I was teaching at Recess at Mt. Hermon this last weekend for some youth workers in Nor Cal and during a Q and A session, the subject of being restricted from youth group came up.

Whenever this comes up in my ministry or in a question from another, I have 2 primary thoughts.

FOR PARENTS:  A parent restricts their son or daughter from youth group because their child likes it.  If they didn’t, they wouldn’t restrict them from it.  It’s not like anyone is ever restricted from math class or from eating their vegetables.  But I would say that like grape flavored cough syrup, just because your kid likes it, doesn’t mean it’s not helpful.  If you tell your student they can’t go to church when they are telling you they want to, this will eventually backfire when they don’t want to one day and you try to force them to go.  It is also totally possible to be an A+ student and a D+ Christ-follower.  Take away their cell phone.  Unplug the computer.  Ban them from the school football game. Give them chores at home.  Just don’t tell them they can’t go to church.  There are tons of families who are forcing their son or daughter to go because they won’t go on their own who would trade seats any day of the week.

FOR STUDENTS:  So glad you you like our youth group.  So glad you come.  But evidently whatever is making it fun is not making a transformation at home either.  If every time you came home from being at youth group or small group, your parents saw a difference in you, then you probably wouldn’t be restricted from it.  Oh, and it’s not possible to be an A+ Christian and a D+ student.  Just because you are striving to love Jesus doesn’t mean you can fail at home or at work and God doesn’t care.  Faking that you hate it won’t help either.  Just put away your cell phone, lean into youth group, and go home a different person.  The more transformational your faith becomes to your real life, the less time you’ll spend fighting your parents over it.

So then what?  What should a youth pastor do when a student is restricted from youth group?

• Talk to parents.  Find out what really is going on at home. Don’t tell them they are wrong.  Just shut up and listen.  You don’t live with their son or daughter and it’s totally possible they are different at home than they are with you.  Be a learner. 
• Commit to praying for their family.  Be sympathetic to the difficulty of raising a teen who loves Jesus in the midst of the world we live in today.  
• Meet up.  If you can, offer to meet one-on-one with the parents or their student.  Meet in a safe public place like starbucks and talk about life.  Let them know you care and that you want to be a help to making youth group not just fun, but helpful too.  See if you can’t agree on some good action steps together that could bring about mutual benefit to their home, the student, and youth ministry too.  
• Keep at it.  When they get to come back, don’t assume things will just automatically changed or are fixed because they came back.  Keep asking how things are going and give reminders to the student when it’s appropriate.  Like when they walk out the door every week to go get in their parent’s car!

Keeping my marriage a priority is constantly in tension with the pull of work, family, and life.

We could probably make a long list of reasons for this tension, discussing the demands of the church, the difficulty of separating work and home life when your calling as a pastor is a 24/7 reality, the needs of people, etc. But, regardless of the reason, if you want to stay in ministry and stay married to your spouse, then my observation and experience tell me it will require intentionality.

Here are five things we’ve tried to do as a married couple that I think have been strategically helpful. Sometimes we’re better at these than others.

Interested in my list?

You can read my five thoughts and several others from Lars Rood and Brooklyn Lindsey on Slant 33 here.

This weekend we launch a new series in Encounter.  It’s called “CRAVE” and is about the urges that drive us and how to discern what we should do about them.  I’m really stoked about it and how our series is being crafted.  We’ve done some things a little different with this series- trying to reorder some stuff, change our outline format, and add a target feeling to each service.  We’ll see how they work.  But each week as we’ve prepared has 3 staples as a starting point.

1. a specific week’s title to guide us
2. a feeling we’re trying to invoke in someone who engages with our service.
3. and a focus issue we’re trying to challenge students to apply to their life.

Ok.. got swamped with the NYWC and never finished this series.

The last thing I would say about dealing with discouragement is simply that it doesn’t have to be this way.  Discouragement doesn’t have to be our reality, but to get out of it, we have to turn the corner towards a better future… and that doesn’t happen accidentally.  It’s not super easy, but it doesn’t have to be complicated either.   It requires us to intentionally choose to tell a different story with our lives.   I’m not sure what that means exactly for you, but here’s a few things that means for me.

NO MORE PITY PARTY:  Life might suck and it will continue to do so until I intentionally choose to say no to depression and funk.  As long as I keep fueling the fire, discouragement will continue to burn bright.   Perhaps we can’t change other’s behavior, but we can decide to not make it worse.

START OVER: maybe I can’t start over fully. Like I’m not recommending you quit your job or ditch your ministry or something radical like that.  I’m just saying that when I need a do over and a better day, I need to do some things over.  If I had a really bad day at work, I have to start today with a clean slate.  If my last teaching bombed, then I must be as resilient as my audience and start over today as if that last experience was not as bad as it feels.

CUT YOURSELF SOME SLACK:  ok, so maybe you are discouraged because of something you did.  But if you’re like me, you might be your own worst critic.  Cut yourself some slack and start over.  Try again and decide to say no to discouragement.

RE-READ PARTS 1-4…. if you’re in a cyclical funk, it might help to start a new cycle of defeating that funk by re-reading and re-thinking this issue in your life for a season until you can find a new normal.

At some point, it’s time to look in the mirror and ask, “Why do I feel this way?”  Really, what is going on in me and why am I so wrecked?