Avoiding Evil

There are times I sit back and wonder what in the world is going through the minds of Jr. High students. I have come to the conclusion that Jr. High is a weird vortex where kids are stuck in a two year metamorphosis from children to teens. The innocent, sweet demeanor of childhood mixes with the rebellious, sour nature of a teenager and boom, you have a Jr. High student. They simply live on another planet and as a youth minister I have to go visit that planet to reach them. Working with these kids is a foreign mission trip all by itself.

We have an event called “The Fellowship” at our church, once every month or two, where kids come in to play games, watch movies, eat pizza, and hang out. The first fellowship we had this fall included a new group of seventh graders who had moved up into the youth group this year. These kids have enough energy to power the largest city in America! At one point in the evening I noticed that the entire group of Jr. High students was missing in action. I ended up finding them in the elevator, standing in a big circle with their shoes tied together! Weird…

Saturday night we had a hay ride and bonfire which included mostly Jr. High students because all of the high school students were at a band competition that evening. I noticed something strange was going down when a large group of girls walked over to the back of a vehicle and began pulling stuff out of it and whispering amongst themselves. It was dark and so I slipped off to the side and snuck around the back of them to hide behind a couple vehicles. My mission was quite successful…that is until someone moved the vehicle out of the way and I was exposed to the whole world! It was on! The pile of girls converged upon me with cans of silly string and all I could do was run and scream like a woman! I am of the opinion that they should ban silly string forever. We also played capture the flag in a big dark field with two different colored glow stix where kids had to run across a three acre field in the dark to grab the other teams stick and take it back to their base without being tagged.

To top off the weekend I took my youth group to Reality House. This is a house of reality in Eureka, MO where they put you in a van and simulate a car crash, in which you die. You then go through all the stages of this life event: the hospital, the funeral home, the morgue, heaven, and hell. At the end of the tour they have counseling rooms where they share the gospel with each person. We have gone every year since I was in the youth group. After getting all of the students organized and into our large caravan of vehicles I hopped into my van only to discover why all the other adults avoided that particular van. It was filled with Jr. High students. It should be known that these kids have the ability to talk without breathing at a pitch that could shatter glass. If you ever decide to put thirteen of them in a van and drive for an hour be sure to bring ear plugs, Tylenol, and a double shot of espresso.

We have a large, high energy, highly motivated group of Jr. High students this year. This particular group is the largest class that has ever gone through the Sullivan school district, so the potential to reach a lot of kids is very real. I know a lot of people who simply cannot handle this particular age group and I can certainly understand… however God has wired me a little different because I love every minute of it. When we used to visit school lunches, before a couple of rouge youth ministers who made stupid choices screwed it up for us, I always loved going to the Jr. High school. These students love attention and flock to you as if you are someone important and special. You walk away from an experience with these kids feeling good and loved…. and tired, beat down, old, run-down, and with a splitting headache, but that is beside the point. I really like the new group of students that we have this year and I believe that God has some pretty awesome plans for them in the near future.

The most interesting thing that I am beginning to see is that these younger kids are entering a world that they are totally oblivious of. When I am working with High School kids I am dealing with students who are in the middle of situations and life changes that press upon them everyday. They are growing up and entering new levels of maturity whereas the younger students are experiencing this teenage thing for the first time as newbie’s. I know before long all that is going to change and their lives will quickly become like that of the older High school students… but I hope to build strong relationships and help them to grow spiritually in a way that will prepare them for what they will face before long. It is kind of like meeting a group of new recruits and beginning to prepare them for the war that is to come. If I could shield them and protect them from all of the things that they will be exposed to and have to deal with in the future I certainly would… but I know I cannot. I can, however, teach them how to act in those situations and hope that when it comes to that point they will make the right choices. But standing in the face of reality I realize that ultimately each and every one of them will make both very good and horribly bad choices in their lives and I will be there, not to criticize or judge, but to support them in the good and pick them up in the bad.

Why do I put all of my time, energy, and heart into a group of students who I know will make bad choices, who will fail, and fall, and falter? Why spend my life with other people’s teenagers who will inevitably mess up and who will foolishly make life choices that will certainly disappoint me? There is something within each of these kids that draws me to them. It is something that causes me to give my life, time, and energy to do what it takes to help each of these teens through life. It is something that I cannot resist, I cannot deny, and I cannot live without. This very thing brings me to my knees, causes me to weep with them, and hurt with them, and laugh with them, and rejoice with them. I cannot escape, I cannot hide, and I cannot run because it’s essence is within each of us. It leads me to love, it compels me to serve, and drives me to go beyond my level of understanding to reach into an uncomfortable realm in which I stand vulnerable. I see it when they smile, when they laugh, when they celebrate, and I see it when the hurt, when they cry, and when they sulk. I see it when I look at their faces and into their eyes… it’s the heart of God. ‘For God so loved the world that he gave his only son…’ and that love is kindled within each one of them. I know it, and I see it in them, so my goal is to help them to know it and see it within themselves. God has called me to bring out the heart of God in each one of them, knowing that it will change their lives forever… it’s called making disciples.

Pressed