Copyright by Derick Brennan 2015 3 Dedication “O Lord our Lord, how excellent is thy name in all the earth!” To my wife, Alberta Byrd Brennan, my son, David Matthew Brennan, and my mother, the late Jean Carol Brennan. Your love is the source of my strength, hope, joy, and dreams. “O Lord our Lord, how excellent is thy name in all the earth!” To my family, Keith Brennan, Darla Brennan, Micah Brennan, Juliette Byrd, Mamie Fains, and countless others, your love, prayers, and encouragement have made this possible. “O Lord our Lord, how excellent is thy name in all the earth!” To my North Carolina Ancestors and Family From slaves and sharecroppers in the field to a scholar at Duke University. “O Lord our Lord, how excellent is thy name in all the earth!” To Rev. Dr. Gus Roman, thank you for being an exhorter, mentor, and friend. Finally, to my Canaan Baptist Church Family, God bless you for your sacrifice, patience, love for God, and love for me. “O Lord our Lord, how excellent is thy name in all the earth!” CONTENTS THESIS INTRODUCTION............................................................................................................ 6 CHAPTER 1 CHURCHES ARE STRUGGLING TO ATTRACT YOUNG ADULT OUTSIDERS AND TO KEEP YOUNG ADULT INSIDERS........................................... 9 CHAPTER 2 A THEOLOGY FOR EVANGELIZING, RETRIEVING, AND ASSIMILATING MILLENNIALS ............................................................................................................... 28 CHAPTER 3 CONGREGATION BEST PRACTICES FOR EVANGELIZING MILLENNIALS.................................................................................................................51 CHAPTER 4 ASSIMILATING NEW AND REORIENTED MILLENNIALS………………………………………………………………………….79 CHAPTER 5 A TEST CHURCH: CANAAN BAPTIST CHURCH……..…………………......98 APPENDIX 1: FOCUS GROUPS……………………………………………………………..125 APPENDIX 2: MARKETING PLAN..……………………………………………..…………128 APPENDIX 3: CONGREGATION PLANNING REPORT………………………….......…...131 BIBLIOGRAPHY ………………………………………………...……………………..……..156 5 THESIS INTRODUCTION In this thesis, I will attempt to affirm that the centrality of evangelistic practice focused on young adults (ages 18-34) is both a fulfillment of the Church’s call to mission and the means to the production of a more vital church. The systematic evangelism, assimilation, and integration of young adults benefit the individual, the family, and the local and universal Church. All church subgroups, including young adults, supply numerous intangibles to the vitality of a congregation. However, young adults provide a particularly significant element that constitutes the vitality of any given congregation. This the case for several reasons, first, young adults, bring the assets of energy, spiritual gifts, younger families, new ideas, and a potential harvest field of non-Christian acquaintances. Furthermore, a dearth of young adults undermines the church’s witness as an inclusive body for all generations. As the aging congregants die without a generation of faith heirs, it jeopardizes the future of many congregations. To date, I have found very few resources that have an in-depth focus on evangelizing and integrating the Millennial segment. My thesis will assist in filling this void. The opening chapter will provide greater clarity of the reasons why the church’s 18-34- year-old demographic and the young adult mission field are shrinking. The section will highlight the forces within and outside of the church that are resulting in young adults avoiding the church or leaving the church. These effects include negative perceptions of the church including the church being an organized religion, biased against women, anti-LGBT, and arrogantly exclusive. Other challenges are societal including church irrelevance, family redefinition, economic instability, and other competing interests. Next, the thesis will establish a theological basis for evangelizing, retrieving and assimilating young adults into existing congregations. The theological foundation for such an 6 initiative will be found in Jesus’ teachings on the Lost Sheep, the Commissioning of the Disciples, and his empowering the Apostles for Missions. As these texts will reveal the advantages of systematically targeting non-Christian and non-church going Christian, young adults from outside of the church are many. The witness began in the nearest geography and spread outward, which may serve as a template for contemporary community evangelism. Several other advantages to targeting 18-34-year-olds in from local community include 1) tapping into a new mission field, 2) having a greater witness to neighbors because other neighbors are a part of the church, 3) facilitating more authentic fellowship in and out of the church, 4) increasing the