126: Should We Practice Communion & Baptism at Youth Group?

Welcome to the Youth Pastery Theologian Podcast, where theology and youth ministry meet, because youth ministry is theological ministry. Hey, welcome to this new episode of the Youth Pastery Theologian Podcast. I'm one of your hosts, Mike McGarry. I'm John Gardner. Hi everybody. Hi. Yeah. All right. So, here we are with another episode and today is quite a question. Are you ready for this one? Let's go. All right. So, today's question is, should we observe the ordinances, Lord's Supper, Communion, Baptism? Those are actually two. I don't know why I said Lord's Supper and Communion. Should we observe Communion and Baptism at Youth Group, at Camp, at Retreats? Should we be doing that in youth ministry? No. Okay. Well, thanks for listening to the Youth Paster Theologian Podcast. Right. So, here's how we're going to tackle this. Yeah. We'll give just our quick knee-jerk opinions. And then I also think it's really important for us to frame how do we address this question that we see popping up in conversations with other youth pastors. You see it in Facebook groups and discussion posts online. Why do we answer the way that we do? All right. How does our theology of the church or our ecclesiology shape the way that we answer questions about Communion, Baptism, and Youth Ministry? So, briefly, John, why do you answer? No. We probably shouldn't be doing that. So it's going to be different for different sacraments or ordinances. When we're talking about Communion, for example, the first place that I go to is the command to discern the body. And as the Youth Group is not the whole body, that can't be done within that. So people will say, "Well, but if I'm at camp and there's elders that are present," or there's church authorities that are present. If they are there from other churches, do they have the authority to tell kids in your youth group, yes, no, to have the right understanding of where they are spiritually over that time to discern whether or not they are Communion and that's my first quick reaction. What's your first quick reaction? Yeah. My first quick reaction is I don't think it's preferred. I don't know that I would say that it is blatantly unbiblical to do so, but I do think it's unwise. We'll get there. Okay. Yeah. So because it's a bigger issue, right, like what is the local church, how does youth ministry and the local church relate to one another, right, like youth group is not church. Yeah. Agree. Absolutely. Your small group is not church. Your Bible study is not church. I would even say I think it's unwise for individual families to dedicate their children at home, yes, and not in part of the church, like what is the role of the church in your family, in your family discipleship and the life of your childs, do you just want them to grow up and be a Christian, like a Renegade nomad Christian, or do you want them to grow up and be an active member of the body of Christ? And if we want to raise the next generation to be members of the body of Christ, then I think we need to elevate our doctrine of the church and to actually live and structure our family, family discipleship, youth discipleship around our doctrine of the church. Yeah. I agree. Okay. So what is the church? When I talk about this, one thing that I will refer to is one of the first visions of revelation where we have the seven lampstands that are the seven churches. And it's one of those verses in revelation that actually gets a one for one. You know, this is what they are, right? And the function of the lampstands in the temple, right, was to give light, right, to be kind of the lower lights if you want to use the old DL Moody phrase, right, to the goodness and beauty of the work that God was doing. Okay. Where Christ is in that vision is He is among the lampstands, that He is present there in a way, even in His omnipresence, right? He is present among the churches in revelation and in some of Paul's epistles in a way that is distinct from a general omnipresence that everyone receives through common grace. And so when I'm talking to people about church versus, you know, I'm involved in six paratroche organizations that each accomplish one thing that the local church is supposed to accomplish. What's the difference between that and the local church? These paratroche organizations are not the bride of Christ and are not the lampstand, right? There is a, and when you take that from people, when you remove that and ask the question, is there something that's going on in a gathered, full body corporate worship service that you cannot aggregate through multiple other ministries? The answer should be yes, right, because, you know, that's the lampstand, that's the place of His presence in a unique way. And you can even get into the church as a temple full of temples, right? And what he writes about that, that's because if we say, oh, well, my body's a temple, so I am the temple. So that's the only temple that I need, right? And there's multiple references to the church being bigger than that, and more important than your individual temple ship. Well, and Jesus says we are the light of the worlds. Yeah. And yeah, the church is described as a lampstand. Yeah, right. Right. So that's where I would go, and I think when I hear pushback to that, I don't want to, I don't want my theological premise to overlook the fact that what they're trying to do is maybe be compassionate to their kids. I want to have communion at camp because I want it to be meaningful, right? I want to, I want to baptize kids at VBS, right? Because it's such a profound and wonderful thing and like, why would we take that away from people? And a lot of times what you're getting is a question that is driven by passion and a heart for people. And so if you just step in and stomp it with your five-point syllogisms, that's, there's a way to do that with care. