Is It All a Race to Nowhere?

If you've ever fought with your kid over homework, stressed about whether they'll get into a good college someday, or worried about the strain on one of your older children's health because of the demands of middle or high school, then you owe it to yourself to see a new documentary titled, "Race to Nowhere".

It remains to be seen if the film will become what it aims to be, which is a game-changer. Before that will happen, it needs to be a conversation starter. And it will give you a lot to think about.

Consider the following "nuggets" pulled from the film (I am quoting from some rough notes I took while watching it, so the transcription may not be exact):

• "Everybody talks about getting their kid into the best school. There is no "best school"; what you should be looking for is the best match."
• On college kids who had to check into stress clinics to recover from the performance stress at the end of academic terms: one college official cites parents who express shock - "How could this happen? They're a good kid." And he answers them, "No, they're a good performer. You never knew if they were a good kid."
• On communities that pride themselves on high test scores at schools: "Community is not about boasting that all is right with the world. Community is like being family; it's being yourself."

"Race to Nowhere" was produced by Vicki Abeles, a mom from Northern California who observed the toll performance pressure was taking on her kids. After her 12-year-old daughter was rushed to the hospital with stress-related illness, she began to investigate what exactly was happening in schools to stress kids out - and more importantly, to question whether it was all worth it.

One of the most heartbreaking parts of the film is when her 3rd grade son testifies to the headaches and stomachaches he feels when he's "stressed out". Um, excuse me? Third-graders should not be "stressed out" - ever. To feel stress is to be aware that someone else is holding performance expectations over you. That's inappropriate enough for a kid of that age, but "stressed out" implies that the pressure has gone on long enough that the target of the stress - the kid - is starting to break down.

The examples in the film get more grim from there. You meet a girl who discovered she could stay up later (and "get so much done") if she didn't eat. She developed anorexia. After a stint at a clinic, she returned to her school, only to be asked by the principal to leave: her weight loss was making other students and teachers worried about her.

It all leads up to the story of 13-year-old Devon Marvin. The 8th grade honor roll student from Danville took her own life when the pressure got to be too much. She was pushed over the edge by a bad grade on a math test.

But it isn't just the effects of stress on students that this film addresses. "Race to Nowhere" also sheds light on high-stakes testing, the college entrance game, the loss of teacher creativity and flexibility (because their jobs have been narrowed to test preparation), the use of drugs by students to stay alert and to relax, and the prevalence of cheating. It barely touches on the industry of SAT test prep, which uses old exams to teach kids "strategies" for gaming the test, turning what should be a measure of student academic potential into another crude and cynical exercise in outperforming an exam. Also alluded to is the dismal reality that vast numbers of high school students admitted to Cal State schools end up needing to take remedial courses. In other words, despite their high test scores and impressive GPAs, they really aren't as smart or proficient as those measures seem to indicate.

And - most importantly - they don't love to learn. School becomes just a joyless enterprise. As one boy in the film describes it, he crams as much information into his brain as he can in preparation for a test, and then, "Two hours later - it's gone." And this causes idealistic young teachers to either harden and accommodate to what the system demands of them, or quit. As a former teacher who got tired of chasing down missing assignments and giving grades, I could identify with the young female teacher interviewed in the film, who became so disgusted with the lack of real learning that was happening that she decided to resign.

It isn't hard to understand why it's gotten to this. Simple economics and demographics paint a grim picture: the Baby Boomers had kids, and there were lots of them. But colleges only have so much room, so competition builds. As the next kid achieves a 4.2 GPA on the strength of his two Advanced Placement courses, your kid suddenly needs a 4.3 and three AP's in order to maintain an advantage. Meanwhile, every parent is keenly aware of the kind of income their kid will need to have in order to have a better life than they do. (And what parent doesn't want that?) The film doesn't go so far as to question whether kids will forever be able to live more affluently than their parents, but it begs the question.

In the end, "Race to Nowhere" is a call to reevaluation and redefinition: what do we mean when we say someone is a "good student" who attends a "good school" with "good teachers"? What should "good grades" represent? But most importantly, what is it all for? The film isn't balanced - and that's the point. The subtitle of "Race to Nowhere" is "The Dark Side of America's Achievement Culture." Clearly, Director Abeles wants us to agree with her that all of this - the super-charged, achieve-at-any-cost, outperform-the-next-kid system that is American education - is damaging to kids and needs to be rethought.

