People tend to fall into one of two categories when it comes to age issues. Either they don't think anyone outside their age group is important, or else they think that the differences between various age groups are an irrelevance.

In growing and developing Christian ministries age does matter, but for reasons other than the conflicts and complications they bring.

Every human being progresses through the different stages of life, and every stage has its own difficulties, concerns and issues which the previous stages did not adequately prepare the person for. One important way that people, and especially Christian people navigate through new stages is to seek the advice of trusted people who have been through that life stage. In the very least people (sometimes subconsciously) copy what those in an age group ahead did if they approve of that group or alternatively dismiss what they did if they do not approve.

Since this is what happens it is important in ministry to have trustworthy people in the age group just above the one you are part of or ministering to. These older people help anchor younger ones and give them a pathway down which to walk in the Christian life.

Role models help people stay connected to church life

When there is no older model, humanly speaking, this is where so many of the younger group are lost to congregational life.

This is easy to see in youth ministry. If there is no cohort slightly older than a particular group that they look up to and aspire to be part of, then the younger cohort is easily lost.

However, the same thing happens when people move into the parenting phase. If there are no examples of mothers and fathers of young children faithfully ministering through these years, then those who have moved into the child-rearing phase often use the trials of parenthood as an excuse to absent themselves from wholehearted Christian ministry. Again when people move from singleness to marriage - without good models of those who have moved into this phase without faltering in their service to Christ and others, then this transition period can become a time when people are lost to congregational life.

I see it happen with people in their 50's as well. This age group is one where there is much more flexibility for a person than they have had for decades: children have grown, mortgage is paid off and part time work is a possibility. I know many in this phase who have taken this opportunity to be even more involved in Christian ministry, and it has had the effect of motivating and envisioning those in the younger age group to think about the same thing.

So, in our churches we need to look at where the age group 'bumpiness' is, in order to predict the difficulty and benefits a particular group will have as it moves into the next phase. This way of thinking gives everyone of us the responsibility of modelling the life of faith to the group just younger than ourselves.

An age group hole?

But what happens when there is no one older to model Christian living?

The good news is that there need not be many people in the older group, just some that the younger group respect and aspire to be like.

In order to have even the few though, we need to think in terms of cradle to the grave ministry. One of the best youth ministries I have seen was a big ministry in the United States. The children's worker got to know every child in the two-year-old crèche. As the children progressed through children's ministry my friend would select some of the children to work with her in crèche when they were 12 years old. All the children wanted to work with this woman.

My friend would then spend two years training these adolescents and then give them a group of 10 year olds to pastor until the 10 year olds had finished Uni.

This long term pastoral relationship often produced out of the younger children being ministered to, a large number of people who desired to minister to those younger than themselves because they had seen the wonderful modelling of the leaders who were just a little older than themselves.