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. When I think about what is the church, I think about the actual, the Greek word ecclesia or ecclesia, however you correctly pronounce the Greek. It just, it means gathering, right, it means gathering. And when it's used in scripture, when it's used in the New Testament and they are talking about the ecclesia of Christ, the gathering of the people of God, it seems like more than just an informal Bible study group. It's more than an informal or casual youth group that's meeting together. You talk about the ecclesia who's in this house or in that house, or when you bring a believer before the ecclesia for rebuke or correction, it is, it is not just a bunch of Christians doing life together, there is some sense of authority and formality to this ecclesia. The ecclesia that goes beyond a bunch of Christian friends doing life together. Yeah. So when you look at how that fellowship is taking place in the New Testament and throughout the New Testament and acts and in the epistles and talking about church conduct, there is a formality to the church. But I think modern people today, we just don't like formality very much, we don't like authority, we don't like structure, we don't want people telling us what we can or cannot do. It's easy for real go getters and ministry leaders and doers to feel like that's just red tape, church leaders, church boards and committees just love to say no to people who have new creative ideas for doing things, the bureaucracy of it, sure. So I get it, I get it, right, like sometimes yeah, like there can be some bureaucracy and church politics involved and can be super annoying, yeah, but it's also like, well, if the church has voted to designate ministry budget to certain ministries and has appointed people who have been serving faithfully in different ministries for a, you know, period of time, sometimes even a long time. Yeah. And then you're going to start, you want to start this new ministry that's basically competing and saying, well, that other ministry is not really doing a very good job, but we're the new scrappy kid on the block in the church. Yeah. We're going to do it better like, how is that? How is that healthy? Like what? Right. It can be a fuzzy thing. So sometimes we need, sometimes we need authority in church and there is a formality to it. So, yeah. So what are the three reformation marks of a church? Yeah. The big three typically are word, and that can be the word preached, the word sung, the word read, and then sacrament or ordinance, depending on your tradition, right, typically in the reformation, that's going to be communion and baptism. And then discipline, right, the discipline, the arm of the church. And that's the one that people don't really seem to want to invite into. Right. No, we know like our argues group, and I say this with a little bit of snark, but there's truth to it too. Our youth group is an extension of the local church. Okay. So what's your formal discipline process for membership in youth group, and what's your process for membership in youth group? Yeah. Do you have a plan to invite youth into church membership? Right, and if the answer is, well, we invite them as members into the youth group. That's not difficult, right, or you can be, or it's a different style of membership than what constitutes membership in the local church, right? Yeah. So membership in your youth group has an expiration date, and then what, yeah, right, when they, when they graduate, now where do they belong? Yeah. Well, and who's, who's the one in terms of, in terms of the, the marriage of ordinance and discipline? If you have a kid who's there for the first time, walking up to take communion at your youth group, who's the person assigned to say, no, or we're not, you know, we don't know when it like, who's, because a lot of times that generosity of spirit that wants communion to be part of youth group can also extend to a generosity of spirit that says, this is for everybody. And it's not. Yeah. You know, so people, people want that informality to be an allowance to do the sacrament wherever you want. And then you start running into additional problems of formality when it comes to, hey, we had a kid who is, you know, passionate and excited and probably not a Christian. So do we need to go up and say like, hey, you shouldn't have taken communion or do we, you know, well, so who's, does your youth group have a elder board on it? Yeah. Like, it's that kind of thing. Yeah. Well, and we've had a kid go through baptism, um, preparation. And then basically