Over the years I’ve had the opportunity (as a youth leader, as a pastor, as a dude) of reaching out to atheist teenagers whom I’ve encountered in various situations (at youth group, in school, on the street.) During these encounters I’ve developed my own set of relational “rules of engagement” that I follow when reaching out to teens who don’t believe in God. I’ve discovered that, if I want to have any real chance of reaching them with the gospel, the closer I stick to these the better. Here they are:
1. Mock religion as early as you can in the conversation.
The Latin word for religion comes from verb that means “to bind or link back.” It is man’s attempt to link or bind himself back to God through good deeds and/or religious rituals. But in Isaiah 64:6 God calls these attempts “filthy rags” or, in the words of Propaganda in the Life in 6 Words video, “even your good deeds are an extension of your self-righteousness.”
When atheist teenagers discover that God is as disgusted by religion as they are it gives them common ground with authentic Christianity. After all it was religious people that Jesus railed against in Matthew 23. It was religious people who crucified Jesus in Mark 15. It was religious people who killed Stephen, the first martyr of the early church, in Acts 8.
Gain this common ground as soon as possible with atheist teenagers. When they see you sickened by the hypocrisy that inevitably accompanies religion, the emotional barriers that often keep them from taking a second look at Christianity can begin to fall down.
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