Last night, I did something that I know that I had not done previously - study. After we finished “doing” youth group (I have been working as a part time youth pastor at a small church for nearly 22 months), and I had sat down around midnight to do some studying. I opened up the book Practicing Passion: Youth and the Quest for a Passionate Church by Kenda Dean, and I read the part where she mentions the Columbine tragedy, and the many hero’s of the story. After reading the little section I thought to myself: “I really have never looked into what actually happened at Columbine.” I proceeded to read a Wikipedia article that explained the events of April 20th 1999 in detail, chronologically. I went to bed at 3:00 a.m. sick to my stomach and in tears. Many thoughts flooded my mind, such as: this could happen to my kids, (either as victims or as murderers) and of course, the question that lingers after every tragedy: How could God allow something so tragic to happen?
Now put yourself in the shoes of Jesus’ disciples, they witnessed the man that they loved suffer and die a convict’s death. Ask the question again: How could God allow something so tragic to happen? In our minds the suffering (life-long might I add) and death of Jesus is justified because we see it as a means to an end – Christ’s death = our salvation, therefore it is okay, but what about the Columbine tragedy? We cannot justify this kind of tragedy in our minds because it does not fit into our neat 21st century pragmatic equation: the events of Columbine = gray area. We cannot see God’s work in the suffering because suffering is the missing element in Contemporary Christology. Show the picture of Jesus holding the sheep and playing with children, but don’t show Him dying a bloody death on the cross.
The article: Suffering: The Missing element in Contemporary Christology, by Father Richard Kammerer really made me think in the light of Columbine. The article explains a lot of what I just said. His tragedy was a girl in his youth group committing suicide, and he explains what he did to cope with the experience. He did all one could do, spent a lot of time with the youth in the church, loving them and praying for them. He also explains how Jesus truly was the man of sorrows, but how through his death He redeems His creation. My only critique of the article (and I feel that it is a big one) is that he gives no insight into correcting the problem of suffering being the missing element of Christology. So what? How do we teach our students that suffering is a necessary integral part of the Christian journey? If we don’t do this (and if we are not with them in the midst of tragedy) then when tragedy strikes it may not be a wake up call for them but they may rather walk away from the faith saying: How could God allow something so tragic to happen? Or even worse: There must not be a God because tragedy does occur. We as youth leaders need to stop selectively teaching and poorly exegeting passages so that our students are not caught off guard when the meet a beaten and bruised Jesus instead of the blonde guy in a white dress they were expecting.
Submitted by Wes Schrickel, a Junior Youth Ministry Major at Ohio Christian University.
Wednesday, September 27, 2006
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
16 comments:
Good thoughts.
I agree that we shoudl not "sugar coat" the gospel or the seriousness of the cross. HOwever, my fear is that in "answering" questions with "God is in it" or "He has a plan" we sometimes trivialize pain. I am reminded of CS Lewis' book "A Grief observed". He had written on pain before, but in this book he seemed to understand it better.
Wes I whole heartedly agree with your view that we need to teach our teens that sufferign and hardship come along with being a true follower of Christ. Our teens today have been spoiled by camps, retreats, huge church events to go play paintball, basketball tournaments, and summer swimming excursions. These things are good to do as a part of your youth ministry but at the same time this world isn't always fair and there is indeed painful suffereing that goes on each day. Our teens need to be able to stand up in these times and identify with Christ and take on these burdens. The last year of my life has been nothing but pain and suffering, but now that God is bringing me out of the storm i have grown tremendously from my experiences. It is essiential that we pass our knowledge of suffering on to our teens.
I like the picture of Jesus with flowing hair and a white dress walking out of the tomb that has the rock that is shaped like a huge wheel running on a track. If you look close, He might be wearing some Nike cross trainers.
Now to the business.
It is a crazy thing that there are many youth leaders, who are ministers of the Gospel, who do not teach the way of suffering. Did Jesus not tell his disciples that they would have to go down the road of suffering. How does that dismiss Christians of today from suffering? It doesn't. Bad things happen, and they present tragic times. How will the youth understand how to cope with these times holding steadfast in their faith in Christ if they are not taught the way of suffering? Or even worse yet...if our leaders do not have a proper concept of Christian suffering.
Thanks for the critique, Wes
Your friend,
Clayton J.H.
I think to teach them about the suffering is when you tell your story. We all have our stories of suffering and pain. That is when we can share our testimony and let them see what we did in our circumstance. There is something in all of our lives that others can identify with. We just need to let them know that we experienced it. A lot of times we want everyone to think that we live on a pedestal and we didn't go through anything. I believe a lot more people could be saved if we shared our testimony of how we made it out.
1:28 PM
I like the thread of this discourse, but at the sametime it may require describing "suffering."
Can we compare some what we call "suffering" to that of Christ's or even the many Martyrs in Christendom.
In addition, what does a theology of suffering look like in 21st century America?
Just some food for thought?
in my eyes the suffering of Christ as well as the suffering of the martyrs was suffering that was endured in order to fulfill the will of God. This might mean sacrifice (not just bodily death but also sacrifice of time, money, sin ect). Philippians 2 is a great biblical example.
The problem with the church today especially in America is we don't every want to experience any type of discomfort. It is some type of warped materialistic hedonism that we all suffer from. The call of Christ is to come and die, and we can't bring our XBOX's, laptops, cellphones or cars (ect) with us. This is our biggest struggle in youth minisry. Kids don't have time to spend with God (they say) because they are too busy gratifiy themself (warped materialistic hedonism)
Wes Schrickel
Pastor Jake...Where's the hot chicks?
