Teen angst (and it's all mine apparently)

The most important thing we do at the largest church of which I have the privilege to lead right now is something called Club 316. It is a youth program made up of community youth, ages 9-14. We teach them, play with them, eat with them and release them into the world.

There might well have been up to 200 or so youth come racing through out program since its inception, of which I had nothing to do with. I'm just a caretaker of them, holding on as best I can as the tsunami of God's love roars through the church.

But we've had very few 15 and up come, and we've had no 15 and up stay.

Which leads me to this report I read this morning.

Ed Stetzer, president of Lifeway Research, says that, "the number of teens who leave the church comes to about 70 percent. This mainly clusters from teens from 16-19. But in what may come as a surprise, two-thirds ultimately return after a hiatus." The researchers found that most of the teens didn't set out to reject the church or the theology of their parents; they simply drifted away. They no longer found church to be important.

And what kept them plugged into the church (I would assume longer or longest in the question):

At least one adult from church made a significant investment in them personally and spiritually (between 15-18). The problem with that, as I see it, is that we can't keep them past 14. So, I worry that we've failed them even as I wonder where they wander.

I pray that we are doing something right that keeps them coming. I pray that John Kurse, who will follow me in this endeavor, will keep praying and doing and helping and all those things.

But I also am a realist, and from the beginning (at least in my time with them), they've come and they've gone to who knows where?

Jesus said to bring the little children to him, but there is almost nothing said about the teenagers. Wonder why? I have noticed that there is nothing on Jesus' teen years in scripture, either. Again, wonder why? They could have been so informative, I think.

Oh, there were teens in scripture if you dig into it enough. Joseph was 17 or so when he was thrown into a pit. David spent his teen years running from Saul's spears. We know that King Josiah was 18 when he came to the thrown. Some think that some of the disciples were teenagers when called as their ministry continued for so very long in tradition's tales. Timothy, Saul's protege, might well have been a teenager.

They faced what all teenagers faced, and yet, here's the absolute truth. Joseph beat sexual temptation from the Pharaoh's loopy wife, David showed exemplary courage in face of danger from the loopy King. Josiah stood firm on ethics and Daniel demonstrated that integrity need not necessarily stand in the way of promotion. The Apostles and Timothy found the ultimate adventure in the Christian life.

We don't know what any of our teen screamers are going to do or are going to be when we leave them or they leave us.

We can only hope. Paul tells us in Ephesian that we are not to exasperate our children but instead teach them.

I pray we have, will, and will continue to.