Book Review: "Presence-Centered Youth Ministry" by Mike King

Many youth ministry books are not particularly “new”. They are repackaged ideas or the collation of other's work with the author’s own spin added. Presence Centered Youth Ministry is a youth ministry book that boasts about the fact that is draws on other’s work yet ironically it comes across as the most original youth ministry book I have read in years – perhaps ever. What’s more it is not only original but in my opinion it is a profound and immensely valuable contribution to youth ministry thinking and practice.

They say the best books are the ones that manage to put into words what we’ve been thinking, and Presence Centered Youth Ministry does that for me. Frequently throughout the book I found myself saying “Yes!”.

If you leaf through its pages, you will see words like “liturgy”, meditation” and “creeds”. You might even think you have picked up a Catholic youth ministry book when you read phrases like “prayer rope”, “praying with icons” and “the sign of the cross”. Perhaps my enthusiasm for this book betrays my liking of contemplative worship and my belief that the Catholic approach to youth ministry has much to teach us who are Protestant.

But before you dismiss this book as “not your thing”, at least check out the first chapter. In it Mike King traces his own thirty year background in youth ministry which began as evangelical as the best of us. If that chapter causes you to become curious then read chapter 2: Dysfunctional Evangelical Youth Ministry. This was the highlight of the book for me. and is summed up by the quote that “The notion of youth workers as entertainers and program directors must give way to youth workers as authentic shepherds, spiritual guides with a holy anointing to lead youth into the presence of God.” Some of the problems with evangelical youth ministry that Mike King highlights are a lack of tradition, age segregation, and “decision-ism”.

If you find yourself disagreeing with his analysis they may not be much point in reading on, but if his words resonate with you the following chapters describe the role of the youth worker in this paradigm, along with suggestions of specific devotional practices related to scripture and prayer which he has used effectvely in his own work with young people.

The practical suggestions are useful. They are practices used by Christians down through the ages. But even if you are hesistant about introducing these into your youth ministry (and Mike King wisely recommends you don’t until they have become part of your own devotional life), don’t miss the overall message of this book. It is a call back to a youth ministry approach that seeks to establish an awareness of the presence of Christ in our youth ministries, but more importantly it is a challenge to us as youth workers – to make Christ the very centre of our own lives and to deepen our own devotional practices. If you miss this point you miss the main purpose of the book and simply use it as another book or programming ideas. It is so much more.