Students see school as one of the most important facets of their lives. For the most part, the relationships and interactions at school are the ones they attend to the most.

If church or parachurch youth leaders view schools as hostile environments that we must equip our students to “go into,” our message doesn’t ring true to those students who are actually comfortable and at home there. And that’s not a good thing.

Every morning, the majority of students walk through the doors of our public education system. Seven to 10 hours a day, five days a week, 36 weeks a year, our students spend more of their waking hours in school than anywhere else. The reaction to this fact by some leads to a “mission field” theology of youth ministry—prepare our youth to go into the halls of their schools as “missionaries” would go into a foreign field. This philosophy also tends to ask our students to be “aliens” among those with whom they really identify and call their friends.

One can take an alternate philosophical and ministerial approach, though: Regarding the public school system as the milieu in which our students’ lives take place rather than a place upon which they merely tread as visitors.

For the past 12 years I’ve been a part of this teenage milieu. From 8:30 in the morning until 3:45 in the afternoon each day, I am “Mr. Turner, psychology teacher at the local high school.” For the past five years I’ve also played the role of Steve, the youth minister. I’ve learned a great deal from being part of two distinct arenas of our students’ lives, and although it’s a burden to hold two jobs, the two complement each other well.

Spending my days in the same environment as the teenagers to whom I minister gives me a little more of a basis to relate to them. It also gives me a pretty good idea of how our students tend to interact in their school environments because of (and in spite of) the things we teach them in our ministries.

On a daily basis I’m confronted with disappointment when I see Christians students doing un-Christianlike things (e.g., cheating, lying, badmouthing teachers and other students) without a clue that their behavior violates the very principles for which they stand on Sundays. On the other hand, I see glimpses of hope and joy each day when students reach out to others, strive honestly to accomplish goals, and minister to their fellow students and teachers through kindness.

Watching this for the past five years has inspired me to make efforts to shape the youth ministry of our church into one that prepares students to engage and interact in their Christian faith as an integral part of a community in their schools rather than as outsiders.

Living out a Calling versus Standing up to a Challenge

We’ve all heard that students are ready to make a difference, and often we make great use of challenges in our ministries to spur them on to greater things. Sometimes it’s too easy to become overly reliant on challenges, so we either wait patiently for controversy or even create it to get a reaction from our students.

It’s not hard to get students worked up when they believe they’re being treated unfairly or persecuted for their beliefs. But in doing this, youth often get the idea that expressive faith is more a reaction to a series of challenges than a daily lifestyle. Several years ago one of my students showed up to school wearing a T-shirt with the slogan I broke a law…I prayed in school today.

In our state, teachers are required to maintain a minute of silence in the classroom each day. I found this shirt troubling, because I spent more time asking its owner to stay quiet during the minute of silence than any of my other students that year.

How much greater of a witness would that student have been if he’d positively used the right to pray by actually doing so each morning, setting an example for others rather than defending a stance that wasn’t even under attack?

Honestly, most of our public school systems allow students to live out their faith within the context of their school community. As youth leaders and parents, we should do our best to educate and encourage our students to take full advantage of opportunities to do so. Students shouldn’t merely know they can pray in school; we should expect them to do so.

We also should encourage students to become involved in Christian clubs and organizations. Any school that allows non-curricular clubs cannot discriminate against the formation or existence of clubs on religious grounds. Some schools don’t extend the privilege of non-curricular clubs or organizations, but we should urge our youth in schools that do to seek out a Young Life, Fellowship of Christian Athletes, First Priority, Christian Fellowship, Youth for Christ, or any number of denominational clubs. If those clubs don’t exist, students should be guided and empowered to initiate and lead them.

There are also many events, both formal and informal, that students can become involved in. “See You At The Pole” has become a national event with thousands of students and teachers gathering around the flagpoles of their schools to begin the day in prayer. This event provides two good lessons for us regarding the place of faith in schools. First, the event isn’t sponsored, promoted, or endorsed by any public school system. (It’s not the place of our public education systems to do this for our students anyway.) Second, the event isn’t discouraged, disrupted, or banned by any public school system.

The fact that schools don’t actively encourage students to show their faith doesn’t automatically indicate opposition to Christianity; a neutral position shouldn’t be mistaken for antagonism. In the best interest of our students, we should equip them to live out their faith with strength every day in the context of their schools by encouraging and leading them toward positive Christian engagement within their school communities beyond just rising to a challenge.