The documentary is thought-provoking, but it stops just short of being compelling. Right now it is being screened at select showings across the country. Apparently a nationwide release is set for March, but the beauty of the early screenings has been that they are all sponsored by organizations which promise to facilitate dialogue sessions as part of the showing. The screening I attended was at Carrillo Elementary, and judging from parents' comments after the film, it was apparent that the movie struck a chord with most of them. But the overall thrust of the film, which is hinted at in the title, is muted and understated. So, for instance, our discussion group spent most of its time talking over whether kids should be given so much homework and pushed to be involved in after school clubs and sports. These are issues broached in the film, to be sure, but they are not the main point, which is that the seeds of over-achievement that are planted in elementary school end up leading...well, to nowhere.

And it is here that Christians should take note, first of all because some of us have unwittingly contributed to a high-stakes culture and not been counter-cultural enough, but also because "Race to Nowhere" can prompt some existential questions about, say, the purpose of life and the value of the mind and the importance of childhood and the meaning of "success". The film doesn't offer answers to any of those questions, from a Christian perspective or another other perspective, but if you take its message to its logical conclusion, those questions are where you end up.

Jesus said, "What good is it for you to gain the whole world, but lose or forfeit your soul?" We should still be asking that question today. And it shouldn't take dangerous threats to our kids' physical health, their self-concepts, and their sanity to get us there.

"Race to Nowhere" is currently showing at select screenings. An early December showing in Carlsbad sold out; another showing for January 6 has also sold out. But check www.racetonowhere.com/screenings for info on other scheduled screenings (for instance, Jan. 12 in Rancho Santa Fe; the film has also been shown in San Diego and Orange County), which continue to be added.

Families Matter

Why hold a FallLaunch for parents on maximizing spiritual influence? Why offer a PG-13 class, equipping parents to guide a young adolescent? Why teach a five-week overview of the Bible for parents & kids to take together?

Simply, because if we care about kids, we have to.

More precisely, if we take seriously the responsibility we've been given to lead kids to faith and through faith, we have to pay attention to the facts about relative influence. "Relative influence" doesn't refer to the fact that families have more influence than churches - but it could! Because in a study by Search Institute, when teenagers were asked who had most influenced the faith they had, "parents" was the #1 response - ahead of church programs, youth ministers, or peers.

That's something to think about. But we need to do more than just think about it. We - churches and parents - need to consider the implications. Here's the truth: church programming is probably better than it's ever been for children and youth. There is a ton of published material out there for groups of all sizes, addressing every topic under the sun. Five years ago the amount of curriculum and devotional materials specifically for preteens was pretty sparse. No longer. Churches and what we do are important. But we are not enough.

Consider: A kid who came to church every weekend and attended our midweek program every single week would have about 111 hours invested at the church each year. By contrast, they spend over 1,000 hours in school per year, and - ready? - about 4 hours watching TV and more than 7.5 hours using all forms of electronic media on a typical day (for kids 8-18, according to the Kaiser Family Foundation, 2010). So with packed schedules, how can parents possibly make a difference?

The answer is that parents set the context of a kid's whole life, and most importantly, they are the ones available when the opportunity for spiritual influence arises. One formal study of parent-child "God talks" found that discussion of spiritual matters was most likely to occur randomly, and not on the way to and from religious services or activities. It seems churches can do all they want to try to make spiritual dialogue happen inside their walls (and they sometimes succeed), but for the most part, kids will talk when they're good and ready! And those times tend to fall among the everyday experiences of life: in the car on the way to school, at mealtimes and bedtimes, while on vacation, during commercial breaks of TV shows, and so on. Families matter because parents are consistently there.

That's not to say that churches don't have a role. We have an important one. But it's wrong to think of kids as empty vessels, who will only think about the things we give them to think about and ask about the things we happen to be talking about. Kids' minds are always at work trying to make sense of the world they live in, and parents, by their proximity, are in perfect position to be the day-to-day leaders.

Imagine for a minute that you were going to tend to your kid's spiritual health the same way you tend to their physical health. What would that look like?

First, you'd recognize that kids are resilient. We don't have to be perfect in the way that we nurture, but we shouldn't be totally negligent, either. Somewhere between "whatever doesn't kill 'em, makes 'em stronger" and perfectionist parenting lies a happy medium, where we do our best with what we have and recognize that one person's efforts won't make or break a kid spiritually.

Still, that wouldn't keep you from bringing your child in for doctor's visits. It wouldn't stop you from giving your kid medicine and rest when they are sick. In the same way, we're right to expose kids to good church programming, to use the counseling and support group resources of a church when needed. It's good to make regular church attendance part of the routine of your family, and for your kid to become known by other kids and leaders.

But if you left the doctor's office and then returned to a steady diet of junk food, that'd be pretty counterproductive. Because you know and recognize that good health is in your hands, a product of the decisions you make day in and day out. You'd buy healthy foods and learn how to prepare healthy meals. You'd encourage your child to get adequate exercise, and rest. As best you could, you'd try to incorporate good health habits into the rhythm of your family's life. And you'd stay up on what promotes health, talking to others who care about what you care about, reading articles and books.

