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Unexamined Impulse is Prejudice | #missional

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My buddy Sam Davidson at Cool People Care highlighted this 10 courageous actions to building community in your neighborhood community. It had me thinking that, 1. community is what people are looking for 2. people really do not know how to go about it anymore because we’ve spent a few generations segmenting our lives to our own personal bubbles. So when it comes to images of church, do we actually know how to build community? We might not..

So here’s some added thoughts to this list of actions for those who would be called ‘people of the church.’

  1.  Take interest in other people’s passions as much as you want them to be interested in yours. We all have ideas for how life should be. The thing is that, unless we are unsurpassed geniuses, we only see a small part of the picture. Asking others what they see can only enhance understanding. [Tough one, stop concerning yourself first and get on with someone else and the things that are important to them. We probably do this very well for a children, but when it comes to our neighbor?..]
  2. Become a mentor to others less involved in their community. In every community there is a small, overworked group of leaders who try to figure out everything for everyone. They go to all the meetings and take on huge loads of work while others are silent—until it is time for them to complain. This will not do. If you are such a leader, mentor someone with less experience. If you are not, approach someone and ask them to mentor you. [I have many gifts and skills that could be shared. Beyond my youth work, which I do this often, do I do that in avenues for people in my neighborhood? No, and that is not something I’m proud of. Could do better to share skill sets to others in my community and who knows the impact that could be.]
  3. Support a cause with no direct personal benefit. We are involved with things we care about the most. That’s natural. My experience tells me, however, that the most interesting and possibly most important discoveries happen in the spaces between interests and disciplines and ideologies. Step outside your natural zone—it’s necessary for uncovering new solutions. [Giving of self with out some “return on investment” is tough cultural impulse to break from. We go to church because we ‘get something’ be it uplifting feeling from worship, friendships, networking, etc. Love doesn’t expect or need a return.]
  4. Invite “them” to your meeting. It is convenient to show our importance by pitting “us” against “them.” But “they” may have insights that will help us better understand the problem and appreciate the marvelous tensions that form a healthy community. [With the diverse & numerous platforms of niche news and neighborhoods we have made it easier to only focus on & affirm our current viewpoints. If you are conservative church type what would it be to go to the liberal group meetings on/about the church? Is it scary to think you will find out they are real people like you?]
  5. Reject the tendency to blame. Everyone plays a role in the problem and everyone must participate in the solution. Practice compassion towards those who, like ourselves, unwittingly contribute to the problem they wish to solve. [We play victim many times. Accountability is hard to come by so much that it is treated in very conflicting manners when it happens. Poverty is an issue and instead of blaming some group or a system, what would happen if we all assumed responsibility for doing our part of the solutions.]
  6. Confront internal contradictions. Claiming that the problem is someone else’s doing conveniently absolves us from doing our part. If I drive my car to a transportation meeting and complain about traffic jams, it’s necessary that I acknowledge my contribution to that traffic. At the very least, acknowledge the irony of the situation. [Chances are we do not even realize the many depths to which we play a part in the problem]
  7. Practice industrial-strength listening. Do not react until you’ve received. [Holy Listening or Spiritual Direction should be part of every Christian’s practice]
  8. Render unto community… Shrink your home to what is necessary and conduct the rest of your life in the community. For example, resist a “theater” room and visit your local theater instead. Anytime you bump into others you make your community a bit stronger. [How big is your church that it becomes so much the focus of your ministry that you have no energy to do anything outside in the community?]
  9. Clarify your image of the future. I find that most decisions we make are shaped by impulses so deeply ingrained we fail to be aware of them. Unexamined impulse is prejudice. Examined impulse, once confirmed, is guidance that leads to something better. Examine your embedded assumptions, embrace the relevant ones, and discard the rest. What remains is a clear intuition, an image of a possible future. Then engage with others to make it a reality. [Know thy self. As Jesus asks, “Who do people say I am?” “Who do you say I am?”]
  10. Resist the temptation to choose between the ideal and the reality. Hold them both in your awareness. Learn to enjoy the creativity and humor this tension offers. It can be quite funny. [You can’t do everything otherwise you’ll get yourself in trouble, you can’t do nothing otherwise you are not living up to the calling of Jesus Christ.]

