Walt Mueller, a member of Westminster Presbyterian Church (PCA) in nearby Lancaster, founded CPYU in 1990. Mueller has worked with young people and families for more than 30 years, written five books and numerous articles on youth issues, and is the father of four children (currently ages 16-24). But he still considers himself “a fellow struggler.”

Attempting to stay current with the changes is “in many ways, next to impossible,” Mueller admits, but that doesn’t excuse believers from addressing “a widening cultural-generational gap that needs to be closed.

“I’m convinced it’s a gap nobody wants,” he asserts. “If we take the time to understand and really know kids, then we’ll be able to cross into their culture, close the gap, and give them the biblical answers and positive direction they so desperately need. Today’s children and teens will only be a ‘lost generation’ if we forsake our God-given responsibility to love and lead them.”

He defines youth culture as attitudes and values, as well as behavior. “It’s the soup our kids swim in; it’s the stuff they marinate in every day. You’ve got to lift the lid off the pot,” Mueller says, “look inside, stir it around and see what’s in there. And you got to know: the ingredients changes every day!”

Mueller says among factors contributing to this ongoing cultural metamorphosis are changing family dynamics and the pervasive influence of media – music, cable TV, the internet, films, video games, even billboards. Unlike in decades past, the media function not just to inform, but also to market things and ideas.

“It’s a huge element,” Mueller insists, “always formulating and reformulating youth culture, trying to sell things to our kids. And thanks to portable media devices, the world that came into our homes through computers now goes with them everywhere. I just upgraded to a new Blackberry,” Mueller says, “it’s mind-boggling how it enables you to stay connected, to everything and anyone.”

Parents and those who work with young people should not feel intimidated, even if it seems the kids speak a foreign language and think in starkly different terms. They should, Mueller says, use the approach the apostle Paul took in seeking to communicate the gospel to the people of Athens:

“My book, Engaging the Soul of Youth Culture, looks at Acts 17 and how Paul engaged the Athenian culture. He looked carefully at their objects of worship, listened and absorbed their views, and then communicated the gospel on their terms. To effectively lead a child to the cross, we [the Church] need to assume a similar posture, that of cross-cultural missionaries. We must have a clear understanding of the covenant family and the role of parents, as well as being more intentional in seeking to understand our children and their world.”

Like the Athenians, who dedicated a statue “to the unknown god,” kids today have a high level of spiritual interest. Mueller observes “an overt, conscious search to understand the spiritual component of their lives. Unfortunately, in a pluralistic, post-modern world, even in the Church, they often embrace strange mutations of faith – a smorgasbord spirituality, a moralistic-therapeutic deism, in which they pick and choose what they want.”

Although Mueller and CPYU have worked with congregations in many denominations, “we fall unquestionably in line with where the PCA is coming from. The fingerprint is all over us, in terms of the Reformed perspective. It shapes our theology of faith and culture.”

He has led seminars and conferences on youth culture for a number of PCA churches, and for several years worked with the Youth in Ministry Institute at Covenant Theological Seminary in St. Louis.

While the resources CPYU offers can help, as can targeted ministries within the local church, ultimately the responsibility falls to the parents, according to Mueller. “To keep pace with the changes, and counteract negative influences, we need to spend a lot of time listening to our kids, watching them, and letting them know we love them. Relationships trump all of the negatives—they’re the key to helping our young people truly understand who God is and who He calls them to be.”

Robert J. Tamasy, a member of North Shore Fellowship in Chattanooga, Tenn.,  is vice president of communications for Leaders Legacy, Inc., an Atlanta-based ministry to business and professional leaders; author of Business at Its Best: Timeless Wisdom from Proverbs for Today’s Workplace, and co-author of The Heart of Mentoring with David A. Stoddard.