Young Men Are Coming Back (Part 2)

Subject: The gap nobody’s talking about (and how to close it)

Preview: The structure most likely to reach a young man is the one nearly every church has invested in least. Here’s what to do about it.

Men,

Like my last article, this one is written with pastors in mind — but every man needs to hear it. Most of what closes the gap I’m about to describe doesn’t happen from the pulpit. It happens when ordinary men decide to pull up a chair next to a younger one and keep showing up. As you read, don’t just ask what your church should do. Ask what you should do.

Last time I sent you the headline: young men are returning to church at a rate not seen in 25 years, and a lot of them are carrying real isolation when they walk in. This one is about what’s — or isn’t — waiting for them once they sit down, and what I’ve seen actually work.

What churches already offer. Lifeway Research surveyed 2,620 U.S. Protestant pastors and asked what their churches already have in place. Adult Sunday School: 69%. Adult small groups: 62%. Women’s groups: 57%. Men’s groups or classes trailed well behind, at 45%. Mentoring or coaching relationships: just 31%. Accountability groups — the format most directly built for the kind of honesty a young man needs — existed in only 14% of churches.⁶

What churches actually prioritize. It gets sharper. When the same pastors were asked to name their church’s top three real priorities — where time, effort, and staff attention actually go — corporate worship led at 74%. Discipleship in general ranked in the middle at 24%. Men’s ministry ranked fourth from the bottom, at 4%. Mentoring or micro-groups ranked dead last, at 3%. Only 8% of pastors say they’re extremely satisfied with discipleship in their own church, and just 11% believe discipleship is the thing their church does best.⁷

Put plainly: young men are re-engaging faster than almost any group in the American church, carrying more isolation than almost any group in the country — and the structure most likely to reach them is the one nearly every church has invested in least. That’s not a knock on any pastor I’ve ever talked to. It’s just where the data says most churches actually are. And it’s a gap that closes for the churches willing to build toward it on purpose.

This is the part I actually spend my time on. The On Target Institute (OTI) model isn’t another event layered onto a Sunday service. It’s a weekly gathering — often a breakfast — built around tables of 5 to 8 men. A trained Table Leader facilitates real discussion after a short message, then makes a non-agenda check-in call to every man on his table each week. The teaching stays short on purpose, twelve to fifteen minutes. The rest of the hour belongs to the table — honest conversation, prayer, and the kind of relationship that turns information into formation.

It’s not theoretical. One church in Colorado Springs started its men’s ministry with 25 guys around breakfast tables. Three years later, more than 400 men were showing up weekly, across roughly 40 churches. Nobody planned for 400 on day one — it started with a handful of men who kept showing up for each other, week after week.

And the data backs up why small and weekly beats big and occasional: men in small groups that meet five or more times a month score meaningfully higher on discipleship measures than men who never attend a group at all — 74.1 versus 60.4 on Lifeway’s standard index.⁸ A weekly table does more for a young man’s spiritual formation than a quarterly event, every time.

What starting actually looks like. This is the question I get most, so here it is plainly — no new staff hire, no new building, no year of planning committees required:

Identify 8 to 12 men you already trust. Not necessarily the loudest voices — the steady ones.
Train them as Table Leaders. Facilitation is a skill; OTI includes the training so a good man doesn’t have to invent a method on Tuesday morning.
Set one weekly table. Same time, same room, breakfast if you can. Five to eight men per table. A short teaching, real conversation, a midweek call that isn’t an agenda.
Invite the men already walking in — especially the younger ones who don’t yet have a circle. Don’t wait until the ministry looks impressive. Start with the men God has already sent you.

The interest is already there, in your church right now. The structure is the only thing missing — and that’s exactly what I help pastors put in place.

If you’re weighing whether this is the right next step — what it actually asks of you, what it doesn’t, how it fits alongside what you’re already doing — that’s precisely the kind of conversation I’d like to have. No pitch, just a real answer to whatever’s actually on your mind.

Now that you’ve been informed and challenged, what are you going to do about it? Whether you’re a pastor, a men’s ministry leader, or a man who’s noticed the younger guys filling the seats around you, don’t let this be one more thing you read and set aside. Reach out through otm.co and schedule a call with Vince or me — we’d be glad to help you figure out how to best reach this younger generation, starting with the men God has already put in front of you.

Roger Medley

VP, Ministry Services — On Target Ministries

www.otm.co

Sources

6. Lifeway Research. “Discipleship Is a Priority Without a Plan for Many Churches.” State of Discipleship study, survey of 2,620 U.S. Protestant pastors conducted Sept. 10–30, 2024. Released Aug. 2025. research.lifeway.com/2025/08/21/discipleship-is-a-priority-without-a-plan-for-many-churches

7. Lifeway Research. “Few Pastors Believe Discipleship Tops Their Churches’ Efforts.” State of Discipleship study (same pastor survey as above). Released Nov. 2025. research.lifeway.com/2025/11/04/few-pastors-believe-discipleship-tops-their-churches-efforts

8. Lifeway Research. “Small Group Participation Linked to Higher Discipleship Scores.” State of Discipleship study. Released Aug. 2026. news.lifeway.com/2026/08/04/small-group-participation-linked-to-higher-discipleship-scores-lifeway-research-finds