reasons I am not a youth minister

this morning I spent a few moments over at becky.bear’s blog. becky was one of the early members of s & s. she recently moved onto seattle, where she is pursuing yet another master’s degree, creating a micro art collaborative and creating Christian community among seattle’s sonic youth. i love to taunt becky about her sixteen inch shoes and rockabilly style, but i have only the deepest respect for her character, ability and heart for God. anyway, while i was reading about her attempts to create a vbs according to brian mclaren, i began to think about why i am not a youth minister. as you might have guessed, this is a long way of introducing yet another list.

reasons i am not a youth minister:

thou shalt not give teenagers swirlys. from what i hear that is one of the first commandments in the youth ministry book. yet, i confess, i have broken it.

thou shalt not put “tweens” in the trunk of a car. yet another commandment that yours truly has shattered.

thou shalt not openly laugh at other youth minister’s admonitions. yet this is how i responded when another youth minister told my kids to trash their secular cds.

thou shalt care if the bean dip shows up at the pool party. but i never gave a shit.

thou shalt not encourage tweens to throw stones at one another. yet i have and do. in fact, one of my afterschool kids received a battle scar yesterday afternoon.

thou shalt utilize a number of non-competitive games. i have blatant disregard for this rule and am more than willing to go “Billy” on a child when you put a four square ball in my hand.

thou shalt do stupid, idiotic tricks for missions' money. so i was never willing to stick my head in a toilet, drink regurgitated soda or finger paint with my own feces in order to send more Bibles to Cambodia…shoot me.

thou shalt utilize hand motions while singing worship songs. i only know one hand motion and most people don’t consider it appropriate for worship.

thou shalt not smoke, drink or openly attend and celebrate Kevin smith movies. guilty, guilty, guilty.

thou shalt not react in a violent way when a teen strikes you in the face. um, i’m pleading the fifth on this one.

thou shalt not tear up jesus tees and use them to wash one’s toilet. yet they had to be put to some use.

thou shalt not "hook up" with one of thy youth sponsors. um, yeah. i had to find some way to encourage her to volunteer. at least i never contemplated connecting with one of the kids.

thus ends today’s edition of uncalled for confessions. if you want to read about a real youth minister in action, check out becky’s blog.