slant33-blog

Kurt Rietema

One of the main reasons we might brazenly challenge a command given in such a straightforward, matter-of-fact, what’s-there-to-question kind of way by Jesus is our preoccupation with how that money is going to be stewarded in the hands of another.

I think affluent Christians like myself need drop the illusion that we’re any better stewards of God’s money than the economically poor are. We might be too theologically astute to go about saying that God has blessed us financially because of our faithfulness, but underlying our pretenses of stewardship is an implicit belief that if God entrusted it to us, then he wants it in our hands and we’d better not let it go too quickly. Maybe it’s because deep down, we don’t believe that greed is as abusive, self-destructive, or dehumanizing as drugs or alcohol in the dirtied hands of a homeless man.

A good friend of mine in Mexico has given me some perspective on this. He lived on the streets for a number of years as an adolescent. He ran away from sexual abuse at the hands of relatives and from the complete emotional abandonment of his father. He vividly recalls a time when he was waiting around a taco stand for something to eat. A couple of men ordered tacos and laid a Bible they were carrying around on the counter. My friend asked if they would give him a taco, and they denied him. He was hungry, and they gave him nothing to eat. At times, he used money he received from begging to buy glue in order to get high and escape the physical and existential suffering that was his daily reality. Today, he’s a pastor whose heart is still wounded by those experiences and now works to heal the wounds of others in those same situations.

Obviously, we’d all agree that it would be far better to give a kid like this the time, attention, and loving environment he needs. But in recognizing our own limitations, isn’t it worth risking our reputations as good stewards, even if there’s a possibility the kid is going to take that dollar for a taco to momentarily escape his pain by sniffing glue instead?

I just can’t see Jesus congratulating me on all the people I’ve passed by with a Matthew 25 rendition that says, “You saw me hungry, but you didn’t fall for it. You saw me holding a ‘homeless vet, anything helps’ sign, but you saw right through it. Blessed are you who do not fall for the schemes of the deceivers. Blessed are you who recognize that help for a down payment on a cheeseburger goes straight into the liquor store’s cash register.”

The very passage where Jesus’ teaching to “Give to everyone who asks you” in Luke 6:30 seems to suggest that God himself could be a little more discerning in the way he dishes out his grace as well. He gives to the deserving and undeserving alike. He is, as N.T. Wright says, generous to a fault (in the eyes of the stingy). To be fair, this passage doesn’t specifically mention money and therefore shouldn’t be taken as Jesus’ final words on stewarding money. Nor should giving to everyone who asks be understood as Jesus’ strategy for eradicating poverty. But it is significant that this commandment is couched in the middle of a passage on loving one’s enemies. This teaching is about disarming the power of hate in the disciple and turning upside down the logic of retributive violence.

As much as I believe that good results can come about in one’s enemies in following Jesus’ teaching (e.g., that one’s enemies may repent in recognition of their own depravity in the face of the absurd grace shown to them), I don’t think this is specifically the point of Jesus’ teaching. The results and transformation that Jesus hopes for are not primarily in one’s enemy but in the hearer himself. This command is first and foremost about forming his followers in an attitude of the heart that reflects the reckless generosity and grace of the Father, regardless of the response of the receiver of that grace.

Ultimately, I believe this informs our response to the statement. I can give several reasons why we shouldn’t always give to those who ask us for money, but we can all recite those as effortlessly as reasons we shouldn’t love our enemies. Those reasons need to be in consideration, but our first impulse toward those who ask us for money should always be, “Yes!” because this reflects the generous heart of the Father. This attitude disarms the power of greed, the power of suspicion, and the belief that we are entitled to the wealth that has been entrusted to us.

Kurt Rietema, his wife Emily, their baby Luke, and miniature schnauzer Freddy, are serving as agents of transformation and renewal in the Argentine neighborhood of Kansas City, Kansas. In this lower income, ethnically diverse neighborhood, they participate in Christian community development efforts and desire to see a new faith community emerge as they seek God’s shalom for Argentine. Kurt also works with Youthfront, where he continues to direct the Christian community development initiatives that he and Emily initiated in the village of Croc, Mexico as well as co-directing a missional formation school for college students in Argentine.

Kara Powell

This is a very provocative and challenging statement for me and for lots of others I know. On the one hand, we want to be generous and cheerful givers and obey Jesus’ commands to aid those in need. On the other hand, some of the leaders I respect who work day in and day out with the homeless recommend never giving money to someone who is homeless who asks you. They endorse giving them granola bars or fast food gift certificates instead.

Recently I hosted a webinar with a group of sharp Youth for Christ urban leaders. Dr. Michael Mata, from World Vision, was on the call, and he mentioned the dangers of “pimping the poor.” That phrase, which is admittedly provocative, arose in our conversation when we were talking about ways to expose donors from non-urban environments to the real struggles and challenges of life in marginalized communities.

Even if giving money to those who ask is formative for us, if it is at least sometimes harmful to those who seeking it, then we are being well intentioned but are actually “pimping the poor.” We are using them for our advantage. We are not looking out for their best interests but for our own. So I disagree with the statement.

But I must be honest: the academician in me is pretty cautious about statements that include unqualified terms like always and never.

Because of my theology of justice, I’d like to rephrase the sentence to read: We should always (yes, I did include always here) act to see justice done for those who ask for money because it is good for our spiritual formation. I can wholeheartedly agree with that statement, even though it did include that dreaded word always.

I would love for believers who cross the paths of homeless people not to default to giving change out of their pockets. Instead, I would love to see us take the time to ask the questions, listen to stories, and see if we can connect them with systemic resources that can help them connect with churches, gain employment skills, access housing, and perhaps even find a job.

That’s not only good for our spiritual formation; it’s good for those individuals’ formation—not just spiritually but on multiple levels. Come to think of it, it’s good for our formation on multiple levels also.

Chap Clark & Kara E. Powell, Deep Justice in a Broken World (Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 2007), 58. Ibid, 93.

Kara Powell, Ph.D., is the executive director of the Fuller Youth Institute (FYI) and a faculty member at Fuller Theological Seminary (see www.fulleryouthinstitute.org). As a 20-year youth ministry veteran, she speaks regularly at youth ministry conferences and is the author or co-author of a number of books, including Deep Justice Journeys, Essential leadership, Deep Justice in a Broken World, Deep Ministry in a Shallow World, and the Good Sex Youth Ministry Curriculum. She volunteers every week as a small group leader for junior girls at Lake Avenue Church in Pasadena.

Mike King

The word always in this statement stirs up an immediate response of no. However, this statement should cause us to wrestle with much deeper issues related to giving, generosity, and responsibility to love our neighbors as ourselves (Matthew 22:34-40).

As I contemplate this, it is clear to me that there is no easy response to the core issue of this statement. On the other hand, perhaps it should be easy. Maybe the best response, the Christian response, is yes. After all, didn’t Jesus instruct his disciples, “Give to everyone who begs from you…”? And when Jesus said this, he was talking about how to behave around those who may even be defined as our enemies. Perhaps always responding with some act of generosity to those who ask for money may be necessary when the request is made to us because they know we are Christians. But I’m not sure I agree with my last sentence.

The reason this is so complex is that every situation requires discernment. Several passages and parables of Jesus indicate that God evaluates the condition of the giver’s heart. In God’s economy, small gifts are valued, which Jesus makes clear through his story of the offering of the widow in Mark 12:41-44. Paul indicates that generous gifts become hollow acts when given devoid of love (1 Corinthians 13:3). Paul declares, “Each of you must give as you have made up your mind, not reluctantly or under compulsion, for God loves a cheerful giver” (2 Corinthians 9:7). I believe that the Scripture is clear in both the Old and New Testaments that we are to place a higher priority on being generous to the poor. One of the biggest challenges in my Christian life over the last several years is to create life opportunities for me to be in proximity to and relationships with the poor.

