Justice Hits Close to Home (Part One)
by Kara Powell
I was midway through my Wednesday night youth group clean up routine. Working with a team of student leaders and adult volunteers, we were stowing away our sound system, stacking up chairs, and scooping up the candy wrappers and smashed paper cups that littered our youth room floor.
But then came a not-so-routine conversation, one that forever altered the way I involve parents in justice and service. Two mothers walked up to me, both of whom were concerned about their fourteen year-old sons.
The mother who reached me first shared her anxiety: “Ever since the series that you taught on missions, my son keeps saying he wants to go to Guatemala on a short-term mission trip this summer. I lay awake at night, worried that something bad will happen to him. He’s only fourteen and I’m afraid he’ll get hurt.”
The second mother, having overheard the first mom, sighed and shared one of the more convicting statements I’ve ever heard one parent share with another. “I wish that was my problem. My son doesn’t want anything to do with church or God anymore, and I think his friends are into drugs. I’d give anything to have a son who wants to serve the Lord in Guatemala this summer.”
Was the first mother wrong to be concerned about her son’s safety? Of course not, but seeking to right wrongs through acts of justice and service are always risky on some level. Perhaps the deeper issue was her hesitation about justice work in the first place. God was inviting her son to participate in the kingdom through acts of justice, but allowing her son to RSVP to that invitation felt way too uncomfortable.
As youth workers, the justice invitation we extend doesn’t stop at the in-box of the fourteen year-old. Like pretty much everything else we do in youth ministry, our impact on both the fourteen year-old and our planet will be magnified when we do the hard work of adding parents’ names to our invitation list.
[Kara Powell is the co-author of Deep Justice in a Broken World, and a main session speaker at Shift 2008. This blog post is the first in a series provided by Fuller Seminary's Center for Youth and Family Ministry. Other free resources and articles like this are available at www.cyfm.net]
I was midway through my Wednesday night youth group clean up routine. Working with a team of student leaders and adult volunteers, we were stowing away our sound system, stacking up chairs, and scooping up the candy wrappers and smashed paper cups that littered our youth room floor.
But then came a not-so-routine conversation, one that forever altered the way I involve parents in justice and service. Two mothers walked up to me, both of whom were concerned about their fourteen year-old sons.
The mother who reached me first shared her anxiety: “Ever since the series that you taught on missions, my son keeps saying he wants to go to Guatemala on a short-term mission trip this summer. I lay awake at night, worried that something bad will happen to him. He’s only fourteen and I’m afraid he’ll get hurt.”
The second mother, having overheard the first mom, sighed and shared one of the more convicting statements I’ve ever heard one parent share with another. “I wish that was my problem. My son doesn’t want anything to do with church or God anymore, and I think his friends are into drugs. I’d give anything to have a son who wants to serve the Lord in Guatemala this summer.”
Was the first mother wrong to be concerned about her son’s safety? Of course not, but seeking to right wrongs through acts of justice and service are always risky on some level. Perhaps the deeper issue was her hesitation about justice work in the first place. God was inviting her son to participate in the kingdom through acts of justice, but allowing her son to RSVP to that invitation felt way too uncomfortable.
As youth workers, the justice invitation we extend doesn’t stop at the in-box of the fourteen year-old. Like pretty much everything else we do in youth ministry, our impact on both the fourteen year-old and our planet will be magnified when we do the hard work of adding parents’ names to our invitation list.
[Kara Powell is the co-author of Deep Justice in a Broken World, and a main session speaker at Shift 2008. This blog post is the first in a series provided by Fuller Seminary's Center for Youth and Family Ministry. Other free resources and articles like this are available at www.cyfm.net]
Labels: conference
posted by Kara Powell at 9:23 PM
0 Comments:
Post a Comment
<< Home