So it is with spiritual health. Our health - bodily and spiritually - depends on the decisions we make, which become habits. What are the habits parents should develop with their kids to promote a spiritually healthy family, and what's just a waste of time? How do we distinguish between spiritual growth and moral development? How do we get kids to want the things we want them to? In short, how do we nurture their hearts?

These questions are what we'll begin to tackle on Wednesday night at FallLaunch, a program which will be repeated in identical form on Sunday, September 19. We're buying dinner (lunch for the 19th) and we'll even care for your kids.

Everyone's time is limited. Let's spend it focusing on questions that matter, which ultimately are not "Which game should we play in class Sunday?" or "What's a new song the kids will like to sing?" The one that matters is, "Given the access and position a mom or dad holds, what can they do to really make a difference in nurturing faithful, faith-filled kids?"

Let's Get This Ball...Spinning? part two

Last week I referred to a basketball spinning on someone's finger as a metaphor for the type of relationship we should want our kids to have with God. And I suggested that much of what we try to do - in ministering to kids and in parenting them - stops short of this ultimate goal. Everything we do, if we intend it to be spiritually nurturing, should either encourage kids to set the ball on their finger, or impart a little extra momentum to the ball if it's already spinning.

Truth is, there's some cool things happening with a spinning ball that, once understood, make for some helpful metaphors for understanding kids' spiritual lives:

1. To begin with, ask yourself this question: Is spinning a basketball on your finger easy, or hard? And the answer, of course, depends on how much practice you've had. Anyone who tries that trick for the first time finds it extremely challenging - particularly if you are young and lack coordination. Most people do not "succeed" when they first attempt it. However, the longer someone has worked at it, the more effortless it (apparently) becomes. People who are very good at this can do other things while spinning the ball: walking, talking, spinning a second ball with the other hand.

What we can learn: While it's not always true that those who have been Christians the longest make for the strongest Christians, there is some truth to the fact that the more practiced you become in spiritual habits and disciplines, the easier it is to keep them up. And why? Because they become habits. And habits, by definition, are things we don't need to think about or force ourselves to do, because they've become second nature. Hebrews 5:14 gives a good example of this when it refers to mature believers as those who, by constant use (that is, consistent righteous behavior), have trained themselves to recognize good from evil.

We do kids a favor when we teach them that a Christian life is just that, a life, and it is lifelong, and it is forever. To keep God and things of spiritual value from being crowded out of the picture takes vigilance. We are right to teach kids that salvation is a free gift of God, but we don't teach enough on the work (and it is work, at first) of following him, learning obedience, setting aside the time to be with him, making it a habit to ask (consciously at first, then subconsciously): "What would Jesus do?" The great thing is that the habit of following Jesus can be developed, and once developed, it works in our favor, because any habit - good or bad - is hard to break.

2. Which brings us to another feature of the spinning ball: inertia. Inertia refers to an object's tendency to remain either in motion, or at rest. Specifically, with a basketball, there is rotational inertia causing it to continue spinning round and round. When the ball loses its inertia, it slows and then quickly falls. There isn't a lot of in-between - no such thing as spinning at medium speed. The ball either spins fast, or it doesn't spin at all.

What we can learn: In the same way, our spiritual lives and those of kids tend to either be in motion and on-track, or lackluster and nearly dead. As one pastor I knew liked to say, "If you don't grow, you will go - away from the Lord." It's hard to operate on spiritual half-throttle. Either you are experiencing spiritual growth - palpable, radical growth - or you aren't. But one leap tends to build on another, and then another. The lesson, I think, is pretty clear: we should teach kids to seek the active work of God in their lives, and to expect it. No, life will not be spent on the mountain tops. Recognizing and participating in the work of God in your life is no shield against hard times. It is, however, the ongoing assent to the process of being shaped and formed and built into Christ's likeness - whether through victorious times or challenging ones.

3. Why that ball eventually slows brings us to another principle: the effect of friction. It cannot be totally avoided. Sooner or later, the contact between a finger and the ball slows the ball down, so that regardless of how much inertia it has at any given time, we can predict that the ball is on its way to stopping.

