Using Your Church Kitchen as a Youth Ministry Tool
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I randomly found this article in the Christian Science Monitor that peaked some brainstorming.
To quote from the article: “At Jill Prescott's ecole de Cuisine (a cooking school), it can be as easy as making the perfect omelet or sautéing vegetables. Students learn that when they follow the rules, master the techniques of cooking, and understand some of the chemistry of food, they experience success. When that happens, the kitchen erupts with expressions of joy: The students have taken a glob of dough, kneaded and shaped it, and turned it into a beautiful and delicious pastry.
“Learning to use piping bags, balancing the flavors of a stew, and filling the room with the seductive aromas of baking bread all bring about instant gratification. To highlight the moment, there are lots of smiles and clapping and look-what-I've-just-done remarks.
"’This is especially significant when all these experiences are presented structurally, rounded off with some relevant culinary information that they can always apply,’ Ms. Prescott says. ‘At that moment, a miracle occurs. A light bulb goes on in the teenager's head, and they leave class empowered, proud, like rock stars, quick to share their new talent with family and friends.’
“At Torte Knox, where Sheelah Kaye Stepkin conducts summer classes for teenagers, she identifies this classroom experience as a memory-making moment. One day she found herself facing a group of bored, restless teenage students. So Ms. Stepkin began telling them a dramatic story about the dumplings they were going to prepare. It was an emotional tale about a 4-day-old Korean girl who was gambled away in a poker game, then at 14 was sold to a silk factory, and at 18 to a Korean man living in America. What freed this young woman from her bondage was her skill at preparing mandoo (a Korean dumpling of minced meat and vegetables wrapped in thin dough). The students were riveted by her story, and when she finished, they had many questions about the woman and her dumplings. They begged to learn more.
“’It is together--the food and the moment--that makes eating special,’ Stepkin says. ‘For me, my special dining experience was when I had my first mandoo. The dumplings and this young woman's story became for me a very special memory-making moment.’
“When she mentioned this to the students, they shared examples of their own memory-making moments. This new understanding brought a complete turnabout in their attitude. They wanted to learn to dice, sauté, and deep-fry correctly. And they carefully listened to what Stepkin said, because she had charmed them with her knowledge and story.”
Food has always been a part of youth ministry. Food is also becoming a part of their TV viewing habits. Not just eating food while they watch TV but also how the Food Network is one of the more popular cable channels for teens. It has become so popular that Food Network has started a second internet channel called Food2 which is geared just for this age group. Then there are all those cooking reality TV shows—someone must be watching them. Because of the Food Network, experts surmise, cooking schools are becoming a popular post-high school education choice. I do know from my view that cooking schools are becoming a respected option for post-high school.
Is there something here that can be a tool to teach the Bible to teens? A lot of us do have industrial kitchens in our church buildings. This has got me brainstorming (and I do not have an industrial kitchen at my church building but I do have access to one at the Boys & Girls Club).
What if you offered a cooking school over a week of the summer or over spring break? What if you had a gifted cook or chef in your church family, or several of them, who could teach a tough cooking skill and his/her life and Bible knowledge at the same time? What if you asked Mrs. Famous-Potluck-Chili to spend an afternoon teaching the teens about how to prepare her favorite things and invite her to share that passion with the teens? What could your teens create with their hands that will teach them about faith?
Years ago when the teens I raised, God’s Family, were younger I did do cooking challenges with them. Mostly because I knew they needed to learn how to cook as a life skill. Those times are quite memorable for them because they discovered they could mix together flour, sugar, baking chocolate (not good tasting) and caramel and make a fantastic dessert with their own hands and brains. They had a real sense of accomplishment.
Our local homeless shelter turns over their industrial kitchen to community groups to prepare lunch and dinner for the residents on the weekends. What the residents often get is trays of lasagna from such groups because that is a simple way to make large amounts of hearty food. But the residents often won’t eat it because they are so sick of it. When we’ve been on the schedule, we try to cook authentic. What if you asked Mrs. Famous-Potluck Chili to create a gourmet cooking challenge, passing on faith as everyone creatively uses their hands and minds, and those residents are the recipients of this faith lesson?
One of my now grown teens, Sarah, inspired by this article thought of many different cooking and faith lessons. One lesson is that people are like ingredients and no one really wants to be the baking powder. But without the baking powder, nothing rises. Another lesson is there is a reason you have to be in the oven cooking for X minutes because if the creation is undercooked you're not ready and if you are over-cooked you're burned. Also the heat might be hot and uncomfortable, but it's what we need to be done. Another lesson is how searing meat brings flavor so sometimes fire is good. Another lesson is how the timing of ingredients and temperature make a big difference in the outcome of the taste which correlates well with Ecclesiastes 3 of time and purpose under heaven.
One of my current teens, Grace, reminded me of her family tradition of resurrection cookies. These are real cookies that you prepare together and each step has a Scripture reference. When mixed they go into the oven overnight. The next morning they are baked cookies—but also hollow inside like the tomb is hollow on Easter morning. For the details of this recipe, go to http://familybasedyouthministry.org/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=126&Itemid=43
Rod Kerr of First Baptist Church of Salisbury, North Carolina, introduced me to what looks to be a great Sunday School resource site, Cornerstones that uses food and cooking as part of their Workshop Rotation Sunday School program. The curriculum uses all five senses including taste through cooking for what is called “Eat Your Way Through the Bible.” Some examples are when teaching about Jesus’ temptation in the desert, share the story of stone soup while making heart shaped biscuits and soup. When teaching about the Lord’s prayer, particularly the daily bread part, translate that into general nutritional needs and have everyone sample food from the food pyramid while teaching how God provides for us. The ideas from this resource go on and on.
What brainstorming inspirations can you come up with and apply to your youth ministry?
While we are on the topic of food and youth ministry, as a closing note I’d like to go in a completely different direction but still on the topic of food and youth ministry. This is from Mark Yaconelli's new book, Downtime: Helping Teenagers Pray:
"If there is one health hazard in youth ministry, it's the food. Pizza, cookies, soda, and fast-food hamburgers are mainstays among most of the kids we work with. Youth (and children) in North America are trained to eat high-sodium, sugary, highly processed, fatty, convenience foods. The result is that American youth are becoming increasingly unhealthy, and other nutrition-related illnesses.
“In youth ministry we seek to live among young people. The unfortunate result, as Tony Jones comments in Soul Shaper, is that 'a lot of youth workers are overweight.'...
"So what does that mean when the eating practices within our ministries mimic the culture to such a degree that we're actually contributing to the physical sickness of the youth we serve? What does it mean when we continually feed kids food that 'clogs' rather than 'gladdens' the hearts of youth? Youth ministry not only needs to teach the theology and beliefs of Christianity. It needs to help people practice a different way of living, a rhythm of life that mirrors the health and richness that God yearns for us to experience. One way we help young people break free of a death-dealing culture of consumption is by helping them recover the sacred and pleasurable act of eating good food."
The chapter goes on to describe the joy of food, the joy of eating food together and how this is an act of prayer. These are some Wild Frontier youth ministry thoughts. What do you think? Have you ever thought that defaulting to the easy decision of ordering pizza has an effect on a teen's faith life? Do you believe that it does? Have you second-guessed your food decisions before? Have you already changed what food you offer while you have the responsibility of minors? Does food choices have any part of youth ministry? This is a challenge I challenge you to ponder.
