Came across a great post from Ben Cantelon the other week which is all about something that has occupied my mind constantly since I started working for BCY. His angle on it is obviously from a worship leading perspective, but it applies really well in other contexts, too…
Essentially it boils down to this - we need to strive to hear God and pursue the call he has given to us.
We should ask, 'who has he called me to be?', not, 'who has he called me to be like?'
So, to ask that question for me means looking at everything I get asked to do in the light of our core mandate to be in schools, delivering quality, Christian input wherever, whenever and however we can.
I just wanted to write about how the pressure to compromise this can come from a couple of areas - outside and inside.
Outside
It's easy to feel as if we need to keep 'trendy'. Does what we do fit with the latest models of youth ministry? Sometimes it’s as if we should be wearing WWHD wrist bands - ‘What would Hillsong do?’ OR WWSSD - 'What would Soul Survivor do?'
It's easy for people to pressure us - when they either ask (or sometimes tell..) you to get involved with things that you know will water down your effectiveness. Or basically tell you that you’ve failed the ‘bums on seats’ test. Or that your predecessor would never have done it like that…
In those instances I think it’s right to stand firm and say a gracious, 'No!'. It's not always easy, and often people find it difficult to take. But believing God has placed a call on me to do schools work, in school first and foremost, I know it's vital not to get side-tracked into things that might call me away from that.
So, we chopped the monthly upper school events (which had died a death, had a horrendous reputation amongst the kids and, in fact, are the kind of thing that churches do better than us.)
I endeavour to meet regularly with CU leaders, but I don’t run weekly discipleship groups for them. This is partly because that need is something I feel is the responsibility of the local churches they attend, and partly because my priority is planning and delivering excellent Christian-based stuff to kids who aren’t yet Christians.
I hope that ppl are starting to get why I do this - even though I still often get asked why we don't run monthly events for upper school kids, or why we decided not to do that discipleship thing that the previous worker did...
Inside
I think it's also easy to start to feel pressure from the inside (from ourselves).
When we look around and wish we had so-and-so's youthwork, or try and do a copy and paste job from such-and-such a successful youth ministry. To get frightfully depressed about how small your youth group is, how untrendy your haircut is and how you really want to say the word ‘sick’ but you’ll never be as street as the new youth worker down the road…
But, actually, I am not so-and-so. And such-and-such may well simply not work in my context, character or calling.
There's no harm in looking about for good practice. There’s also no harm in looking up to, and talking regularly to, ppl doing the same thing elsewhere, and doing so successfully – having heroes, I guess you would call it.
But it's vital to stay focused on the unique stuff God has called us to do, not wish our ministries away or, worse, undermine and sabotage our ministries from the inside by trying to be a person we’re not, doing something God has not called us to do anyway!
When we try and be someone we’re not, doing something that is just not us, as well as spending energy on our young people, we are spending it on maintaining a front. Youth work is hard and tiring enough, ppl…! It also models lying and pretence to your young people and sets yourself up to fail, because, at some point, you will be found out.
Cantelon says this at the end of his blog: We don’t need more of the same thing, we need more of the new thing, more of the true thing. And the only way that will come about is if we are true to ourselves and true to who God has made us to be.
Caveat
This is not to say that wanting to do something along the lines of what someone else is doing is always going to dilute your calling.
This is not to say that everything anyone else ever says to you about your ministry will be a distraction and must be ignored. Keep an ear out for wise, prophetic people who can speak with authority into what you’re doing.
We've got to pray for discernment to know what is God, what is you, and what is outright from the enemy.
Affirmation
The Bible has a few things to say on this...
Romans 8:28 – called according to his purposes
- not according to the latest trend; not according to your hobby horse; not according to the agenda of x, y or z person
Phil 1:6 – he who began a good work in you will carry it on to completion until the day of Christ Jesus
- God started something unique in each one of us when we got saved. He called us then to follow Christ, and from that point it is actually about figuring out what that means for us individually. From the general call to salvation, to the specific call he has placed on our lives. Part of him completing his work in us is that we keep listening to him, persevering in what he is saying. What God starts, he finishes!
Phil1:9-11 is my prayer for all of us youth work bods out there - whoever we may be...
9And this is my prayer: that your love may abound more and more in knowledge and depth of insight, 10so that you may be able to discern what is best and may be pure and blameless until the day of Christ, 11filled with the fruit of righteousness that comes through Jesus Christ—to the glory and praise of God.
Feel free to comment!
blessings...
:)