by Bryant Fisher
Bryant is the Director of Student Ministry at Brentwood United Methodist Church in Brentwood, TN.
You’re doing it! All the hours you spend wondering what your faithful few need from you. The time you spend making sure the space you create is for the teenagers coming and teenagers missing. Do you know that people ask “what would we do without you?”.
Maybe you’re working multiple jobs and one is this is just one of them. Or maybe it feels like this youth worker role is just filling a spot so church can say they have something for teens. Have you had that moment when you asked yourself if people even understand what you do? I get it. I’ve been there and I’ll be there again at some point.
Look, if you’re just needing someone to say it, I’ll be that friend.
You are making magic.
No one prepares you for that moment when you’re wondering if there’s another capable adult to handle the situation you’re in. You doubt yourself if this is really what you should be doing. Is God even listening to how you feel? Through all those questions and wrestling sessions though, you’re still here. You showed up again and whether you are in the season of believing it, someone is going to benefit from you showing up again.
Let’s be honest, showing up isn’t always the easiest thing to do.
We hear stories all the time of how impacted a student was by the simple presence of another caring human being. And here you are my friend doing that work over and over. And for many in the ministry of your youth group, that is like magic. The stories you hear and know well are confirming that in your life because you are there when they are told or lived. Sure, there’s more to the calling than that. There are other pieces to that make up who you are and why you are doing the work alongside these cool, frustrating, beautiful, and messy teenagers.
You believe in them and the “showing-up-ed-ness” qualities you bring to the table, the basketball court, the fields, the theaters, and all other spaces you connect with a student who desperately needs to know someone is going to see it, whatever “it” is.
And all this work with the messy people no doubt makes you a tiny bit scared (okay maybe a whole bit). But remember this, you amazing show-up-er person, sometimes there is a little bit of fear in a big call. And no matter how much you might question that, God has called you into it so that you would love what you are doing and that you would start noticing one of those teens in the room does too. Hey, maybe even to the point where they are starting to see God moving. Wow, now that’s magic.