Presence-Centered Youth Ministry: Guiding Students into Spiritual Formation by Mike King. Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity Press, 2006, 192pp., $15.00, paper.

My Thoughts in a Nutshell: First, this is a great book, but King stumbles into giving us a new aesthetic for youth ministry (candles for couches) in places that he thinks he’s instilling a new theological outlook. Don’t get me wrong, there’s some serious rethinking of youth ministry going on here — it’s a book that should be read — but it leaves some serious theological work to be done lest we find that practices are just the latest and greatest way to attract teens. If the primary rationale for incorporating practices into youth ministry is that they work with this generation (an instrumental argument), then these “heirlooms of the faith” will be quickly discarded when they no longer seem to hold the allure of fresh and new. King shows us what the latest youth ministry fad is — presence-seeking practices — but he doesn’t make a strong argument for why this must not be a fad and why we cannot afford to let the incorporation of practices into youth ministry rest merely on instrumental grounds. That work is yet to be done, but if it doesn’t happen quick, the whole practices movement is going to be discarded like last month’s Group magazine.

Review

The sweeping shift in youth ministry from programs to practices is brought to an evangelical audience in Presence-Centered Youth Ministry as Mike King delves into a re-visioning of evangelical thought on the subject. The book begins with an autobiographical glimpse of King’s adolescent experiences in a mainline church and follows him through his “conversion” to Christian fundamentalism and ultimately a tempered evangelicalism. Along the way we get a glimpse of King twenty and thirty years ago as a fundamentalist youth minister trained to draw teenagers to the altar with “psychological methodology” in order to reduce “sales resistance for the Holy Spirit” (19). In a confessional tone King admits that many of his “efforts were actually detrimental to the Christian formation of adolescents” and he sets out on a new “journey to pursue God” in a refreshed evangelicalism (21). King joins with other recent voices in the field (such as Mark Yaconelli in Contemplative Youth Ministry: Practicing the Presence of Jesus) casting a new vision for youth ministers as spiritual guides. Youth ministry needs fewer “religious technicians” and more “spiritual leaders” says King who understands presence-centered youth ministry to be a function of youth workers who practice the presence of God. The first half of the book lays out King’s critique of evangelical youth ministry and his rationale for a presence-centered alternative. In the final sections King considers spiritual practices-he refers to them as the family heirlooms of Christianity-that sustain presence-centered ministry.

This book will certainly create discussion if not ruffle feathers due to its thorough critique of evangelical youth ministry and because of its appropriation of a variety of practices foreign to conservatives. King openly endorses the use of icons, prayer ropes, body prayers, and a variety of monastic practices that would normally send evangelicals into a fury were it not for his careful explanations and abundant use of scriptural backing. Even so, many will likely find themselves reading with cautious suspicion. King, however, has no intention of writing to tickle the ears of those in the fundamentalist and evangelical traditions in which he has been steeped. Immediately upon establishing his credentials in a chapter entitled “Three Decades of Youth Ministry” King sets about to expose the flaws in the tradition he helped build by dismantling a “Dysfunctional Evangelical Youth Ministry” (chapter two). Lamenting the “big business” model of evangelicalism King calls for a reconsideration of quick conversions that he says “don’t lead to genuine transformation, and ultimately they do more harm than good” (82). King urges evangelicals to instead place emphasis on nurturing faith by allowing time and space for youth to be ushered into the presence of God. King suggests this happens in an environment conducive to the working of the Holy Spirit and through the historic practices of the church that “habituate a way of life in Jesus” while connecting teenagers to the story of God.

King proceeds to introduce practices that support awareness of God such as silence, imaginative prayer, examination of the conscience, respiratory prayer, and prayer postures. In advocating the development of a personal rule of life King suggests values such as simplicity, community, and confession. King’s willingness to discuss the use of icons and other visual focal points will likely lead some readers to break out in iconoclastic hives, but he approaches the topic with sensitivity and wisely counsels youth leaders to consider the use of icons in their own lives long before introducing such objects to youth ministry. King also includes a section dealing with body care as a spiritual practice and sets forth a compelling starting point for thinking on the matter. Additionally, King’s short section on confession as a component in a rule of life is a conceptually rich discussion that makes it possible for Protestant youth leaders to begin moving toward a more robust conversation on the subject. His suggestions for creating a rule of life for youth groups is brilliant and the result is that King provides an organic presence-centered alternative to purpose-driven youth ministry mission statements that often are sterile and unchanging.

