I have had many great days in youth ministry. If I hadn't had at least a few, I wouldn't be doing it still after twelve years. There've been teary-eyed, snotty-nosed camp salvation experiences. There's been students who've left my ministry to do short-term or medium-term missions, and recently to go into full-time church work. There have been well-received sermons. There have been rockin' youth band "performances" where I felt like the students taught the adult congregation what it really means to "worship." We've had nights where we didn't think we could get any more kids in the building and where we thought the pizza place was just going to have to open up a tab. We've hugged the neck of an elderly lady as we put the finishing touches on her brand new wheelchair ramp. But in all honesty, I think the best night in youth ministry I've ever had was just a week ago on Wednesday night.
I don't use a lot of curriculum. Not because it's not good or I don't like it, but because I always feel my lessons are most effective when the faith that God has planted in me comes through a passage. The good thing about this is that I get to write whatever I want, whenever I want. The bad thing about this is that I get to write whatever I want, whenever I want. Well, we were coming off a lesson series and I was really unsure about what I should teach that night. Many weeks, there is a clear-cut direction or I continue a series theme or teaching through a book or section of the Bible. But it was Wednesday afternoon, and I had nothing. I had posted a couple days earlier on my blog about Tim Tebow's 316 yard performance (a la John "3:16") and essentially how Christians need to be careful what we ascribe to the hand of God, whether it's a football stat or a natural disaster. One reader commented that we should "be thankful that God was being honored in public fashion (which I did not disagree with in my post), in a country where prayer is taken from schools, the Ten Commandments have been removed from courtrooms, and old crosses have been torn down from public parks." My response was that the decay in our country was not because prayer and the Ten Commandments have been removed from schools and courtrooms, it's because they've been removed from our homes.
With this all fresh on my mind, as a Wednesday night discussion starter, I created a hypothetical scenario for my students. I put up on the projector after worship time the following:
"Today, a constitutional amendment has been passed, banning all prayer from school campus buildings, and all biblical references from public places of any type. Your job is to meet in groups and discuss what will be your plan of action."
The junior high students took the bait. As I sat in the junior high's group, they began discussing how to organize a protest in front of the school. They schemed a prayer "rally" for the cause and looked at writing their congressmen. I sat in their group as a listener, keeping discussion going, but I did not lead them to any conclusions that were not their own. But I was really proud of my high school students. Because while these ideas were discussed, the older students really looked at how to deal with the changes and work within a system that did not advocate their beliefs. They discussed ways to meet off-campus in homes and ways to "secretly" have meetings and "break the law if necessary." As they discussed, I called both groups back together and as they were sharing, one of my high school girls took the floor. She began to share and began to shake, almost uncontrollably. After she gathered herself, she said that God had really been dealing with her about her circle of friends and how important it is that our innermost group of friends be followers of Christ. She was led to tears and shared passionately to the rest of the group that our community of believers is the most important thing we have and we should do everything we can to find ways for people to learn more about Christ. In response to the scenario presented and the options of having more meetings off-campus and other opportunities for people to learn about the gospel, she said, "Why aren't we doing this stuff already?"
Then I shared the lesson from Acts 4. Without writing the whole passage, essentially Peter and John had been brought before the Sanhedrin for healing a man. The Jewish leaders were not pleased with their growing popularity, but neither were the Romans. They had performed signs and miracles and did not know how to deal with this growing faith. My point to the students was that in its earliest stages, "Christianity" was never designed to thrive in a coddled environment, but has always thrived in persecution. We looked at the roles of the church community in worship, fellowship, and ministry how if you organize a protest about your religion, there is none of that. Protests have their place, and people should speak out about things that are important. But in terms of expanding the gospel, it won't be done through a protest, a letter to a congressmen, or even a rally.
I didn't do much teaching. Our lead student did most of the teaching because what I had given them as a lesson, was right in line with what the Holy Spirit had been doing in her life, and she was able to share with the students very passionately about what was so important. We looked at a few more passages and talked about the issues from different angles. But never, in twelve years of ministry have I seen the Holy Spirit so evident at one of my meetings. If it happened all the time, I might be a little skeptical of services being led more by emotion than by the Spirit. But there was no doubt that God had put us on the same page, and my discussion starter was to reinforce what he was already doing in her life and in the lives of the rest of the students.
It was an amazing night I won't soon forget and I'm hoping the student's don't either.
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