pool of ministry volunteers, because of a reduced commute time, and 5) strengthening the bonds between the church and the community for more effective partnership. The third chapter identifies several best practices of evangelism and model churches based on a comprehensive 2010 study produced by Faith Communities Today. These practices and churches are relatively successful in drawing and retaining 18-34-year-olds because there is a magnetism that is alluring to the emerging generation. This paper will chronicle and codify the myriad of factors that should be considered when evangelizing young adults including the emotional, social, and personal motives. This section will also include a plan that outlines the preparation, planning, execution, and measurement of evangelism efficacy. Next, the thesis will be dedicated to the best practices of assimilating and integrating young adults into the church’s spiritual formation processes, ministry service roles, and leadership positions. In this section, the paper will address the young adults that are currently a part of congregations but are not consistently active or entirely vested. The desired outcome will be to orientate new young adults while re-orientating existing young adult members who are not fully active. Relevance is the major challenge, and this chapter will emphasize the necessity of 7 congregations being intentional about the value, privileges, and responsibilities of membership and leadership. The emphasis will be 1) Illustrating the temporal and eternal relevance of life in Christ, 2) teaching the importance of being a consistently active disciple in the local family of faith and the universal kingdom, 3) sharing a broader scope of Christianity including both a disciple’s privileges and responsibilities, 4) fostering a healthy environment of intergenerational believers, and 5) enlisting young adult participation as the church attempts to transform the spiritual lives of local individuals, families, and communities. Finally, the thesis concludes with a test church, the Canaan Baptist Church, whose young adult segment has been significantly impacted by the challenges noted above. Canaan’s young adult demographic is the smallest in the church as attested by internal statistics and a Church Planning Report. With around 50 active individuals, this subdivision represents less than 5 percent of the congregation. In response, the church has created a viable strategic initiative purposefully to target young adults for evangelism, reorientation, assimilation and integration. The strategy is based on the best practices of the other churches, a congregational survey, focus groups, and a census analysis of the immediate zip code. 8 CHAPTER 1 CHURCHES ARE STRUGGLING TO ATTRACT YOUNG ADULT OUTSIDERS AND TO KEEP YOUNG ADULT INSIDERS Introduction The contemporary American church is in an epic struggle to evangelize, assimilate, and integrate young adults ages 18-34-years-old as members and disciples. Those in this age demographic are also referred to as Millennials, Mosaics, Generation Y, and the Emerging Generation. There are a multitude of issues within and outside of the church that are contributing to the challenge. This chapter will provide an overview of the causes that are contributing to the church’s lack of influence and relevance for the Millennial generation both those outside of the church and inside the church. For every issue introduced, there will be a briefly suggested response for churches dealing with that particular problem. This chapter will also provide a compelling reason for every church to be intentional about developing and executing a plan to target young adults for evangelism and retrieval efforts. This chapter will establish the foundation for the rest of this thesis which includes chapters on theology for evangelizing young adults, best practice churches, strategies for assimilation and a test case church. Struggling To Attract Outsiders According to the work of David Kinnaman, the “Outsiders” are those young adults who may have an awareness of Christianity and the church, but have rarely, if ever been introduced to the teachings or spiritual formation practices that distinguish Christianity from other religions or organizations. This is a growing demographic. As Kinnaman writes: There are about twenty-four million outsiders in this country who are ages sixteen to twenty nine. …Each generation contains more than the last, which helps explain their growing influence. For instance, outsiders make up one-quarter of boomers (ages forty- two to sixty) and Elders ages (sixty-one-plus). However, among adult Mosaic and 9 Busters, more than one third are part of this category, a number that increases to two- fifths of sixteen to twenty-nine-year-olds.1