Mark 2
*This is a slightly modified version of a talk given to Young Life staff and volunteers
I am hopeful we are increasingly becoming convinced of our WHY- because we have fallen in love with our community and we recognize their desperate need for Jesus.
Mark Chapter 2 will begin to answer HOW people get to the feet of Jesus.
“A few days later, when Jesus entered Capernaum, the people heard that he had come home. So many gathered that there was no room left, not even outside the door, and he preached the word to them.”
Jesus is in a home and the house was so full that they were overflowing out the door.
The story doesn’t say this but I think it is safe to assume that the people in the house likely entered through the front door and they just kept coming in until there was no more room.
I want to present to you tonight Club and Camp and as the front door of Young Life and we would be crazy to not send as many people as we can through the front door to get them to the feet of Jesus.
If the goal is to get kids to the feet of Jesus and Jesus is in the living room the easiest thing to do is to go through the front door.
As a leader who has fallen in love with your community and their need to know Jesus the easiest thing to do may be to get them to go to club or camp. In large part this is the easiest because someone stands up with a well prepared, compelling talk about Jesus. We should be inviting people to the feet of Jesus through the front door.
I told you last night about some of our neighbors. The family we have become closest with kept asking more and more about YL and ultimately I believe about Christ. Eventually they said, to us kind of disgustedly, “If YL is so great you should be telling everyone about it. If not you are robbing people of this great gift.” I agree and I don’t think they were really talking about Young Life. I think they were actually talking about Christ without even knowing it.
An observation I have made over the last 15 years on Young Life staff: The Pendulum has swung from one extreme to the other and we could use a little balancing. There was a time when we cared so much about getting kids to club that we began to USE them. Some of you have felt this. Kids felt, and often were not wrong, that their leader mostly loved them for helping to make their thing, Young Life, a success.
In response to this we largely stopped inviting kids to club and camp. You might think I am crazy saying that, but I mean personally inviting in a compelling way. “I want you to join me at club, or camp.” Not a mass text or Instagram post. We stopped inviting for fear that we would come across as only loving them for showing up to YL. I am grateful that we made this correction.
And I think we could use a little balancing.
The truth is that you know of a place and a group of people where kids will be loved for who they are, they will laugh hard, they will talk about significant things, they will belong, and they will be told about a God who also loves them for who they are.
The most loving thing you could do in that case is to invite them into that.
Our first HOW is simple. INVITE people to enter through the front door.
We must FIRST care deeply about kids-- then invite kids to camp. Invite them to club. Invite them to go on adventures with you and the other leaders. Even more significantly invite them into a life that is truly life.
This may be a stretch of the analogy but I want to present Campaigners as a side door.
Club is the preferred flavor of some people but it is not the preferred flavor of all people. I believe Campaigners should be an access point for kids. It may not be the front door but it should be a side door. Students are desperate to talk about things that matter in a grace filled environment. Even non Christians. They see and feel injustices and brokenness. They are asked to grow up fast, they are dealing with hard things. They have questions. Sometimes they want an outlet from that, but sometimes they want to talk about it and how Christ interacts with it.
I asked a 12 year old, “How do you know your leader loves you?”
She answered this way:
“She answers me when I ask her a question or texts with a good non snarky response she doesn't talk to me as if I'm a little kid and she always lifts me up by giving me compliments and is willing to have a deep conversation whenever I need one.”
This girls preferred flavor is campaigners and I hope we don’t wait to invite kids like this in to a setting like a bible study.
Or this text from a leader who was hesitant about getting a campaigners group started because she wasn’t sure the girls were ready for it.
Me between classes:
Marelee, gonna do this thing called campaigners, it’s like a bible study. You down.
Marelee: yeah girl, I need me some Jesus.
Me: cool, when you free?
Marelee: idk girl you tell me.
Me: Friday before school?
Her: yeah, I’ll bring my sister and her friend.
Let's invite kids in through the side door too.
The house is overflowing with people and 4 people arrive carrying a man who was paralyzed.
I am going to take some liberties again with this story but I don’t think it is a theological risk I am taking.
I don’t know how far they walked and I don’t know anything about the four people carrying the mat. I am guessing they knew and loved this man deeply and I bet along the journey, if not before they also loved each other deeply.
John 13 says that they will know we are followers of Christ by the way we love each other.
Have you fallen in love with your team?
This is our second HOW: Loving each other.
The uniqueness of a Young Life leader is that we are people that talk about significant things and we are the people of Contagious joy. I don’t know what tonight’s plans are after I am done-- but I have a feeling Pheasant Run is going to be filled with contagious joy that people want to be a part of. Acts 4 tells a story of Peter and John and it says that the people took note that they had been with Jesus. Kids notice the uniqueness of the life you live.