While I continue to reflect on this statement, it occurs to me that I have rarely been asked face to face for money outside of organizational requests. I think I need to be more proactive in giving to those with needs around me because I think it is difficult for them to actually ask for help.

This post is turning out to be a clarifying formational contemplation for me. I can’t imagine a situation involving a person or family in need within my social connections who would get a no answer from me, or my wife, in response to a personal request for financial help. I don’t always respond to organizational or ministry requests for money. I don’t always respond to request from homeless people for money, although, over the last several years I have become much more prone to give money to homeless people on the street. I really think discernment is important. We should listen for the Holy Spirit’s promptings. When we aren’t sure how to respond or if we should respond, I think we should err on the side of generosity.

This is an important issue. We should process this for ourselves. We should dialogue with our loved ones. We should engage the young people in our ministries in this conversation. Since I actually wrote this post over a period of three days, my concluding statement is different from my first sentence. For the sake of our own formation, we should almost always give to those who ask us for money.

Steve Argue

At a cursory level, I suppose it simply captures the reality in all of us that we are in process, in between, trying to find our way. Like many words (e.g., missional or authentic), this term risks becoming an ambiguous, hindering concept, co-opted into youth ministry subtexts. While youth workers use the word constantly in dialogue, teaching, and preaching, its meaning remains vague.

I do believe we’re called to a journey or pilgrimage, and I think each person must embrace its meaning before attempting to use it on others. What may be a hurdle for some is not the reality that spiritual formation is a journey but that journey (noun) calls them to journey (verb). Just because there is a journey doesn’t make someone a journeyer any more than acknowledging the existence of marathons make one a marathoner. Further, activity is not synonymous with journey any more than randomly surfing the web is research. Thus, I offer some signposts:

You know you’re on the journey when you’re moved by wonder. New territory heightens your senses as you experience something for the first time. Often the view is obstructed when one’s language, outlook, or assumptions blind one. Journeying people have the ability to see people and situations with continually first-time eyes. They believe that each situation, each person, every day is worth discovering more fully. Journeyers see. This is worship.

You know you’re on the journey when you embrace personal goals along the way. While journey is often referred to as the opposite of destination, this does not mean passive wandering in hope that the destination will appear. Do not hide behind the journey metaphor as an excuse for aimless wandering. Journeyers actively seek God, critically reflect on themselves, and discover that outcomes are likely not random events but fruit. Journeyers sweat. This is spiritual practice.

You know you’re on the journey when you’re laughing and crying. Journeyers get close enough to be moved by others’ journeys. Life is not lived at a safe distance, protected by power, theological dogma, or busyness. Journeyers find ways to come close enough to be moved to tears of joy and pain. They feel deeply, experiencing wonder and exhaustion. They recognize that there is nothing safe about their journey. Journeyers feel. This is solidarity.

You know you’re on the journey when you view the mundane as sacred. It’s the daily practices of love, charity, emails, conversations, spiritual practices, etc., that sustain the journey. These are the things that no one notices, yet this is the sacred stuff of journey. Leadership, vision, or events can blind journeyers from the smaller, more sacred, more essential things. Those who lose sight of this roll their eyes when receiving parents’ emails and get annoyed at “interrupting” phone calls. Journeyers live for the small, unnoticed acts. This is prayer.

You know you’re on the journey when you see yourself as the guest. Journeyers give up control. They come as visitors to every context, graciously learning, honestly seeking to understand, and resist forcing their agendas on others. Journeyers see every relationship as holy ground and every person as an image bearer. It’s been said that when one sees another as an opponent, the result is competition. But when one sees the other as a fellow journeyer, the result is partnership toward a shared goal where everyone risks change and transformation. Journeyers accommodate. This is self-giving love.

You know you’re on the journey when someone asks you how you’re doing and you say more than, “Busy.” Those who are on a journey have a story to tell, a discovery to share, an experience to express, and they can’t help it. Journeyers are beat poets and artists. This is witness.

You know you’re on the journey when you depend on others to journey with you. Those truly journeying recognize that they need the company of others. As numerous theologians have reminded us, the Christian life is personal but not private. The essence of Christian spirituality reflects the nature of the Trinity through journeying communities that perpetually tell the story of God in word and sacrament. Journeyers connect. This is the church.

You know you’re on the journey when you see faith as improvisation. When traveling, it’s tempting to overpack your creature comforts. Journeying is about packing less and leaving familiar things behind. It is more about improvising than making everything fit old paradigms. It exposes the limits of your faith categories and asks you to let go of your pre-packed theology, programs, and dogma. It asks you to reconsider your notions of God, world, and self, which will be both scary and liberating. Journeyers risk. This is faith.

You know you’re on a journey when you recognize that your pursuit is embedded in God’s pursuit of you. Journey is more than a self-focused endeavor. It is situated in the understanding that God is continually pursuing us, showing us the reality of our world where God’s love, grace, and recapitulation of you, others, and the whole world are happening already. At times you may lose your bearings, but you are never lost. Journeyers are embraced. This is the gospel.

Journey on, friends. Hope to bump into you along the way.

Lilly Lewin

Because that’s what life is. Life is a journey, and so is our life in Jesus. Life isn’t stagnant, and as much as we try to stay the same, to stay stationary, “the road goes ever on and on.” And as leaders, we need to talk about this because we tend to want to stay put, and we tend not to like or appreciate change.

Everyone starts at the same place. We all need God, and we are created to be in relationship with God. Many of us don’t see that for a long time. Some of us take detours along the way and meander in the wilderness or camp out in the valley or put down roots in the suburbs and just STOP, not wanting to go on the next leg of the adventure.

Some of us carry way too much stuff. Some of it we collect on purpose, and some of it is really heavy baggage that gets heaped upon us. Yet it all is a part of the journey. And the question is… Will we allow the journey to change us and transform us? Or will we have to continue to wander about in the wilderness? (Yet even in the desert God is there and continues to provide for his kids.)

With the journey of faith in mind, I often begin confirmation class with a handout. On the page, I’ve drawn a path. The road winds around, and there is a river with a bridge out; there are potholes on the road; there are mountains and valleys; there is a bus stop beside the path and a castle/cross/kingdom pic drawn at the end of the winding road. I ask my students to consider where they are on their spiritual journeys as they start confirmation (or as they start the new school year, or even the New Year).

Some might not even feel they are on the path at all. Some might feel they are in a pothole or stuck in the mud somewhere. That’s okay. We need to talk about that and allow them to see that God is in the process and with us in the potholes and even sitting beside us on the bench at the bus stop, even if we don’t see him yet.

Father Edward Hayes says that we are all “homeward bound” hobos—on the road home to be with Jesus (Lenten Hobo Honeymoon). We are all in process, and we all sometimes get stuck, and most of us take breaks along the way. And it’s okay to take baby steps.

Journey is how God has built the human experience. It’s unknown and ever changing. Life forces us to go forward; it’s the nature of time—birth, life, death; it’s what we’ve been given.

When it comes to spiritual formation, I really appreciate the metaphor of the journey. It gives me great hope. I’m not done yet. Nothing is set in stone. There is a path, there is a way, there is a road through. Best of all, I’m not stuck if I don’t want to be. I can take a new road and know that it will ultimately be safe because the King is with me. And for me, this is exciting! My life in Jesus really is an adventure.

“Thinplace… A pilgrimage of discovery and creativity” is the tagline on my business cards. Thinplaces are the places where one feels closest to God; where heaven and earth seem to touch. And pilgrimage involves going on a journey together, seeing what God is up to, and getting out of our normal routines. We travel together in order to discover something about ourselves; we travel together to understand and discover what God is doing and has been doing in our world. That’s why I believe in going on pilgrimage personally and with students.

We need to see, and we need to help our students see, how journey is woven into the entirety of Scripture. The children of Israel were pilgrims heading for a strange land. They didn’t really know where they were going when they left for Egypt. They really weren’t sure that it was a good idea anyway. And they definitely had doubts about their leader. They took major detours, building golden calves and complaining about food and water.

