Love this video from “Billy Madison”. The moderator was the only one in the crowd who wasn’t fooled.
One of the things I love most about high school students is that they are skilled “crap detectors“. They are horribly difficult to persuade, especially when it comes to religious matters.
If you’re lying to a high school student you better expect their crap detector to kick into gear. Faking it? Consider yourself detected. Embellishing? Misconstruing? Manipulating? Guessing? Their crap detecting capabilities will catch you in the act. Using the same old out-dated methods to reach and teach them? They’re not having it. Putting God in a little itty-bitty box based on your understanding of Him? Not gonna fly.
The challenge for me and my team is to:
- Remain 100% transparent.
- Listen.
- Never ask them to do anything we aren’t doing ourselves.
- Abandon all teaching methods that are dead.
These are just some initial thoughts I’ve had as I’ve evaluated the crowd at Calvary these past six months.
Side note: “church kids” are the most effective crap detectors around. They don’t wear hand-me-downs for very long unless they really like the way they fit!
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