“Five Point Crankiness” December 30, 2010
Posted by mscrankypants in Baptist, Bible, Body of Christ, Christian, Christian Living, Christianity, Church, College Ministry, Faith, God, Jesus, ministry, Opinions, Postmodern, Religion, Youth Ministry.2 comments
General things that have made me cranky lately:
1) People put prematurely into leadership at church. My daughter knows a young man (he’s in his early to mid 20’s) who knows virtually nothing … and I mean NOTHING(!) … about the Bible or about the Christian faith. But he’s now been put into a position of upper leadership with both the college aged group and the high school youth group at church. (How stupid is that?)
2) Leadership in the high school youth group at church who are young in the faith and don’t have a clue how to live out their lives as godly young people. For example, one young woman’s idea of a good time is to go to bars, get drunk, and flirt with guys. But because she doesn’t officially “date,” she thinks she’s a good example of a Christian young person. She even leads small groups in both the high school and middle school ministries at church. (Hello?!)
3) Mission organizations that attempt to tack belief in Jesus onto the worship of foreign gods (or “idolatry”). Combining Christianity with other religions is called Syncretism … and it’s completely contrary to the Word of God. They’re not bringing people into the faith — they’re creating new religions instead.
4) Ministries to the “post-modern” world who attempt to become like them in word, action, deed, philosophy, etc., rather than minister to them from the position of propositional truth as revealed in the Word of God. These post-modern Christians discourage knowledge, discourage discovering truth (they don’t believe there is such a thing as “absolute truth”), and actually encourage deconstructing truths that have seen the Church through centuries of humanism, conflicting religious views, and even persecution. The post-modern world (read: post-“knowledge/thinking” world) doesn’t need the Church of Jesus Christ becoming just another option they can tack onto whatever the current wind of thought might be — the post-modern world needs the church standing up for TRUTH! God’s truth. The Bible’s truth. The faith handed down throughout the generations. The old, old story.
5) Pragmatism in the church. The idea that if a ministry doesn’t succeed (ie: “show the numbers”), then it’s dropped like a hot potato. What about missionaries who have struggled for years and years and years with essentially no measurable fruit, but they’ve spent all those years learning the language, translating the Word of God, building relationships, etc.? Planting and watering the seeds that someone else comes along and harvests later?
Adult adolescents December 29, 2010
Posted by mscrankypants in Bible, Body of Christ, Christian, Christian Living, Christianity, Church, College Ministry, Faith, God, ministry, Opinions, Religion, Spirituality, Youth, Youth Ministry.2 comments
A friend was telling me the other day about a book she’d read on recommendation from her son’s private Christian school. The basic premise of the book (unfortunately I can’t remember the title offhand) was that adolescence used to be something that occurred during a person’s teenage years and was usually over and done by about age 18 or 19. Then they’d move on into the adult world.
But now, according to the author, we have a world of adult adolescents … with their teenage years extending sometimes into their early 30’s until they finally grow up and function as adults.
I’d like to read this book just because it sounds like perhaps the author has thought through some issues that I’ve only recently become aware of, myself.
When my oldest daughter turned twenty several years ago, she was definitely well along the road to being a fully functional mature adult Christian woman. But the other young people at church were still essentially teenagers (even the ones we knew who were in their late 20’s and early 30’s). Even the ones who were married and doing things like going through seminary, were essentially having trouble navigating adult life because they really just wanted to sit around and play video games, drink beer, and hang out with their friends all day on the couch.
And it wasn’t just the young people at the church we attended at that time, either. It seemed to be pretty much across the board. My daughter has a number of school friends who’ve gone away to college and they end up seeing schoolwork and academics as secondary to partying and having fun. They’re basically majoring in “Having Fun.”
Whatever happened to the days when college kids worked hard to put themselves through school and made a huge effort to really learn something? The only thing these current kids seem interested in doing is continuing high school dynamics into their college setting (cliques, interpersonal drama, video games, etc.) … just throw in a little beer and a lot more freedom (and in some cases, a lot of beer). 😉
My daughter was visiting a friend on his campus, and she said that as evening came along, it was like the wild animals were let out of their cages. Nobody was studying or pursuing academics … they were just all yelling out their dorm windows and planning the next party.
I’m not saying all kids are like this (my daughter isn’t, for example), but I’ve definitely seen a change over the past 30 years of how “adult” young adults actually are. I got married at age 19 (which wasn’t the wisest thing to do, but that’s a whole ‘nother story), but when I look around me, I realize that even in the midst of our own stupidity and immaturity, my husband and I were really, honestly trying to make a go of it in the adult world. We paid our bills, worked hard, studied in school, limited the partying in favor of more important priorities (like homework and sleep and work schedules).
