WyldLife Training Resource #24

“Preparing our Messages – the survey says…”

A key tenet of Young Life has been to communicate the gospel in a language our audience can understand. We are very skilled at illuminating the basic points of the gospel to high school kids. At camp, we clearly articulate the theology of substitutionary atonement so kids understand well the decision they will make either to follow Jesus, or continue living as they please. But with middle schoolers, I think we should feel the freedom to communicate the heart and desires of Christ without feeling chained to our traditional gospel sequence.

Speaking to kids every other week at club, or even over a five-day summer camp, will not seem like adequate time for a thorough proclamation of all Christ has done for us. But the gospel is not a set of talks, or the four spiritual laws; it is a person. If Jesus is lifted up, simply and beautifully for kids to see, many feel ready to begin following Him. Then, as they walk with the Holy Spirit through the years, they will progressively come to understand the meat of the full gospel.

I spoke at a five-day WyldLife camp this summer. Yes, I tried to cover enough of the gospel for kids to respond and follow Jesus – and many did. But I found great freedom in choosing different topics to accomplish this. The theme of the week was, “Exploring the Questions of Life.” Here are the ones we investigated:

  1. Who is God? A very personal creator who made us for a relationship with him.
  2. What is God like? He is loving, compassionate, just, forgiving, and yearns to walk with us as our closest friend.
  3. How do we know? He became a man in Jesus Christ, who demonstrated all of the qualities of God so we could fully understand him.
  4. What does God think of us? “He thinks we’re very important – so much so He wants to spend time with us.
  5. Why do we need Jesus? We are eternally separated from God apart from Him because we rejected the life He offered.
  6. What did God ever do for me? God showed us the full extent of His love by sending us His only son to die on the cross so our sin penalty might be paid in full.
  7. What is Jesus’ invitation to us? To turn away from our sin and begin to follow Him all day, everyday. This is the purpose of life.
  8. Will God still love me if I fail? Yes, He understands who we are because He made us. If we follow Him, He will lead us to a higher level of right-living than we ever imagined.

It is critically important that we attach gospel points to felt needs in kids’ lives. For example, early adolescents don’t feel they are very important in our society. They think they have nothing to contribute. So we should share with them the account of when everyone in town was excited for Jesus to heal the synagogue official’s daughter. But on the way there, He encountered a woman of little importance in the eyes of the townspeople. Yet Jesus stopped and listened to the entire story. Why was she important to Him? Because He created her (Mark 5:21-34).

Or, since middle schoolers are in the midst of their identity formation and typically struggle with insecurity, we can make the gospel relevant to them by sharing how a little guy named, Zacchaeus, a complete loser in his school, was chosen to spend a private evening with the Creator of the universe in his home( Lk 19:1-10).

Want to know what middle school kids really want to hear in a Young Life message? A group of WyldLife kids in Northern Virginia were surveyed as to what questions and topics they would like to discuss in club. Here’s what they said:

1.How can I get along with my parents?

2. How can I be a good friend?

3. Why do parents always have the final say?

4. How should I deal with the pressure to succeed?

5. What if I feel left out of the crowd (self-image)?

6. What is my purpose?

7. Why do we need God? What does He do for us?

8. What is God like? How do we know?

9. How can God help us with our problems?

10. How can I believe in something I cannot see?

11. Why should I believe in the Bible?

12. How do you grow in your relationship with God?

13. How can I be a leader instead of a follower?

14. What does God do when we make Him mad?

15. How should I deal with peer pressure?

16. How do you deal with people you don’t like?

17. What’s the meaning of life?

18. Where do we go when we die? How do we know?

19. When is the world going to end? How should we live then?

20. How do your decisions affect the rest of the world?

21. What will we be like in the future? Who decides?

22. How do you handle injustice in the world?

23. Is there life after death? Reincarnation?

24.What does God want from me?

CAUTION:

These topics are student generated, but that doesn’t mean we only discuss these topics. Rather, I use their questions to get their attention, let them know we’re going to address one of their concerns, but then I lead them to the gospel point I would like them to know. The gospel is presented, in a language they can understand, and is received because it is relevant to their needs.

I pray the Lord richly blesses our proclamation efforts this year!

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* For more training on how to effectively deliver a talk to junior high kids, see WyldLife Training Resource #5 – “Our Message.” It is archived at