Everyday Drama
I love what I do! It’s hard to imagine that for the last 3 years every dime that I have brought home to my family has been paid to me by faithful Christians who believe in student ministry.
One of the funny parts of what I do is that lots of times people look at it and say, “wow, that’s easy… You get paid to do this?” True enough, when I am taking students to fun places or cultural attractions or even on college visit weekends, my job looks fun because it is.
But at the same time they will say “you are pretty special, I wouldn’t want to do what you do.” For the most part this is because many adults are either afraid of dealing with adolescents or don’t want to learn the skills and patience to work with them on a daily basis.
In fact, and this is what makes me a weird person, I actually don’t mind the daily ups and downs of “teen angst.” I think it is fun to be a part of their growing up. I don’t see it like James Dobson describes it as “a tumultuous time” but rather an incredible time when God shapes men and women. At the end of the day I want to be a significant person in developing the next generation of Christian leaders. Hopefully, these will be the church leaders who welcome Christ back to earth for his millenial reign.
Certain frustrations
Lately I have been mired in relational no-mans land. This is what I mean, most of my “core students” are really wrestling with life… Here is what one of my leadership students posted in her blog the other day.
“everything changing when is turn around, all out of my control im a mobile” that’s how I feel. Like IM a mobie (like one of those things they hang above a baby’s crib that goes in circles, not a car) I’ve felt soo far away from my friends lately like no one wants to talk to me and stuff and i feel so let down, left out, and alone. i’ve also seen the bad sides of some people lately and it’s not too pretty. i don’t kno if it has always been there and i just never noticed or if it is just coming out now but it’s frustrating and kind of scary.
Reading that doesn’t scare me. It expresses true desires… She is saying “Life is changing and I want it to go backwards. I want things to be like they were when I was younger. But how this is manifesting itself in this student is scary. She is kranky, she is tough to be around. She has a lot to say but doesn’t say much to me.
Helping students understand their world
I’m here basically because it is a universal that parents and adolescents can’t talk. I wish I know why, but they just can’t talk about real life. Kids are wrestling with tremendous changes as they approach adulthood and almost all parents look at their teenagers and say “why can’t you be 9 forever?” Adolescents are wondering and looking for their place in the world while mom and dad are depressed that their little girl is growing up too fast.
Yesterday we had a chance to sit down with another student who was really wrestling with these developmental changes. She was ready to “give up” because she really wanted life to be simple… It only took me telling her the truth… Life is complicated… That stuff was always there but you didn’t see it… Now that you are getting older you are noticing these abstract realities… All relationships are messed up to one degree or another. What was manifesting itself to me was “PA has been rude to me and I won’t stand for it… I’m telling him to be nice to me or I am checking out of the youth group!” Most people are scared of that… I saw it as an awesome opportunity to teach her about how much she has grown in the last 12 months.
She posted in a comment to a friends blog bashing me:
I know what its like to feel rejected and stuff cuse that’s how I feel lately. And I’m gonna say something please don’t get mad…I talked to PA on Sunday, explained to him whats bothering me and stuff, and he was really cool about it. But also, his life isn’t really easy right now either, its not fair to him for us to expect him to always do whatever we want him to do and say whatever we want him to say. We take our stress out on him, so we can’t really complain about him taking his stress out on us, thats just what happens when you are close to somebody and around them a lot. We treat PA like crap and then we expect him to raise us up to a level thats higher then everybody else, including himself. Yes, he is a youth pastor and some of this comes with the job, but that doesn’t mean that he isnt a normal person, going though things that everybody else goes through, experiencing emotions that everybody, including you and I are feeling.
All of this is part of their process. When I shared with PB all of what was going on in the emotions of our students he said, “Aw man… Maybe you’ve got the wrong leaders identified…” I thought about that for a while. Maybe he was right? But then I thought some more. What he is seeing is adult immaturity… No crap, they are still kids! But at the same time they are influencer’s on their campus. They are growing up emotionally, physically, and spiritually… They might be a pain in the ass right now… But I love to see how much they are growing and to see the infantile potential of them as Christian leaders!
All this to say… Life is complicated. Beautiful, but complicated.
Most Commented Posts
- BROWSE / IN TIMELINE
- « Previous Post
- » do you belong?
- BROWSE / IN Uncategorized
- « Previous Post
- » do you belong?
SPEAK / ADD YOUR COMMENT
Comments are moderated.