What we can learn: Friction operates in a way very similar to sin. Kids can grasp this: sin drags everything down. Even nice people sin. Even spiritual champions sin. Our tendencies, even in the spiritually strongest of us, will eventually be toward selfishness, greed, envy, and pride. "So, if you think you are standing firm, be careful that you don't fall!" (1 Cor. 10:12) No matter how far we've advanced toward spiritual maturity, temptation and the world and the flesh are working against us. And they will win...but only kind of. That's where the power of the resurrection comes in. A Jesus who's been raised from the dead makes the eventual perfection and you and me possible. What can't be done now - a basketball that spins forever, a person who is perfect in all they say, think, and do - will happen one day because God's power over the grave signals the end for sin. Take away sin and eternal life becomes a reality. Take away friction and the ball spins forever. In the meantime, just as a strong finger, held perfectly straight, supports the ball's inertia, we do our best to minimize the amount of sin that we allow in our lives by keeping ourselves strong, sharp, and focused on the purpose of our lives.

4. To counteract friction, every spinning ball needs a little help to keep it going. This help takes the form of a push - but not just any push. If handled clumsily, the ball will come unbalanced and fly off the finger that's supporting it. Instead, the push needs to support the ball where its rotation appears to be weakening, and it needs to move in the same direction but at a slightly faster speed than the ball is already going.

What we can learn: Don Ratcliff has observed in his new book ChildFaith: Experiencing God and Spiritual Growth with your Children that we too often look for and listen to kids' programmed responses about God and pay little attention to their spontaneous ones. In other words, the questions they ask and comments they make that we haven't solicited often give us the best insight into a particular child's theology and spiritual vitality. Very often we don't teach to their interests because we are afraid we won't cover "the important material", when in fact what's "important" is whatever information speaks to things they're already thinking about.

The best spiritual nurture does not impose itself, but comes alongside what is already happening, helping kids to make sense of it (for example, giving them a spiritual vocabulary) and encouraging them to keep doing whatever it is they are doing that has been good for their spiritual growth. We need to be really careful that the help we give kids in their spiritual lives is just that - help - and that it is sensitive to what they've experienced of God and where God is trying to grow them. And, just as the push needs to be slightly faster than the ball is already rotating, we need to be great spiritual leaders and to put great spiritual leaders into our kids' lives.

5. It is one thing to talk about or to demonstrate how to spin a ball on someone's finger; it is entirely something else to get them to do it themselves. That is the product of practice - a lot of self-doing. If we think that hours and hours spent watching others spin the ball will make someone better at it, we're fooling ourselves. People need to grab the ball and go, and fail, and try again, and they may need encouragement to try it enough times to where it really sticks.

What we can learn: Strong Christianity is built by doing. We must give kids opportunities to live out the faith, because there is a point beyond which demonstration and explanation stalls. Ultimately, we can't practice Christianity for our kids, though we might be comforted to think so. They own their own faith. It is nurtured by what they do.

Unfortunately though, unless a robust understanding of what a Christian "does" and ought to do is held, we can quickly push kids into community service work that lacks any spiritual dimension. The fact is, as we live out our faith, some of the doing is inner and vertical - what might actually appear to outsiders as inaction. A person who wants to change the world but has no regard for spiritual things cannot make sense of Martin Luther's statement that whenever he faced a busy day, he was unable to make any progress unless he spent three hours in prayer. But a spiritually mature person begins to understand. Yet another dimension of our spirituality is the horizontal one - our relationships with one another. We "do" Christianity when we enter into relationships and strive to do them right, overcoming isolation and alienation and growing into real relationships. The third aspect involves our service to the rest of the world, but the value of that is cheapened if it is not accompanied by a heart for God and a heart for others.

So, a rounded approach to nurturing kids' spirituality is called for. There are no "just" answers, as in:

• "Kids just need to go to Mexico and serve at an orphanage. That will open their eyes to how much they have." Missions trips are important, yes; but they alone do not fuel sustained spiritual growth.
• "Kids just need to learn the Bible. Once they have the basics, that will get them ready for what they'll face as adults." Bible knowledge can contribute to spiritual maturity; but merely knowing lots of facts divorced from their contexts really does not produce kids who are devoted to God.
• "Kids just need to have a church that they love going to." As a professional in ministry, it's hard for me to disagree. But, allegiance to a church program alone does not yield spiritual maturity.

Kids need lots of things; there is no magic bullet. We do well to take this holistic view of what it is to be spiritually healthy, and to help kids attend to their personal relationship with God, their day-to-day relationships with family and friends, and their personal sense of calling and service.

6. The final thing a spinning ball does is attract a lot of attention! And while there may be recognition that the person holding the ball is responsible, peoples focus is generally drawn to the ball itself.

What we can learn: Ideally, when a kid is really growing spiritually and living out what they believe, people will be drawn to what they see. The overflow of a Christian life should leave a memorable footprint, as qualities like love, care, kindness, mercy, and gentleness impact the recipient long after the one who acted in that way is out of the picture: the gift outlasts the giver.