I went to listen to some songwriters perform a few weeks ago. In Nashville, events like these are easy to find. What I like most about these events is listening to the stories behind the songs. Usually, you’ll hear something like, “When I wrote this song with Joe and Tom…” or “As Jane and Wanda and I wrote this…” Go to enough of these and listen to enough of these stories and you’ll realize that no one writes songs alone. Look at the liner notes to any CD in your collection and you’ll see.

And, in Bill Gates’ recent piece for the BBC, he wrote:

Communication skills and the ability to work well with different types of people are very important too. A lot of people assume that creating software is purely a solitary activity where you sit in an office with the door closed all day and write lots of code. This isn’t true at all. Software innovation, like almost every other kind of innovation, requires the ability to collaborate and share ideas with other people, and to sit down and talk with customers and get their feedback and understand their needs.

In other words, we’re not alone. We can’t be our best alone. We need community like we need air, shoes and wi-fi.

There’s a difference, however, between community and communitas. Community can simply mean some sort of loose grouping, without any kind of real connection. Our neighborhood, our city, or our classmates can be considered our community. But we can still not know anything about another person in this community.

What we need then, is communitas. This is a Latin word that describes a more intense type of community – one that usually undergoes some sort of bonding experience or rite of passage together. Fraternities and sororities are a shallow form of this, sharing a common initiation ritual. Guys who stormed the beach at Normandy and firefighters are a more intense version.

Youth 2011 and Claiming Space

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Last week Kevin & I spent the week alongside my nephew & Josh Vegors putting together the ‘Sacred Space’ for Youth 2011 in Purdue. So what was this ‘Sacred Space?’ Well, it was a contemplative prayer & arts space that we set up that the youth could experience God on their own, where they were, and express that however they felt it.

The thing with crafting contemplative space is that you give up control. In a contemporary worship environment you can control the flow or the highs and lows of emotion through the time. When we do these contemplative spaces you set the stage, but whatever dance that happens after that is out of your control.

I was completely and beautifully reminded of this in this one moment at our Youth 2011 Sacred Space. Josh who was helping out started to take pieces of the artwork that the youth created and placing them in the hallway in a display type manner. Not part of my original plan but it is what he was led to do so we went with it. Hours later I was coming out of the sacred space room and I see this girl sitting on one of the chairs in the hallway. She looks distressed enough that it gave me some cause for concern. So I was just about to walk up to her and ask her if she was okay when I realized that she was actually visually meditating on the art pieces and probably in prayer. So I backed off.

To my surprise even more. She, just then, fell from her chair to her knees and proceeded to hold that prayer posture for some five to eight minutes. It was crazy. This was the freaking hallway.. There was not anything sacred about this hallway, until now. This youth broke some of my ideas of the space we set up in a contained room and took the sacred into the hallway and claimed it as something special.

I think it is neat that teens are wild and uncontrollable. God probably thinks they take after him.

Claiming Space as Sacred
Claiming Space as Sacred

 

Unity in Diversity

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“What we have most in common is not religion but humanity.” (An Altar in the World, Taylor; p. 102)

Recently, my family and I moved to Evanston, IL so that I could pursue my PhD at Garrett Evangelical Theological Seminary. As we explored Evanston, I was so excited to see all of the options of delightful restaurants in the area. There is a Greek restaurant around the corner, a Ethiopian restaurant down Chicago
Avenue, a Haitian restaurant less than two miles away from our house and a lovely authentic Mexican restaurant right downtown. As we explored some more, I also noticed that there was a Bah’ai Temple up the road, a Jewish synagogue around the corner, a Greek Orthodox community in the next neighborhood and more. What would this mean for my family and I who have spent the past four years in the bible belt of the USA?