get pulled from baptism by his parents who are believers and members of the church and they were concerned by what they had seen at home. And it can sound super harsh. Yeah. For parents to be like, I don't know if you really get it. Yeah. But at the same time, like, isn't that appropriate? If parents don't see the fruit of the gospel in their kid's life, and it's not just because the parents are being harsh or judgmental or legalistic because they're not like, well, you didn't do the dishes correctly on Sunday, like, but they are not seeing gospel fruit in their kid's life, uh, that is evidence of a genuine conversion, like parents should, especially believing parents should be consulted as part of that baptism process. Yeah. And camp in particular, you have heightened emotion, oftentimes you have lack of sleep. You have, um, whether, whether or not you are trying to do this, there can be pressure of performance. Yeah. Right. Um, the number of kids I've had talked to me at camp where they're like, I don't feel like I'm getting what's going on because I'm not crying. Yeah. Totally. You know, like, I remember telling that as a teenager, like, I'm not a hugger. I don't, you know, and like, am I bad? Like, there's that kind of, uh, so if you're throwing all of those things into the mix, and then on the last night, saying, by the way, who wants to, who wants to take a step to show your faith, right? And so and so's friend goes up and then so and so's other friend goes up and then so and so's other friend goes up and then they're all staring at her. Yeah. You know, like, you're going to do this like, that's, that raises some problems in my, in my mind. Yeah. Doesn't mean you can't find ways to mitigate that if that's part of your polity or tradition. I think, but I think you, you had better be extremely mindful that that's going to happen. Yeah. And have the ability to say, maybe not yet. Mm hmm. Right. Yeah. Yeah. So if a, uh, I want to go back to those, those marks of the church, sure, real quick. Yeah. Um, because I think they're helpful. Yeah. They're helpful marks of a church that make it just very clear. What a church does because of what the church is. Okay. So there's the preaching and singing of the word, yep, celebration of the gospel, um, faithful administration of the sacraments or ordinances. Mm hmm. So it's not just a matter of convenience. Yeah. That growing number of churches who do, quote, church online, which, yeah, online churches is not church. You can observe, yeah, worship online, um, but you can't do church online. I don't even like the phrase doing church. Right. Yeah. Um, but right. A faithful administration of the sacraments and ordinances and, um, you know, taking the common cup together, right, like, like, like, together, yeah, this is why I sometimes you go and visit churches who, um, sorry, my apologies churches and pastors whose toes I'm stepping on, where everyone takes communion individually, right, you go out, you take the cup, you sit back down, yeah, you have emotional music playing in the background, and then you take communion on your own when you're ready, yeah, before, yeah, worship continues. There is something about, um, even though you're not literally drinking from the same cup, because, you know, I understand that, right, yeah, germs and all that, but to partake in communion together, um, along with all the fellowship of the saints, um, and longstanding tradition, yeah, with other believers around the world who are sharing in the flesh and blood of Christ, yeah, together by faith. Mm-hmm. That is meaningful, more than just an individualized practice, yeah. Um, and celebrating baptism and affirming that, I know there's different, you know, believers baptism and infant baptism discussions, but either way, uh, baptism is a symbol of new life in Christ, right, it's a symbol of conversion, yeah, um, and we agree with that together. So, um, right, what does it mean to be a Christian that should be more than just a very short emotional thing, right? If you don't still want to be baptized after camp, then, right, should we baptize you at camp while you're, while you're eager, right? And with baptism too, it's, it's one of the few, it's one of the few times in church where you vow, right, and a vow, both in the old and New Testament and also medieval and modern, uh, a vow is done in the presence of witnesses, yeah, it's done with God, but also in the presence of witnesses, right, right, because whether it is, um, infant baptism, uh, confirmed upon conversion or believers baptism, uh, confirming conversion, whatever, um, the, there is, when, when people say, well, I don't want, I don't want to be baptized too early or I don't want to baptize, make it too early because, um, they'll forget their baptism. And it's like, well, the convenient thing about baptism is it's done in front of witnesses, right, so that I can when a, when a kid is excelling in some way, not just for discipline's sake, but when there's an excellence of spirit, you know, or, or the appearance of a spiritual gift at an age where you didn't expect to see it coming, I can say, wow, I remember when you got baptized and it's amazing seeing God just confirming that. And if, whether or not, whether or