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Tending Body Life

For deacons, elders, and others in caring ministry and spritual leadership.

Let young adults live on the edge

by Mark Diller Harder

Young adults are some of our best voices. They raise the tough issues without mincing words. Yet, often their style is unorthodox, or their actions are impulsive and unpolished. I have seen young adults speak out of turn in a congregational meeting, or put letters in mailboxes listing complaints about the church. As a result of their methods, both the young adults and the church end up anxious and uncomfortable.

But the young adults among us are in good historical company. Jeremiah smashed pottery jugs and walked around town with a yoke around his neck (Jer. 19, 27). Ezekiel held a strange vigil for 430 days and baked barley cakes over cow dung. (Ezek. 4). It was the young students Conrad Grebel, George Blaurock, and Felix Manz who questioned the state church’s infant baptism practices and baptized each other as adults. Young dreamers were the ones who started many of our Mennonite church institutions. Often misunderstood and labeled radical, they end up leading the way.

As a conference staff person and pastor, I have struggled to know how best to relate to and respect their prophetic idealism. I represent the institution in an era when young adults are suspicious of all institutions, including the church. Young adults sniff out any whiff of insincerity or politicking in the church. Still, there are several approaches that I have found helpful in my ministry.

Take young adults seriously. You take someone seriously when you ask questions, research their issues, provide forums for public discussion, offer leadership opportunities, and even challenge and disagree with them. At the conference young adult events and retreats I help to plan, young adults shape and lead all the sessions, and they come up with creative, interactive, and challenging presentations. In my congregation, First Mennonite, Kitchener, we hear regularly in worship from young adults who have participated in Christian Peacemaker Teams. Two second-year university students have been given the responsibility to lead our Youth Worship Team, which plans and leads music once a month. When given the opportunity and support, young adults will show great potential.

Grapple with the issues. Young adults keep us in touch with the cutting-edge issues of our world, since they keep pace with modern culture. Last February, a group of 20 Mennonite young adults and 20 Muslim young adults spent a weekend together in Toronto at both the Jaffari Islamic Centre and Danforth Mennonite Church. It was a rich weekend of dialogue, friendship, and hospitality that explored the ways we express and share our faith in our multi-faith, multicultural society.

In recent years, young adults from our conference have marched on Parliament Hill in Ottawa before the war in Iraq; experienced the struggles and joys of life while being hosted in several First Nations Communities in northern Ontario; and asked questions about the place of faith in post-Christian Montreal. They have had opportunities to debate such issues as gender and sexuality, how to read the Bible, the environment, and the role of prayer.

Young adults have a refreshing clarity of thought and a direct approach, even if it lacks subtlety. It is important, therefore, to have places where the issues are dealt with head-on.

Cultivate relationships. All this can only take place in the context of relationships and community. Provide mentors. Keep in contact even when young adults distance themselves for a while. I make it a point to answer personally every single email I receive from a young adult, even if it has come as part of a group list from some distant place in the world.

Being in relationship means forgiving the mistakes young adults make. Young adults might later regret rash actions or harsh words of criticism. Give room for growth and new maturity without holding it against them. The church’s greatest gift to young adults is providing a safe and loving place to test and live their gift of prophetic idealism. May the church accept and nurture this gift!

Mark Diller Harder is Minister of Student and Young Adult Ministries with Mennonite Church Eastern Canada, and a pastor at First Mennonite Church in Kitchener, Ontario.