Contagious Joy. Loving each other. Living a set apart life with and in front of our kids. This is our HOW.
So as they arrived and the house is full they come up with a plan. They climbed to the top of the house and dug a hole through the roof. Let’s not become numb to this either. They loved this man enough and they were convinced enough that all they had to do was get him to the feet of Jesus that they climbed to the top of the roof, cut a hole in it and lowered the man to Jesus.
WE are ROOF people. We are the people who will do whatever it takes to get kids to the feet of Jesus.
“When Jesus saw their faith, he said to the paralytic, ‘Son your sins are forgiven.’”
Some of the pharisees and teachers of the law then get in an argument with each other and with Jesus about Jesus’ authority to heal. This little argument has great significance but I am not going to dive into that tonight.
Eventually Jesus then says to the man who had been paralyzed, “I tell you, get up, take your mat and go home.” He got up took his mat and walked out in full view of them all. This amazed everyone and they praised God saying, “We have never seen anything like this.”
It is not lost on me that last night’s Gospel story included Jesus healing an illness and in this one Jesus heals a man’s paralysis. Some of us and some of our loved ones have not been healed and I don’t know what to do about that. It confuses me.
The thing I love most about Young Life leaders is that we are Roof people. Relentless in our love of kids. Willing to do whatever it takes to get kids to the feet of Jesus. There is a price to this. The 4 folks that were carrying the mat had a steep price to pay. I imagine it was physically hard, they certainly risked looking foolish, the results were uncertain, and they may have even had to pay for the roof repair.
There is a price to pay for us too. I bet many of your friends have no idea why you always go to Middle School soccer games, our results are not promised, kids hurt us too, and we certainly look foolish at times. But we have decided it is worth it.
Our most powerful HOW is that we do whatever it takes.
The most practical how I want to present to you tonight is this: Telling them about Jesus.
The front door is nice because someone gets to prepare a message. But to be Roof people we must be artists in sharing the truth of Christ.
Romans 10:14 “How, then can they call on the one they have not believed in? And how can they believe in the one of whom they have not heard? And how can they hear without someone telling them?”
We must become great at doing this in the car, on a walk, over a coffee table or at Chipotle.
Kids don’t need another adolescent. They want to be friends with us because we offer them something different than the 1500 kids they walk by everyday. They want us to go somewhere in our friendship.
I asked a high school senior what she loves about her Young Life leader who had been her leader for the last six years. She responded,“Jenna is always there and always is interested in what is going on in my life. Whatever is important to me is important to her. My friends were more worried about what was going on in their lives so it was hard for them to be interested in mine. But not Jenna. I am sure she had things going on in her life but when she was with me she was only interested in me.”
Being a teenager feel perilously close to having the ground give way and everything they have built their life on come crashing down. When the fall begins they reach out for someone to help them stay upright. So they grab onto a friend who is too focused on staying upright themselves to be able to offer any help.Young Life leaders must be healthy and stable enough to say to our friends, “Whatever is important to you is important to me.”
They want to be friends with you because your life is built on Rock and their friends lives are built on sand. We must be stable to offer stability.
When you go to coffee with a kid and they are devastated about not making the basketball team you listen and support. And then you tell them how basketball is like water from the well. There is nothing wrong with it but it will leave you thirsty again but Jesus offers us living water that we might never thirst.
Or maybe it is a girl sharing with you about a boyfriend breaking up with them and you get to point out that attention from guys is like building your house on sand.
We share a lot of life with kids. Are we telling them about the one who gives them life?
Or another kid says “I am so stressed about school” “Why does this cause you such stress?” “Because I hate disappointing my parents, I know they say they love me no matter what but it doesn’t feel that way.” “ I am so sorry that you feel that way. I wrestle with that a lot too. For me I take such comfort knowing what God says about me and about where my worth and value come from.” The bible tells us that we are fearfully and wonderfully made, that you are God’s beloved, that you are God’s masterpiece. Have you heard that before? How would your life be different if you believed that as your truest identity?
We must be artists because not everyone is going to enter the front door.
When the kid you have wanted to go to camp simply can’t go. Perhaps you tell them that the two things I am most disappointed that you will miss is the adventure and cabin times. So you create 5 days of an adventure and discussion on a different week. Everyday you say you will pick them up for 1 hour of adventure and one hour of discussion.
Because we are ROOF people.
I can’t flesh out every example. That’s the beauty of relational ministry- you know what the kids you love need.
YL Club and YL Camp are the Front Door to get people to the feet of Jesus and let’s use the front door when it is open. But sometimes the front door is locked. Sometimes the living room is full.
Totally convinced that if we fall in love with Jesus and fall in love with our communities we will end up running into each other on the roof where relentless innovation happens.