The Divine Crash

Proverbs 22:6 says

Train up a child in the way he should go: and when he is old, he will not depart from it.

What happens when that doesn’t happen? What happens when I as a youth worker do all in my power to make sure that by the time a youth graduates from youth group they know they way they should go and they depart from it?  Did I fail? I have volunteered actively with one youth group since November 2001.  I have seen hundreds of youth come through the doors and seen all there is to see.

Some of my youth are married with kids.  Some are now pastors (which is weird for me).  Some have tried to kill themselves during youth group and some have called me in the middle of the night because their parents were fighting.

I wouldn’t change any of it for anything.

Yet, there are those youth that I discipled who I spent more time with than their own parents and then I see them after a few years they have walked away from Jesus. This breaks my heart. How could this happen.  I taught them everything I know and instead of following Jesus with their whole heart they spend most of their nights getting drunk and throwing up.

I thought this verse said if I train a child in the way they should go they would not depart? Isn’t the Bible true?

Maybe that’s not the point of this verse, maybe when these former youth wake up in a pile of their own vomit and their friends have left them because the money is gone then they will remember the way they are supposed to go?  Or maybe it never really gets to that point. But they do trade Jesus for the almighty dollar and when they are powerful executives they see things like the tragedy in Haiti and give most of their net worth to help the cause because they remember the way they learned in youth group.

So maybe I didn’t waste my time teaching them, maybe they didn’t depart because they still remember and maybe even though they have taken a side trip they haven’t departed entirely yet.

And so maybe, in your ministry with your people it isn’t a waste and the people who seem like they aren’t listening are actually paying the most attention and when it matters most will remember everything you say.

Filed under:
Youth Ministry by RevBT