Can we create spiritual growth in kids? No, we can't create it, anymore than we can coax a basketball up onto someone's finger all by itself. Can we manage it for them, so that they live spiritual lives because of our fervor or our example? No - the best we can do is cast compelling vision by the way we live. And we can do more, by encouraging kids to develop the sorts of lifelong habits and practices that make their souls fertile ground for God's spirit. When we recognize that God is already at work, we are more likely to help in ways that actually are help, that compliment the work that is being done rather than disrupt it. I look forward to this year of ministry, and the many opportunities we will have together to impart a little extra spin to the ball, so that it might continue ever-more gracefully and forcefully, spurring our kids on to great outward acts of faith, and inspiring onlookers to want the same.

Let's Get This Ball...Spinning?

To the parents of new fourth graders, welcome. This is a blog where I bandy about ideas on ministry to children and adolescents, but specifically preteens. I have just completed ten weeks of coursework on the subject of family ministry, namely the consideration of how churches ought to help families become the most nurturing places they can be. The course involved lots and lots of reading, observation of other churches, consultation with fellow ministry professionals, exposure to multiple models of family programming, and development of curriculum. The byproduct, of course, was extended reflection on the unique role that families and churches each play in promoting the development of faith-filled kids, and what sort of balance actually constitutes partnership. And for me, now having reached the end, one question stands out: How can we get kids to initiate and maintain dynamic, personal relationships with God?

This question bedevils youth pastors and children's pastors, parents, Christian educators and, more and more, senior pastors, as we cope with the dismaying reality that between half and three-quarters of young people who are raised in the church will leave when they get to college. That fact motivates us all to do better by our kids and teenagers (even though we have slightly different reasons: ministry folks are alarmed by this statistic for what it says about their programming. Parents are alarmed because their kid could be in the 50-75% who walk away.).

The answer isn't simple. But one of the reasons we fail to make progress towards an answer is that we spend a lot of time seeking answers to the wrong questions. The question above - how can we get kids to initiate and maintain dynamic, personal relationships with God? - is the question. Here's why.

As Christians, we believe the hope of humanity lies in this thing called redemption, and that just as all things were created good, all things also groan under the yoke of sin, yearning for liberation and transformation back into their original design. "All things" includes people, of course, but also groups of people: families, marriages, communities, friendships, governments, cultures. So while we insist on the value of knowing a personal savior, we are not unaware that the very contexts people live in - their primary relationships - are sometimes themselves what is keeping an individual from knowing Christ and loving him fully.

So a Christian approach to the healing of humanity necessarily centers on personal redemption: Does this man or woman, boy or girl, believe in (trust in) the finished work of Jesus Christ - his death and resurrection - for the forgiveness of their sins? We long to see people reconciled to God (2 Cor. 5:19-20). Sometimes this new life will give them strength to endure or new resources to work through life challenges: a troubled marriage, strained friendships, the loss of a job, bad habits, personal unhealth. Other times, those are hurdles people need help clearing so that they may experience the goodness of God more fully.

Ultimately, we want people to experience (and re-experience, and re-experience...) reconciliation with God. To live in a state of grace. To walk by faith. All different ways of saying the same thing. In every case, the relationship with God - personal, intimate, and meaningful - is the inner engine that fuels the outward blessing.

So where - specifically when it comes to youth and children - are we falling short? Why, despite our best efforts and best intentions, do kids fall away from churches in droves once they get to college?

I'm going to suggest, this week and next, an answer by way of a metaphor: The ball keeps falling off the finger.

It's not that we're not caring. It's not that we don't have great intentions. It's that our efforts - in churches and in homes - inhabit the periphery of second- or third-tier issues and never connect those all the way to the target, which is inhabited by our central question: How can we get kids to initiate and maintain a dynamic, personal relationship with God?

We miss in two directions. Some church programs and Christian parenting books (and consequently, Christian parenting practices) focus on manufacturing good fruit. The unspoken message is: with the right amount of self-discipline you, too, can pretty much live the way God wants you to - a message which is decidedly not the gospel. The other misdirection is harder to detect: we either attack things that might stand in the way of kids' relationship with God, or we provide good, wholesome events and programs that point them in the direction of Christ, but we fail to carry the ball across the goal line. More specfically, we fail to make the hand-off so that kids can carry the ball across the goal line.

What do I mean? A few examples: Sunday schools abound with lessons on the importance of being nice, kind, generous, etc., to other people. But that's a little too simple. Any Christian perspective on "being good" must take into account the God who made us good, that our ability to do good comes from God, the purpose of being good, the potential of goodness to altar our character, and the importance of obedience to the good even when we don't feel like it. Ultimately, a lesson on goodness must equip and challenge kids to go out and do good, then to reflect and share how that experience impacted their relationship with a transcendent and all-good God. But that almost never happens. We stop at, "It's wrong to be mean to people."

