Robbed

This blog is different. It’s still something I’m passionate about but not necessarily about orphans. For those of you who do not know me personally or haven’t talked to me I need to give a little clarification before I start the next blog post. My husband and I both teach in the college age ministry at our church. He’s been teaching for about 3 years and I’ve been teaching for about two. I teach a class of girls ranging in age from 18 – 26, and they are all either in school or working towards school. When I first started teaching it was more out of obedience than anything else. It was something God laid on my heart for several months before I even got up the courage to ask anyone about it. It was not something that I “felt like I would be good at”. I honestly felt too young, unqualified, not smart enough and I definitely didn’t think I would be comfortable speaking in front of these girls. I was worried they would immediately see right through all of my fears and have no desire to hear anything I said. They definitely did see right through my fears, although not in the way I expected. Instead they loved the fact that I was transparent. Over the past 2 years I have gone from a class of 5 to a class of 25. Not because I’m a good teacher, because I’m not, but because this age craves guidance from someone they feel is striving to live for God. If you’ve been through the college age you probably can look back and see that time as one of the times in your life when you had the biggest amount of growth in the smallest amount of time. It is the time of your life when you have to learn pretty quickly what you believe, what you stand for and why. This is the time when you come face to face with the fact that “their parent’s faith” won’t cut it; it has to be their own faith. However, I have also found that if they chose to make this faith their own then it is the time in their life when they are most willing to alter their life course to live for God. For some reason at this age these students are willing to give up anything and everything to live a life that is pleasing to God, but something is missing.

Three weeks ago I went around a classroom of almost 30 girls and asked this question: “what is the one thing that is holding you back from being ‘sold out’ for Christ”. Some of the girls responses were as follows:
“a fear of failure”
“a fear of rejection by my family”
“a fear of being mocked by my friends”
“ a fear that I can’t…”
“a fear that I will mess things up”
These answers still haunt me. As the girls continued on it was all I could do to hold back my tears. Not because they wouldn’t be “sold out to Christ”, instead I wanted to cry because I realized that each of these barriers can be overcome. They just needed someone to come along side them and say “follow me as I follow Christ, run with me and I’ll have your back”. I looked around this room of close to thirty and realized that there was no way I would reach all of these girls. I could go to breakfast, lunch and dinner with a different one of them every day of the week and would still only end up having the time to talk to 21 of them, and I definitely wouldn’t have the time to follow up with each of them to give them the encouragement and support that they need.

A few days later I went to lunch with a girl who is also in that class that I’m personally “discipling”. She was telling me how she wanted to disciple some middle school girls but she didn’t know how because she had never really had anyone ask her the tough questions. I apologized to her and told her that was supposed to be my job as her mentor, disciple, whatever you want to call it; and I obviously hadn’t done that. However, the interesting thing was in my heart my response was the same as hers. I hadn’t done it because I didn’t know how either. I never had anyone ask me the hard questions. That’s when I realized the “robbed” feeling. I began asking some of the older girls I knew if anyone had ever truly discipled and invested in them, only 1 girl said yes! In the church somehow we have gotten away from one of the basic qualities of a Christian – discipleship. We never had anyone take the time to teach us how to disciple, so therefore we don’t take the time to teach those younger than us, and this pattern continues on. However, in the bible over and over again we see that discipleship is one of the core responsibilities God places on us. I’m not supposed to reach 25 girls, even Jesus had his 12 and of that the very close 3.

I’m not going to lie, at first I wanted to jump on the bandwagon and blame the generation before me. Well, if they had discipled me, I would know how, and then it wouldn’t be such a big deal. I realized soon that this lack of discipling went even farther. I started asking older ladies I knew, most of them hadn’t been disciple either! It almost seemed like a one way train headed in the wrong direction. I realized that by making excuses I was robbing the generation younger than me. I began to be convicted by such passages such as Titus 2, 2 Tim 3:16, 1 Tim 2:2 and Matt. 28. These verses seemed to be telling me that especially as a woman; I should be discipling, teaching and training. It wasn’t something I could blame on the prior generation it was something that I needed to do. I had to try to break the cycle in my life and decide that I was going to try my hardest to learn to disciple someone just as the Bible has said.

To close out my blog I really want to issue a challenge that I gave myself. Are you discipling someone, or are simply coasting through your walk trying to become “the best Christian you can be”? Upon listening and reading lately I’ve really realized that my walk and my attitudes as a Christian are selfish. My focus is constantly consumer based, “how does this message apply to me”, “what do I need to change in my life”, “what does God want from me”, “what is God’s will for me”. Instead my focus should be more of bringing God glory in everything (period). If that is my focus then it doesn’t matter the “me” God will take care of that if I keep my focus on Him. Part of my keeping my focus on Him is realizing that when He commands me to do something in His word (Matt 28) I must do it. If I do not then I am purposely keeping a part of my life from bringing Him glory. These students don’t want someone to come to them and say “lets walk through a bible study”, they simply want someone to come to them and say “I have your back, together lets figure out how to bring God the most glory”. They just want someone who will take the time to personally invest in them.  For most of them they have enough people in their lives teaching at them (they are in college after all) sometimes they just need someone to listen and offer biblical advice. They’re just as intimidated as you are but for some of them they are struggling spiritually because they don’t have this influence. I want to finish out with a closing thought from that same young lady I had lunch with.

“I wish someone would have come along side me when I was younger and asked me the hard questions someone who would have challenged me to chase after God; then maybe I would know how to do the same thing to girls who are younger than me. But I’m not going to go ask one of these older ladies to do that, I’m too scared. But if any of them would just come and ask me I wouldn’t hesitate to say yes.”

These students are willing to let you teach them, are you will to reach out?

2 Tim 2:2

“And what you have heard from me in the presence of many witnesses entrust to faithful men who will be able to teach others also.”