It brought back memories of the lecture that I heard at the Princeton Forums for Youth Ministry last spring. Eboo Patel, the founder and leader of the Interfaith Youth Core, gave a lecture about being faithful to his religious tradition in a religiously diverse world. He talked about being Muslim in the diverse city of Chicago and raising his children to be Muslim in the midst of diversity. His nanny was a Columbian woman who was a devout Catholic and he was sending his children to a private Catholic school. The question he raised is, “How do I think about raising my kids in a religiously diverse world or working with youth in a religiously diverse world?” He went on to say that as a Sociologist, the question was much easier to answer, recognizing that in the United States, your child could have been born in a hospital founded by Jewish philanthropists, and the lead doctor could have been a Muslim, the nurse could have been Filipino Catholic and the person giving the epidural could have been Hindu. The reality is that in most of Urban and Suburban America, religious diversity is everywhere.

The challenge is: How do we nurture faith in the reality of religious diversity?

What Patel then shared was that from a non-personal, analytical perspective, all of that sounded good, until it became personal and he was raising his own children in the diversity of this world. Part of the role that we all must play, as parents and as youth leaders is to pass on our faith. In the reality of passing on our faith, we must also face the challenge of teaching “truth” amongst diversity in religious truths.

This brings us back to the age-old question of what is “TRUTH?” How do we teach biblical truth today? We cannot ignore the fact that we live next door to those who are Jewish, Muslim, Hindu, Buddhist. We cannot prevent our children from encountering people of other faiths, other traditions and other truths. In the Christian tradition, we have a compelling need to share our truth with others, because of our biblical mandate and mission of the church. (Matthew 28:18-20) So, where does this leave us as leaders in the church?

Historically, we have reacted in several ways:

  • We have ignored “the problem.” We have done everything in our power to prevent our children from ever having to face diversity by segregating them into sections and groups where everyone is the same. They think the same, act the same and sometimes even look the same.
  • We have approached it with violence. In our recent past, we have sought to wipe away others who are different from us, believing that if we just purge them from the world, the problem would be fixed.
  • We have completely given up our own faith and tradition to embrace a faith or tradition that feels better OR we have given up any faith or religious tradition all together.

I don’t believe any of these reactions have helped people in the world. All of these reactions have only made our children and youth even more disenfranchised and unwilling to encounter any god, let alone our Christian God. So, what is the response that the world needs today? What is the reaction that will incline people to becoming more loving, more caring and more considerate for all of creation? Anyone? What are your thoughts?

Amy Valdez Barker is a long time youth minister from the North Georgia Conference. Soon to be PhD student at Garrett Evangelical Theological Seminary working with the Vital Congregations Project.

7 Choices You Can Make To Keep From Losing Yourself in Youth Ministry

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I had a reality check six months ago while sitting in a volunteer training seminar. Our instructor suggested that youth ministry volunteers focus on their hobbies and figure out creative ways to get the youth to participate too (a youth flyfishing expedition? Why not?) He had us start with a list of our hobbies… and I realized that I didn’t have any hobbies outside of my job in youth ministry. This cannot be healthy.

In a profession like youth ministry, it’s easy to get caught up in the role of youth pastor/youth director and lose touch with who you are as a person. Youth workers almost by definition are givers, people who sacrifice their goals to help others. It is almost universal that youth workers will ignore their own needs every chance they get. But you have to spend some time taking care of yourself or you will find yourself where you have nothing left to give, and probably at the worst possible time. Here are 7 choices you can make to keep from losing your sense of self in your job:

The first 4 choices are internal things you can control – basically ways to take care of yourself. The last three involve external factors that you can work on but you might have limited control.

Internal Choices to Make to Keep from Losing Yourself in Youth Ministry

1. Choose to care for your own soul. You pour your heart into helping others. But who is your pastor? Consider finding a pastor who is not your boss. Who holds you accountable for your own spiritual growth? The best way you can minister to other people is to make sure you are spiritually fed yourself. Choose to make time for personal Bible study, retreat, worship – whatever you need for your own spiritual growth – and make sure to do these things before you get caught up in work. Do not get in the habit of putting youth ministry before your own relationship with God.