Or we might educate parents on shielding their kids from violent or sexually explicit media content. We might put literature in your hands that teaches you how to use filtering software and to block certain TV programs, or we might recommend alternative sources of movies and music. Ultimately, though, if it fails to nurture kids' spiritual relationship with God (that is, if our kids don't enjoy and appreciate God more), all we've done is shield them from bad stuff. Not a wrong intention in and of itself, but incomplete - a peripheral issue - if our real desire is to see them in a life-giving relationship with God.

Some national youth and children's ministries have "worldview" in their crosshairs. They pump out product after product aimed at getting kids to adopt a worldview that believes in the concept of objective truth. But they aren't always careful or successful in leading kids through the "Now that..." step: Now that you understand that there is objective truth, how can we help you get closer to the One who gave it? Kids might become more morally discerning or morally dogmatic, but they aren't necessarily any closer to God.

Or, we might offer terrific church programming where everyone is safe and happy and the pizza shows up on time and the music is great and kids laugh and make new friends...but in the end, we haven't offered much that a secular youth-serving organization could have done. Our ministry has been guilty of that at times. Are we attentive to nurturing the seed that was planted? Honestly, no. It's all we can do to see an event through to its conclusion, and we're grateful when the last kid gets picked up. Don't get me wrong. I think care, programming, relationships, and a fun environment all matter. But properly understood, they are means to an end. And God is the end.

The answer, by the way, is not to be spiritually ham-handed. Kids see through that. They know when you're layering on spiritual language or practice that doesn't fit with the context or is inauthentic. Sometimes a fun bowling event or a fishing trip can be allowed to be just that. Often kids are more profoundly affected when adults simply "be church" rather than "have church".

By choice, I am an optimist. I do think the efforts families and churches make for the good of kids are all useful, and I don't want to see them go away. But could we be more complete in ensuring that we are always driving toward the ultimate goal? Yes, we could. A lot of it involves consciously driving ourselves back to the question that matters: Is this getting kids to initiate and maintain dynamic, personal relationships with God?

So here's the metaphor: a vibrant spiritual life, one that overflows into all other aspects of life, is like a basketball spinning on someone's finger. I myself am not very good at that trick. But when I do sometimes get it to work, it's amazing to me how effortless it is. Which is itself an illusion: there's a great deal of effort involved in getting the ball spinning and keeping it spinning, but it doesn't look like it. It just looks and feels amazing. Kind of like a vibrant spiritual life. Therefore, as we minister to kids and adolescents, I think our eye should be on getting, and keeping, that ball spinning. Spinning with such ease that a child's relationship with God becomes almost second-nature. Spinning with such force that its existence alters their habits, relationships, mindset, future plans, and affections.

But, the ball rarely spins and keeps spinning the first time the trick is tried. And it never keeps spinning wholly on its own. There are lots of false starts, and a constant need to supply the energy that will keep it going. So it is with kids as they develop a spiritual life. Every one of our attempts to "help" should have the ultimate aim of getting that ball spinning on their finger. Demonstration can be important, but for the most part, kids will benefit when we hand the ball to them and work with them on getting it to spin on their own finger.

I've written in this space before that kids are like diamonds: successful formation is the product of consistent heat and pressure over a long period of time. We might well ask ourselves: is our ministry to kids, in homes (through parenting) and in the church (through ministry programs), having the effect of getting that ball spinning?

(to be continued)

Creating a Just World for Kids

The concept of "quality time" was born in the 1970s, as a way to allow parents who wanted to "have it all" and "do it all" to balance family life, careers, and a full plate of individual interests. The idea was that if you didn't have a lot of time, at least you could make the time you have count. Later, detractors would note that you can't schedule a "quality" encounter, but that quality is a dynamic in a relationship that develops over time: quality may be a byproduct of quantity.

These considerations - are we spending enough time with kids, and is the time we spend valuable - are worthwhile. But I would suggest there is yet another way adults can invest their time that will inject quality into the context of their kids' lives - a gift that keeps on giving, if you will.

That gift is to be the dispenser and the ensurer of justice in their world. To back up a bit, one component of quality time - that is, the thing that actually makes quality time "quality" - is that it is redemptive. In other words, it is recovering lost value. It is replacing or reinstituting something of worth that is otherwise lacking. When we spend time with kids that is redemptive, they leave better off than they came in, because we've left them with something that lifts them or stretches them or grows them. To use a biblical metaphor, we've set their feet upon a rock, giving them a firm place to stand. (Psalm 40:2)

Justice is redemptive, because it restores an order and a fairness to a context where disorder and injustice are the norm. By establishing justice, we send a message that injustice, however rampant, will not be allowed to bully its way to the top, but that we're paying attention, noticing, and willing to exert correction whenever necessary. I'm convinced this is God's heart when it comes to injustice. He notices, he grieves, and he speaks, so as to remind the world that injustice does not reign, that it should never be accepted as the status quo. Unfortunately, we've sometimes been too busy or too apathetic to battle systemic, institutional sins like unjust power structures, or unjust treatment of prisoners, or racism, or torture. And the longer the church - God's agents of remedying injustice - is silent, the more injustice does become the norm.

