If you involve them, they will come. With so many activities vying for teenagers’ time and energy—sports, academics, social life, sleep—it’s a wonder young people ever attend worship services. And when they do, they may act bored or apathetic or lack respect for the traditions of the church. Yet, many churches across the country are discovering something about teens and worship: If you involve them in the worship service, they will be there. Especially if you let them lead.

Robert Starkey, a recent high school graduate, is convinced teens can contribute in a huge way to their congregations. Starkey, along with a group of United Methodist teens from his area in eastern Michigan, has adapted for teenagers a curriculum designed to certify adult lay speakers for church ministry. Now, this same group is spearheading a year-long program to train youth from 100 United Methodist churches to lead worship in their churches.

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“Every generation has to learn wor­ship,” Starkey said. “Involving youth in worship does a lot more than just enrich their lives—it really enriches the congrega­tion to have an entire service led by youth or to have a liturgist who is a youth.”

Feeling Needed

Not every church has young people like Starkey who are ready and willing to become leaders in their congregations. So how can the minds and hearts of older churchgoers be changed toward teenagers when so few youth take initiative to sing in worship bands, read Scripture or serve as greeters in their churches?

Sometimes it takes a visionary adult in the congregation to initiate change and equip teenagers to use their gifts.

The Church of the Ascension in Pittsburgh, Penn., has a population of more than 60 teenagers. Until recently, it didn’t involve youth in leading worship beyond the Episcopal congregation’s tra­ditional roles, such as carrying the com­munion cup and processional cross to the altar and lighting candles at the front of the sanctuary. But Alex Ruzanic, Director of Student Ministries at Ascension, finds that though teens don’t always like all the elements of his church’s formal Anglican worship, he can keep them engaged by encouraging them to take ownership of weekly services.

If teenagers are going to become true leaders in their churches, they also need to feel needed in their congregations. At the.river, a new church south of Boston, Mass., youth are indispensable to the con­gregation’s worship life. “We don’t ‘let’ kids get involved; we need them to be involved!” said Mary Dykstra, who part­nered with her husband, Bruce, to plant the church just over two years ago.

If you would like to get your congrega­tion’s youth more involved in planning and leading worship, the stories of these five churches may help you get started. Each received a Worship Renewal Grant from the Calvin Institute of Christian Worship to stimulate their thinking. But you don’t need a lump of money to start involving youth in the worship life of your congregation.