And even before that, Abram and Sarai were pilgrims, leaving their comfort zones and traveling to a place God would tell them. They too got confused and sidetracked along the way, sometimes with drastic results. But throughout their journey they were seeking to follow God and attempting to hear his voice and doing their best to listen to him.

And Jesus didn’t invite his disciples to sit down and memorize a bunch of rules. He invited them to follow him, to go with him and learn along the way.

It’s important for us to remember and for our students to know and understand that God has taken all his children on journeys of discovery and creativity; that life in Jesus doesn’t allow us to remain the same. Jesus asks us to get out of our boats and follow him. And if we choose to leave our nets, our lives will definitely never be the same.

Chris Folmsbee

First, I think it may be the healthiest way to view spiritual formation—as though each of us is unfinished, always becoming. So we refer to it as a path or journey to remind us of where we have been, where we are, and where we are going. Not only does it remind us of ourselves, it reminds us of others who have also embarked on the path toward becoming more like Jesus.

Second, to refer to it as a journey or path implicitly suggests movement. We aren’t a static people; we are a pilgrim people in exile, awaiting our future residence with God. A path or journey denotes progress or development.

Third, a journey is unpredictable, isn’t it? When was the last voyage or expedition you took that didn’t have some twist or turn—unwanted, maybe—but nonetheless, an arbitrary happening. Our path to formation is like this. It possesses sometimes an immediate and abrupt change in plans. We are who we are becoming to respond to those changes in plans. Ever been delayed at an airport? Had a flat tire? Lost your passport or had it stolen? All of these things contribute to our journey.

Fourth, a path has undulations. It has smooth and rocky soil. Paths have steep ascents and declines. Paths can be leisurely traveled or require great amounts of exertion. Is not the spiritual journey of becoming like Jesus very similar?

Fifth, a path or journey represents a course of action—a purpose. Spiritual formation isn’t passive; it requires certain practices and disciplines. Formation doesn’t just happen. Change may operate this way (except from a vending machine), but (trans)formation demands that we take up our cross, not simply sit and look at it.

Finally, just as a journey or path can open to other routes or passageways, connecting us to people along the way, so can our formation open us up to new dimensions of our soul, connecting us to people and places we’ve yet to discover.

Sarah Arthur

Picture the lone scholar in his study, poring over a biblical text. On the one hand, he is embracing the kind of single-minded passion that the psalmist celebrates in Psalm 119:97: “Oh, how I love your law! It is my meditation all day long.” On the other hand, he is engaged in an activity that is foreign to text’s intent and function.

The Scriptures were not intended primarily for individuals to read in the quietness of their rooms, with private meditation or personal enlightenment the only goal. Rather, as Stephen Fowl and Greg Jones put it in Reading in Communion: Scripture and Ethics in Christian Life, “Scripture is primarily addressed not to individuals but to specific communities called into being by God.” When we read Scripture, we read Scripture. The community of faith reads it together, beginning with the mere act of biblical translation (the work of dozens of scholars in conversation) and then in group Bible studies, but most importantly in worship. And not only do we read it—as if simply hearing and reflecting on the words were enough—but we read it like an orchestra reads a musical score. The goal is faithful performance.

It’s like picking up the text of a Shakespeare play. I can read it on my own, but the whole time, I’m aware that the letters on the page are simply the prompts and cues for a much larger communal production. Writes Nicholas Lash, “The performance of scripture is the life of the church. It is no more possible for an isolated individual to perform these texts than it is for him to perform a Beethoven quartet or a Shakespeare tragedy” (Theology on the Way to Emmaus). This performance takes place in worship, Lash says, but more specifically in the sacrament of communion. Through communion we enact the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus as expressed in the gospels. We hear the Word, speak the Word, sing the Word, ingest the Word, and then leave with the task to share the Word with the world.

In that sense, we are always reading Scripture toward group performance. The scholar in his study, if he is honest with himself, is merely practicing his lines. His dissertation may be an important safeguard for making sure the whole group gets the lines right or puts the proper emphasis on certain phrases or doesn’t overlook the less popular passages, but the dissertation is not the ultimate goal. The goal is his cupped hands at the communion rail—the same hands that will grasp his son in a hug or pick up a mop at the soup kitchen.

But it doesn’t end there. While we may read Scripture toward performance of the text, the performance of the text is also reading us. Take the sacrament of communion again. During the Chilean dictatorship of Pinochet, for instance, the Roman Catholic Church at first was cozy with the regime that silently tortured and eliminated thousands. As William Cavanaugh describes in his powerful book, Torture and Eucharist, the perpetrators of violence were right there on Sunday morning, taking the body and blood of the tortured Christ along with everyone else—even with their victims. And eventually the church began to realize this was deeply, fundamentally wrong. The reading and performance of the Passion each week had begun to read them. So the church began to create a counterculture, a community that offered its own outreach and care to the victims. It no longer endorsed what the government was doing, no longer participated in government programs, even took steps of excommunicating perpetrators of violence.

“The play’s the thing,” said Hamlet, “wherein I’ll catch the conscience of the king.” The faithful performance of the text, which is the goal of reading the lines in the first place, has the curious effect of reading us: of taking our spiritual vitals, gauging our spiritual temperature, pointing out anomalies, holding up mirrors. The two readings cannot be separated. Which should give us pause the next time we advise youth in our ministries to spend time reading their Bibles every day. If we don’t add the important caveat, “There will be a performance on Sunday”—or even, “There will be a performance the minute you leave your room and talk to your mother”—then we’re not being honest about the nature of this text we claim to live by.

Chris Folmsbee

Before I even answer this question, let me say this. If you have not read Eat This Book, by Eugene Peterson, go to Amazon and get it now. You will be blessed by its contribution to your spiritual formation.

Now, to the question at hand… Four thoughts come to my mind when asked the difference between reading Scripture and letting Scripture read us. The best way I know to answer this question is through my own life experience. These thoughts may not be true for you, but then again, they might be very true.

1. Accessibility or Authority. When I read the Scriptures, I go looking for something as if I am the authority on the text/subject. When I let the Scripture read me, I go into it with a soul that is open and accessible, able to be reached (for example, during the practice of lectio divina).

2. Practice or Principle. When I let Scripture read me, I am in search of a forming practice or a faith-shaping discipline that transforms me from the inside out. When I go to Scripture, I am often in search of a particular premise or principle. The former is much more difficult and requires more of my conscious effort.

3. Soak or Surface. When I let Scripture read me, it means that I am permeable, and I absorb the truth into my very being. Letting the truth soak into my soul opens up new dimensions of truth. Sometimes, when I read the Scriptures, I am simply searching for truth on the surface.

4. Mission or Myself. Usually when I read Scripture, I am tempted to read into the passage(s) what I need God to do for me or what God has done for me. A particular blessing, perhaps? On the other hand, when I let Scripture read me, I usually end up finding ways that God can use me for the sake of the world, as opposed to me using God.

Andy Root

I really don’t know about this question. It has always bugged me, or at least confused me. Or maybe it has bugged me because it has confused me. I like the idea that Scripture does something—that it reads us as much as we read it. I potentially like that we give Scripture some form of agency. I think this escapes some of the propositional truth exegesis that dominated evangelicalism decades ago and is still holding on in places today. But what I don’t like is that it too easily (and confusingly) assumes that we don’t read Scripture (it just reads us) and then blurs the importance of hermeneutics when reading the text. In other words, it can distract us from realizing how deeply we bring prejudices and perspectives into our reading. I wouldn’t want to undercut the importance of what we’ve learned from philosophical hermeneutics. But that’s for a whole other post.

Okay, here is what I really think is at stake in this question and how I would like to nuance the conversation. Either way you frame the question, Scripture is an agent. But Scripture is a collection of written texts, pieces of paper (or papyri or whatever) collected into a book that can sit on your desk or keep a door open. Of course, it is possible that words that make up ideas can be transformative, but it is you—the human agent, the subject—who reads them and brings them to life. In themselves these pages don’t live.

