Intentional Intergenerational Ministry is the fostering of a deliberate “approach to breaking down the barriers between ages in our faith communities…bringing hope to those who feel isolated and separated from God.”[1] In this type of ministry the entire congregation becomes involved, intentionally seeking ways to enhance fellowship and “bring all of God’s generations together in worship, service, play, meals, and prayer.”[2]
Because the church body is the whole household of God (Ephesians 2:19), every person of every age is vital to parish life and ministry. Therefore, interaction between the saints of a particular congregation is essential for the entire spectrum of the worship of God. For it is through persons that God is revealed; it is in this way that “God enters our lives of isolation and alienation…[for]…God seems to come most vividly through other persons, through dialogues, through a hug, through mutual care with living, breathing human beings.”[3]
Paul tells us in Romans 12:4-5 that “just as there are many parts to our body…it takes every one of us to make it complete. So we belong to each other, and each needs all the others.” Therefore, all the saints are necessary for the fullness of the church; the stories and traditions of the church are a vital part of the present and a foretaste of the future. “There is something to be passed on, to be transmitted,”[4] and if people, who are the vehicles of these remembrances, do not give these traditions, stories, cultures, and knowledge to younger generations they will be lost forever. In Psalm 78:1-4 we read, Give ear, O my people, to my teaching; incline your ears to the words of my mouth. I will open my mouth in a parable; I will utter dark sayings from of old, things that we have heard and known, that our ancestors have told us. We will not hide them from their children; we will tell to the coming generation the glorious deeds of the Lord, and his might, and the wonders that he has done.
Who are these saints, these generations? In the terminology of Intentional Intergenerational Ministry, they are divided into seven groups, two generations of which are not alive today and five that currently are a part of the American cultural fabric:
· Our ancestors who have passed on.
· The G.I.’s: born between 1901-1931. There are approximately 29,000,000 people in this generation alive as of 1997.
· The Silents: born between 1932-1944. There are approximately 40,000,000 people in this generation alive as of 1997.
· The Boomers: born between 1945-1963. There are approximately 69,000,000 people in this generation alive as of 1997.
· Generation X: born between 1964-1981. There are approximately 79,000,000 people in this generation alive as of 1997.
· The Millennials: born between 1982-2003. There are approximately 76,000,000 people in this generation that will be born by the end of this year.
· The people who are yet unborn.[5]
The people of the United States are divided into these groups because each generation living today is profoundly affected by a collective historical experience at an early age. Individuals growing up are influenced by their economic, social and political circumstances. What Morris Massey calls the development of “gut level values” occurs during each person’s formative years (sometime between the ages of 10 and 20)…they create a unique historical signature by living out their “generational gut level values” in the real world.[6]
These are the general trends among our population in the culture that makes up our society today. Popular advertising and marketing practices dominate our media and retail experiences and use this information to divide people, targeting the manufacture and sale of consumer goods. This fact of popular culture has entered our congregations where ministers of the gospel “divide today’s churches into neat, congregational market niches.”[7] This common practice of marketing the ministry of the church to secularly determined groups of people inhibits the telling of God’s story by breaking down the very interpersonal relationships that are so necessary to the cohesion, vitality, and longevity of the body of Christ. “For Christ is like a single body with many limbs and organs, which many as they are, together make up one body…” (1 Corinthians 12:12).
In contrast to market niche ministry, Intentional Intergenerational Ministry “fosters an intentional approach to breaking down the barriers between ages in our faith communities.”[8] This is important because “the church…[has]…the greatest opportunity for offering hope to…[our]… society…[which is]…increasingly isolated and separated by generations.”[9] And since the church is to minister to people in context, those in ministry need to address the “fragmentation, isolation and separation…[that]…are the most unheralded issues we face in…[American]…society.”[10] As James W. White, an expert in Intergenerational Religious Education, says, “isolation and insulation of individuals is all too real. The thought-full [sic] person is sensitive to the changed realities of our geographic mobility, single-parenting, age-specific social formations, the separations caused by various institutions, and more. These factors work to pull generations apart.”[11]
In contrast, the institution of “the Church is the only agency in Western civilization which has all the members of the family as part of its clientele. It is the only organized group which reaches persons through the complete life cycle from birth to death.” [12] This fact is an advantage for the furtherance of the gospel among the people of our culture today. It allows the church the potential to reach every American generation with the gospel and kindle in hearts the desire to worship God. It is a feature that should be emphasized and encouraged by church leaders so the people’s need for the love of God and the community of the saints does not go unmet among those we tend in this postmodern era.
Within the congregation, Intentional Intergenerational Ministry is a sincere fellowship paradigm that enhances the communal and individual experience of all aspects of the Father, the Word, and the Holy Spirit by every participant. This reach of God allows the Holy Spirit to move with energy and balance throughout a congregation, for the differences between the generations “can make the wholeness of life more comprehensible.”[13] This is important
because it is the elusiveness of wholeness that is prominent among believers and nonbelievers alike in our culture today.[14] Existential issues of contemporary society naturally become a part of church life in a way that no subgroup of the congregation can ignore when Intentional Intergenerational Ministry is introduced into the church fabric. The generations are no longer isolated from each other’s joys, sorrows, spiritual lives, and uniqueness. Instead, people affect each other in profound ways and each group experiences the other’s potential and limits more intimately than those felt between homogeneous groups of people. The similarities and differences that arise provide balance for the overarching worship mission of the church, completing God’s vision for the local body in a particular era: past, present, and future. This heightens the potential and dynamism of the Holy Spirit that is manifest in the congregation, for in Ephesians 3:20-21 we read, “Now to Him who by the power at work within us is able to accomplish abundantly far more than all we can ask or imagine, to him be glory in the church and in Christ Jesus to all generations, forever and ever.”
[1] Gambone, All Are Welcome, iii, 3.
[2] Ibid., 2.
[3] George E. Koehler, Learning Together: A Guide for Intergenerational Education in the Church (Nashville: Discipleship Resources, 1977) 10.
[4] Ibid., 11.
[5] Gambone, All Are Welcome, 11-15.
[6] Ibid., 16.
[7] Ibid., 92.
[8] Ibid., iii.
[9] Ibid., v.
[10] Ibid., 1.
[11] James W. White, Intergenerational Religious Education, 160.
[12] Ibid., 13.
[13] Gambone, All Are Welcome, 94.
[14] www. ginkworld .net /position papers, (3/14/03).
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