not they were fully, right, like, you know, I got baptized when I was 10, I don't, I don't, I don't really know that I knew what it meant at the time. Great. Everyone who was vowing with you, they knew what it meant at the time. And now we can say like, great job or stop swearing or, you know, whatever it is, like the, vow aspect of it is another one where, why I don't want to impose a vow on a campstaffer, right, who's not going to see that kid maybe again for the rest of their life, yeah, you know, I'm a witness of their baptism. Well, and that directly feeds into the third mark, right, that the whole church discipline component. And that's not a church discipline in terms of just we want to tell you to stop sinning you sinner, right, but also just church discipline and church discipleship. Like, how are we helping you grow in Christ? How are we discipling you? And you have made a public statement that you are a new person in Christ. We've seen that. We've heard you say that. And yet these things that you're doing, these things that you're saying are not inaligned with that. And so it's not legalism. It's not legalistic. And I think a lot of people feel like it's, it's legalistic and it's harsh and judgmental and hypocritical and all these reasons that we give for why not to have hard conversations because we don't want to have hard conversations. We don't enjoy having hard conversations and if you do enjoy having hard conversations, you're probably not the person to be having them in the first place. But if you get baptized at camp, separate from everyone back at church who knows you and sees your life, then you're losing the benefit of discipleship and you're withholding from that kid. The many ways that God has ordained for his ecclesia, his church, to gather together and to strengthen and support one another as they grow more like Christ. Yeah. Here's a question. How do we love our families or our kids who come into youth group? They've been involved and you know, they go off to camp and they come back and they say, "I got baptized at camp." Yeah, that happens. It does, and I mean, honestly, I would go with Augustin, who says, you know, what confirmed that baptism? God confirmed that baptism, right? Because he was dealing with, I got baptized by a priest and then turned out he was a heretic or a scumbag or that type of thing. So did it count, right? I wonder if it wouldn't be really helpful to have an opportunity before your local church in that instance, to have that kid come up and say, "Hey, I want everybody to know, you know, I was baptized and I'm a believer and can you walk with me in faith, right? So that there's some way the church has made aware of it, but that we're not just continuously re-baptizing all of our campkits." I know. Yeah, I get that. Yeah. What would you do? Yeah. Hahaha. You're going to get me in trouble, John. I know. Haha. My, there are many Baptist churches who would not recognize that baptism. Interesting. Okay. And would then re-baptize you. Okay. There are others who would joyfully celebrate that. Okay. Um, I'm walking myself around having to answer the question, aren't I? Tiptoe through this mind field way out there. I know. So my preference, if it was completely up to me, church bylaws, church bylaws, often are what they are. So typically churches that I've served in have had something in the bylaws that kind of tell you what to do in these situations. I would probably want to beat with that kid and maybe talk to, meet with that kid and over zoom, um, preferably with the person who did the baptism, okay. And just talk about, like, hey, tell, bring me into it, like tell me what happened. And then to recognize and affirm it, um, I don't want to be so stringent that I say that's not real baptism, because it doesn't meet my expectations. But I also want to express on behalf of the church, like, they look like this is not nothing. Yeah. Right? Like, your baptism is not just an individualistic decision. It does affect us and we, we want to be committed to you, um, so how can we talk about church membership now that you haven't baptized and how can we bring you into church membership because you, you're professing Christ publicly. How can we, how can we bring you into church membership in a public way to say, hey, over the summer, you know, so and so was baptized at camp, um, since that happened at camp, we, rejoicing what the Lord through the Holy Spirit has done in their life, um, but, you know, to, to join the church, like, we want to give so and so the opportunity to tell us what Christ has been doing in their life. Yeah. And so then you're kind of bringing public witness in and you're not, you're not shaming them. Yeah. Right. But you're also not being like, yay, isn't camp baptism awesome. Right. So that was, that would be my preference. Yeah. And we can easily add to the issue if we're trying to solve something that was done independent of church authority by solving it independent of church authority, right? So if we're doing this, just like, I think this is a good idea. Instead of talking with your pastoral staff, your elders, right, and saying like, how can we, how can we do this, um, you know, you're not, you're not helping the authority thing if you're