Living Positively Rather Than React Negatively

Just like the student who wore the aforementioned T-shirt, students and parents alike are more likely to show their faith in public when they react to a perceived wrong.

One year while teaching U.S. Government, a student turned in a rough draft research paper on abortion. Students were required to choose a controversial issue and present both sides of the argument. This student refused to present the pro-choice stance on the issue and to use any source other than the Bible. When I informed the student that he wouldn’t earn credit on the final draft unless he cited more sources and presented the opposing side, both the student and his parents voiced concerns about violating his rights as a Christian.

The thing is, this assignment wasn’t an expressive one. In other words, the intent was not to provide a vehicle for students to express an opinion or defend a position. The sole intent was to get them to investigate arguments on opposing sides of an issue. Students need to understand when personal expression is appropriate and acceptable.

The Web site “First Amendment Schools,” maintained by the Association for Supervision and Curriculum Development (www.firstamendmentschools.org), is a good resource for educating yourself and students. It may be a good idea to teach a series of lessons on First Amendment cases that relate to public school students in order to teach them that they’re not expected to drop their Christianity at the schoolhouse door; rather there are appropriate ways to express themselves.

When students encounter setbacks such as the student who wrote the paper on abortion, they can get the impression that their faith isn’t welcome or valued at school. Then sometimes they’ll inappropriately lash out at perceived abuse. But by teaching students how to exercise the rights they do have, we not only create a school system in which God’s presence is even more known, we also train our students to live out their faith now and in the future affecting change from within.

Connecting School and Church

There are countless ways to bring the school curriculum into church. In nine years of teaching world history, I never encountered a textbook that didn’t mention Abraham, Nebuchadnezzar, Darius, Xerxes, and several other names that should be familiar from the Bible. Talk to teachers you know and find out how matters of faith and Christianity are taught in school curriculum, especially in English and Social Studies.

A lesson on Esther will go much farther if students are reminded of the King of Persia named Xerxes that they learned about in world history. I like to think that when my youth group members learn about Nebuchadnezzar and Babylon in their ninth-grade history class that they think of his connection with Daniel and Jeremiah, and maybe even bring them up in questions or discussion.

Most students also learn about Martin Luther, John Calvin, and the Catholic Church leading up to the Protestant Reformation. Students should be learning about Luther’s ideas of “faith alone” and “sola scriptura,” Calvin’s ideas on predestination, and the many ways that church doctrine was shaped during the Reformation.

These topics, part of the state Standards of Learning in Virginia, are excellent subjects for creating a deeper understanding of the roots of our faith and linking students’ experiences in school with their experiences in church.

These connections can also run in the opposite direction. Many classes and assignments not only allow, but also expect, personal expression. From creative writing in English to less traditional courses such as filmmaking, opportunities abound for students to add their Christian perspective to the diversity of dialogue in our public schools.

We should find out what our students are working on in school and help them find ways to express their faith in those contexts. A member of our youth group, for example, created a narrative video for a class using the song “Does Anybody Hear Her” by Casting Crowns.

On another occasion a student used several opportunities in a public speaking class to craft topics around her faith. We allowed this student to share her work with the group and encourage all of our students to share the artistic talents that they work on in school—from writing to ceramics to music—by giving them a forum to link their “faith-based” skills to school-related projects. These connections help students see their faith more holistically and enable them to better carry their faith with them throughout all areas of their lives.

For quite some time now our schools have existed as a microcosm of society. For many students, their schools are the primary reality of their lives. For those of us who’ve been through it, our memories may be fond or dismal, but we tend to forget just how much our lives were bound in the social milieu of our schools for better or for worse. Although it may look strange from the outside, for many of us, school isn’t such a foreign place; it’s almost like home.

As youth ministers, we should recognize this and strive to teach our youth how to live out their faith day to day—not just in big ways, but also in the small “normal” ways. In doing this we can help our students live out and express their faith as an integral part of their school communities. Many of our youth see their schools as the setting in which they live their lives. Their most significant experiences, strongest relationships, greatest successes, and deepest anxieties take place there.

Therefore our biggest impact as youth ministers on this culture may come more from how we help our students live out their lives as Christians within public schools—not outside of it.