My Epic Journey

Mark D. Regnerus argues in his book, Forbidden Fruit: Sex and Religion in the Lives of American Teenagers, that churches are not much more than “social control units.”  What he means by that is, the church is designed to bend adolescent (for that matter any age group) behavior away from the norm and “helps prevent them” from sinning.  He states that this done by “enmeshing [adolescents] in a religious personal network and community.”

My thought is this, Is this really our goal?  Are we just trying to curb teenage behavior by putting them in a setting that is socially religious?  Or should our goal be more personal and deep?

I would argue that our goal should be that our teenagers’ behavior is a direct reflection on their view of God not of the church.  Perhaps this is why so many students leave the church after high school because their view of church has changed.  If they had a proper view of God I think the stats would be different.

As a youth pastor I am then challenged to create, not a social control unit, but a place where students meet, wrestle, and commune with a real, knowable God.

At Grace Point, we use the University Class system to take our congregation through key elements in their spiritual walk.  It is a great way to challenge one’s self and to make sure you are continuing the growth process.

My job–teach Class 401.  The topic of Class 401 is Our Mission, which is to obey and complete the Great Commission (Matthew 28:19-20).  Per Terry’s (our Senior Pastor) suggestion we actually put the lesson into practice by meeting at the local Caribou Coffee and buying a $100.00 gift card to pay for next $100.00 worth of orders at the counter.  Result–opportunities to share the love of Christ.  We didn’t “give a cup of water” (Matthew 10:42) but we did give cups of coffee, and mocha.

As we were sitting there writing and sharing our testimonies with each other, I was struck with my former way of Christian living–Transactional Spirituality.  What is TS?  It is when we do “spiritual” acts to God but with OUR agenda in mind.  We are looking out for OUR best interest instead of God’s.  Our hope is that as we do “good” things, God will see them and in turn do something nice for us.  Our spirituality is reduced to a bank transaction with God as our bank teller.

I remember the moment though that all changed.  I was sitting in my office at my first youth pastorate reading the Gospels.  I realized that the Jesus of the Gospel was different than the Jesus I grew up with.  My Jesus was a judgmental Jesus.  If I did bad He didn’t like me, but if I did good He did.  I wanted Jesus to like me.

The Jesus of the Gospel is a truly loving Jesus.  A Jesus that loves me for who I am.  Yeah–God punishes up, but not because He is mad at us, but because of His love for us.

What Jesus do you serve?  Is your faith transactional based or grace based?

This past Sunday, Terry (our Senior Pastor) had a great vision to get the church to think and live “outside the box.”  He challenged the church to be more of a movement than a monument (a reference to Erwin McManus’ book, An Unstoppable Force).

We divided up into three groups and then went out to show the love of Christ in a practical way.  Two groups headed out to homes and passed out batteries for smoke detectors.  My group passed out 20 boxes of Panera bread bagels to law enforcement agencies, fire departments, ems stations, etc. 

the Smith family dropping off bagels at an Urgent

Care Center.

We don’t know the full results yet, but we do know that seeds were planted and on one Sunday in August, a church in Ohio decided to not only talk the talk but to walk it as well.