Generative Intergenerationality
Are Churches Giving Tacit Approval to be Exclusive?
Rethinking Youth Ministry: What Stu’s PhD Is Teaching Us About Generative Intergenerational Church
This week’s conversation was a special one.
and I sat down with Stu to unpack the research behind his PhD — work that grows out of two decades in youth ministry, thirteen years planting Soul Revival, and a long wrestling match with a single question:Why are young people leaving the church?
Why Stu started (and restarted) the PhD
Stu shared the story of why he began this research journey, and why he had to start again at one point. The motivation was simple: he wanted to understand what he’d been seeing for years. Churches often intend to include young people, but if we’re honest, many of our ministry models unintentionally approve exclusivity.
That tension pushed him deeper into studying youth ministry history, cultural shifts, and the patterns he’d seen at Soul Revival.
The slow, generative work of writing and walking
Our conversation wandered, in the best sense. We talked about how writing clarifies thought, how walking creates room for meditation, and why long-form podcasts give space for genuine thinking rather than hot takes.
Stu also opened up about the imposter syndrome that shadows academic work. And yet, he keeps pressing on because the questions matter, and the church needs the answers.
The “clown suit” problem and the Blue Ocean alternative
One of the most fascinating threads was Stu’s “clown suit” metaphor: the idea that churches became irrelevant by trying too hard to be cool. In the race to be culturally palatable, we accidentally dressed ourselves in something that made us look less serious, not more.
Instead of competing for the same small pool of young people, Soul Revival has intentionally embraced a Blue Ocean Strategy — pioneering fresh approaches rather than fighting over the same ministry space.
From moderate to generative intergenerational ministry
Stu explained how his PhD work has shifted his language from “moderate intergenerational ministry” to generative intergenerational ministry — a model that doesn’t just include young people, but creates new expressions of faith with them.
His research weaves together Kenda Creasy Dean, Erik Erikson, and a critique of the homogeneous unit principle, showing how easily churches slide into exclusion.
Culture shock and the Shock Absorber
At one point, Stu noted that churches often take so long to adapt to cultural change that the moment has already passed. We’re constantly reacting to yesterday’s culture, not today’s.
The Shock Absorber model tries to flip that script:
Young people experiment with being Christian in their emerging cultural world
Adults provide the theological grounding, wisdom, and relational stability
It’s not a youth-only ministry, nor is it a fully inclusive congregational, but rather a fifth way1, where segregated youth spaces and accessible intergenerational spaces exist side-by-side, generating new expressions of faith without losing gospel roots.
Humility: the heart of generative ministry
At the end of the day, I’m convinced this only works because of the theological truth:
We are co-adopted by the same Saviour.
Humility between generations is possible because neither age group “owns” the church. We belong to Christ — and that shared belonging frees us to learn from one another, trust one another, and create something new together.
And as always, listen along to The Shock Absorber podcast on your regular podcasting platform, or click through on one of the links below.
“Fifth way” refers back to the classic youth ministry text, Four Views on Youth Ministry and the Church, edited by Mark H. Senter III. We have found that Soul Revival Church’s approach to youth ministry and the church cannot be defined by any of these paradigms.