A kind of postmodern interpretation would be that only the community of faith lives, so Scripture only reads us as we read it together, drawing it into our subjective experiences. Part of me really likes that argument, but I think it makes the human agent too central. I’m worried that some have tried harder to make the Bible, the inanimate object, live, as though the Bible is one of Andy’s toys in Toy Story. I actually don’t think this is very helpful—therefore I do not think Scripture reads us.

Rather, I think the Word of God reads us. I hold that it is Jesus Christ who is living and moving in the world; it is Jesus who is encountering us, “reading” us, if you will. Jesus is a subject, an agent; Jesus is the living Word—living as the fullness of life, as the one who has passed through death. As the Johannine literature asserts and as most theological traditions affirm, Jesus Christ is the Word of God, and this Word is moving and active because this word is a living person.

So this means that our goal in youth ministry (and brace yourself, I’m about to say something to get you thinking) is not primarily to have kids read and know the Bible. We don’t care if they know about the inanimate object. Rather, what we want—and want deeply—is for kids to use the Bible to interpret the activity of the Word of God. What’s important is not that kids can memorize verses but rather that they embody the Bible enough to use it as a lens to seek God in the world.

The Bible is not the fourth person of the Trinity; the Bible is not divine. It doesn’t need to be error free to be true. The Bible is the authoritative lens (tool) to discern where and what the living God is doing. So the whole whining-about-kids-being-biblically-illiterate shtick is a red herring. Who cares if kids can pass some stupid Bible test? Who cares about biblical knowledge? What we want is for them to become interpreters (and of course, now, from this perspective, biblical knowledge is very important!) who devour the Bible—not to pass a test but to have the eyes to see the beauty and suffering of God’s action in the world.

The Bible is the authoritative gift God has given us to see the normative shape of God’s continued action in the world through Jesus by the Spirit. Chew on that for a while—and if you have more questions, wait for the third book in my theology and youth ministry series, which will be out first thing 2013. And for now, send all your angry emails to Mike King.

Steve Argue

Dear Failure,

It’s been awhile since I’ve written. You’ve probably liked it that way. But I’d like to take a minute and define our relationship. Here’s where I think we stand:

You’re my worst nightmare. I’ve been told all my life that if I believe in something hard enough, I can accomplish anything. I feel your pressure to accomplish. Anything. Everything. As soon as I experience success, you’re right there next to me, saying, “Bet you can’t do that again.” Or, “nice job this time, but you’ll need to wow them more next time.” Or, “Way to go, but do you think it was good as so and so?” So there you are, warping my perspectives, even my successes, in my American context that fuels your convincing fire.

You’re way too big. I want to get rid of you. I try to pretend you are wimpy, that you’re just an obstacle to overcome or a lemon that can be harnessed into lemonade. Rugged individualism tells me that what won’t kill me will make me stronger. Yep, I eat failure for breakfast. The problem is, you never go away. There always seem to be more obstacles. More lemons. I’m getting tired (and my bladder is really full).

You don’t shut up. My personal history has preserved your message. I try to shut you out so I can’t hear your recurring words speaking to me through familiar voices from my past. I pretend that it doesn’t bother me, but these voices find their way to some of the deepest parts of my soul, whispering your bitter words. “Your failure defines you.” “You may believe you’re fine now, but I know what you’re really like.” “Those good things you do look great, but I’m making you do them out of fear of me, out of anger to prove me wrong. You can’t shut me out with your good deeds; I’ll use them to make me even stronger, to haunt you even more.” How do I get you out of my head? Or is it impossible? It’s like someone telling me not to think of the color blue.

You’re an evangelist. You have even succeeded (failure is successful!) by getting me to believe in a different god and savior. I’ve been lulled into treating god as the one who makes the pain go away or gets me the job or makes it all better. You’ve convinced me that happiness is the greatest goal and that struggle isn’t real; it’s just “God closing the door because there’s something bigger for me.” What if struggle is the bigger thing?

Honestly, I get frustrated with God that God doesn’t just take you out. After all, aren’t Christians supposed to live victorious lives? Small groups would be so much more popular if people didn’t need to share their failures. The god of your church has people who are always “fine,” with a few daring to ask others to pray that they “have more patience.” You’ve succeeded to lull me and our Christian communities into groups that avoid talking about you for fear we find out that you really exist in all our lives. Therefore, we hide from each other and from ourselves. Nice job.

You exist. I don’t want to believe in you, but I’m choosing to. In fact, I’m going to love you. Yes, you’re lovable. Maybe, if I can embrace you, I’ll understand you and put you in your proper place. Therefore, I’m going to choose to think about you this way:

You are a reminder of my limitations but not a definer of my person. I know I can’t do everything perfectly, but I am called to live faithfully. I will not let you define who I am, but I think you can help me remember that I’m not made to do it all.

You are my limp, not my cancer. You highlight my natural limitations that aren’t burdensome but liberating. This freedom allows me to celebrate, not compare. It allows me to extend grace to others and to myself. You’re a limp that reminds me, not a cancer that kills me.

You are my teacher, not my excuse. I will seek to learn from you. You have something to tell me when I do experience you in my life. I will resist seeing you as an exception to blame someone else or excuse my responsibility.

You are my cheerleader, not my heckler. When you remind me that I have failed, I will choose to hear, “Good job, you took a risk!” rather than, “Told you so.” You are my gauge that celebrates risks and keeps me from playing life too safe.

My sense is that you’re not going to like this letter because it’s written directly to you, and I think you prefer a more stealthy relationship. My hope is that if I can be honest with you, I can be honest with others and get on living life the way I’m created to live it. See you soon.

Your friend,

Steve

Lilly Lewin

I fail a lot. I fail at being a good mom, a good wife, at saying “I’m sorry,” at thinking of others before myself. I fail at paying attention to what God is doing, to the needs around me. I fail at remembering names, and I always fail at remembering numbers. I also fail at making deadlines…a lot. Just ask all my editors.

Let me just say loudly, I hate to fail. In fact, I’ve spent most of my life trying hard—really, really hard—not to fail, yet I’ve been programmed most of my life to equate doing anything wrong, any little screw up, missed opportunity, or even a missed phone call or deadline, with failure. My view of failure has been one of the primary parts of my life. If we’re going to be friends, then you need to understand that this is how I see the world.

Is it possible that we can relate to all people simply on how they define failure?

My first full-time ministry job left me feeling like a failure. I was on a large church staff, my husband was also on staff, and it was my first job back after having a baby. At that point in my life, it wasn’t easy for me to tell the truth to people in authority and not easy for me to say I had a problem with something. So I wrote a letter to my supervisors and told them my frustrations with my job and why my job needed to change in order for me to continue doing it. I wasn’t looking to leave my job; I was just getting stuff out on paper. This was back in the dark ages of the early ’90s, before email. The result of that heart-pouring letter was…I got fired.

I felt like a complete and utter failure. The way it was handled was horrific, and we had to move because we couldn’t afford to live on just one salary. But more than that, I questioned my call to ministry. Had I totally missed it?

Twenty years later, I can safely say that I know myself better, and I know what Bill Cosby means when he says, “I don't know the key to success, but the key to failure is trying to please everybody.”

What is it about failure we just don’t like? Or we just can’t stand? I hate to fail, yet I fail all the time. Doesn’t that seem stupid? I failed at getting this post in on time. How we define failure and who defines failure determines our view of our lives; and how we learn to love or hate it.

Many of us equate failure with pain. If I fail this test I’ll get in trouble with my parents, or I won’t make the grades I need to go to the college I want. Or, If I fail to pull off this event, this retreat, I won’t get the raise or get the props or get the praise I want/need.

I was programmed to strive for perfection in my family of origin. I was the performing firstborn who tended to do the right things and in the right order. I was driven to perform well; not to fail.

The sad thing is that my drivenness came from a dad who said, ”It’s a 99, why isn’t it 100?” when I showed him my report card. So I’ve spent much of my life striving for that 100.