What happens then is that the number of victims grows, because the doers of injustice believe they can act with impunity. Victims sometimes become oppressors themselves, because after all, if it's a dog-eat-dog world, you may as well exercise the advantage that you have. You may be thinking that I'm describing what happens in modern-day sex slavery, or exploitation of laborers, or caste classifications in India - and I am. But I'm also describing the world kids live in when adults unwisely retreat in the name of "teaching them to work things out for themselves."

If what constitutes "teaching them" is actually a constructive intervention, that's one thing. But if it's a refusal to act because the dispute seems downright trivial to us or we just don't care, we should bear in mind that such efforts toward self-mediated conflict resolution rarely result in justice. By refusing to intervene, we send a message that we really don't care about their social world (which is tacit permission to mistreat others), or that we are aware but we still expect them to put up with whatever unfairness is plaguing them because "life's not fair."

We can do better. Surely an attitude that injustice is an inevitable reality will produce kids who grow up to believe that - well - injustice is an inevitable reality, on whatever scale. The truth is that there are schools that have cut down bullying incidences, where teasing and put-downs are not acceptable, and in which it isn't good to be bad. This is accomplished not by meddling in kids' social interactions, but by the same means in which justice is established in the adult world: violators are brought to account, victims are given a voice, and the vision and value of establishing a just culture is reaffirmed.

As a kid who grew up on the receiving end of my share of mistreatment - and I dished out a good deal of it, too - there were times when I really wished an adult had taken notice and acted on our problems in getting along with each other. Instead, kid justice ruled. And kid justice is not justice. It rarely has in view the greater good or restoration for the victim, but is marked by retaliation and one-upsmanship. What's needed is a figure with enough common sense and authority to say, "No - this is how it's going to be." Some kids have the common sense. But few have the authority.

If we somehow establish justice among kids, we send a message that fair play and equal treatment of others ought to be the norm. They come to expect it, and to practice it. I used to believe it was best to turn away from kids' disputes and make them work it out on their own. It's too much of a bother and frankly, the things they quarrel about seem trivial. But I've changed. When we trivialize their concerns about fair treatment, we actually sanction injustice. Of course teasing and name-calling isn't as grave an injustice as slavery, and I don't mean to equate the two, but only to make the point that if we model a practice of inaction toward anyone's suffering but our own, we are teaching kids that to step outside of themselves and own someone else's injustice isn't worth the effort. Why would I bear someone else's problems when I've got enough of my own?

Remedying injustice wherever it happens is not a matter of becoming a party to the injustice. Rather, it entails bringing the offender to account, and empowering and restoring the victim. What does this look like, say, in the context of bullying? First of all, kids should be aware that bullying is not ok and won't be tolerated. This is more than a rule, it's a cultural expectation: using your influence to intimidate someone else is wrong. Secondly, all kids are taught assertiveness skills to speak up for themselves, first to the bully and secondly to an adult - who won't brush aside their concerns, but who will act out of a sense of duty. Third, while we would hope that empowering kids and communicating expectations would stem any harrassment, when bullying does happen, adults are willing to step in and address the problem directly. This usually means bringing the offender and the victim face-to-face, sometimes with a third-party peer, for mediation. These programs work and have been implemented successfully at schools. They work precisely because they are engineered by adult authority figures, and that communicates: "You've violated a norm, and we've noticed, and we're not going to let it stand, so here's our efforts to fix it."

Asking kids to keep problems to themselves when the problem is actually bigger than what they can handle is a terrible solution. We often fail to step in because a 10-year-old's problems seem so small: why can't they see that this isn't worth fighting about? But it is that lack of mature perspective that makes them unable to either rise above the conflict or work out an equitable solution. They need our help, not to do it for them, but to give them the perspective that they lack and the skills and - most importantly - the permission to face down an injustice and make wrong right. This is the gift that keeps on giving, because when they bring an expectation of fairness into all of their relationships, they are less likely to be bullied again and more importantly less likely to visit that torment on someone else.

It's easy to sit in an affluent American community and assent to the idea that injustice is wrong. The real test is whether we have the courage to look for it in the immediate contexts of our lives and fight it wherever it's found - even if that's in a place as seemingly insignificant as our kids' lives and their relationships with other kids.

