Matt Andrews's Blog - Posts Tagged "christianity"
From Chapter Two
"Here's something I think about often: When I was in high school, Christian t-shirts were popular, and it was a badge of courage to wear one to school. It was really no different than being the gutsy kid who wore a Raiders jersey to school in Broncos country. It didn't tell other kids anything about Jesus, it only told them something about the kid wearing the shirt. The truly holy kids upped the ante and brought their Bibles to school too, and allowed themselves to be seen with them. Hmm. Did that teach anyone anything about the message inside, or did it only serve to identify the Christian teens as members of one more subculture?
I think it showed every other clique that Christianity was just a clique too. Maybe it implied that the counter-cultural message of Christ couldn't plug into anyone's existing subculture. They would have to give up whatever they were doing and look like those kids if they became Christians. Worst of all, it created more than a handful of teenage Pharisees, who considered themselves persecuted and might even have become smug Christian adults."
I think it showed every other clique that Christianity was just a clique too. Maybe it implied that the counter-cultural message of Christ couldn't plug into anyone's existing subculture. They would have to give up whatever they were doing and look like those kids if they became Christians. Worst of all, it created more than a handful of teenage Pharisees, who considered themselves persecuted and might even have become smug Christian adults."
From Chapter Three
"I was on a mission trip in Costa Rica, and in downtown San Jose we came across a Christian bookstore. Interestingly, it looked a lot like its kindred stores in the US, except I couldn't read the titles very well because my Spanish is weak. At first it was amusing to see such a familiar sight: lots of colors I would describe as "soft." Lots of...well..."church-nursery-looking" objects. And that's what finally struck me: If I didn't know any Spanish at all, I would have thought it was a store for babies! Considering what's actually inside the Bible, and the effect it's had on global culture, how does it come to be sold in such a wimpy-looking store?"
From Chapter Four
"If you're involved in youth ministry, then you're going to be involved in a lot of talk about seeds. It makes sense, considering one of Jesus' most important parables is about sowing them (Matthew 13).
When I think about most of the "seed" conversations I've had in church and ministry settings, one thing is always implied by these conversations, but I guarantee it's missing from both our lists. Does your list say "resignation to failure"? If nobody thinks seeds signify resignation to failure, then why is the phrase "we're only sowing seeds" spoken in defeat so often in youth ministry? The first time I really thought about this, it made me so mad that I decided not to say it anymore.
Teens have a will that's just as free as yours or mine. They're free to make decisions that are bad, and of course we'd be foolish as leaders to think we can ever control them. Besides, God himself has opted not to control teenagers, so we probably ought to fall in line with his way of thinking. Kids can drive you crazy when you've "planted all these seeds" in their lives, a they still make bad choices. It's enough to make you say, "Well, we're only sowing seeds!"
But that's fatalism, not Christianity, and it's an example of how believers can get bogged down in a metaphor like "sowing" and accidentally exchange that for the real point Jesus was trying to make. Jesus' parable of the soils tells us that it's the condition of the soil a seed is dropped in that dictates whether or not it will grow. That gets me thinking about the whole "nature vs. nurture" thing that sociologists like to argue about: Are some kids just "good soil" while others are "bad soil"? And if so, can the "bad soil" kids be enriched in some way to better prepare them for seeds?"
When I think about most of the "seed" conversations I've had in church and ministry settings, one thing is always implied by these conversations, but I guarantee it's missing from both our lists. Does your list say "resignation to failure"? If nobody thinks seeds signify resignation to failure, then why is the phrase "we're only sowing seeds" spoken in defeat so often in youth ministry? The first time I really thought about this, it made me so mad that I decided not to say it anymore.
Teens have a will that's just as free as yours or mine. They're free to make decisions that are bad, and of course we'd be foolish as leaders to think we can ever control them. Besides, God himself has opted not to control teenagers, so we probably ought to fall in line with his way of thinking. Kids can drive you crazy when you've "planted all these seeds" in their lives, a they still make bad choices. It's enough to make you say, "Well, we're only sowing seeds!"
But that's fatalism, not Christianity, and it's an example of how believers can get bogged down in a metaphor like "sowing" and accidentally exchange that for the real point Jesus was trying to make. Jesus' parable of the soils tells us that it's the condition of the soil a seed is dropped in that dictates whether or not it will grow. That gets me thinking about the whole "nature vs. nurture" thing that sociologists like to argue about: Are some kids just "good soil" while others are "bad soil"? And if so, can the "bad soil" kids be enriched in some way to better prepare them for seeds?"
From Chapter Five
"Working with teenagers means having a hard deadline: high school graduation. What do you want to accomplish with your teens by the time they graduate? What does your church leadership want you to accomplish? What do their parents and guardians want? Do your teens, most of whom are just beginning to think critically, even know what they want?
Based on my own experiences in youth ministry, I could sum up most of the explicit and implicit requests that have been made of me as a leader with this "top three" list, which just might fit your ministry experience too:
-Get them all saved
-Preserve their virginity/make them take a purity vow
-Prevent them from drinking/experimenting with drugs/watching bad movies/listening to bad music
This list could be shortened into a single phrase: "preserve their innocence." Although I've always understood the good intentions behind these high hopes, I also knew that something was inherently wrong with singling out these objectives. Even so, it can be hard to articulate that to concerned parents or expectant pastors."
Based on my own experiences in youth ministry, I could sum up most of the explicit and implicit requests that have been made of me as a leader with this "top three" list, which just might fit your ministry experience too:
-Get them all saved
-Preserve their virginity/make them take a purity vow
-Prevent them from drinking/experimenting with drugs/watching bad movies/listening to bad music
This list could be shortened into a single phrase: "preserve their innocence." Although I've always understood the good intentions behind these high hopes, I also knew that something was inherently wrong with singling out these objectives. Even so, it can be hard to articulate that to concerned parents or expectant pastors."
