A Hard Pill to Swallow

Between two churches and 8 years of youth ministry thus far, one pill I have found hard to swallow.  Can a person be a “youth” minister without any youth?  Well the answer is yes.  Being a youth minister is not a “job description” but a calling.  It’s the outward expression your inward calling and personality.  However the hard pill to swallow, quite often, is seeing students who don’t want ministered to.  Our stories are often the same.  We had a youth minister in our life that greatly impacted us or wished we’d had one.  We see the importance of having that person in our life that may not be our parents, our pastor, or our “friends” that remember what it was like to be a teenager that survived enough to still choose Gods will for their life over their own or their parents. 

A hard pill it has been to swallow to not see students not want to be ministered to; it’s harder to see and endure those who “attend” church but are not a part of the ministry.  In every church, in every age group, in every ministry area there will be some who attend but are not a part of.   These are students who are somehow satisfied with doing the minimum while, at the same time, hoping for the maximum in return.  I hard pill I’ve swallowed is to admit, “They are members of this church, just not the ministry.”  Knowing a day is coming when your ability influence them toward God will end should compel you to chase after them harder.  One the other hand, if a sheep ignores the shepherds rescue, at some point the shepherd must consider the welfare of the flock and return to it.  However, another spiritual ministry conundrum arises.

When Jesus shared the parable of the lost sheep (Luke 15:1-7) it doesn't share HOW the seep got lost or WHY the sheep got lost or ever WHERE the sheep got lost at.  We should not get hung up on the circumstances surrounding the lost sheep but hung up on the sheep itself.  But another question arises when looking at this parable; when did the shepherd leave his flock to search for the missing sheep.  We are told where he left his flock; “in the open country.”  The “open country” is symbolic of what is safe and secure.  Does that mean my 1^st duty as a youth minister is to those who are a part of the ministry, to make sure they are safe before I leave them a pursue those who aren’t?  OR is my 1^st priority those who are lost from the ministry and getting the others to a safe place is a part of the overall plan to recapture the missing ones.  And yet still there is another puzzle that arises.

Jesus reveals the “spiritual condition” of the sheep in his explanation of His parable.  Jesus says, “one sinner who repents than over ninety-nine righteous persons” which indicates the sheep’s spiritual condition as being lost from God.  The translation is the sheep is symbolic of those without Jesus as their savior.  In talking about those who may be a part of the church but not the ministry, the question still presents itself as a difficult one; what portion of my efforts should be spent on reclaiming those who are lost from the ministry in contrast to those lost from God and pouring into those already plugged into the ministry?  I do know that a balance has to exist.  What that is I’m not sure of.  But when my heart turns against those who are lost to the ministry, for whatever reason, I now have a spiritual problem.  However, a FAR GREATER spiritual problem exists when I have lost my care and concern for those lost from God regardless of my calling in Christ.  EVERY Christian should have a heart for those lost from God.  In fact, NOT having that care or concern might explain why most churches are in the shape they are. 

 

MY Philosophy in Ministry...Whats yours?

My Philosophy in Ministry

 

            As you can probably tell there are a few words that are incredibly important to me.  Where I go they go.  They are Whatever, Wherever, Whenever, and Whoever.

 

Whatever:

It is my desire that everyone would grow to a point of faith, obedience, and trust to say “whatever” to God.  As Peter stepped out of the boat to walk on water, it didn’t matter what was in the way.  Peter was going to be obedient, even if it meant walking on water.  It is my passion to see students and adults alike to say, “Whatever it is Lord, I will do it.” Some would say this is the hardest thing to say to God but I would say it is simply the first.

 

Wherever:

To say “Wherever God” is to simply add Isaiah 6 and the Great Commission together.  God brought Isaiah to a point in his life where he gave up everything and said “yes” to God.  The Trinity asked in Isaiah's presence, “Who will go for Us?”  Without knowing any details about the mission Isaiah said, “Here am I, send me.”  He essentially said, “Wherever you, Lord, want me to go I will go.”  Some might say this would be the hardest thing to say to God but I would say you’re focused on the mere costs.