just like, no, I figured it out. Yeah. You know, yeah. Yeah. And now that I'm thinking about this actually did happen recently and there was a teenager who's part of the youth group, um, okay, and she, yeah, I met with her seven elder at the church now. I'm not on staff, but I'm one of the elders. Um, so I met with her, um, hard, her testimony. She got baptized, um, at Christian camp with her former church a couple of years ago, and then she wanted to become a church member at SSBC. So she was able to, we were kind of able to give thanks for where the Lord has done at this camp where she was baptized, um, while still giving her a public testimony and bringing her into membership at our church. Yeah. And where, where I've run into it, tends to be less to do with baptism and more to do with the Lord's upper. Yeah. So that's far more common in youth group. Where because I've been asked as a camp speaker, um, hey, you know, traditionally we do communion, can you administer that? And honestly, every time I've said, you know, um, and try to be gracious, right? That like, let me tell you why I don't, like, come on, stop it. Um, every time I've been with people who are directing camps or helping with camps and they're like, um, honestly, I've, I've had to say this, I think every time I've done free marriage counseling, like, will you do communion at our wedding? Like, no, uh, you know, and, and I'll explain why and try to be gentle about it. And I've, uh, the majority of the time people have been like, oh, that makes sense. Yeah. And they won't press, they won't press the issue. And I think sometimes we can feel like, oh, I've been invited as speaker or, right, you know, um, efficient in this type of thing. And, you know, so it's kind of the point where I'll usually say that within the first session of pre-marriage counseling or, um, going into a camp just to be like, hey, just so you know, uh, like, if you guys have a, if you guys have a desire for communion, that's not something I'm going to do. Um, I just want to be upfront with that. And if that means, if that means they're going to say like, well, then you can't be a camp speaker. Cool. That's, you know, as much as I love speaking at camp, it's like one of my favorite things that I do. Right. Um, it's, that means I'm not the right guy. Yeah. I'm not the right guy for that week. And that's okay. Yeah. Yeah. And I face that too, just even, um, um, church with who is able to take communion. Who? Yeah. And so it's for, for me, it was a very clear look. Those two ordinances, baptism is a public declaration that you are a Christian and communion is a regular, is a regular, regular portrayal of your ongoing union with Christ. Yeah. So if you can take communion, then you should have been baptized. I agree. And if you, if you feel that you are not ready for baptism, then you are also not ready for communion. Yep. So I was the mean dad who did not let my kids take communion on Sundays until they were baptized, even though a bunch of their friends in youth group were, had been taking communion for years. Yeah. Yep. Um, and I was just like, guys, no, like here, here's why I don't want to be harsh about this, but I do think that this is pretty clearly just what the Bible teaches about what baptism is and what communion is. I think that's true. Yeah. And if you're, if you're providing communion in youth group, to a bunch of kids who have not been baptized, yeah, I think you are functionally undermining the meaning of communion. Yeah. I think that's true, which it sounds harsh. It does sound harsh, but the, the language and by it surrounds communion. It is language of discernment and judgment, right, and requires sometimes the ability to say, no. Right. And Paul even saying, some of you are sick because you, and experiencing hardship, because you are not taking communion in a manner that is worthy of the Lord. Yeah. I mean, it's right there. In the scripture. People saying some of the hardships that the local church is facing is because they're not administering the ordinances while that's a scripture. Don't argue with me. Are you Paul? Yeah. And I know that sounds harsh and, and all, but it's just right there. I just, yeah. Well, the way that I'll say it is, the way that I'll say it when we're talking about ordinances at youth group, I'll say, so here's just what I'm noticing and take it for what it's worth. Some of you are not taking communion and you should be. Some of you are taking communion and you should be like, let's talk about why. Yeah. Okay. And a lot of it is baptism. Yeah. What it is, you're not taking communion because you're not at church on Sunday, right? Like you did, you have been baptized. You have committed and then you started, you know, club soccer and now you're not taking communion ever. Yeah. You know. Right. It's a, it's a tricky thing. Yeah. To try to bring it up. And again, I just think it's something we don't talk about, but I think it's a conversation that youth are willing to engage and to have. Yeah. Right. Do you ever talk, I mean, do you ever talk about what baptism is and what it means and what communion is and what it means in youth ministry? Yeah. Because these are important aspects of the church that every kid who is at