A Word For My New Students

"For this reason, ever since I heard about your faith in the Lord Jesus and your love for all the saints,  I have not stopped giving thanks for you, remembering you in my prayers.  I keep asking that the God of our Lord Jesus Christ, the glorious Father, may give you the Spirit of wisdom and revelation, so that you may know him better.  I pray also that the eyes of your heart may be enlightened in order that you may know the hope to which he has called you, the riches of his glorious inheritance in the saints,  and his incomparably great power for us who believe. That power is like the working of his mighty strength,  which he exerted in Christ when he raised him from the dead and seated him at his right hand in the heavenly realms,  far above all rule and authority, power and dominion, and every title that can be given, not only in the present age but also in the one to come. (Ephesians 1:15-21 NIV84)"

This is my prayer as a new pastor over a group of high school students. I pray this over you as often as I can remember. I'm always believing God for Big Things for us. 

Love,

Pastor Justin

Burying the Lead

Students can be incredibly hard to reach. I mean really reach. They’ll be your friend. They’ll talk to you. They’ll even let you develop a perception that you’ve reached them on a deep level…but you haven’t.

My truck was in the shop recently and a colleague picked me up and gave me a ride to the office. En route we drove by a large high school. In talking about it we both instinctively said, “I do NOT miss high school!” Honestly, it was pretty awful. Middle school wasn’t much better. High school is hard, so in order to protect themselves students build up various levels of walls to keep the big scary world out.

As youth ministers we have to climb over the monumental fact that we’re not students with them. We’re not their peers. As much as why try to be “relevant” or “on their level,” at the end of the day we’re still just another adult vying for their attention and claiming the authority to speak into their lives. Once you work, and invest in the relationship, and lose hours at lock-ins and online playing CoD, and sitting in the bleachers cheering at football games, there are still just some areas that won’t let you through. There are just some gates you can’t get past.

And then, usually you have no idea that it’s coming, a student will come up to you and share something spiritually amazing that’s happened in their lives…and they thank you, sometimes you hug, sometimes there are tears. You really have to treasure those moments. And I do. I write about them in my journal. I have a file for things that students hand to me. I even keep scrapbooks of ministries I’ve worked with in the past. All of those things are an important part of keeping your sanity in ministry.

All of that being said, I kind of always thought those moments were amazing, but just an unexplainable mystery of the greatness of God. I mean, how we can get over the disparity of our stations in life, somehow sneak past their defenses and then find amazing rewards…and, maybe I’m burying the lead here, then I read this:

Isaiah 45:2-3

I will go before you
    and will level the mountains;
I will break down gates of bronze
    and cut through bars of iron.
³ I will give you hidden treasures,
    riches stored in secret places,
so that you may know that I am the Lord,
    the God of Israel, who summons you by name.

Holy Frustration Batman!

Luke 9:35-41

                        A voice came from the cloud, saying, “This is my Son, whom I have chosen; listen to him.” ³⁶ When the voice had spoken, they found that Jesus was alone. The disciples kept this to themselves, and told no one at that time what they had seen.

³⁷ The next day, when they came down from the mountain, a large crowd met him. ³⁸ A man in the crowd called out, “Teacher, I beg you to look at my son, for he is my only child. ³⁹ A spirit seizes him and he suddenly screams; it throws him into convulsions so that he foams at the mouth. It scarcely ever leaves him and is destroying him. ⁴⁰ I begged your disciples to drive it out, but they could not.”

⁴¹ “O unbelieving and perverse generation,” Jesus replied, “how long shall I stay with you and put up with you? Bring your son here.”

                I absolutely love this passage of scripture because we see Jesus in kind of a strange place. We’re used to seeing him in miracle mode or teacher mode, but this story finds him in between those places. He’s just come from the Mount of Transfiguration. I suppose you could consider this a spiritual sabbatical of sorts. Just prior to this he had been teaching, healing, calming storms, raising the dead…a busy season of ministry to say the least (and you thought Christmas time was rough). So he took some time away. He went up to the mountain to pray and refocus and get away from the crowds and even most of his disciples. He has this amazing time on the mountain communicating with some old buddies (i.e. Moses and Elijah). He comes back down the mountain refreshed…and here are the people waiting for him, unchanged and needy.