Yet we all know in our heads that only God makes 100s; people do not (not to mention that God doesn’t have a big grade book in the sky). People mess up, screw up, and fall flat on their faces. All the time. It’s what people do. It’s one of the things that makes us human. The beauty is that we can get up and start over. We get to say we’re sorry and start over.

That’s one of the best gifts I can give my kids and my family, both at home and in my church—to say I screwed up, I was wrong, I handled that badly. And on my good days I even get to acknowledge that it might take them a while to forgive.

How we define failure and who we’ve allowed to define failure for us determines how we view failing. We allow other people to define failure for us—most often our parents. Or it’s the invisible “they.” If “they” define failure for us, then we can blame them and not take responsibility.

We tend to run from failure because we equate failure with pain. And we define pain as bad, instead of as a gift. We believe failure is bad, not good. If we believe that failure equals pain, then we will do whatever it takes to avoid failing because we don’t want to hurt. But what if pain is not my enemy? Pain can be my friend. Wouldn’t this change a lot in how and why we do things?

What definitions are we passing along to our kids and students? What are our everyday definitions of failure, and how are these affecting how we live our lives?

• We need to redefine failure so we don’t see it as only painful.
• If we are free to fail and free of the pain we feel when we fail, then all bets are off. What if we engage our common humanity, accept failure as just human, normal?
• We—you and I—get to choose how a mess-up affects us.

Is failure is an opportunity? Can we see failure as a gift, not a curse?

In the movie A Good Year, Uncle Henry Skinner says to young Max, “You’ll come to see that a man learns nothing from winning. The act of losing, however, can elicit great wisdom. Not least of which is, how much more enjoyable it is to win. It’s inevitable to lose now and again. The trick is not to make a habit of it.”

Andy Root

Failure really is no fun, but it is entertaining. I bet we could create quite a list of failures in ministry—failed games, failed events, etc. Some of my favorite youth ministry stories are stories of failure.

Like the story of my student Derek, who decided one night at a lock-in to play the game “break-in.” The idea was simple: young people divided into teams with the first team to break into the church winning. The kids loved it, but after a neighbor saw some kids trying to pull open a window, she called the police. My student, the intern youth pastor, next saw his student in the back of a squad car. That’s a failure, and a funny one.

Such failures are embarrassing and difficult in the moment but are great fodder for entertaining stories because they reveal that we’re human and that we’re not perfect. Embarrassment has an uncomfortable way of reminding us that we’re fallible. We love to hear of others’ embarrassment because it assures us we’re not alone with our failures and finitude—and maybe it’s just plain funny.

Now, of course, failure can be amusingly funny, but it also can be no joking matter. Leaving a group of young people because of a failure of discretion, or realizing that you failed to properly interpret your fit can be very, very painful. There are so many people who have hard feelings toward the church after working in it. And it is so painful because these failures forcefully remind us that we’re human—in fact, that we’ll die.

Failure feels like death; it can communicate that we’re not worth much; we might as well be dead because we’re worthless—at least at this task. And this often cuts even deeper because we’d felt like we were called to this task, like God had assigned it to us, and we either failed God or God failed us—either one is deeply painful.

So how do we deal with failure? I hesitate to answer this, for fear that I’ll start sounding like some self-help loser, trying to convince people that “failure is just the first opportunity for a new success” or something lame like that. Because anyone who has experienced real failure knows it is only the dark pit of hell. Plus, that sentimental crap is almost always the speech of winners; only the person who has mastered success can look back nostalgically at her failures. For those in failure, it’s just a heavy burden.

And what’s interesting is that the biblical narrative is filled with losers and failures. And not as counter examples, not as signs for why you should follow Yahweh so you can avoid failure. Rather, the crazy thing about the biblical text is that its central figures—its heroes, if you will—are failures. From infertile Sarah and Abraham to stuttering Moses to little David to the peasant Jesus from Godforsaken Galilee. It seems that the God of Israel likes losers; after all, Israel itself is qualified to be God’s people because they are small and insignificant. They are failures.

So I want to make an argument that I hope won’t be misconstrued or confusing—but I think the God of Israel is a God who embraces failure, who actually uses failure as the fuel for God’s own action in the world. I know, I know that this could be misused or misunderstood, opening up to some pretty crappy abusive practices—but honestly, so can making success the measure of God’s activity. So let me explain.

Throughout the biblical story, you have a God who acts from what theologians call ex nihilo, out of nothing. What this means is that God is not dependent on anything in creation or humanity to act, that God creates life out of nothing. Not only is creation ex nihilo, but from the ex nihilo of Sarah’s womb comes Isaac; from the ex nihilo of the virgin womb comes Jesus. God takes what is nothing, what is dead, and brings forth life.

I’m actually quite convinced that the Christian story is the story of a God who takes all that is dead, placing Godself in death, so that life might spring ex nihilo, out of death. God, throughout the biblical story, moves from death to life. If that is so, it is no wonder that this God, who places Godself in death, uses failures and losers—those with nothing, those knowing nothingness—to be God’s instruments and vehicles in the world.

So how do you deal with failure? Not by looking on the bright side; that’s just an optimistic candy coating that makes the failure go down easier. No, the way to deal with failure is grieve the hell out of it; to feel it; to be angry about it; to cry and cry; to be brave enough to get inside it and know it; and then, to take it and seek God in it because this God takes what is dead and brings forth life. The way to deal with failure is to trust in prayer, anger, hope, and fear that the God of failure will move out of our failure. Don’t make failure good; it isn’t (even the funny stuff). But in its horror, in its pain, seek God, knowing that this God promises to be present where there is failure, suffering, and death. This God takes failure into Godself so that from the darkness of reality, a light of life might break in.

Why is the theology of play an important piece in our spiritual puzzle?

Sarah Arthur

“Theology of play” was the buzz in the early ’70s—an attempt, I’m guessing, to incorporate the more positive aspects of the ’60s into the American church’s self-understanding. After centuries of straight-laced decorum, in which the goal of the mainline church was to produce good citizens of democratic capitalism, the cultural revolution of the ’60s posed a serious threat to all things, well, serious. While churches had various knee-jerk reactions against such a threat, minor voices began wondering whether this was just what the church needed—less decorum, less seriousness, less didactic, word-based teaching, and more play, more movement, more art, more joy in the Lord.

Enter such things as Christian clowning, the famous painting of Jesus laughing, and Godspell. Youth for Christ and Asbury Theological Seminary gave us the Christian music festival in 1970. The creative worship movement gave us puppets and liturgical dance. One could even trace the beginnings of Youth Specialties in the late ’60s to the call for more play. Indeed, one could trace the beginnings of youth ministry as we know it to that movement.

Sometimes these approaches failed to rise above the painfully pointless (e.g., endless rounds of Chubby Bunny) or the painfully hilarious (e.g., giant puppets entering the sanctuary during the processional). Indeed, the church began to realize that play for play’s sake was not the thing. But there were occasional glimpses of real, deep, and abiding joy. I remember, for instance, watching a performance of Godspell as a teenager. Sorrow gripped me as the character of Jesus was carried offstage by his grieving friends—and profound joy flooded in when he ran smiling back down the center aisle to join in the closing number. Who knew that dancing clowns would help me experience the power of the resurrection?

Fast forward to 2010, and the theology of play, loosely understood, is taken for granted—especially in youth ministry. Many youth workers still, despite numerous trips to the ER, secretly believe that Capture the Flag has inherent formational value. If we can turn the Parable of the Sower into a skit, the assumption is that more teens might be saved. While clowns and puppets are so last century, we are not above incorporating the Old Spice guy into our announcements (“Look at your youth pastor—now look at me—now back to your pastor—now back to me”). The roles have reversed, and it’s the minor voices that are calling for more seriousness, more contemplation, more actual learning.

