Wednesday Night Live! Update

Last weekend, I attended the National Youth Workers Convention in Pittsburgh, PA. It was a great time to connect to other youth workers in the United States and learn from the veterans the ins-and-outs of ministry. One thing that was of particular interest to me was the discussions we had on today's youth. According to the veterans, today's youth are:

· Often misunderstood
· Often misunderstanding
· Not only wanting to know how, but why…
· Searching for spiritual things – something bigger then themselves.
· Want something to commit to, to be a part of
· But Church is often a struggle, seeming irrelevant and boring
· Tired of cliché, same-old stuff messages
· Dislike fake, hypocritical, and phony people

This got me thinking... don't all of us sometimes feel that way?

.

This past Wednesday Night, we began to discuss the issue of moving closer to God and the struggles that seem to go along with it. Sometimes we dislike the things we do as Christians because they're not really fun. Sometimes we dislike the things we do because they don't make any sense. Sometimes reading the Bible is more tiresome than life-changing, making us feel like it has no implication for our lives today. But instead of rising to the challenge of promoting change, more often than not we stick ourselves in a rut and inwardly wrestle with God.

.

Jesus calls us to something more, to a bigger life than just making in through each day. Life is more than a routine, a set schedule of rising in the morning and doing the daily tasks. Christianity is more than just reading a few passages out of the Bible and attending Church on Sunday - it's about seeing God. Jesus spoke this quite simply when He said, "Blessed are the pure in heart, for they will see God" (Matt. 5:8). God doesn't care so much for our words or our actions. He doesn't care how much money we make nor what we wear - He's to be at the very core of our heart. He's to be what we breathe, what we feel, what we think. Our everything is to be His.

.

As a youth ministry, we're going to continue looking into this idea of growing closer with God and hopefully answer some of the questions we have. Remember, Wednesday Night Live! meets at 6:30PM on Wednesday nights...