A Pastoral Letter to America's Youth

I’m making this week’s meditation a letter, an open letter to young people, not just in our church but in the wider community.

Dear Young People,

As a pastor, I feel the need to directly communicate to you what’s on my heart. I often think of my growing up years. Those years weren’t always easy. I didn’t always like it. I lived with fear and angst like so many kids of my generation in the age of nuclear weapons.

But knowing all that you all face in this day and age, my heart aches. I know you deal with so much – wars around the world; mass shootings at schools; vicious, divisive politics; a planet in peril; social media that gives you escape but also sometimes harms you. It’s hard enough to grow up, learn who you are and who you aren’t, deal with your parents and school and your future. Add in all the other stuff, and the difficulty and complexity for you is next level. And we wonder why anxiety is such a reality for so many of you.

I personally feel the need to apologize to you, on behalf of folks older than you. Now, it’s not really possible for me to represent everyone, so I’ll simply apologize for myself.

We, your elders, your leaders, your culture, have dropped the ball and sadly you suffer the consequences. I’m sorry. I’m really sorry that you have to face so much, too much, too soon.

But I don’t want to stop there. I want to share some good news. I feel the need to share this good news with you because there are so many mixed messages out there. And I know the internet, YouTube influencers and social media are things. Information is everywhere, but the good news I want to share too often gets lost in the mess.

I begin this good news with a Mr. Rogers’ quote. You may not know who Mr. Rogers is. Google him. He’s a beautiful human being who did so much good in our world. He said this,

“I believe that at the center of the universe there dwells a loving spirit who longs for all that’s best in all of creation, a spirit who knows the great potential of each planet as well as each person, and little by little will love us into being more than we ever dreamed possible. That loving spirit would rather die than give up on any one of us.”

A Loving Spirit - that's what we're sorely and painfully missing.

And that this Loving Spirit loves us, this truth we're sorely and painfully missing that too.

Here's the heart of the good news Mr. Rogers points to. “To be,” to simply exist in this world, means to be loved by a Loving Spirit that would rather die than to see us suffer needlessly

You don’t have to do anything to earn God’s love for you, except simply sexist. Just be. You don’t need a degree, get a good grade, or look or be a certain way. You don’t have to reach a level of respect, admiration, or popularity. You don’t have to have a lot of friends and likes on social media.

To be on this earth means to be loved unconditionally by a Loving Spirit who breathed the universe into being and who'd rather die than see you suffer. 

We are God’s beloved no matter what!

As for who God is, this is where it gets even better. God is Love!

Do you get the amazingness of this!? We are loved by Love itself.

What's more, we are created by Love for love, to love. Our built-in capacity to love comes from straight from the heart of God.

Now, I can guess what you’re thinking. 

If love is the truth, then why all the hate and anger?

Why the vicious and ugly politics?

Why all the chaos?

Why all the violence, threats of violence, fear of violence?

Why the mess we’ve made?

Why the mass shootings we ignore?

Why the wars we wage?

Why the meanness, callousness, and lack of compassion?

Why all the bad news?

Well, the simple answer is one that may be hard to hear. Hard mostly because no one talks about it anymore.

Well, our society, our culture, our leaders have forgotten and walked away from the good news I just shared. 

Our culture has forgotten and walked away from the truth that each of us is God’s beloved one. We’ve forgotten and walked away from the truth that God’s love for us is built-in. No one earns it. No one has to be, look, become something, or be from a certain place.

To exist in this world means to be loved by the Loving Spirit that created and inhabits our world. We've forgotten and walked away from this.

We’ve also forgotten and walked away from the truth that each of us is equally created in the image of God, each endowed with the spark of God, each dignified as God’s children. 

And we’ve forgotten and walked away from the truth that God is Love.

The church calls this forgetting and walking away from God and the Good, the church and our faith calls this sin.

What we need to walk away from is just that - sin!

We as a society cannot forget or walk away from the Love of God any longer. Sin kills the Spirit and more!

Fortunately, turning things around is not beyond us. Redemption, turning things around, is right in front of us! Love is right in front of us.

Our forgetting and walking away is not the end of the story. Sin does not, cannot win!

How? Why?

Love has created a bridge back. Love has not left us hanging.

Christ - here I get specific - Christ is the bridge back to remembering and returning to the way of Love. Christ, the Loving One, the One who was hung on a cross by human ignorance, hatred, and anger, Christ cuts the rope, loosens our noose, and frees us, freeing us to remember and walk toward God.

Let me end by saying this:

Many of your generation have in turn done your own walking away, namely from the church. I can understand. You’ve walked away from our poor example of walking Jesus’ way. You’ve walked away from our sold-out faith, used and abused by the powerful and those seeking power. You’ve walked away from our spaces that condone political and religious leaders, leaders who join hands and worship the god of power and wealth. I get it. I’ve been there. I, too, once walked away.

But I have faith you’ll eventually arrive at Jesus, the one who has been lost in all the ugliness and chaos. I have faith you’ll arrive at Jesus, stay there, learn and live his way of love, and then exemplify it for us. 

You will lead the revival of a new, yet ancient way of living the faith.

You, our young ones, will be the key to all of our salvation in Christ.

How?

You will remind us of what we’ve been missing. You'll remind us what we've forgotten and walked away from. You’ll remind us of the essential truths of the faith. You’ll remind us of why we’re here!

The child shall lead us!

I realize you’re no longer children. But you’re closer to childhood than us old fogeys!

And you’ll soon be leading us home!

May you know God guides you and that we love you.

Amen.