I have long worried that the way the church has structured confirmation unwittingly gives its young people permission to forsake active participation in the mission and ministry of the church. I discovered that I was not the only one with this concern when I came across a Christian Century article in 1988 that discussed this very issue. Will Willimon, quoting a pastor-friend, wrote:
“Confirmation is a second-rate junior high commencement ceremony after we have marched the kids through a series of boring classes and then laying-on-of-hands to graduate them out of the church.”
For 36 years, I have sought a better way to do confirmation. To do that, I had to identify what confirmation was for. I discovered an answer in baptism.
According to the Gospel of Mark, after Jesus emerged from the waters of baptism, God affirmed his identity: “You are my Son, the Beloved; with you, I am well pleased” (Mark 1:11). Immediately following the baptism, the Holy Spirit led Jesus into the wilderness, thus initiating his mission. Jesus’ baptism serves as his commission, his calling to serve God’s purposes of renewing the earth, the same renewal promised to Abraham (Genesis 12:1–3) that his family would bless the world.
As our children pass through the baptismal waters, the church speaks the same blessing of belonging over them — they belong to God in Christ and to God’s mission. Baptism answers the perennial questions: Who am I? and Why am I here? As Luther reminded himself, “I am baptized” and, to quote those venerable saints, the Blues Brothers, “We’re on a mission from God.”
Likewise, when our children are baptized in Christ, the church is responsible for sending and commissioning them to go into all the world (Matthew 28:18-20) as partners in Christ’s service (1 Corinthians 3:9). That is the most fitting rationale for confirming the baptized: to strengthen (Latin, confirmatio) the baptizand’s identity and vocation in the service of the missio Dei, God’s mission to renew the earth.
That is precisely the goal of Changing the World: Confirmation for the Missional Church. It affirms the confirmands’ God-given identities and vocations while strengthening them in both.
Missional confirmation does not include the language of “joining the church” because the baptized are already church members; they already belong to God in Christ and to the church. “Strengthening” is at stake, not “joining.”
Missional confirmation proposes that the church strengthen the youth for participation in God’s mission. To that end, trusted adults mentor the confirmands through the conferring of the Spirit’s gifts and their anointing as the priesthood of all believers.
Adolescence is the perfect time to challenge teenage church members to embrace a compelling vision of compassion and generosity—a time to take healthy risks in reflective conversations with trusted adults. Missional confirmation can be a seedbed for developing a new generation of disciples committed to following the way of Jesus Christ.
Learn more about Changing the World: Confirmation for the Missional Church.
