what if...

It's that time of year again--the time of year a lot of ministry leaders dread more than any other--it's annual report time. Usually writing the report is no big deal for me, but this year I knew it was going to be a little more tough. Youth ministry at Westshore has been...has been...has been...exactly. Difficult to describe. A bit muddled, a bit directionless, at times almost motionless. Sometimes I wonder if standing still is even worse than taking a step backwards. It was a time of transition, and yet it wasn't. Maybe it was supposed to be a time of transition, but we--check that, I--was too stuck in the way we had always done things to see the movement God was trying to initiate. Funny. I swore I would never do that.
So now what? Where does God want to take youth ministry at Westshore, and how can we make sure we're along for the ride instead of kicking God out of the driver's seat so we can slam on the breaks? Over the past few days, some questions have been rolling around in my head like those marbles stuck in that old marble-maze game.

• What if every teenager in our community had a place they come could where they would feel loved by adults, accepted by their peers, and important to the Creator of the Universe?
• What if every teenager in our community had an adult in their lives who loved them unconditionally? who encouraged them? who cared about what was happening in their lives?
• What if every teenager in our community believed that God had a plan for their lives?
• What if there wasn't a single young person in our community who thought church was boring? who thought Jesus was dull? who thought Christians were hypocritical?

Sounds impossible? It is--at least it is for us. May we never limit God's vision by only seeing what we think is possible.

So how could those 'what if's' become actual possibilities? I spent most of Sunday afternoon asking God the same thing, and, as usual, He answered my questions with more questions.

• What if every Christian young person in our church had a non-Christian friend they were praying for?
• What if every young person in our church took time out of every day to honour God?
• What if every young person in our church felt accepted and loved by every other young person at Westshore?
• What if every young person in our church had a plan for how they would grow closer to God? What if each of them could answer “yes” to the question “are you closer to God now than you were a year ago”?
• What if every young person in our church believed they could make a difference in someone else’s life?

Maybe the most important question should be "what if we actually made God's vision for youth ministry a priority instead of just trying to survive youth ministry?" I don't know what would happen. I want to find out.