Word to the Y's - Christianity Today

Nontraditional meeting space has become a standard utensil in the outreach toolbox. Restaurants, school auditoriums, theaters, community centers, even bars and pubs have been put into use for Sunday services. In addition, these “third spaces” (not homes, not workplace) are perceived as safe zones where people can engage the Christian community without full exposure to organized religion.

Leadership has watched with interest as congregations take over innovative spaces for worship. But we have been particularly intrigued by a developing movement that is thinking beyond Sunday morning and has found a unique venue that is both a meeting place and a mission field—the YMCA.

We were introduced to the Y church movement in 2008, when I interviewed Pastor David Newman, whose church meets in the Countryside YMCA in Lebanon, Ohio. “Antioch the Church of the Y” began meeting there as a temporary solution until they could afford to build or buy a permanent facility. But within a couple years, they realized they had stumbled into a mission field.

“I have thousands of people a day walking the halls in the place where I minister,” David told us then. “That’s an extraordinary opportunity.”

Now instead of simply holding services in the Y, Antioch Church understands its ministry as taking place primarily in the Y and through its programs. We reported briefly on this ministry in the Fall 2008 issue of Leadership, noting then that Newman’s vision is to see a church meeting in every YMCA in the world—all 14,000 of them.

Shortly after the article ran, we received news that several pastors had read the piece and contacted Newman about planting in a Y. In the months that followed, more than two dozen pastors and planters asked Newman for more information. Of those, five have made earnest efforts to plant missional churches in a YMCA. One church at a time, it seems, Newman’s vision of 14,000 lighthouses is becoming a reality.

Why the Y?

The YMCA works as a meeting place for a number of practical reasons. The facilities are ready made for the most basic of church ministries—there are classrooms, nurseries, and recreation areas. Many Ys have chapels, which can easily be made into worship space on a Sunday morning. And because most branches don’t open for business until late morning or early afternoon on Sundays, churches can hold services without fear of interruption. Plus, someone else is responsible for maintaining the premises, which takes a load off the congregation.

David Newman says of his Y meeting place, “I never have to worry about the property. Instead we are able to focus all of our time and energy on ministerng to our community.” That’s enough to warm any pastor’s heart.

But Newman and other pastors I’ve talked to are also attracted to the Y for philosophical reasons. There is a golden rule in both real estate and outreach: location is everything. One quality that makes the YMCA attractive to church planters is that they can be found everywhere, from affluent suburbs to inner city neighborhoods, in this country and all over the world. There are nearly 2,700 YMCAs in the United States, which provide services for some 21 million members.

In other words, the YMCA can provide access to a population many churches fail to reach. Over half of Y facilities in the United States are located in neighborhoods where the median family income is below the national average. The organization has more than 10,000 childcare facilities in the U. S. alone, making it the world’s largest provider of childcare. And roughly 40 percent of the children in these programs come from single-family homes. Not only that, but YMCAs are allowed in many countries that are closed to missionaries. In terms of mission potential, the YMCA can put a congregation in contact with a population in desperate need of the gospel.

But place is only part of the appeal. Churches can also benefit from the Y’s programming. Every YMCA offers slightly different services. A branch may function as a soup kitchen or homeless shelter in some neighborhoods and more like a health club in others. But everywhere, the organization’s programming is designed to meet specific local needs. This provides an invaluable opportunity for churches that want to maximize their outreach efforts.

“Instead of creating my own programs and trying to get the community to ‘come and see,'” explains Newman, “I can ‘go and be’ salt and light by infusing Christ into programs that are already in place.” Newman’s Antioch Church leverages these programs as their primary ministry venues. Church members serve on the board, coach in sports leagues, teach classes, and volunteer at after school programs organized and funded by their host YMCA.

Perhaps the most important point of connection for churches and YMCAs is that they share an institutional vision. Each year, every YMCA branch signs a national pledge affirming their mission to be “a worldwide fellowship united by a common loyalty to Jesus Christ for the purpose of developing Christian personality and building a Christian society.”

This means that the relationship between a church and local Y can be a boon for both. A church committed to the Great Commission can offer to help a YMCA fulfill its own purpose.

Reality check

Given the organization’s Christian origins, it’s tempting to assume that every Y would welcome a church in its midst. That’s not the case.

Since the Young Men’s Christian Association began in 1844, its official mission (recently reworded) has been “to put Christian principles into practice through programs that build healthy spirit, mind, and body for all.” For founder George Williams, the “C” in YMCA was central. His original vision was to provide prayer and Bible study as a means to keep young men off the street and away from the dangers and temptations of newly industrialized London.

Today, however, the “for all” phrase of the vision statement is the YMCA’s central commitment; the organization prides itself in not refusing service to anyone on the basis of religion or economic status. While that’s a great commitment, it can stymie churches. Some Y administrators feel that a church can compromise the organization’s conviction to welcome any and all people regardless of creed.

Janele Nelson, the mission emphasis director of the YMCA of Tacoma-Pierce County in Washington, puts it this way: “If a church plant gives the impression of not being spiritually safe—that their primary goal is to share the gospel verbally and convert people to the Christian religion—the YMCA will feel obligated to limit the church’s access to their members, or at least not endorse its activities.” In other words, the YMCA is not likely to let a church roam its halls to recruit or proselytize.

