What are you doing with those punk kids? (luke 15)

Have you ever been drawn to a group of people, just inexplicably drawn?

Sense I started youth ministry there is a group of students I am just drawn too. I think this is true for all of us. There are people who we are drawn too, people we identify with, maybe people who we are like. The whole "birds of a feather" thing. I took one of those silly little face book quizzes a couple of months ago to find out what kind of high school crowd I would be hanging with in today's groups. It turns out I'm an emo punker at heart who really wants pink hair.

I don't know about the pink hair, but I know these are the kids I am drawn to in ministry. The brooding artists, the fringe kids, the one who march to a different drummer who no one else seems to hear and who is playing with some serious ferocity. I remember going on an 8th grad trip a few years back now and meeting one of those kids. I knew the moment I met him, I wanted him for my student leadership team. He was just one of those kids I was inexplicably drawn too. I had to wait 3 years, but he finally came and engaged and led. He is leading still, just by who he is. I had the chance to tell him as well. "I wanted you man, from the first time we skated together, I knew God had something special for you."

These are not the stereotypical youth group kids. These aren't the jocks who are going to draw everyone else in. Not the popular crowd. Jesus didn't hang with the popular crowd either. In fact the pharisees in Luke chap 15 where pretty offended by the crowd Jesus ran with. Why do you spend time with these sinners and eat with them!!! Jesus tells the lost parables at this point. A lost sheep, the shepherd leaves the 99 in open country to find the one. A lost coin, the widow sweeps, cleans, and searches the house although she still has nine others. The lost son, after a life of rebellion returns to his father to be a servant, instead he finds his son-ship reinstated.

Each one of these stories has the "God" figure searching for and drawn to the one who is lost, the one who has wandered off, the one who is in strait up rebellion. I desire for my heart to beat with the heart of God don't you? So who is the one in the corner in your life? Who is the lost one? Who is the one in rebellion? Jesus is drawn to these and so if our hearts are to beat as his, then we must be too.

This is not to say the jocks, scholars, nerds, and pretty people don't need Jesus. Each of us has our affinity for a certain group of people. There are lost sheep, coins, and sons among them all. Search for them, look for them, find them and when you do celebrate them with all your heart. The angels are throwing a party, so let's join in!

May you find yourself drawn today to the lost ones, the rebellious ones, the ones Jesus is drawn too.