We all have images of what a youth worker looks like, how they dress and how they behave. These days it seems to be all about the beard, in the past it was all about the skater clothing; if you have been around longer than me then you might be able to dredge out another stereotype or two. I guess for most of us the image that came to mind was not of an 82-year-old woman called Val.
I met Val a few weeks ago, when I visited a youth church that was full of some really tough young people who came from some really challenging backgrounds. More than half the group lived in care and all came from the city’s roughest estates and Val was part of the team there. I must stress that Val looked like how you would expect a 82-year-old woman to look, she wasn’t dressed as a skateboarder in any way, she clearly didn’t know the latest slang and she confessed to me that her hearing wasn’t what it used to be so unless the young people spoke pretty slowly she couldn’t really understand what they were saying!
The young people loved her, they all called her Nanna Val and they all went out of their way to speak to her. She said that she had never felt threatened by the young people in all the years she’d been part of the group. It’s easy for me to have a little chuckle at this slightly odd situation when actually there is lots for Val to teach me. Let me throw in a couple things for starters:
1. She didn’t consider herself ‘above’ the young people. Val had only come to faith herself in her mid-70s and reminded me of this a few times as we spoke. She was there to learn, to grow and to journey with the young people. This group was seeking to be church for the young people and Val was bought into that too and that was important. During the worship time Val closed her eyes and raised her hands, she didn’t feel the need to look around the room and see who was doing what; she led by being and worshipped with the young people.
2. Towards the end of the evening there was a time of ministry where people could be prayed for. It was mainly leaders who prayed for young people and a few young people who were being developed as leaders were also offering to pray. You could see the discomfort when the young people asked some of the adults if they could pray for them, but not from Val. She was there to receive their gifts and if that meant they wanted to pray for her then great. I guess the real key here was that she saw it as a normal and good thing, there was no sense of her ‘humbling’ herself.
Clearly, I’m not arguing for the sacking of all youth workers and replacing them with retired people (although clearly Val is proof that you’re never too old) but I hope we can learn from her example and see how important it is to journey with our young people, leading from alongside and receiving their gifts.
Sam Donoghue is Head of Children’s and Youth Ministry Support for the Diocese of London. He enjoys cycling and eating cake.