The IKEA Effect in Ministry: Co-Constructing Faith with Gen Z

Note: This is a cross-post from Building Faith, a ministry of Lifelong Learning at Virginia Theological Seminary. Head over to buildingfaith.org for more articles like this one authored by our very own, Josh Packard.

A few years ago, my wife and I decided to assemble an IKEA bookshelf together. We followed the instructions, deciphered the diagrams, and spent hours laboring over every screw and bolt with those tiny tools provided in the kit. When we finally stood back to admire our handiwork, an irrational wave of pride washed over us. It wasn’t beautiful. It was particleboard, but it was ours. We had built it with our own hands, and we loved it more than furniture that cost ten times as much.

We moved that flimsy bookshelf from one apartment to the next in graduate school, then from house to house when we got real jobs. It lives in our basement to this day. It survived not because it was well-made but because we took ownership of it.

Researchers have a name for this: the IKEA Effect. Psychologists Michael Norton, Daniel Mochon, and Dan Ariely found that people assign significantly greater value to things they have a hand in creating, even when the end product is objectively mediocre. A little bit of friction—a little sweat over an Allen wrench—turns something disposable into something we hold onto for life.

I think there is a profound lesson here for how we approach faith formation with young people.

From Buckets to Toolbelts

For a long time, youth ministry has operated on what I call the “bucket theory” of faith: Adults possess the knowledge, and our job is to pour that knowledge into the empty buckets of young minds. Sermons, curricula, Bible studies, and the like are all designed to transfer content from those who have it to those who need it.

But research tells us this model isn’t producing the results we hope for. Kara Powell and the Fuller Youth Institute’s “Sticky Faith” research found that young people who are given space to voice their doubts and wrestle with hard questions are far more likely to carry their faith into adulthood while those in more passive, content-delivery environments are the ones most likely to walk away.

I found this same dynamic as I was doing the research for my new book, “Faithful Futures: Sacred Tools for Engaging Younger Generations.” Our nationally representative study at Future of Faith of over 2,000 people found that 67% of teenagers report they grow spiritually when someone listens to them share their beliefs without judgment compared to just 33% who say they grow spiritually while hearing a sermon (Future of Faith, “Sacred Listening, Deeper Faith,” 2025). Young people grow more in faith by articulating what they believe than by being told what to believe.

That’s the IKEA Effect at work. Faith that young people help build when they voice, question, and shape with their own words is faith they are far more likely to keep.

What if, instead of filling buckets, we handed young people a toolbelt? What if our role as ministry leaders was less about delivering the right answers and more about creating the conditions where young people could construct their own relationship with the Divine?

Try This: The Question Wall

One of the simplest and most powerful ways to put this into practice is an exercise called the Question Wall. It’s part of a suite of free Sacred Listening tools that we developed at Future of Faith specifically to meet the needs we were seeing in the data that young people grow in faith when they are genuinely heard, not just taught.

Here’s the setup: Designate a wall or large board in your youth space. Provide sticky notes and markers. Invite young people to write down any question they have about God, faith, doubt, meaning, or anything else that comes to mind. The questions go on the wall anonymously. Then, rather than answering the questions yourself, facilitate a conversation where the group explores them together. Your job is to listen, ask follow-up questions, and resist the urge to “fix” the doubt or deliver the correct answer.

Let the questions sit. Don’t rush to resolve them. When a young person writes “Why does God let bad things happen?” they are doing sacred work by naming the real territory of their spiritual life. Honor that. Revisit the wall regularly, and let questions accumulate over weeks. Young people will start to see that their wonderings are shared and that the community takes their inner lives seriously.

What makes this exercise so effective is that it shifts the young person from passive recipient to active disciple. They are building their own faith, and the IKEA Effect kicks in: They value it more because they helped create it.

Invitation

The Question Wall is just one example. You can find this tool and many other free Sacred Listening resources at futureoffaith.org/sacredlisteningtools.

In a world where young people are drowning in content but starving for connection, the most radical thing a ministry leader can do might be to stop talking and start listening. You might be surprised by the faith they build when you hand them the tools.