And here we confront the dilemma that continues to plague youth ministry: play or learning? Champions of play argue that teens need to move, have fun, build community through games, escape from the pressures of everyday life for a while. Champions of learning argue that our task as youth workers is to preach the gospel and make disciples, not to make more experts at Guitar Hero. But I suspect this is a false dichotomy, born from a thin understanding of the true nature of both play and learning.

There is not space enough to tackle both play and learning as thoroughly as they deserve, but suffice it to say we must find a kind of balance. Physical movement and imaginative engagement, which are at the heart of play, have the potential to embed knowledge in our muscles and hearts in ways that didactic teaching cannot. But this is not to say that anything goes: not every kind of play embeds knowledge or even the right kinds of knowledge. And meanwhile, the goal of the Christian life is not to become walking encyclopedias of information about God, Jesus, and the Bible. The goal isn’t knowledge for knowledge’s sake but knowledge for the sake of acting as God’s reconciling agents in the world.

Perhaps this tension is best summed up in the words of British author G. K. Chesterton: “The more I considered Christianity, the more I found that while it had established a rule and order, the chief aim of that order was to give room for good things to run wild” (Orthodoxy, 1908).

In your youth ministry, what is that rule and order? What are the good things that you want to run wild?

[1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Christian_music_festival

Mike King

Play is important because play is something human beings were created to do. The Bible is mostly silent concerning an explicit position on the issue of play. However, the Scriptures mention play, dance, creativity, and celebration often.

Play is something children naturally engage in. In Mark 10:14–16, Jesus says, “‘Let the little children come to me; do not stop them; for it is to such as these that the kingdom of God belongs. Truly I tell you, whoever does not receive the kingdom of God as a little child will never enter it.’ And he took them up in his arms, laid his hands on them, and blessed them.”

Children, driven by wild curiosity and endless amounts of energy, naturally play, pursue fun, entertain themselves, and enjoy even the simplest discoveries. It seems a stretch for me not to believe that Jesus had the joy, frivolity, and wonder of a child in mind when he declared that they had discovered a posture toward life that “kingdom of God” people must embrace. Also, the prophet Zechariah lays out an eschatological vision that describes boys and girls playing (Zechariah 8:5). There are many childish things we must put aside when we grow up, but playing should not be one of them.

I think this kind of question is good because it makes us think and deal with one of many issues that have been ignored by a dualistic view of life. This kind of mindset prioritizes spiritual things (a very short list) as the serious things that should get all of our attention, and everything else is, at best, necessary but tolerated nonspiritual things (like eating and sleeping), to those really really nonspiritual activities that are frivolous, maybe even sinful (like exercising, playing, recreation, and having fun).

Robert Johnston, who wrote The Christian at Play, quotes Augustine to make the case that the issue of play has been a controversy for a long time. “From the time of Augustine down to the present era, Christians have often been suspicious of play. For Augustine, conversion to Christianity meant a conversion from a life of play. To him, even eating was sinful if done in a spirit of pleasure.”1 This way of thinking was fueled further in the modern period by the Protestant work ethic. An all work and no play lifestyle was one of the evidences that God had truly redeemed a person.

An adult who still finds time to maintain a rhythm of play has discovered an important aspect of living. Our broader culture has many stereotypes (some merited) about Christians. One is that Christians don’t have fun. Friedrich Nietzsche, a 19th-century philosopher, declared, “No one in my parents’ church ever had fun.”

Theologian Robert Hotchkins insists: “Christians ought to be celebrating constantly. We ought to be preoccupied with parties, banquets, feasts, and merriment. We ought to give ourselves over to veritable orgies of joy because of our belief in resurrection. We ought to attract people to our faith quite literally by the fun there is in being a Christian.”

The issue of play in youth ministry has come up a lot in conversations about programs, events, and activities and their roles in youth ministry praxis. It is an important critique to insist that youth ministry should be more than fun, games, and activities in order to engage meaningfully in the Christian formation of our youth. At the same time, though, to hold a position that doesn’t include a theology of play is a big mistake. And by theology of play, I don’t mean making a cheesy spiritual application to a game of Capture the Flag or describing how our life is like a volleyball that sometimes gets hit out of bounds. Please!

The simplicity of playing is enough, and it is spiritual. Playing should be considered an important aspect of what it means to live life to the full, made possible by Jesus Christ.

For more information on this issue consider…

Theology of Play, by Jurgen Moltmann, Harper & Row, 1972

Gods and Games: Toward a Theology of Play, David Miller, Harper & Row, 1974

The Christian at Play, by Robert K. Johnston, Wipf & Stock Publishers, 1997

[1] Augustine, Confessions, trans. F. J. Sheed, New York: Sheed & Ward, 1942, X, 31.

Brooklyn Lindsey

“In Jesus’ name we play and we pray. Amen.”

Our high school pastor , Rick Gebauer, often ends his prayers with that phrase. More than a pithy play on words, it’s a statement of belief that it’s just as important to play in Jesus’ name as it is to pray in it.

But why? Is it because youth leaders love to play? Partly. But there is a bigger reason—whether we recognize it—that we play. Playing makes us free. Play is a hospitality that we provide to each other that says, I’m okay with you—just as you are.

I read a book once titled Reaching Out, by Henri Nouwen, on the three movements of spiritual life. I can’t quote it exactly, but I remember learning this important truth: When we reach out to each other with hospitality and care, we open ourselves up to be vulnerable. We expose our own humanness and give others the opportunity to see us up close, which frees the receivers of our hospitality to be themselves as well. It’s a grace we can give.

I believe play is important for the same reason. I’m imagining the game of Ultimate Banana we played on the mission trip this summer. It’s like Ultimate Frisbee—same rules, except with a banana. Many of us stink at catching flying banana peels. I end up with goo in my face, teeth, and hair. I’m a horrible tosser. There are some who are better than me. But we play on. We laugh. We free each other to be losers, to be winners, to just be part of something we do together.

One of our volunteer youth leaders loves to play. When at camp, on youth trips, or riding in a bus, you’ll always find Garrett at the center of a group with a deck of cards playing Mafia or with some cups around a table, trying to teach 13-year-olds rhythm. A few things are guaranteed when Garrett is involved. There will be laughter. Someone will be embarrassed. Everyone will enjoy the said person’s embarrassment. Then someone else will take a turn. Jokes will be made. Legends will thrive, and new understandings of each other form as competitiveness, shyness, spunk, creativity, imagination, wonder, randomness, and hilarity collide in sheer joy and memory.

Play is a grace we can give and receive. If done in healthy environments with leaders who understand its power and gift, it can free us from a world of stress and deliver us into a body that can open its doors to let us in.

The late Mike Yaconelli always encouraged us to play and play hard. He called us all to live our lives in dangerous wonder and childlike faith. As a member of the affirmation team at the National Youth Worker’s Convention one year, Mike applauded me not for all the notes I had written to youth workers. He applauded my efforts to load a remote-control truck with candy with the intent of crashing it into people as they walked along. He later helped me take down signs of encouragement all over the conference center. We had fun balling the tape up together and throwing it at people. Mike lived in the moment. He played when he could have been calling the shots. And it made a difference to me and so many. I felt at home with Mike.

I would like to play with the same presence and purity of heart that Mike did. I would like to know the power and freedom that comes in playing together. I should remember that God helps us to play when we don’t feel like it. And play may be that one thing that unlocks the tough kid or the shy soul.

Play. It’s important. May we always play (and pray) in Jesus’ name.

In what ways does befriending someone whom you find it difficult to like bring you closer to God?

Chris Folmsbee

Every one of us has people in our lives whom, for whatever reason, we find it hard to like. The idiosyncrasies of others can drive us batty if we let them. We know too well the specific things that some people do to get under our skin and take us to a place of complete irritation, frustration, and sometimes even fury. For that reason, we tend to separate ourselves from the people who raise those emotions in us. There are some people who just drive us mad! Conversely, each of us drives others mad! It is just the way humanity works.

