Things I Wish I Knew When I Was A 20 Year Old Youth Pastor

A Personal Retrospective With Supporting Scriptures

Me, Circa 2011

“Most young ladies settle down and get a dog before trying on family life. Me? God decided a puppy was too safe and He gave me a couple dozen teenagers who have trouble concentrating and listening to authority. Life is definitely interesting. I just praise God that these lives are in His hands; I may get to put a few fingerprints in the clay, but He’s the One behind the wheel.”

Facebook Post, 5/5/2011 (One year into youth ministry)

I ran into one of my former youth group kids this week.

Our employers collaborated on a community event, and we had a moment to catch up.

He made a comment about how I knew him when he was a “literal child.”

I can’t help but think that I was one too.

Taking notes before a youth group Christmas party, circa 2011

Wisdom Comes with Time.

Listen. I turned 20 years old, got baptized, signed up as a church member, and graduated from youth to youth pastor within the same week.

I was not equipped.

I did not understand what I was getting into.

I honestly regret that I took on the role of being a youth pastor.

It was a confusing time. I recognized I wasn’t a good candidate, but all of the adults in the church seemed so certain I was a great choice.

I kept on thinking it was temporary. But the weeks turned into months and years.

I had lots of fun in that season, and I really hope that I made a positive impact for a few kids.

I know I care deeply for all of those kids.

But, I was a kid too. I can see that with so much clarity now.

Now, I realize that wisdom comes with time.

The scripture rightly cautions against making recent converts overseers in the church.

I would not have considered myself a recent convert when I was twenty, because I had been a Christian for many years.

However, I realize now that 20 years old is quite young- and being on fire for Jesus for a couple of years in high school doesn’t make you ready to be a youth pastor.

“The saying is trustworthy: If anyone aspires to the office of overseer, he desires a noble task. Therefore an overseer must be above reproach, the husband of one wife, sober-minded, self-controlled, respectable, hospitable, able to teach, not a drunkard, not violent but gentle, not quarrelsome, not a lover of money. He must manage his own household well, with all dignity keeping his children submissive, for if someone does not know how to manage his own household, how will he care for God’s church? He must not be a recent convert, or he may become puffed up with conceit and fall into the condemnation of the devil. Moreover, he must be well thought of by outsiders, so that he may not fall into disgrace, into a snare of the devil.”

1 Timothy 3:1–7, ESV

The Christian Lifestyle Isn’t About Signs & Wonders.

In 2012, the documentary Father of Lights came out.

It particularly highlighted Bethel church in Redding, California as a pioneer in the realm of miracles, signs, and wonders.

I packed my youth group kids into a 15 passenger van and drove to a film premiere hosted at a church a few hours away.

Evangelists like Todd White were heavily featured in the 2012 film and insisted that signs and wonders were normal Christianity.

I fully bought into the hype.

I would end up attending one of the Power & Love conferences that Todd White headlined, not long after this film premiere event.

In 2014, after becoming solidly established as a Christian celebrity, White launched his own ministry- aptly called Lifestyle Christianity.

The Finger of God/ Lifestyle Christianity Message, in Summary:

• Signs and miracles are meant to be part of the everyday lifestyle of each believer.
• These supernatural works are necessary in evangelism for effective conversions.
• The increase in miracles performed by Christians is the practical revelation of the Bride of Christ to the world.
• This revelation of the Bride is necessary for End Times revival & is the sign of the imminent return of Christ.

Now, I realize believing the gospel (not signs & wonders) is normal Christianity. It is simple, and it is meant for all people.

All of the hype around End Times revival being necessary for the return of Christ feels unhinged from what is taught in Scripture.

I simply don’t buy it any more.

“Where is the one who is wise? Where is the scribe? Where is the debater of this age? Has not God made foolish the wisdom of the world? For since, in the wisdom of God, the world did not know God through wisdom, it pleased God through the folly of what we preach to save those who believe. For Jews demand signs and Greeks seek wisdom, but we preach Christ crucified, a stumbling block to Jews and folly to Gentiles, but to those who are called, both Jews and Greeks, Christ the power of God and the wisdom of God. For the foolishness of God is wiser than men, and the weakness of God is stronger than men.”

1 Corinthians 1: 20–25, ESV (Text bolded for emphasis.)

And it is the gospel, not personal prophecy or supernatural signs and wonders, that will cover the earth before the return of Christ.

“And many false prophets will arise and lead many astray. And because lawlessness will be increased, the love of many will grow cold. But the one who endures to the end will be saved. And this gospel of the kingdom will be proclaimed throughout the whole world as a testimony to all nations, and then the end will come.”

Matthew 24:11–14, ESV (Text bolded for emphasis.)

Music is Not the Pinnacle of Worship.

The ministries I admired around this time of my life not only preached about miracles and increased intimacy with God, but they seemed to believe that the way to receive those things was through music.

I remember the first time I was asked to sit and listen to worship music, without speaking or praying or moving. It was during youth group.

The older folks called it soaking in the Holy Spirit.

I found it to be odd. Uncomfortable.

The other youth whispered, fidgeted, and looked around while a gray haired volunteer played a Jason Upton CD.

Eventually, I began to feel the waves of emotion that the older folks were caught up in during these long music sessions.

I started seeking that feeling in Christian music and worship times, and I would go on to guide my youth group to seek it too.

We all believed that feeling was the Holy Spirit.

Now, I realize that those waves of emotion were something common that all people can experience.

There is even a word for the sensation: frisson.

Frisson comes from a French word that means shiver.

It’s associated with goosebumps, a chill up the spine, or waves of pleasurable emotion.