I quess I'll have to go to Doug's
site or that lame MS.site Sarkazmos.
GED Wannabe
Wes,
The suffering of Christ was predicted a long time before He entered in the world. Old Testament prophecies point us in that direction. Through this suffering this suffering salvation came to the world, reconciliation for mankind with Almighty, and restoration in the relationship between Creator and creation. This was a ransom Christ paid and it was paid for once and all. It was the perfect way, through submission to the Father, to get live out the special revelation or redemption plan that was foretold in Gen 3:15.
Many people were killed during the time of Christian persecution. As we learned in church history it got to the point that people were fanatical about it and they went ahead to be thrown front of beasts, get burned, crucified, etc. A good resource to read about the martyrdom is “The New Encyclopedia of Christian Martyrs” by Mark Water.
However, when we look at the suffering of Christ and the suffering of a Christian there is a great difference between the two. In the Great Commission, Christ promises to be with his disciples, “I am with you always, even to the end of the age” (Mt 28:20b NASB) At this point Christ already suffered, was crucified, died, was resurrected, and about to ascended to the Father. When he faced his suffering he was deserted. His disciples chickened out and fled. Peter denied Him three times. When Christ came to the end of His suffering, His own Father had to leave Him, “My God, My God, why have you forsaken me?” (Mt 27:46b NASB) That is what made Christ’s suffering so “unique”. He was on his own. The absolute suffering that was a pleasing sacrifice for the broken relationship between God and man.
When Stephen was suffering in Acts 7, it is written that as he died Christ was with him in his suffering and waited for him to depart from this world, “Behold, I see the heavens opened up and the Son of Man standing at the right hand of God.” (Acts 7:56 NASB) This account shows that Stephen had the help of trusting in Jesus and be there with him in his suffering.
“How could God allow something tragic to happen?” you ask after reading the story of Columbine. The question should be asked rather this way: What did her death (suffering) accomplish for the Kingdom of God? As I read it many years ago, she had to say, “yes”, to Jesus every day from the day she called Christ in her life, and she was ready to face those who killed her with the fact of sharing that she was a believer, a follower of Christ, an authentic Christian, fearless to the point of death. What witness did that bring in the world?
It does not matter whether we live in the 1st, or 21st century. Suffering and persecution will come at us because we live the Kingdom culture that is against any other world’s culture, philosophical view, and ideological system. We need to teach youth about it from a perspective that it will not be easy to live in any parts of the world for Christ. People of His age hated him, but the world will hate us even more because of His name. (Mt 10:22) It will not be easy but He is with us. Immanuel means, “God with us” (Mt 1:23b NASB). He promises to be with us till the end of the age. What a hope! What a promise from our Lord, Savior, and Friend.
The EC not only contained within it a theology of suffering, they actually embraced it. I recently read Ignatius of Antioch's Epistle to the Romans in which he pleads with the Christians there:
"I beseech of you not to show an unseasonable goodwill towards me. Suffer me to become food for the wild beasts, through whose instumentality it will be granted me to attain to God. I am the wheat of God, and am ground by the teeth of the wild beasts, that I may be found the pure bread of God. Rather entice the wild beasts, that they may become my tomb, and may leave nothing of mby body... then shall I be a true disciple of Jesus Christ, when the world shall see no more of my body."
When I think of suffering I think of what happened yesterday in Pennsylvania to the Amish school. Can we as humans ever really understand why those nine girls had to go through what they did because one man wanted revenge? I would have to say probably no. We can never truly comprehend why this has happened unless we understand that no matter what things happen that God is still in control. As Wes said, we MUST teach our youth about suffering. We do not want them to go through something and because of their lack of understanding and knowledge of suffering blame God. In my life time alone, I have seen many people blame God for family members dying, not having money or food, etc. We must remember that God is the one who has given us everything that we have. As Clay said before, God did not tell his disciples that they would not suffer for Him and as youth leaders we need to allow Christ to become so real in our own lives that our youth see Him in us. Our youth need to find out who Jesus really is and whether or not they would be willing to suffer and maybe even die for Him.
I agree that the topic/issue of "suffering" needs to be addressed in our youth groups today. Our youth need to know that even in the suffering, God is there and even when things doing seem to go as planned, like they should, or how we want them to, God is always there to heal the hurting and to use the situations for His glory. Romans 8:28 says that "we know that all things work together for good to those who love God, to those who are called according to His purpose". Even the bad God can use for His glory in the end and I think it is important for us to help our youth understand and grasp that. We can still have fun but we need to make sure that we (and our youth) are turning to God in the suffering and trusting in Him. It is through these times that we and our faith will grow.
i agree completely with you and it is interesting that you used Romans 8:28 because i typically refer to that verse as one of the most commonly mistinterpreted verses in the entire Bible. But you are right, God can and does use the bad things to shape into the image of His Son, which is for our good just like the verse goes on to say. A lot of people take that verse to mean that all things work together so that we will always be happy ect. Things that happen for our good will not always immediatley seem good
that last one from me. I forgot to put my name down.
--Wes
The Columbine story is definitely very moving. I'm always amazed by what went on there and even more so by what the early church went through in terms of the persecution and also what Christians are facing today outside of the United States.
We are all met with tragedy in youth ministry at some point and how we react to it, says volumes to the young people that look to us for guidance. Great post...Can you give me any more info on the article by Father Richard Kammerer? I tried the link and it took me to another webpage about youth ministry, but I couldn't find the article...God bless...Jason
Post a Comment