Yes, we were young and had fun, too, but we knew to balance the fun with the adult priorities of our lives. For example, my husband’s brother played in a band, and we’d frequently go dancing at whatever bar or club my brother-in-law was playing at … but we didn’t drink and drive, we didn’t stay out too late if we had to work the next day, and if we had a test at college, we’d pass on the dancing and bar-hopping all together.
My daughter and I have talked a lot about what’s wrong with the young people around her. She has a very difficult time finding young “adults” to befriend. Even amid the leadership in the college group at churches, many of them are still doing nothing more important with their lives than watching movies, playing video games, and taste-testing micro brews.
I have some thoughts about why this is happening, but this post has gotten long, so I’ll save some of my “why” thoughts for another day.
Are We Amputating Parts of His Body? February 2, 2007
Posted by mscrankypants in Baptist, Body of Christ, Christian, Christian Living, Christianity, Church, College Ministry, Faith, God, Jesus, ministry, Religion, Spirituality, Youth, Youth Ministry.3 comments
Our church has a ministry especially for the college aged people and other young adults (up to about age 30). On the surface, I think this sounds like a great idea. Young people can connect with others their age as they figure how to live out their life of faith in the context of today’s world. Great, so far.
I heard our Senior Pastor say the other day that when he retires in 15 to 20 years, he wants to hand off the leadership of the chuch to this new emerging generation. Yep, that makes sense. About the time the current leadership is ready to retire, the younger generation will be taking over the reins of ministry.
So far, so good. But remember, I’m Ms. Crankypants so of course I have a problem with all of this. Here it comes. 😉
The Bible is quite clear that one of the roles for older women in the church — women who’ve been married for awhile, successfully raised kids, and actually lived to tell about it(!) — are supposed to serve as mentors for the younger women. But if the younger women who are just starting their homes and families are all segregated off with their age-mates in their own church service, their own small groups, and their own ministry outreaches, at what point do the generations come in meaningful contact with each other?
I remember being a young mom and wishing there were older women in the church who I could rub shoulders with as I attempted to live out my faith in meaningful spiritual and practical ways. But the older women either weren’t there, or were all too busy with their careers, retirement plans, etc., to take time to walk alongside a fledgling mom like me and show me the ropes. I remember telling myself that when I found myself in the position of being one of the “older women”, I was going to make sure I was available to the next generation. Providing I didn’t grow up to be a complete spiritual imbecile, I wanted to be that “Titus Woman” for others coming behind me.
Well, now I’m getting close to that next stage of life. One child is grown … two others are quickly following. I’ve been married for nearly 30 years. I’ve almost hit half a century of plodding through this earthly life. Seems like it’s time to start looking around for opportunities to give into the lives of younger women.
But guess what? They’re no place to be found! They’re all hanging out with each other in church prescribed groups with others their age. It’s almost like they’re a small church within the larger church … but without any sort of meaningful contact with the older generations. It breaks my heart to see the walls … the official church programmed walls … that have been erected between the upcoming saints and the seasoned ones with wisdom and experience to share.
I can understand making connections with other people in your age group (we all need friends who can relate to our stage of life), but the Church (the Body of Christ) is made up of ALL ages and stages … young, old, healthy, sick, happy, broken-hearted, new moms, old moms, teens, elderly. Doesn’t it say in the Bible that the various parts of the Body aren’t suppose to say that they don’t need each other? The truth is, we all need each other deeply. Desperately. Iron sharpening iron, and all that.
Going back to that comment my pastor made about handing off the leadership to the younger generation someday, I find myself wondering just how prepared the next generation is going to be for that leadership role when they’ve been segregated away from the wisdom of their elders throughout all of their formative years (from those early preschool Sunday School classes to the college and post-college age groups)?
It seems to me that interaction with our age-mates is important … but should be secondary in the life of the Church. Otherwise we just end up with a bunch of feet teaching each other how to be a foot … rather than an entire body working together in unison.
For example, at our church, the younger generation has an entire church service that’s mainly just for them. It’s in the evening and is advertised as a way for the participants to get to sleep in on Sunday mornings. (Ugh.!!! Oh, sorry … had a cranky moment, there.) Anyway, my children and I go to the evening service but not so we can sleep in. We go to church at night so it frees us up to serve during the two Sunday morning worship services. Whether teaching Sunday School or ushering or helping with hospitality or working at an information table, we have the chance to serve the entire Body … plus we can still attend a worship service each week. It breaks my heart to think that all the young people in that evening service are being encouraged to sleep in, rather than to plug in and be of service to the rest of their local church body.
I think the younger generation has effectively been amputated at our church from the rest of the Body. And what happens to a limb that’s been amputated? Unless it’s saved quickly and reattached while life still remains, it dies.
I’m praying that somehow the living connections between the generations will reestablish themselves before it’s too late. I’d hate to see gangrene or rigor mortis set in.
Ms. Crankypants 