2. Choose to care for your mind. What do you think about? The questions you ask will become habitual. What kind of thoughts are you letting into your head? Are you reading positive things and surrounding yourself with a positive helpful message? Just the simple act of reading positive material can keep your mind from spiraling down into negative thoughts. (check out some inspirational books, read Scripture) You need to keep yourself in a positive and healthy frame of mind.

3. Choose to care for your body. We all know youth work can mean lock-ins and a seemingly limitless number of occasions to eat pizza. That might have seemed like the ideal job in college, but we’re not getting any younger. Be honest, are you eating well? Getting enough rest? Exercising? You know what you need to do – do it! We all need to take care of ourselves physically – get adequate rest, exercise regularly, wear sunscreen. If you are taking care of your body, you will find that you have more energy and you will last longer.

One of the healthiest things you can do is to say “no” when people are asking you to add another commitment to your schedule. Consider this: When asked the secret to making amazing products, Steve Jobs said “It comes from saying no to 1,000 things to make sure we don’t get on the wrong track or try to do too much”. Your ministry works the same way, do too much “not amazing stuff” and you can’t focus on the truly important stuff.

4. Choose to develop yourself outside of your profession. Get a hobby. Learn new things. Keep your mind sharp. [Have a bucket list? No? Make one. Have one, cross one off this month. Who do you have fun with? In the military they say at social events, “never open the hangar doors”, which means when you are at a social event with people in your unit, focus on the fun, and don’t talk about work. Having trouble turning off the worker mode and relaxing? Maybe you need friends that are not involved in youth ministry [in any way shape or form].

External Choices to Make to Keep from Losing Yourself in Youth Ministry – these are
about your relationships

5. Choose to make your home relationships a priority. It’s too easy to take your family for granted. If you are married, you need to make sure your marriage is a priority over youth ministry. This might mean turning the text messages off when you get home, scheduling date nights and not letting youth events conflict with them, eat regular meals together. If you have children, you need to be demonstrating the priority your own kids have over the youth events. Bonus: when you choose to make it clear that family is your priority, you are being a great role model for youth. Set boundaries.

6. Choose to build positive work relationships. Church politics is [not any different than office politics, when people who have different opinions and values work together, sometimes their personalities don’t fit. It’s] unavoidable. [But you can be part of the solution instead of feeding the problem.] Make sure you are keeping things positive with your coworkers. Try to understand the pressures the senior pastor might be under. Take the janitor out to lunch. Lift people up. Work relationships are one of those things that make the job joyful when they’re great, miserable when they’re bad.

Work relationships also include your relationships with volunteers – be positive, affirming. [And if there is a problem with fit or calling] be loving but direct, [not everyone is going to be a successful long term volunteer].

Along those same lines, choose to have healthy youth relationships – set your boundaries and make sure your relationships are appropriate. [If you are not doing safe sanctuary where you are consider adopting it as a standard, it helps keep everyone safe, and it doesn’t leave room for any inappropriate rumors to take root.] Remember that your role is not to be the “cool buddy” of teenagers, you are an adult. Being a youth worker is not the same thing as being a youth. You can coach your students, you can listen, you can cheer them on, but you are not there to live life for them or through them. Choose not to be alone with youth or to be in situations that can be misunderstood.

7. Choose your job wisely. Churches and youth ministries have different personalities; just like youth workers have different personalities. If you are working in a church that has unrealistic expectations for you or just isn’t a fit for your personality and gifts, you might be miserable and on the way to
losing yourself before you even begin.

Choosing the job that is right for you starts with an honest self-assessment.. What are your strengths? Gifts? Passions? Are you an extrovert that gets your energy from having a large number of people around? Then don’t go to work for a small church with a high average age and few youth. If you are passionate about student leadership, will you be content working for a church that expects you to produce programs? If you are passionate about discipleship, will you be content working for a church that expects big outreach events and large crowds? How much time does your job really require? Will this work with your other priorities for spiritual growth and healthy relationships?