Whenever:

To say “whenever” to God’s call requires the next level of willingness to put aside our schedules, plans, and arrangements.  Saying “whenever” doesn't mean having no plans of our own.  It means when God calls, because He is Lord, we choose His plans over ours because His ways are higher than our ways and His plans are greater than ours.  Some might say this would be the most challenging thing to say to God but I would say their focused on ordinary scheduling.

 

Whoever

I would contend that saying “whoever” to God’s call is the most difficult out of the four.  Saying “whoever” means whoever God sends you to or sends to you, you are faithful in not only showing them the Gospel by your actions but also sharing with them the Gospel by your words.  This is the most difficult because, like Jonah, we all have prejudices we must overcome before love can be expressed.  Saying “whoever” means you understand that God loves everyone and Jesus died so that anyone might have forgiveness of their sins.   “Whatever,” “wherever,” and “whenever” are reflected by our faith, hope, and love of God while our love of our neighbor is reflected in saying “whoever.”

 

            I believe the Great Commission of both the Church as Jesus’ body and the Christian its members is satisfied when all four words are lived out.  Missing one of them reveals a certain level not of immaturity but incompleteness.  Just as the Body of Christ (the Church) is incomplete when its members are absent, so is the Christian when one of these words is absent.  I believe these words fulfill the Great Commission, the 1^st and 2^nd greatest commandments, as well as all other teachings of the Old Testament, Jesus, and his disciples.

NOT come...but GO!

So I have the awesome blessing to have lunch with my students (middle school or high school) each week if I choose.  One of my core beliefs about ministry, and frankly being a Christian, is wherever.  Wherever people are who are disconnected from God are is where I need to be and in this case it my students and they “happen” to eat lunch with other students who are disconnected from God.  So why then would this practice be founded upon.  Ok so eating lunch WITH then isn’t…but going to where people are is!

               Youth ministry is almost more about keeping up with what’s going on than anything else:  schedules, concerts, birthday parties, ballgames, special events, etc.  One of the BIGGEST misconceptions about who I am and what I do is that its only about fun and games.  If I’m spending time with a student and a group of students….I HAVE ULTERIOR MOTIVES! My motive is, surprise surprise, to love them as I love myself.  I can’t do that if I'm not where they are and, surprise surprise, they can’t get to where I am (most are under 16-18…. hellur).  Yet the general way most churches do ministry is, “meet us at this place, at this time, on this day, looking this way, and do it this way, then we will show you how much we love you.  I'm no theologian or Biblical historian but I'm almost certain Jesus didn’t minster that way.  Just ask the slutty prostitute, thieving tax collector, cheating wife, naked “crazy” man, stinking dead man, and many more sick, blind, deaf, and generally sinful people Jesus spent time with.  [btw that list would have included you too] 

               We single out certain sins as if they're worse than others, as long as nobody singles out ours, and essentially say to people to “get right with God” without ever being Jesus to them.  If Jesus went from heaven to earth, to the cross, to the grave, back to the earth, then back to heaven (btw He’s coming back)  so that I may reconnect (get saved) with God…why do we make hard for people to know Jesus.  Well, it may be in fact some of “us” don’t know Jesus to begin with OR we have forgotten what He did to make salvation convenient to us sinners.  Discipleship is supposed to be hard for the believer, getting saved isn’t. 

               My life in youth ministry I have noticed we fail in making the Gospel (the extent to which God loves EACH and EVERY person) convenient and accessible while succeed in making it inconvenient somehow hidden.  This is backwards. The Gospel is already inconvenient enough to those still seeking it, as it forces one to examine their own life with an eternal perspective and forces them to choose while trying to weigh eternal consequences.  We (youth ministers, leaders, pastors…CHRISTIANS) shouldn’t be making it any harder than it already is.  I challenge you to inconvenience yourself for the sake of someone else’s’ eternal destination…after all, someone (Jesus) did for you.