Creative Programming: Interview with an Atheist

As most youth leaders know, trying to come up with creative discussion programs is very challenging. You will be able to get youth out to fun activities and possibly even service projects, but getting them engaged in a good discussion-style program is very challenging. The trick is picking a program and "marketing it" in a way that gets the youth and their parents talking.

Several years ago, I was serving a local church that had a pretty active program. I had no problem getting youth out to do fun activities that we planned, but it was like pulling teeth to get them out to Bible studies or discussion programs. One of the challenges was that most of the youth had difficulty sharing their faith with others. Now I could have developed a program, called it "Faith Sharing 101" and lead a very good program on how to witness to others. But I knew that would've gone over like a lead balloon.

Instead, I discovered an intriguing idea from the Youth Specialties Ideas Library. One of the program discussion ideas was to have an "Interview with an Atheist." The basic idea was to get someone to play the role as an atheist. You would invite them to come to one of your programs and be interviewed like one of those late-night talk shows.You could ask them questions like "Why are you an atheist?", "What do atheists believe?", "How long have you been an atheist?", etc. Then after you spend some time "interviewing" you would get the individual to share their own faith story.I was shocked at how popular this program was. I had parents who wanted to come and hear what the atheists had to say, and I had kids who got upset when the atheists shared why he believed what he believed. They were by default defending their faith without realizing it.

Needless to say, it was the most well-attended discussion program I had during my whole time at the church.To make it more believable I invited a my father-in-law, who they had never met, to play the role as the "atheist"(it also helped that he had an acting background). So if you like me had difficulty getting youth to come out for discussion programs, try doing something creative like this to hit home the values you want them to learn. The sky is the limit.

Word of Caution: Be sure to clear any creative program like this with the senior pastor of your church or the youth advisory board that you use to help with your planning. It will save you a lot of headaches in the future.