Some Ideas:

In our youth ministry, we use one on a label pointed to a GOSPEL presentation.

Personally, I use one as my Twitter profile pic, that points to MinistryPlace.net (See Image..)

I would love to hear what you’re doing….

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Maybe You are a Youth Worker that has been told you are too young/old/boring/playful/whatever to effectively serve in youth ministry. Maybe you have been sucked into church politics without even knowing it and you are now paying the price. Maybe you’ve been bullied by a youth parent/deacon/elder/Sr Pastor/whoever. Maybe you fantasize about what youth group would be like if “that kid or those kids” suddenly stopped coming. Maybe you want to hang it up, go work 9 to 5 in a cubicle somewhere. Maybe you have the feeling that nothing you are doing in your church matters, or you made a mistake coming to the church where you are serving.

Maybe you feel horribly inadequate and ill-equipped to deal with all the junk that is thrown into the laps of your teenagers and families. Maybe you have felt the constant pull between church expectations and building deep relationships between spouse and your children.Maybe you’ve had that deep feeling tearing away at you that something is not matching somewhere between your beliefs and what your church is teaching. Maybe you have that desperate wish to tell someone you are not “fine” ; that you are really dying and wasting away inside, your soul is screaming for something, somewhere to give.

I’m not going to tell you to just suck it up, or that it will get better. It really may get worse first, in a way you can’t even imagine. I’m not going to tell you to count it joy, that you are doing something right. While Biblical, it is the wrong time to hear it.

I will tell you I have been there.  I will tell you that you cannot walk through this alone. I will tell you that the longer you hold it in, the worse it will be when it finally comes out (because IT WILL, one way or another). I will tell you that you are not the only one who has ever experienced this. I will tell you that I will gladly talk, pray, cry, or whatever else to help you walk through this.

Youth Workers, we are in this together. It is not God who wants to see us like this, but the enemy that seeks to kill, steal, and destroy.

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In the ministry context, I notice that our churches, we have the same thing happen. We throw out all these “Christianese” terms with no definition or context, and expect those who do not have a Biblical worldview to understand. They don’t. or worse, they misunderstand.

Before you use the word, justified, sanctified, atonement,etc, hit the link below and see what kind of effect you may be having.

(just a short disclaimer, that this site does not have a Christian worldview at heart, and a few terms in the article may be too risque…)

[original article from socialnomics]

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Consider the envelope successfully pushed, folks.

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It will probably be a hot issue for some years to come. I have fielded the following question many times -

“Does a person who commits suicide automatically go to Hell, even if they were a believer?”

I have probably more questions than answers myself, but

Lets unpack this…

Assuming the person is a believer, there are several things scripturally we have to look at. First is Romans 8:38. it clearly states that nothing in creation can separate us from God’s love. 1 Corinthinans 3 gives indication that believers will have to account for all that we do, good and bad. This passage points also toward unrepentant sin in the believer’s life as well. Then What does the Old Testament and New Testament say?

The Old Testament view?

There are a few instances that cast a strange light on suicide in the Old Testament:

The first is Samson. He made some dumb choices that cost him his strength and role in leadership of God’s people, but we see at the end of the story that God gave him back that strength one last time to be used to make a huge point to the Philistines that God was more powerful than the idols the Philistines worshiped. God used a man committing suicide to show His strength….No indication that he would endure eternal punishment.

The Second is King Saul in 1 Samuel 28. A few points of note: Saul was God’s chosen, anointed king. We see in this chapter that God’s spirit had left Saul. He goes to a witch/medium (depending on translation). The Medium had conjured up Samuel’s spirit. God seemingly allowed this to bring forth prophecy (later fulfilled). Samuel stated that Saul and his sons would be with him that day (Good Side of Abraham’s Bosom/Paradise/Heaven, etc.). Saul did meet his end, fulfilling a prophecy made, but it was Saul’s suicide that fulfilled it…..No indication that he would endure eternal punishment.

The New Testament View?

The New Testament view can muddy the waters even more theologically speaking, as there is even less clarity. The first narrative we often think of is Judas (see Acts 1:8) . It tells of Judas taking his own life. But there are a lot of unanswered questions about him. Was he truly a follower, or a misguided radical? Did he truly show remorse and ask forgiveness for being a traitor to Christ? Why does the New Testament not take the opportunity to mention what his “just desserts” are? If you do say Judas was truly a follower, then you have to deal with the issue of “Satan entering him” and whether that could happen to a true believer (another time)…

Then there is this passage – 1 Corinthians 3:17 – It tells us that God will destroy the person who destroys His temple. That temple is the believer’s physical body. Many will make the logical jump that this passage also includes suicide in its scope. However, that view would seem to disagree with John 10:27-30 where it speaks of God’s inescapable eternal life that He gives us. There is also the passage from Romans 8 mentioned above that would agree with John 10.

Then you are left with this passage – John 15:12-14. We all know verse 14 from little kid Sunday School…But to get it in context it includes ‘Greater love has no one than this: to lay down one’s life for one’s friends” in Verse 13. Where does this piece of the New Testament puzzle fit? An Iraq War veteran shed new light on this passage to me the other day over coffee, as he explained that stuff like that went on “in the sandbox” much more often than we would like to admit.

The questions you are left to wrestle with and dig into God’s word to solve are these:

• Is God’s grace truly sufficient to cover all sin, including suicide?
• Is suicide a “bigger” sin than other sins? Why? Are there “bigger” sins than others?
• If the premise for suicide is that you cannot ask forgiveness afterwards, what happens to the person who forgets to ask forgiveness for a sin that occurs just before thy die, such as bitterness, a lie, etc?  Does that place a higher value on our asking forgiveness than Jesus’ shed blood on the Cross?
• Where does mental illness or ill effects of drugs (legal or otherwise) come into play?
• What about the person who knowingly lays down his/her life to save others?

Feel free to weigh in below. Did I miss something?

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You need to watch this if you care about teenagers….

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