She came in that afternoon from school with several questions and comments she had about things we’d been discussing in youth group. She had scrawled a list on a scrap of loose-leaf notebook paper, and she took her time smoothing out its wrinkles.
It took her a while to start talking and even longer to look me in the eye. She told stories of drinking with her friends (assuring me she could “handle it”); she railed against the church for not raising a voice against various injustices; she asked questions like, “How do we know anything in the Bible is true? We weren’t there.” And, “This doesn’t even make any sense; it contradicts itself all the time. Why does it even matter?”
I didn’t say much. I just listened. This agitated her; she wanted a list of answers she could study her way through. She knew I would challenge her about how hard she partied on the weekends, knew I would push back against her blanket statements that the church didn’t care about AIDS or poverty or bullying or child soldiers in Uganda or, for that matter, her.
And then finally, she shoved aside her list, clenched her jaw and fists, locked her angry eyes on me and asked, with a voice half steel defiance, “I don’t understand, Julie! What I am supposed to believe? Just tell me what I am supposed to believe!”
And for the first time in my youth ministry career, I realized the tension between the holy practice of admitting, I don’t know yet still giving our students a faith worth believing. When I read Sticky Faith, I heard Kara, Brad and Chap writing out of this tension.
Most of the time, we make it optional. I remain haunted by these words of Kenda Creasy Dean: “Students are looking for something worth dying for and, sadly, all too often we give them pizza” (or Red Bull). That Kara, Brad and Chap have been bold enough to say we just aren’t getting it done is good news. Because we aren’t. We do not teach a faith that matters, that is life or death. We teach faith as an option. A possibility. Or, even worse, we make it, as Kara, Brad and Chap so beautifully point out, about sin management, a list of dos and don’ts if one is to be called Christian.
The Boy and Girl Scouts have dos and don’ts. So does the football team. The drama club. And if a member of those organizations doesn’t want to follow the rules, he or she can opt out. When we make faith solely about rules, we run the risk of making opting out too easy, throwing Jesus off like that jacket Kara, Brad and Chap write about. Church becomes just another choice instead of transformation and hope.
It’s easy to succumb to a youth ministry that revolves around Don’t have sex. Don’t do drugs. Don’t drink. Don’t cuss. Don’t listen to bad music.
In reference to a dos and don’ts sort of faith, Kara, Brad and Chap write, “In this gospel focused on behaviors, we’ve sadly let the gospel deteriorate into a list of good virtues, and then we slap Bible verses on them. We don’t blame them for tossing that gospel aside. Wouldn’t you do the same?”
Maybe if we just give them a list of things not to do, they’ll be okay, right? Safe. Christian or no, there is no guarantee of safety. There is no warranty from pain or nightmare or despair. What the gospel promises is that we are never alone in that pain or nightmare or despair. That God loves us—simply because we’re God’s. And that a life lived following Jesus is the way to draw closer to the person God has called us to be.
That is what is to be trusted; that is what is to be counted. It matters.
The Sticky Faith authors would have produced an even stronger piece of writing if they’d delved into what it means to boldly proclaim the gospel while still living in a global culture. My own theology demands that I respect the tenets of Judaism and Islam; my own worldview dictates that, while I try to follow Jesus, there are still things to learn from those who do not. We cannot teach the gospel without making room for discussion of those who share a history of faith with us; to do so leaves out crucial conversation that can help our youth determine their own place in the history and family of faith.
Does teaching a faith that sticks mean teaching a faith that we all must adhere to, despite varying interpretations of Scripture?
If our youth walk away from church for a while post high school, does that mean we’ve failed them?
How do we help our youth discover faith as a way of being, promising wholeness and community, and not that prescribed list of dos and dont’s?
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