least a church kid, every kid is familiar with these. They know that these are important things that the church does. And yet there's very little teaching and instruction about what they mean. Yeah. And I would also include teach fairly and accurately and graciously what other people believe about these things. Right. Yeah. As a Baptist, I hear a lot of people talking about infant baptism only from the Roman Catholic perspective of infant baptism forgives your sin. Yeah. Yeah. And I'm like, that's not what Hado Baptists believe. Right. Yeah. And then when I explain it to them, they're like, oh, that sounds much more biblical than what I thought. I'm like, yes. Like, yeah, this is why there are faithful brothers and sisters in Pado Baptism and believers, Baptism churches who can join together in ministry. Yep. Because there are actual good biblical arguments to be made for both certain points. Very, very. And it's just too easy to present a cheap takedown. Yeah. We'll strongly. Yeah. Yeah. So talk about communion and Baptism with your kids. Teach clearly about it and explain to them why other youth groups might do those things. Yeah. But we're not going to because we want you to be part of the church. Yeah. And youth group is not your church. Yeah. Yeah. And that right there, that right there is going to sound harsh to a lot of people. Yeah. It's not. But it will sound that way. Right? How many of you have had somebody be like, oh, Pastor John, y'all of us last week. It's like, all I did was tell you you did something. You know, like, that wasn't yelling, calm down, but like, uh, or that was really legalistic. That was really judgmental or that. And I think too, we have to remember a lot of our kids are not going to corporate worship as much as we used to. Yeah. Or as much as they do. Maybe post-COVID worship attendance is real. We don't want to talk about it anymore because we're so tired of COVID. But yeah, our people are part of the church anymore. They may, you, you very likely may have kids in your youth group that have never even seen a baptism. That's true. Or had the opportunity for communion because if they have been, um, siloed off to other ministries their whole life, right? And then you add to that once a month attendance, um, so they miss whatever communion week is, depending on your tradition, right? It's very real that when you're starting to talk about the ordinances, you can even bring up the question, how many of you have ever seen somebody get baptized? How many of you have ever seen communion just happen, right? Not that you've taken it, but you've watched it. Yeah. And I think we would be surprised at how many hands don't go up. Yeah. So even that doesn't, you know, be gracious enough, not just for the, not just for the new friends in the room who are not churched, but for your kids who are not, we'll say adequately churched. Right? How's that? Right? Yeah. Or for kids whose parents give them the choice, do you want to come to Sunday church or to youth group? Yeah. Yeah. And when I'm faced with that question, say, go to church, go to church, I'm the youth pastor and I'm telling you, don't come to youth group, go to church, if you have to choose between going to church or youth group, yeah, I'm going to tell you go to church. Yeah. Yeah. Because we're not the lame stem. Um, book recommendation is nomad by Alex Duke, um, his, his book is the companion book to iconic and the new, uh, the new growth press book series. So where iconic, uh, talks through the doctrine of the image of God, um, Alex's book nomad talks about the church, doctrine of the church. Why is the doctrine of the church important for youth? And why is it important for youth to really like be members of the body of Christ? So nomad. Yeah. And how do we journey through life, uh, with fellow believers and church members in Christ? Okay. Um, John, any final comments before we wrap up this conversation? Be gracious without conceding. What is biblical? Mm-hmm. That's awesome. Yeah. Good. Yeah. And I just say, talk about it. Yeah. Your sound is nicer. There we go. I'm just, I'm just so much nicer. You'll sweet heart. Uh, shots. All right. Well, listeners, thanks for listening in and thank you for your minutes. Restry. I apologize sincerely for toes being stepped on in this conversation. Thank you for loving us and bearing with us. Even if you do disagree, uh, it's okay. We're allowed to disagree with each other. We love you. We're grateful for your ministry, um, we're allowed to disagree, um, with our friends. Um, but here we are. Yeah. So, uh, thank you for listening and we hope to have you, uh, still as listeners. Despite all that's, so see you next week. See you next week. Question mark. Question mark. Thanks for listening to this episode of youth pastor, theologian podcast. To learn more about YPT's ministry and to subscribe, visit youth pastor theologian.com. When you subscribe, you'll get a download link for our ebook youth ministry is theological ministry. It's a great way to catch the vision for what YPT is all about. You can also learn more about our YPT curriculum and our teaching workshops and all the other things that YPT offers for the sake of theological renewal in youth ministry. Thanks for listening.