We’ve all heard the well-known saying, “Fate chooses our relatives; we choose our friends.” We typically choose our friends for a variety of reasons. Some of us choose our friends because we have like-minded interests or because we like the way someone makes us feel or we like to be in charge or we don’t like to be in charge or because we want to be like the others we are befriending. Whatever the reason, I am confident you don’t look for the people who are hardest to like to befriend. Why intentionally inflict such lunacy upon ourselves? We’d rather just steer clear of the insanity and be in control of our relationships, just like we like to control everything else in our lives.

Honestly, I think the reason we don’t befriend the people we don’t like has more to do with ourselves than the other person. We are often unwilling to negotiate our emotions and instead just abandon the people we find it hard to like. It is easier to dump the agitations and be about what we want. It is easier to be in control of our relationships. This control issue comes from largely from the fear that we will be thought of in one way or another as onlookers make judgments of us according to whom we befriend and whom we don’t.

Befriending those we find it hard to like does bring us closer to God. First, it releases our desire for control, allowing us to receive the powerlessness that God demands. Releasing control is saying, “You are God and I am not.”

Second, it takes our eyes off ourselves and places them on others. We befriend those we find it difficult to like because we want to be people of kindness and grace who extend God’s love and restoration—kingdom people.

Third, we befriend those we find it difficult to like because in doing so, we reveal the story of Jesus. Revealing the story of Jesus is to reveal the gospel. To reveal the gospel is to reveal the mission of God. To participate in the mission of God is to join in the activity of restoring the world to its intended wholeness.

Fourth, we are brought closer to God though a process of self-transcendence. When we are able to recognize our own faults, weaknesses, and annoying characteristics, we put ourselves in a place where we can learn from others, realizing that our lives are not without need for ongoing development. In other words, we begin to see in others (even the ones we find it hard to like) the very things that we need to make our lives more whole or complete.

Finally, when we befriend people we find it difficult to like, we tell God the truth about who we are—people in need of love, care, and friendship. When we tell God the truth, we awaken forgiveness. When we awaken forgiveness, we open our lives to a greater level of mercy and, in some cases, even pardon. Because God pardoned us, we too, therefore, ought to pardon others. In this way we are brought closer to God.

Danny Kwon

When I first read this question, I was puzzled. What does it mean to befriend someone who is “difficult to like?” What does it mean for someone to be “difficult to like?” Perhaps I am “difficult to like?” The nature of this question could make a person consider a variety of relationships. Could it be a co-worker you don’t get along with? Could be it a person you are forced to work with? Could it be a friend of a friend whom you need to develop a relationship with? Could it be a difficult parishioner? Could it be a student in your youth group? Could it be a parent who is antagonistic?

These were just a few of the various people in my life whom I considered and whom I believe I am called to nurture relationships with, no matter how difficult it may be. However, I do believe that these relationships are certainly worthwhile, and moreover, they do truly bring me closer to God in many ways.

For instance, I know that when I feel like I am dealing with a difficult person, while I may try to initially resolve the difficulties myself, it is often not easy. Hence, I am glad that in this way, it turns me to prayer and dependence on God. In doing so, I believe that I am opening myself up to God’s grace and accountability and letting myself be examined by God amidst the difficult situation. As Psalm 139:23 says, “Search me, O God, and know my heart; test me and know my anxious thoughts.” As I pray this prayer, I can sense God’s Spirit reveal to me my sin in the difficult situation, how I may need to humble myself, and in what ways I need to change.

More importantly, however, it is the general movement of God in my heart that draws me closer to him that I find I am most grateful for. Difficult situations, especially in relationships, can be taxing, painful, and hurtful. However, I am thankful that ultimately, God uses these situations to draw me closer to him.

Another way these difficult situations draw me closer to God is that is in those times when I feel like I have been hurt, personally attacked, or treated unjustly, it helps me to remember that Christ—despite his hurt and having an unjust punishment placed on him at Calvary—was able to forgive those who wronged him. We all know the words Christ exclaimed on the cross: "Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do." In his act of forgiveness, he was also turning to God the Father. In my journey, as I struggle with the times I have to deal with a difficult situation with another person, and especially when I feel that injustice is present, I am thankful that it turns me to God.

Finally, trying to befriend someone who is “difficult to like” draws me closer to God because I again realize the greatness and need of the love of God in my life. Moreover, it is the reason and motivation that I can love and reach out to those who are even difficult to love. First John 4:19 says, “We love because he first loved us.” When I find it difficult to love a “difficult person,” I always remember that “…God demonstrates his own love for us in this: While we were still sinners, Christ died for us.” Subsequently, since he does love me so much, I am also called to love even those who are “difficult to love.”

Claire Smith

It would be pretty boring if everyone was exactly how we wanted them to be. Where would the challenge in life be, that challenge that keeps us more in touch with who we are, that forces us to look at ourselves time and time again, and if we’re honest, that makes us pray some more for grace and strength?

So everyone doesn’t really “suit our taste,” just as every flower or food or animal doesn’t. Always there are things and people that are more palatable than others. Think about it: Would you want it to be any different? God in God’s infinite wisdom has created this earth with a great deal of variety. This variety affords us the opportunity to learn about other types of life, ways of living, and ways of viewing the world. However, sometimes it’s easier to stick with the people we like rather than stretching ourselves and making adjustments to deal, live, and work with the others who are not likeable. It stretches us too much. Yet real community comes out of the reaching and accommodating and stretching.

When we encounter someone we do not immediately like, we have a choice. We can erect a fence, or we can find ways to reach out and discover the likeable aspect(s) of that person. We can also reach within to discover what has been stirred inside ourselves to cause us not to find that person agreeable. You may say that we do not always have a choice because sometimes we have to interact with those we do not like. Yet we really do have a choice. Even though we may physically have contact with those we do not appreciate, we can withdraw and build psychological, emotional, and mental fences. There is one more option: we can recognize in that person God’s creation and with God’s help reach in and reach out.

It’s easy to blame the other person for not being likeable, but could there be something in ourselves that needs adjusting, and could this be God’s way of encouraging that adjustment? Could it be that we have a limited understanding of God’s love and God is bringing us to a more perfect understanding? We tend to pray when we’re challenged. Thus, when we encounter someone we do not like, let us reach out to that person and pray that this God-appointed meeting and journey may allow the love of God to be more perfected in us and Christ’s image to be better formed in us as we draw nearer to God. How can we help our students to live this?

Other than books developed specifically for youth workers, what kind of books should a youth worker be reading on a regular basis?

Chris Folmsbee

If we are going to move toward becoming more and more about holistic youth ministry (think: the whole of people, not programs), then youth workers must be reading books (and blogs, journals, magazines, etc.) in a variety of genres.

Before I list what I believe are some very important genres to be reading and interacting with, let me first give a few reasons why I think reading helps youth workers. For many youth workers it isn’t so much a question of which genre to be reading but whether one chooses to read at all. Last week I asked a youth worker if he had read a certain book. His response? “I don’t have time to read.”

5 Very Simple Reasons Why Youth Workers Should Read

Reading can ignite your imagination. We all know the importance and effects of an active imagination. I speak to youth workers who often tell me they are bored with their jobs. While working with people is different all the time, the ways that these youth workers work with people is often ordinary and repetitive. Reading can help lift you out of the mundane and inspire you to new ideas and practices.

Reading can help you become a better communicator. Regularly interacting with the thoughts of others through reading can help you develop a better vocabulary, better understand how to construct sentences, provide examples of ways in which to bring new definition to an old word, etc.

Reading can help you become a better communicator simply because you interact more with language and words. Experiencing the use of words through others can help you build a meaningful array of useful words to use in your own context.

Reading can help you stretch you. We’re all lifelong learners, or at least should be. So reading the thoughts, ideas, etc., of others can often lead you to think about topics you might not normally think about. For me, it is often the ideas of others that lead me to thinking beyond myself. Most of the time I am forced to think about new and challenging things through reading the thoughts of others, not through my own discovery.

