Kevin had been a friend a co-laborer for many years; but he suddenly seemed pensive, which was much different from the outgoing person I had known for years. I invited him to lunch where he began to unpack some of his pain.
“I am not a dynamic speaker,” he said. “I am unsuccessful at discipling others. I have trouble getting along with some of the parents. Now my deficiencies are coming back to bite me. I find myself angry all the time. I did not go into ministry to become this mad.”
Kevin had a broken heart—a common condition that has inspired hit songs, popular movies and classic novels.
Adam was dealing with emotions of hurt and shame never experienced before, and he explained to God the true state of his heart: “I was afraid, so I hid.”
All of us are all broken, aren’t we? We hide, wear masks and pretend we have our acts together. Humans are so complex; and that includes youth workers who can be sincere, loving and godly, as well as insecure, competitive, comparison-driven and annoyed. We are jars of clay, cracked and damaged.
Henry Nouwen said ministers of Christ are wounded healers; and Thornton Wilder said, “In love’s service only the wounded soldiers can serve.”
Broken teens need to know youth workers are breakable. Students want to trust us, but they won’t until they see us become open and vulnerable.
In my first role as a paid youth leader, I was trying to earn the right to be heard; and for some reason, I thought if I told all my success stories of evangelism on airplanes and how I had sold out my life to Jesus that my kids would be impressed.
One Sunday night, I was teaching and I broke down in tears and talked about how I was struggling to trust God in some area. When the night was over, evidently my candidness about my broken heart resonated with some kids, and they stuck around. Jan waited in the back of the room, hoping to be the last person to speak with me.
She came up to me and sheepishly looked down at the ground. “David,” she said in a halting voice, “you have been here for about a year now, and I have never really liked you.” (I am thinking, “OK, thanks for the encouragement.”)
She continued, “It seems [as if] you are trying so hard to electrify us with your perfect Christian life, but I’ve never found trusting God [to be] easy. Tonight when you cried and confessed that being a Christ follower is hard for you sometimes, I said to myself, ‘Tonight, David Olshine has become my youth pastor.’ I now can look to you for leadership.”
What if all youth workers quit hiding our broken hearts as Adam and Eve did and instead accept the fact we are all wounded soldiers who are strongest when we are the weakest because the power of Christ rests in us?
Didn’t Jesus say, “Take My body, broken for you?” What if our messes can be redeeming and healing? We don’t have to hide anymore. God loves us—broken youth workers—just as He loves broken kids.
When you have a heart that aches, give yourself permission to come clean. Your soul needs the confession and cleansing, and your students will love you for being real and honest. “In love’s service, only the wounded can serve.”
David Olshine is the director of Youth Ministry, Family and Culture at Columbia International University in South Carolina. He is the author of the best-selling Studies on the Go and is co-founder of Youth Ministry Coaches.
