The Stripped-Down Truth About Transformation
At the end of his concert, Mr. Boone gave an altar call that left me weeping. Shy as I was, I stood in front of several thousand strangers (it seemed like several million) and made the three-minute journey from the grandstands down to the stage. There a nice elderly man prayed with me to receive Jesus as my Lord and Savior.
And now, several decades later, that one teary moment at the feet of Mr. White-Buck Shoes pretty much defines and confines my Christian-growth trajectory. Or...not!
Just like the several hundred Christian college students who responded to our survey "The Truth About Youth Evangelism," my conversion experience constitutes a tiny chapter in my faith story...
• In high school I connected to a mainline church youth group for the first time and learned my faith had a reasonable foundation.
• As a freshman in college, I was suddenly stricken with a life-threatening illness around the same time I hooked up with some charismatic Christians—they prayed for a release of the Holy Spirit in me. For the first time, I had an insatiable hunger to read God’s Word, and my relationship with Jesus became an every-moment reality.
• After college I was asked to teach a Sunday school class at a big evangelical church, and I learned how to defend my faith and draw others into a love relationship with God. I used a concordance and a Greek dictionary for the first time and devoured C.S. Lewis, George MacDonald, G.K. Chesterton, Malcolm Muggeridge, Elisabeth Elliot, and others.
My story is a pretty fair example of two truths we uncovered in our big survey...
1. Family ministry is the key to evangelism. Most people in America come to Christ because their parents brought them to church regularly when they were young. Parents are, by far, the best evangelizers.
2. Teenagers need recommitment experiences like rockets need boosters, and youth leaders are key to those experiences. Mission trips where kids do something in the name of Jesus, crisis experiences where kids learn they deeply need Jesus, big events where kids are asked to choose for Jesus, camping experiences where kids learn the power and necessity of a faith community, and teaching experiences where kids must defend their faith are all crucial to long-term Christian growth.
Caging evangelistic impact inside a moment-in-time conversion is like reading only the introduction to a great novel.
Conversation
A once-in a life-time
A once-in a life-time evangelistic experience is not enough. Young people have to get drenched in God's Word + camps, fellowship, real-life events, hands-on experience in mission trips (just like Mr. Lawrence mentioned). Kids, as well as parents and church leaders, have to persevere to learn more and more about God. Hear what Paul said to Timothy, "And for this reason I remind you to kindle afresh the gift of God which is in you through the laying on of my hands. For God has not given us a spirit of timidity, but of power and love and discipline (2 Timothy 1:6-7). Paul encouraged his protege to keeon on fanning the flame of the passion for the Lord. Timothy was a great leader and even great leaders have the necessity to set their eyes on the Lord and even recommit experiences.
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