
If you get invited to an event on Facebook, how often do you actually RSVP and do what you RSVP’ed for? How many times have you created a Facebook event for a Youth event and had 4 people RSVP and 40 show up, or 40 RSVP and 4 show up?
So you want to know how to use social media to be the most effective in your Youth Ministry? As someone who loves blogs, Its almost painful to say it, but quit reading blogs about it and start asking your students. Most likely you have a group of students who you can ask questions like this in a productive manner. I guarantee you that will make your Social Media Strategy 50 times better than reading 50 blog posts about creating one.
