There’s a lot of talk about relationships in youth ministry today, and I’m glad to see it.

Program-driven youth ministry (youth groups that rely on sermons and events to change teens’ lives) aren’t working. Relationship-focused youth ministries (youth groups that focus a majority of their energy on developing meaningful God-centered relationships with students) are our only hope.

But relational ministry has become a buzz word.

Everyone nods their head and agrees enthusiastically when you talk about relational ministry. You might even be nodding your head right now. But is it truly the driving force behind our ministries? What is that motivation deep down inside us that might be pulling us away from what we know is best?

How do we know if we are really committed to relationships in our youth ministry?

Here are a few questions to ponder that can help uncover our deeper motivations:

• What do you spend a majority of your time on?
• If someone asked about your youth ministry, what is the first thing you would tell them?
• Would you truly be content or satisfied at the end of the day if fewer teens came every week, but you saw deeper spiritual growth happening in the few students that did stay?
• Are you willing to give up anything and everything about your ministry—even the weekly meeting—if you found a model that made a deeper impact on your students?

We should  constantly reevaluate ourselves if we truly want to be focused on relationships. Numbers aren’t bad, but they can be meaningless.

Notice I didn’t say “we need to reevaluate our programs.” What we really need is to constantly examine and reexamine where we are spending our precious time and if we are spending our time on what we know will have the greatest impact.

Special note to leaders of larger groups (or leaders that want their group to grow): “Relational ministry” can’t always mean that you have a relationship with every student. Effective youth leaders have found ways to reproduce themselves in student and adult leaders (just look at Moses) while still emphasizing relationships all the way down the “leadership chain.”

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