If I told you that you could go on a mission trip each day where would you want to go? My mind drifts to Hawaii at this point.
If you knew you could wake up each morning and take a mission trip to a certain people group whom would you want to reach?
Part of my responsibility as a parent is to teach Ty that Jesus Christ has called all of his followers to be on mission in their world. This means that every day when we wake up as followers of Christ we step out of the door of our home and into the mission field. It doesn’t have to be a foreign land. As a matter of fact we now have missionaries from other countries to the USA because we are that messed up, and obviously the followers here (self included) aren’t doing enough to reach our own country.
If I’m going to teach my son how to be a missionary then two things are going to have to happen:
- He must see me doing missions. More is caught than taught.
- I must give him and show him the opportunity to do mission.
This is our responsibility as Christian parents, to do any less is messed up and failure. Could we even be bold enough as to say it is “sin”?
This morning I attended the FCA at FFHS. I was so impressed that this group of students would make the effort (mission takes effort) to get up early and head to school for FCA (Fellowship of Christian Athletes) and most aren’t even athletes, which it is great that FCA is reaching the non-athletes as well. I went to do a little videoing and while there I noticed that our youth group was barely represented. This made me realize a couple of things:
- I haven’t done a good enough job publicizing this group with our students.
- I haven’t stressed the importance of campus mission with parents.
- I haven’t shown our students the potential for them to reach many students with the good news of Jesus Christ by using a club on their campus, their mission field.
- What is the purpose of this FCA huddle? Does the huddle even know?
Parents, if your school has a Christian club you have an excellent opportunity to teach your child about missions by making sure that the parent taxi (another blog coming soon on this topic of parent taxi) is running early, work with other parents to car pool, to get your son or daughter to their school to meet with this club. On top of that use this as an opportunity to pray with your teen in the car on the way to school asking God to help him or her to be a missionary to the largest mission field in America, the public school system.
As a parent are you modeling mission to your teen?
As a Youth Leader are you modeling mission to your teen?
As a teen are you modeling mission to your friends?
7 comments:
Man Andy...your posts just get better and better! We try to teach Evan and Emily that they are always missionaries no matter what they do or where they go. It reminds me of a funny story. When Evan was about 4 we went to eat dinner at Applebees and when our dinner arrived we all prayed...in. the restaurant in front of everyone! There was a family sitting near us and when their dinner arrived they began eating, and this bothered Evan. So he did what every 4 year old would do. He got up and as loudly as he could he yelled, "Hey you need to pray." I have never been prouder of my little missionary!
how many student athletes do you have in the youth group?
probably 10-12. I noticed I put it was "great" that most weren't athletes and that's not what I meant so I edited the post. I think it is great that FCA reaches the non-athlete as well.
As usual, great post, Andy. Being in a church with a very mission minded atmosphere, our youth are exposed early and intensely the mission field. HOWEVER, not enough emphasis in on bible study, acceptance, evangelism, etc. The kids in our church do at least one mission oriented activity per month. Many of them do it because their parents make them (yay parents) but unfortunately thee isn't much said about WHY we do these things. It's certainly not about getting the most service hours or being able to say you've participated in every youth activity. If you ask any of the kids why they packed bags full of groceries at Thanksgiving, most would tell you because they were told to. Our youth program does not have "hang out" time on a particular night so that these students have a place to go to just hang with their friends. They have Sunday School and mission work. Period.
I guess all that to say that it is so encouraging to get a glimpse into a youth ppastor's blog that seems to "get it" and realize it has to be about IT ALL. Our church would be blessed to have a pastor like you for our youth. Your youth are in good hands. Kee it up!
I just noticed that your profile said you wuold be a food critic if you didn't already have your dream job. How's about a blog of that nature in your "spare" time. You know, between being a husband, father, youth pastor, cooking at home, yada yada yada....
Great post. I spent most of my "growing up years" in a small town in the Bible Belt. I went to church every Sunday for about 16-17 of the first 18 years of my life. Even so, I was lost as I could be. There was an FCA at my high school (which was also very welcoming to non-athletes). I can think of only two specific occasions when Christians actually witnessed to me.
I eventually became a Christian my first semester in college, but I often wonder how my life would have turned out had more Christian high school students really seen their high school as the mission field...
I remember thinking, as I ended my senior year of high school, how I could have done more to share my faith with my friends.
Nearly 9 years later, and I've heard of several of my HS friends who have accepted Christ since and some who are even serving in ministry full-time. I hope that I may have been a small part of that.
Nate (former FCA co-prez)
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