Reading can be a stress reliever. Because so many of us take on the stress of others and pile it on our own stressors, we need to have direct outlets of relief. Some fish, hunt, golf, or play Wii. Some read. Reading can stimulate your mind and at the same time be a creative and healthy way to relax. Some of you already know this because this is how you relax. Others of you have never tried it. If you haven’t tried to read for relaxation’s sake, give it a try. You might be surprised how it helps you.

Reading can help you do your job better. A lot of what we read is either directly or indirectly the experiences of others through story. Often the experience of others can help us realize our strengths or weaknesses. You can learn about yourself through reading, and you can learn a lot about how to do your job better through the successes and failures of others. The most recent example of this for me is the book Rework, by Fried and Hansson.

Book Genres Youth Workers Should Read:

• Theology: because youth ministry is a theological endeavor.

• Leadership: because we all need to be better leaders.

• Education: because so much of what we do is teach.

• Sociology: because the world and people change, and we need to know how and why.

• Religious: because other faith traditions have good thoughts on life too.

• Art/Culture: because the creative expressions of others can help you be more creative yourself.

• Politics: because youth workers are citizens too.

• Anything else that makes you smile, laugh, or just plain have fun and relax: because if you don’t, one day the stress will become so overwhelming that you’ll think throwing in the towel is the best solution. It may be the best solution, but let it be because you decided it, not that another factor or set of circumstances decided it for you.

Mike King

Youth workers: Please read books other than books developed for and marketed toward youth workers. Rarely does a specific youth ministry book come out that legitimately deserves the label “must be read by youth workers.”

One of the recent books deserving the must-read label for youth workers is Andy Root’s Revisiting Relational Youth Ministry: From a Strategy of Influence to a Theology of Incarnation.

With that out of the way, I will organize my response to the question above into two categories.

First Category: Books that help you become a better youth worker.

I believe there are books that should be read by youth workers who are involved in the Christian formation of young people in the realm of an ecclesial context. Yes, this category includes books written specifically for youth workers directly, but I believe this category should primarily be made up of books not written specifically for youth workers. We should be reading books that help us think more deeply about faith, ecclesiology, anthropology, sociology, adolescent development, culture, history, business, leadership, communication, economics, psychology, and above all, theology.

Books like Peter Senge’s The Fifth Discipline: The Art & Practice of the Learning Organization and Edwin Friedman’s A Failure of Nerve: Leadership in the Age of the Quick Fix helped me to become a systems thinker and shaped me as a leader of a complex youth ministry organization.

Reading books about the developmental theories of Jean Piaget, Lawrence Kohlberg, Erik Erikson, and others help me gain a fuller understanding of the dynamics of adolescent development.

Books like Life Together, by Dietrich Bonhoeffer, and anything by Lesslie Newbigin broaden my horizon concerning the church and the mission of the church in our culture.

The books in this category broaden my understanding of how the world works, how people interact with one another, how I can communicate better, how conflict is resolved, how to organize, how to interpret the changing landscape of culture, how to think about what it means to be a faithful church in the culture in which we live, and on and on.

Second Category: Books that help you become a better human being.

These types of books should inspire you to be a better person, to be more fully human and more fascinated with life, love, and faith. What are the subjects and interests that make you feel alive? What fires your imagination and fills you with passion? Read books that inspire you. Maybe it’s science fiction, a compelling biography, the beauty of poetry, or the classics that stir your soul. Keep reading. Be a lifelong learner.

Often the two categories I’m using to classify what youth workers should read overlap for me. I find few things more deeply moving and spiritually energizing than reading theology. Athanasius’s On the Incarnation, Walter Brueggemann’s The Prophetic Imagination, Jürgen Moltmann’s The Crucified God, and N.T. Wright’s The Resurrection of the Son of God challenge my faith and move me deeper into love and life with God.

I find that often when I feel closest to God, I’m drawn to poetry. English Poet William Wordsworth defined poetry as "the spontaneous overflow of powerful feelings: it takes its origin from emotion recollected in tranquility."

It is really sweet when I find treasure in a book that combines several of my interests into a feast of literary delight. My favorite novel accomplished this for me. I was in my early twenties when I first read The Source, by prolific American novelist James Michener. The Source is an epic novel tracing the history of the Middle East, beginning in the Stone Age and going up to the modern state of Israel. The story unfolds through fictional characters who are creatively linked to archaeological artifacts that are uncovered at various levels of a modern-day excavation of an ancient tell by a group of archaeologists. This book is absolutely fascinating, exploring such themes as the development of monotheism, culture, religion, politics, etc., over millennia of history.

The Source fired my interest in history, archaeology, the geography of the land of the Bible, world religions, Scripture, and much more. In my office I proudly display my collection of archeological antiquities I’ve gathered over the years. I’m passionate about the history, politics, and cultures of the Middle East. In 21 trips to the Middle East, I’ve taken hundreds of young people and youth workers with me in hopes that they would become as fascinated with this part of the world and its connection to our heritage as I am. Pretty powerful ramifications emerged for my life and ministry from “just a novel.”

Read, read, read…

I saved the best for last—Scripture, the Bible, Sacred Text, the Word of the Lord—whatever you want to call it is okay with me. Just read it, love it, live it, study it, meditate on it, embrace it, embody it, rediscover the beauty and power of the story of God at work in the world. God’s story is not for yesterday. It is the continuous unfolding of the Spirit’s transforming narrative in our current reality.

Dave Rahn

Based on my conversations with youth workers, our lives are too full of über-urgent activities to read. Too bad. I’m my best version of myself when I’m regularly reading.

It’s still important for me to read something from God’s Word every day. I don’t beat myself up when I miss, like I once did. But this is the intake that trumps all other reading as nourishment for my soul, which is, by the way, my chief reason for reading. I don’t want my innermost Dave to shrivel up for lack of sustenance.

There is another category of books I recommend for constant nibbling. Some books are rooted in Scripture and aspire to teach, coach, and encourage me. Tim Keller’s The Prodigal God and Counterfeit Gods are both new titles that accomplish this end. Whatever John Stott writes also gets me there, as do the works of Watchman Nee. I come away from this sort of reading having been taken on a deep-dive tour guide through some portions of the Bible, satisfied because of the unique power of God’s Word and more prepared to live faithfully.

I think God also enriches our vision when we read books that are theologically upstream from our current assignments. Ron Sider’s Rich Christians in an Age of Hunger messed me up at a time when I thought all I was supposed to do with kids was attract them to meetings where I could challenge them to begin a personalized relationship with Christ. Howard Snyder wrote a few books, including The Problem of Wineskins, that both anchor and stretch how I understand a local church’s form and function. Though these books are not directly written for youth workers, they can help us move into the mature depths we need to lead well.

I happen to be a student of leadership formation, the process of change, and organizational culture. Books in this category are often not explicitly Christian, but they have sure been relevant to my world. A while ago it was Peter Drucker and Chris Argyris; now Patrick Lencioni, Stephen Covey, Tom Peters, Peter Senge, Jim Collins, and Seth Godin crank out books I value. I’m not sure everyone should share these particular interests of mine, but I do think it is wise to cultivate diverse reading interests that have professional application.

When the rare research-based book is published with youth ministry relevance, I am eager to pore over it. Christian Smith has made fabulous contributions lately. (By the way, I don’t tend to put Barna in this category—he does solid research but overreaches too often for my taste when it comes to implications.)

I also love reading a few books each year that are pure fun. These need to be page turners, books I have trouble putting down, wonderful stories of escape. There was a day when fantasy novels did the trick. More recently, John Grisham mysteries are my taste.

I don’t know about you, but the creative part of my soul enjoys the chance to soar over varied landscapes now and again.

Kurt Rietema

Kara Powell

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Why is the theology of play an important piece in our spiritual puzzle?

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In what ways does befriending someone whom you find it difficult to like bring you closer to God?

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Other than books developed specifically for youth workers, what kind of books should a youth worker be reading on a regular basis?

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