Although King pushes our thought on several issues, I am surprised by a dearth of discussion on the sacraments - practices that Christians have described through the ages as mediating the presence of the Holy Spirit. King’s concept of presence-centered youth ministry opens up a broader discussion on issues such as real presence in the Eucharist, and the relationship of adolescents to the sacraments, but this is a conversation King mostly sidesteps in favor of understanding Eucharist as a time of personal confession.

Setting the Mood: A Shift in Theology or Merely Aesthetics?

Despite King’s desire to break with the revivalistic language and techniques of his upbringing sometimes his advice seems vaguely mechanistic, almost like the revivalism he critiques. “Use art, special lighting and music to create environments conducive to worship and prayer,” King advises in a section entitled “Creating Sacred Spaces” (95). He does not help readers understand how these kind of techniques are any different than setting the mood with the rock music, colored spots lights and Christian music posters that used to define hip youth rooms, and the emphasis on environment makes the chapter read more like a spiritualized episode of Trading Spaces than a complete overhaul of the theology guiding youth ministry. As such, King’s shift here could be perceived to be more a change in the aesthetics of youth ministry than the theology. King continues, “Tactile components, such as the laying-on of hands, shaping and molding clay, or oil for us in anointing participants, can significantly add to the symbolism of a worship experience and may result in a transformation moment” (96). It is ironic that these suggestions come in a chapter called “Trusting the Holy Spirit with Your Youth Ministry” because they sound oddly like the youth ministry trainer King met thirty years ago who showed him how to elicit conversions by reducing “sales resistance” to the Holy Spirit. Fast-forward thirty years and King appears to have traded conversion for candles. The language of sales resistance in chapter one becomes “conducive” environments in chapter six. King’s question from thirty years ago can be heard in his rationale for today’s ambient music and room drapes, “Oh, we knew the Holy Spirit could do what he wanted, but why make it harder than necessary for a teenager to come forward?” (19). We should be honest and confess that both highly choreographed altar calls and candle-lit rooms with ambient music are equally effective techniques for manipulating the emotions and eliciting a spiritual response. The broader question is, “What is the proper role of the emotions and human orchestration in spiritual experiences?”

A Pragmatic or Theological Shift?

King’s model also appears to rest heavily on a sociological description of contemporary teenagers, which means that the shift from pizza to practices is at least as much a pragmatic shift as a theological one. “There is a new seriousness about young people, millennial people. They don’t want to be entertained. They want to be challenged,” King says (54). However, what of those teenagers who do not fit the millennial stereotype? Is there a place in presence-centered youth ministry for teenagers who don’t resonate with the challenging, practice-infused, in-silence-sitting approach to youth ministry that King advocates? What will happen to practices (and youth workers as spiritual guides) when the next wave of post-millennial teenagers surges through our ministries and defies our tidy descriptions of what teenagers want? A pragmatic rationale might have been fine when youth ministry methodology consisted of playing Chubby Bunny and delivering three-point youth talks. However, the shift to reclaiming the “family heirlooms” of Christianity-prayer, meditation, devotional Scripture reading (a shift that King actively supports) - raises the bar for how we evaluate our work. Without a robust theology to accompany youth ministry’s shift toward spiritual disciplines, even faithful practices will be quickly discarded when they no longer appeal to a new generation. If our defense of the practices that King highlights in his book extends no further than a pragmatic appeal (i.e. - youth respond to these things) then there is little preventing them from becoming just the latest gimmicks. King makes some initial strides in saving presence-centered youth ministry from this fate by naming youth ministry as a theological endeavor that brings students in proximity to the Holy Spirit; however, there is more theological work to be done lest such a viewpoint becomes just a passing fad.

Presence-Centered Youth Ministry is an excellent supplemental text useful for challenging some long-standing youth ministry thinking and practice. While answers to some deep conceptual questions are not clear, it does serve as a formidable challenge to the youth ministry status quo. Some of King’s book will be repetitive for those exposed to spiritual practices in other contexts, but his larger contribution may be in situating his model as a response to the excesses of evangelical decisionism, and in naming the specific task of youth ministers as bringing youth into the presence of God. “Whether we have a deep walk with Christ or a shallow faith we are guiding youth spiritually, either in a healthy or a dysfunctional manner,” King states. He is most assuredly correct, and we would do well to listen.