Adam West is easily the greatest Batman
of all time...sorry Christian Bale

                Like I said, I love this passage of scripture. My yearly Bible plan takes me through it at least once and I usually read it more than that in a year. Every time I come away with something different and today I saw something amazing…Jesus was frustrated! Even the Lord of all Creation was frustrated! There it is! Holy Frustration! The divine mandate for my curmudgeon ministry!

I don’t believe he was frustrated that the people had needs, but in their lack of spiritual maturity. Meaning, it’s not about the disciples healing this kid, it’s about the power of God.

 The fact that even Jesus got a little frustrated says a lot about me, and you, and about ministry in general. Here are two new things I took away from this passage:

       1.            Jesus got frustrated…but never sinned.

a.       It’s easy to cloak the cause of sin in frustration. Don’t let yourself get away with saying, “I’m sorry, I only said that (or looked at you that way or treated you badly or threw you under the bus to a church member) because I was frustrated.” Always choose your words carefully!

                                                               i.      “The good man brings good things out of the good stored up in his heart, and the evil man brings evil things out of the evil stored up in his heart. For out of the overflow of his heart his mouth speaks.”[1]

       2.            The Kid Really Was Possessed!

a.       Just because the people were not where He might have wanted them to be spiritually doesn't mean they were just being needy…the kid was really possessed! The point here is that Jesus, despite his frustration perhaps even to the point of disappointment, still happily worked to meet the need. A wise minister I worked for advised me to always love people where they are even if that’s not where you hoped they would be.

i.       “If one of you says to him, “Go, I wish you well; keep warm and well fed,” but does nothing about his physical needs, what good is it?”[2]

            Jesus, help us to be like you. Help us to be sinless in frustration and to love people where they are.

---

[1] Luke6:45, NIV

[2] James2:15, NIV

Why Mourn a Victory?

Ezra3:10-13

When the builders laid the foundation of the temple of the Lord, the priests in their vestments and with trumpets, and the Levites (the sons of Asaph) with cymbals, took their places to praise the Lord, as prescribed by David king of Israel. With praise and thanksgiving they sang to the Lord:

“He is good;
    his love to Israel endures forever.”

And all the people gave a great shout of praise to the Lord, because the foundation of the house of the Lord was laid. But many of the older priests and Levites and family heads, who had seen the former temple, wept aloud when they saw the foundation of this temple being laid, while many others shouted for joy. No one could distinguish the sound of the shouts of joy from the sound of weeping, because the people made so much noise. And the sound was heard far away.

         

            The book of Ezra co-chronicles Israel’s return from exile with Nehemiah. There is some debate as to which story began first, but historical clues tell us that they were concurrent for at least some portion of the story. This passage leaves me with a simple question: “Why mourn an apparent victory?”  In this passage Israel is being restored! Ezra is leading the rebuilding of The Temple of Jerusalem. Nehemiah is rebuilding the great walls of the city. Why mourn? I wonder if only the older generation mourned while the younger generation shouted for joy because the older crowd recognized their part in the exile. Even though Israel had been lost to Babylon for 70 years, this passage says that many of them remembered the original temple. It is certainly feasible that they were part of the sinful generation of Israel that caused God to pour out judgment on them via Babylon.

            I minister to middle-schoolers, high school students, and college/young adult aged students. I see in them such potential for greatness. I see in them such determination that I never saw in myself or my peers. I truly believe that the coming generation of Christ-Followers will see greater things than any of us have ever seen or could dream of. I believe a revival of Spirit and of the Church is coming for them and for us.

            I hope that my generation of ministers can rejoice when we see the young people we work with have great victories and not mourn over the “would-a, could-a, should-a’s” of ministry. If the next generation is to take the Church of Jesus Christ to new heights it is my prayer that my generation of ministers will stand beside them in victory feeling as though we poured everything that we could into them and connected them with Father as much as we possibly could.

