I don’t have many reasons why I should go into youth ministry. I don’t have many, but I have one. He believes in me. And He is calling me into it.
I am terrified. Simply terrified.
But this is what I desire: a place where teenagers can make their own footprints. Where they can tread their own path and create their own place. Speak the voice that was given to them, with words they thought of themselves.
I desire to create a place where things can break, whether it be a chair, or a picture frame, a window, or a heart, a place where things can things can be broken like lives and families and door hinges, a place where things can be spilt like secrets and sorrows and soda on old grungy carpets. A place for teenagers to let their wishes be known, a place for students to be loved and known and valued, a safe and challenging place where the spiritual discipline of play can be reignited, and where laughter is a certain kind of prayer.
I’ve learning that the greatest apologetic is noticing the littlest moments, paying attention to His fingerprints and the greatest theodicy is laughter, great and boisterous laughter. My heart pines to tell teenagers about the terrible beauty of the Cross, and the beautiful terror of His resurrection. But more than that, I want see our lives transformed by His death, and, and by His life, His promise to live within us as an active force of being.
I could talk all day about ideals and use pretty words and dream big. But I can’t say more than a few words about how. Not yet. I have much to learn. I think the how begins with having a heart being filled with the Love from Him. I think the how begins with seeing potential in these students, in seeing their humanity, in sharing in their hopes and their dreams and their silly stories. Ministry isn’t a profession, it’s a life, it’s about living with and walking alongside fellow leaders and alongside students. It’s about gleaning all I can now from both my failures and my friends in ministry and perhaps maybe the few successes I have along the way.
