Monday, August 29, 2005

Pretending on Sundays

Nick (Thinking PAdre) has put up an interesting quick thought (dated: Friday, August 26, 2005) on the plight of the "associate" pastor who fills in while the "SR" is gone.

I empathize because I think it's true. I wonder how many people are pretending to listen on a Sunday morning. I also wonder how many people are in denial about how many people are listening on Sunday morning.

Also - I think another major difference in teaching adults and teaching students is that students don't pretend if you are boring. They haven't been conditioned into pretending on Sunday mornings. This is just another reason why I consider it a priviledge to be around teens so much. They are so core.

I wonder what those of us who are YP's can do to keep the students from being conditioned into pretending on Sunday mornings?

14 comments:

Nick said...

The comforting thing is that they pretend every week, that sad thing is I might be the only one who notices.

But you hit the nail on the head, you know when you're reaching students they don't have camo skills yet.

Anonymous said...

If you are truly concerned about how to insure your youth don't pretend, try showing them a little of the north of 17 culture.
That is the culture of Northern Ontario. There may be lots of bugs and freezing cold winters but the people are real. It doesn't take long in this enviroment to realize that they see more value in being true instead of nice. The beauty about that is, you don't have to guess what they think of you. If you are ugly they'll tell you "you're Ugly"

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Unknown said...

Hope this doesn't get lost in the spam can...

I see that conditioning beginning even before they're involved in Youth ministry. How many churches have the little kids leave the service when it's time for the sermon? What message does that send?

I know the intent is to let them learn on their own level and everything, but I'm afraid the only thing they learn is too often that the sermon is boring - something to sit through, and 'pretend' to listen. No action required.

We subtly tell kids that they can't really understand God's Word. I just don't think that's what Jesus had in mind when he said stuff like, "Let the children come to me" and "Unless you become like these children, you'll have no part in my kingdom."

James said...

Perhaps this problem is going further than I originally presumed!!

But I am wondering who owns the anonymus comments from N. Ontario??

Anyone want to own up?