            It is my prayer today that I will leave nothing on the table. It leaves me dreaming I will waste no opportunity to reach a young person for Christ for they might be the one to change the world.

            Where does it leave you?

This Says It All About 9/11

I remember my affliction and my wandering, the bitterness and the gall.

I well remember them,
and my soul is downcast within me.

Yet this I call to mind
and therefore I have hope:

Because of the Lord's great love we are not consumed,
for his compassions never fail.

They are new every morning;
great is your faithfulness.

(Lamentations 3:19-23 NIV84)

Will You Fight For It?

I well remember them [my afflictions],
    and my soul is downcast within me.
²¹ Yet this I call to mind
    and therefore I have hope:

²² Because of the Lord’s great love we are not consumed,
    for his compassions never fail.
²³ They are new every morning;
    great is your faithfulness.

Lamentations 3:20-23

            If you read the first 19 verses of Lamentations chapter three you will find a laundry list of similes describing Jeremiah’s feelings of loss about the destruction of Jerusalem. They detail how he feels forsaken by God. He says, “…like a lion in hiding, he dragged me from the path and mangled me” (v. 10-11). And then there’s my personal favorite, “He has broken my teeth with gravel” (v. 16a). So how do we get from that utter sadness and despair to these verses talking about the love and faithfulness of God?

            Jeremiah says when he remembers all of his problems he is saddened to his very soul. (Let’s pause here to say that spending your time recounting to yourself all of your difficulties is a recipe for depression anyway.) Then he “calls to mind” three aspects of God that give him hope: Love, Mercy (compassion), and Faithfulness. It’s no accident that he had to intentionally call those qualities of God to mind. Sometimes you just have to fight for it.

            I challenge you today to take a quick mental examination of what your focus is drawn towards. If it is drawn towards your problems and difficulties, it’s time to fight to call to mind the Love, Mercy, and Faithfulness of God. Will you fight for it?

Steer Your Fear

     I'm not a parent, and for the near future plan to keep it that way, but I was someone's child and I work with students and parents on a daily basis. It puts me in a great place to make some observations and I've noticed some cool things over the years. For instance, there are many levels of cleanliness when it comes to parents. Some people will always rinse off a dropped pacifier before getting it back to the child, some don't care. I had a friend once who used to hold the business end of the pacifier in his mouth while getting his daughter dressed and then give it right back to her. This phenomena seems to vary by child. If the first born drops their pacifier it's incinerated like medical waste and a new, hermetically sealed one is installed. By the third child the, "just blow it off" method seems more prominent.

     An important job of parents is to steer the fear of your kids. You don't want them to be afraid of the dark, but you do want them to be afraid of running into traffic. That fear makes them careful until they are old enough to understand and avoid the peril without fear. My wife has an irrational fear of dragonflies that developed from childhood. I'll be honest, not super helpful. My sister was afraid to flush the toilet for a while as a youngster because one of those automatic toilets at the mall flushed with her on it and scared her to death. I guess she thought she was going down with the ship. It's an important to steer the fears of your kids away from things that cripple them and towards things that protect them. It affords them the opportunity to grow to maturity.

     "The fear of the Lord is the beginning of
               wisdom;
          all who follow his precepts have good 
               understanding.
          To him belongs eternal praise."

-Psalm 111:10

     This thought is short and simple. We get caught up in that word "fear." We think, "That's only for the Old Testament God. The NT God is all about love man!" Never forget the OT God and the NT God are the same guy. 

     Also, ponder this. The God who created the universe, with all of it's nuanced greatness, had to squeeze the concept of our need to be awed, amazed, and a little afraid of the glory and power of his presence into our language. It's sort of like trying to play a Beethoven symphony on the triangle. There just aren't enough notes to describe it adequately.

     So when scripture talks about "fearing God." Think of it as the fear our parents steered into us. Just like a healthy fear of electricity helps you to mature from childhood to adulthood in a healthy way, a fear of the Lord allows you to mature from spiritual infancy to spiritual maturity.