Frisson is not the Holy Spirit.

Maybe frisson can be something we experience when the Lord is moving. That’s possible.

But it’s also something we experience when a room full of people sing Wonderwall in unison on karaoke night.

And Oasis probably wasn’t anointed by the Holy Spirit to record that song.

I regret the emphasis on music and emotion.

The idea that you should feel something when you sing praises, pray, read the Bible, or any other time you’re engaging with God is seriously damaging.

The amount of people who feel rejected by God or passed over by God because they didn’t feel something angers me to think about.

People are often told they will fall over, speak in tongues, or feel waves of liquid love during worship, prayer, or altar call moments.

The truth? Sometimes God is silent, and sometimes you feel nothing. That’s why this thing we are exercising in Christianity is called faith.

Now, I realize that worship is about your intention & life toward God.

It’s about keeping the faith and directing your own life, as much as you can, toward faithfulness to Christ.

“God is spirit, and those who worship him must worship in spirit and truth.”

John 4:24, ESV

Worship is about how you live & how you think.

“I appeal to you therefore, brothers, by the mercies of God, to present your bodies as a living sacrifice, holy and acceptable to God, which is your spiritual worship. Do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewal of your mind, that by testing you may discern what is the will of God, what is good and acceptable and perfect.”

Romans 12:1–2, ESV

There Are No Secret Keys in Christianity.

I spent a lot of money on books by authors from Bethel Church and other supernatural hot spots.

I attended as many revival meetings and conferences as possible.

I listened to hours of podcast interviews and sermons, daily.

These people had what felt like secret keys to the supernatural and intimacy with God, and I was determined to ascend the hill of the Lord myself to stand beside them as an elite Christian.

That turned out to be an exhausting & impossible determination.

Now, I am convinced that Jesus taught everything openly in order to exclude elitism and secret knowledge from being part of following Him.

Christianity is not meant to be a religion with secrets and riddles and gurus who reveal hidden knowledge to the elite.

The mission of Christ is the open-sourcing of truth and salvation to the world.

“The high priest then questioned Jesus about his disciples and his teaching. Jesus answered him, “I have spoken openly to the world. I have always taught in synagogues and in the temple, where all Jews come together. I have said nothing in secret. Why do you ask me? Ask those who have heard me what I said to them; they know what I said.” When he had said these things, one of the officers standing by struck Jesus with his hand, saying, “Is that how you answer the high priest?” Jesus answered him, “If what I said is wrong, bear witness about the wrong; but if what I said is right, why do you strike me?” Annas then sent him bound to Caiaphas the high priest.”

*John 18:19–24, ESV*

Hearing From God Doesn’t Mean What You Think it Means.

I remember struggling for years with wanting so badly to hear the voice of the Lord.

I was around people who claimed to hear His voice daily. He talked to them about little things, like which shirt to wear or if they should buy their kid a toy at Walmart.

I wanted that level of intimacy with God. And I tried.

I imagined Jesus sitting in the room or in my car with me during the day as I attempted to pray without ceasing.

I prayed at altar calls, begging for more of God.

I attempted (again and again) to receive the gift of tongues to strengthen my ability to pray.

I cut out all secular music, and for a time, even movies above a G rating.

I obsessively took every thought captive so that my thoughts were as pure as possible.

At one point, I heard a teacher say that because you have the mind of Christ, His voice sounds a lot like you.

I took this and I ran with it. From then on, I believed that many of my thoughts were from God.

I was finally hearing His voice every day.

Or I had become a complete basket-case.

Now, I don’t believe the Lord sounds like me.

I believe that God’s voice is holy.

I believe His voice inspires awe and fear, and it’s not possible to miss it.

If God wants to speak to you, there’s not anything that is going to stop you from hearing Him and hearing Him clearly.

I really appreciate the teaching on this topic from Pastor Chris Rosebrough.

Listening to old podcast episodes of Rosebrough’s Fighting for the Faith program did me a lot of good to disentangle from lots of false teaching.

Rosebrough compares what people are saying in the name of God to the word of God.

And Rosebrough never asks people to listen to him with an open heart or even an open mind- he asks them to consider his teaching with an open Bible.

I am going to share part one of his series on Hearing the Voice of God here. Needless to say, I highly recommend his content.

[embed]Part 1 of Chris Rosebrough’s Hearing the Voice of God series

The Gospel is the Main Point.

This seems so obvious now.

Of course the Gospel is the main point.

I was so enthralled with the new thing and how God was moving in the season that I left the Gospel behind in much of my spiritual practice.

I used the Gospel as a jumping-off point to get to what I really wanted to talk about- living out your destiny, hearing the voice of God, the latest teaching from my favorite celebrity pastors, and how to ignite the End Times revival.

I looked at the Bible like a book of lessons to be learned about how to become a giant in the faith that could usher in revival.

I had a works-based mindset that was only thinly veiled by my hyper-spiritual worldview.

Now, I realize that everything in the Bible is there to reveal Christ and to assure believers that we have peace with God.

We see again in 1 Timothy chapter 3 a great point being made that’s relevant to this topic. Godliness, which you might think is comprised of good works, is instead connected with the Gospel.

Godliness hinges upon the Gospel of Christ.

“Great indeed, we confess, is the mystery of godliness:

He was manifested in the flesh, vindicated by the Spirit, seen by angels, proclaimed among the nations, believed on in the world, taken up in glory.”

1 Timothy 3:16, ESV

There are certainly more things I wish I knew back then…

Maybe I will revisit this topic again.

Until next time: You are not alone.