If you find yourself in a church that doesn’t fit your personality and gifts, it may be time to make the difficult choice to make a switch. The more you can align who you are as a person and how you are comfortable in ministry, the healthier you’ll be.

Erin Jackson is a veteran & certified youthworker as well as part of the Youthworker Movement team. She lives in Arlington Texas with her husband Dennis and three kids. She can be found blogging at http://umyouthworker.com/

Transitioning Well in Ministry

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Luke 5:1-11, Mark 1:16-20 and Matthew 4:18-22 all point to the Gospel story of Jesus calling the Disciples. I marvel at these stories because all three of them end with the sentence: “Immediately they left their boat and their father and followed him.” The scripture doesn’t tell of Disciples struggling with this invitation from Jesus or discerning what is right or best for them to do for their families. It doesn’t tell us that they were completely dissatisfied with their lives as fishermen, it just says, “And he said to them, “Follow me and I will make you fishers of men.” A straight forward and simple invitation to leave everything that they knew, everything they understood to be normal and follow the great Teacher, Prophet, Rabbi of their time. I imagine this being the most radical transition anyone has ever faced in the history of ministry.

The way we experience transitions today is not as simple as it was presented in the scriptures. Most leaders, even appointed leaders in the church struggle, discern and pray about the transitions they must face in ministry. Some transitions are a part of the covenant that clergy leaders have made, promising to “Go where they are sent.” Some transitions are a part of discerning and understanding a person’s individual call to ministry. Some transitions are forced and unexpected, while other transitions are welcomed as a means to escape.

Whatever the transition may be, in ministry (especially youth ministry) we have a responsibility to transition well for the sake of the youth and God’s people in the church.

For me, the transition to pursue the PhD was in response to God’s call in my life. I have always felt called to research, teach and discover what God wants the church to be doing in our world today. My focus has been adolescent faith development and the more involved I became in local church youth ministry, the more I was convinced that the mainline denominational church’s are missing the boat. It was also becoming clear that I needed to respond to the call Jesus was offering me today, rather than waiting and waiting until the time is just right.

Despite the fact that I absolutely loved and adored the congregation that I was serving and would have been content continuing to serve as the Minister of Families with Youth, Christ was calling and it was a “drop your nets and go,” kind of moment. Now, explaining the fact that you have to leave to people you love isn’t an easy task. But, focusing on God’s call should always be the priority.

Here are a few things that I have learned in transitions:

  • Be clear that your decision is based on faithfulness to God.
  • Don’t make this about you, make this all about God.
  • Remind God’s people that God is always present, no matter who comes next.

God is with them! God will not forsake them, nor will God abandon them, even when you leave. God is with them! (PS – Ministry really isn’t about you! It’s about God, so trust that God can do great things through others, too.)

  • Have faith that God will provide. Do all in your power to be kind, loving and generous to all those around you, even the leadership of the church, no matter what the circumstance of your transition. (Friends, it doesn’t help to smear the names of the leaders in the church or discredit them. Remember, they still have to stay and lead the people. You are not helping ministry if you make their lives miserable after you leave.)
  • Celebrate what God has done through your faithfulness. Allow the congregation to celebrate the fruits of God’s ministries through you, too. (It’s always good to end in honor and recognition of God. So, celebrate!! God is always good!)

Too often we believe that it’s all about us and what WE are doing in ministry that is great. But, if we believe in the power, authority and faithfulness of the Divine, then it has nothing to do with our efforts, but everything to do with God’s grace.

We do what we do in ministry, because God is gracious, God is loving and God has equipped us through the power of the Holy Spirit. If we hold on to that, then we, too, can drop everything in a moments notice and follow Jesus.

Amy Valdez Barker is a long time youth minister from the North Georgia Conference. Soon to be PhD student at Garrett Evangelical Theological Seminary working with the Vital Congregations Project.