so, what would you say?

This week for our Confirmation students the topic was the authority of scripture--where we got the Bible from, how we know we can trust it, what do the words inerrancy and infalibility mean and where do we as leaders and our church in general fall, and what can they say when people ask them questions about why they believe the bible. We recognize that at some point they will encounter people who will ask them questions that they haven't been exposed to or prepared for in church and we think that's not okay. If someone is going to poke holes in what they have always assumed to be true about scripture we wanted it to be us youth leaders where we can help them reconstruct some of what they've been taught rather than a college professor who doesn't care about their faith. We talked to them about how we fall into the "we believe scripture is infallible" camp of people, not inerrant, which made sense to them, they even picked that camp before we told them that's where our church tends to land.

Sunday morning they received a talk on the background of where we got the New Testament, and then in the afternoon they were broken into groups of 5, and each group was given a real life scenario of a conversation they will most likely have about the bible at some point in their life. They were given time on Sunday and time last night to come up with responses to their scenario and then they presented them to the whole youth group last night. After their presentation each group sat down one at a time with a panel of Chuck, George and I to receive questions, feedback, critique, and so we could point out where there might be holes in their arguments. We told them we needed them to think deeply about these scenarios. There weren't easy answers, we were not going to tell them where to find any answers, and their answers needed to include something from scripture. We had a bunch of theology books there for them on Sunday, theological dictionaries and a few other books and told them they needed to actually research what people were saying on whatever topic they had. It was a fascinting exercise to watch. We don't ever make them do anything very academic, and some didn't like that it felt like "school" to them. But we also realized that the church does a lot to just hand kids their faith and doesn't help them look deeper or think critically about things very often. Some of these kids are about to graduate and will be in college next year and at some point will have to answer questions that we know they aren't necessarily prepared to handle. Each group had one kid in it that has a ton of bible knowledge and 3-4 kids who don't, so of course the 1 kid ended up doing most of the work and presenting. But then when it was time for their conversations with us, we had a chance to ask each student questions to press them a little deeper. Some were a little uncomfortable, some said, "wow, I didn't realize that what we said might not work as a response," and some enjoyed being pushed harder. All in all they did a really good job, we were proud of them, but we also reminded them that arguing people with "facts" isn't always helpful because there are just as many facts that can be thrown at them for why believeing in the bible isn't smart. So we talked to each group about responding with their own stories, experiences, and encounters with faith and community to answer a lot of questions because people can't argue with your story.

So, what would you say if you were confronted with one of these 3 scenarios?

"Your friend Susie grew up in the church and knows all the bible stories but dosn't think they are relevant. She asks you why you think the bible is relevant. How would you respond?"

"In one of your classes a teacher tells you the bible is like any other mythological text and it is no more authoritative than Homer's The Iliad. Your friend comes to you after class and asks you how you can still be a Christian after what your teacher just said. What do you say?"

"Your friend comes to you and says, 'I saw a preacher on TV who said that the Haitian earthquake was a result of their sin. Do you believe this?'"

Not always straightforward answers huh? We definitely do not want to turn these kids into little apologists--giving them a handful of pat answers to throw back. We wanted them to wrestle deeply, figure out how this scenario connects with their own story, and see what they came up with. Definitely a worthwhile experience!