Even within the same YMCA, employees can have varying degrees of openness to Christian initiatives. Earlier this year, Greg Douglas was sent by his church to plant a congregation, Work of Christ Church, in a YMCA. Douglas met with success. But he learned that twice before, since the branch opened in 2003, two other church planters had asked to launch a church in the facility, and both were denied. There was a different executive director on staff when the other planters broached the subject. A closed door in 2007 was an open door in 2009.

The problem more broadly is the nature of the YMCA’s Christian commitment. In its constitutional documents, the Y is an explicitly Christian organization, but the decision makers at the executive level in a local branch may not support the organization’s distinctively Christian emphasis.

A very local church

Even so, YMCA branches are much more open to the prospect of forming a mutually beneficial relationship with a worshiping community. Greg Douglas’s launch strategy for Work of Christ illustrates how a church can prove its commitment to fulfill the Y’s mission and vision, as well its own.

Church planters usually begin a new congregation with a core group of committed volunteers. They may have come from a sending church, or the planter spends months building a network of relationships across an area to form this core. Once a core group is developed, the official launch of the church usually corresponds with the first public worship service.

Douglas’s approach with Work of Christ has been very different. He is approaching the Y as a missionary might. Rather than building a core group and launch team, his first priority is to understand the context of the mission field. This means becoming better acquainted with the mission, vision, personality, and needs of the local Y branch. To do that he volunteers in Y programs, meets with staff and administration for prayer and counseling, and generally makes himself available to the branch’s members. So while Work of Christ Church is not holding regular public meetings, Douglas feels that the church is being planted.

“We have moved into the Y and are trying to align ourselves with where God is already at work,” he says.

Moreover, Douglas is building a core group of Y members and staff. Rather than canvassing the neighborhood and trying to attract likeminded worshipers, he has focused his attention on the branch that will be his congregation’s home. Because his Y does not have a chaplain (many do), he feels his first pastoral responsibility is to be a “spiritual resource” to the staff. From there, he says, “I have to trust Jesus when he said, ‘I will build my church.'”

The power of partnership

The churches that are making best use of their YMCA locations are the ones that perceive the local branch not simply as a venue for ministry but as a partner in ministry. And for a branch to view the church as a partner, they will have see how they stand to benefit from the relationship.

“It’s easy for a church planter to focus only on his own church—his passions and vision,” says Douglas. “But if you want to make the Y your mission field, it’s important to propose your plan to the executives in terms of how you can help them fulfill their own mission.”

One key way a church can benefit the Y is through volunteerism. Because every local branch organizes and funds its own programming, it depends on volunteers to make those programs run smoothly. Many of these programs target children, families, and older adults. If the Y sees the church as a pool of passionate and qualified volunteers, it will be more likely to consider partnering with the congregation.

Another concern for every Y is membership development and retention, because YMCA branches are supported by paid memberships. A church becomes very attractive indeed if it can help its host branch find new members and keep the ones it has.

When Douglas started ministering at his YMCA, he discovered the branch was unable to provide childcare regularly for children between eight and twelve years old during peak times. They simply didn’t have the volunteers. As a result, the Y was losing members. Douglas saw an opportunity. He suggested that Work of Christ Church provide volunteers for that age group as a part of their regular ministry. This would benefit the church, because it would give them opportunity to develop relationships with neighborhood children and their families. But it also appealed to the branch administration, which saw the cooperation as a way to stem their loss of members.

Douglas found another way to partner with his host Y on the issue of membership retention. Although the Y is supported by paid memberships, the organization has a policy not to refuse people services for financial reasons. People are encouraged to pay what they can and the YMCA provides considerable amounts of financial aid to make up the difference.

Work of Christ now raises money to provide scholarships for needy families so they may benefit from the Y’s services. They are also working with the branch administration to develop a personal finance class for people receiving aid from the Y. Again, this appeals to the branch’s desire to attract and retain members, and gives the church a great opportunity to meet and minister to its neighbors.

An exercise in imagination

YMCA director Janele Nelson warns planters, “The greatest challenge a church planter may encounter stems from the YMCA’s having a very limited understanding of its own Christian identity, therefore having no context from which to make decisions that involve the YMCA and church relationship beyond that of landlord/tenant.”

One of the planter’s first hurdles, then, will be helping a Y administration expand its understanding of community outreach.

But the YMCA is not the only organization limited by its imagination. Greg Douglas has learned that any Y-based church also needs to think differently about ministry.

“You have to look at the Y church through a different grid,” he says. “You have to be sensitive to the expressions of the gospel that can take place in the context of the Y.”

Ultimately, a pastor with all the necessary resources and experience may fail in the Y if he or she can’t see where God is already at work in the Y and its programs. They can make the fatal mistake of trying to turn the Y into a giant church.

“I don’t want the Y to be a church,” says Douglas. “I want it to be a cultural common ground where people who otherwise wouldn’t can encounter the gospel of Jesus Christ.”

Brandon O’Brien is associate editor of Leadership.