Ready to Roll

By Karen J. Lucas-Howard

“ROADTRIP!” I have it written on my calendar in pink ink. It begins March 3rd and I can’t wait to get started. My name is Karen Howard, and for the second consecutive spring, STEAM is hosting a six week workshop for moms and their 4th-6th grade daughters. During this workshop which is based on my workbook entitled, Just Who Do You Think You Are?, I will lead mother and daughter teams on a fun and exciting excursion through the town of YOUston. Using activities, puzzles, scriptures and conversation, daughters will discover more about themselves. Moms will discover more about their daughters, and both will discover more about God.

Girls who attended the workshop last year enjoyed learning about their own personal styles, personalities and how God sees them. Moms expressed that the time they spent with daughters in these sessions was invaluable… and fun. One mom described the experience as “priceless.” Another mom said that the class inspired conversations with her daughter that probably wouldn’t have taken place otherwise.

When completing the final workshop evaluation forms, all the moms agreed that we achieved the goals of the sessions: To encourage girls to explore their own personalities and thoughts; To encourage a growing relationship between girls and their moms; And to encourage a growing relationship between girls and God.

This workshop is a great tool for moms who want to build, strengthen, and grow a healthy Godly relationship with their daughters. For more information on how and why I came to write “Just Who Do You Think You Are?” click on the link below… and then sign up to join us!

To register: e-mail Joy Beidel in the 4th-6th grade ministry.

Article: "Just Who Do You Think You Are?" by Karen Lucas-Howard

An Update: Human Trafficking at the World Cup

A few months ago, I wrote about a proposal in South Africa to legalize prostitution during this year's World Cup, and the danger that posed for children and youth who might become pawns at the hands of sex traffickers, for whom such a move would be a financial boon ("A Great Evil that is About to Unfold", October 10, 2009). Now, Benjamin Skinner, who was a panelist at the Global Forum on Human Trafficking here last fall, has published this article in Time Magazine on sex trafficking and South Africa's weak resolve to stop it.

What's New at STEAM

New Year - new session of STEAM. Kids are already back to school(!), which means we gear up for the SPRING session beginning this Wednesday. (Having returned from Christmas vacation in North Dakota, where my family lives and where it was 30 below the morning I flew back, I love referring to a January event as "Spring Session".)

Lots of the familiar electives will be offered again, and in addition, here's what's new this time around:

Scrapbooking for Remembrance. Remembrance is a common theme in the Old Testament: God commanded the Israelites to remember, and not to forget, his forgiveness and deliverance and provision. We, too, benefit from looking back - or we risk being dragged down in our everyday circumstances, losing perspective. So along with getting kids started on their own scrapbook album, this elective will explore journaling and other reflective practices that are helpful in a robust spiritual life.

The Great Dollars and $ense Challenge. Let's teach kids how to handle money! Let's teach them young the value of dollars and sense, how to save and budget, and how God regards money, which is often the king of this world. In this elective, we've hand-picked from the best financial education lessons we can find for kids and our interactive approach will challenge kids to be wise stewards of the money they now have and will one day have.

Missions Projects. This elective will put kids to work each week on a different project to aid local and oversees missions organizations. As kids work, they'll learn about people with needs and how we can meet those needs.

Model Building. Kids will work in pairs to construct a model of the Israelites' tabernacle, the "house" they built for God while they were wandering in the wilderness after the Exodus. The tabernacle was later built in a more permanent form as the temple, so kids will learn about the priests and their sacrificial duties, the division of the courtyards, the items in the sanctuary, and so on. Great for hands-on learners!

Sewing. This is another one of those electives that came to us - someone wanting to lead offered this as a suggestion, and we agreed. It is, as the name implies, an introduction to sewing, and how to take a project from the concept stages through to completion. Kids will learn how to operate a sewing machine. Because of equipment limitations, we can take a maximum of eight kids, and this elective is already half full.

Sign Language. We offered Sign only once before, and it will return the second six weeks of this session (March-April). Kids will learn the alphabet, numbers, and how to sign basic words and phrases, as well as some special religious signs. I think a course in sign language is great because it opens kids' eyes to the reality that there is a whole segment of society - the deaf community - who are shut out from communicating with everyone except those who can sign. This has a major impact, of course, on whether and how deaf people can attend church.

Juggling. Juggling makes its return, after debuting the second six weeks this fall. Juggling challenges kids' coordination and also teaches them to be patient, to be thankful for what they can do (rather than resentful about what they can't), and to celebrate new accomplishments with one another. We also teach kids how a simple juggling routine can be used to share the gospel.

You can see all of the midweek program electives at our website - click the tab that says "Midweek Program".