C.S. Lewis and The Fantasy Suite
Most of you who know my story, know Young Life played a key role in my faith journey. I had a young adult pouring into my life and the lives of my close friends for 3 years in high school. She showed up randomly and she showed up predictably. No strings attached.
My senior year of high school I started going to a church with some friends from school. They just hired a new youth pastor. He and his wife were young and fun. There were about 30 of us who attended on a weekly basis as I remember it. Somewhere within my senior year he had made a special invite to Juniors and Seniors to begin going through a C.S. Lewis study on Wednesday evenings. I went the first week, eager to grow, and soon realized C.S. Lewis had a lot of great things to say that my 17 year old mind was not fully capable of understanding. I was the girl that signed up for A.P. classes only to be with my friends, and suffered through the work I was not cut out for the rest of the year.
After the first week, my young life leader called and asked my friends and I if we could move our weekly time we met together for Bible Study that we called campaigners. The only night she had available was Wednesday evenings. I felt slightly guilty for ditching on this awesome, super “spiritual” sounding C.S. Lewis study, but a night with 3 of my close friends and someone who was “role model goals” kids would describe in 2016 seemed to be more enticing.
So the following Wednesday myself, 2 of my close friends, and this young adult began meeting weekly, and 12 years later, I can still reflect on and tell you what took place with a small group of us in her living room. 1. The Bachelor. That’s right folks. The Bachelor in it’s original days aired on Wednesday evenings, and part of our deal for agreeing to Wednesdays was that we could not miss the bachelor. Some weeks, if we were running late getting to her house, that would mean we better hurry up and check in with each other and then spend 5 minutes in prayer because Jesus would certainly not be happy if we missed who got the one on one date, or the fantasy suite invite… 2. Vulnerability. We didn’t always spend hours reflecting on scripture, but man do I ever remember seeing the presence of Jesus in that living room. I remember the time this adult shared with us some really tough things from her past. Like how her promiscuity in high school would greatly impact the rest of her life. Or the time that she shared with us how hard it was for her and her husband to keep their hands off of one another before they were married. She knew the struggle was real, and we had a secret code we used for our group when we were in serious dating relationships. She always asked “How’s the t-shirt fitting?” If it was a little loose, that meant the struggle was real for us too, but if it was snug, well, we were doing okay with our boundaries set. Regardless, we knew that she was someone we could share the good, the bad, and the ugly with because she had done the same for us. Walls were broken down, and she created a safe place for us. We never felt shamed. We always walked away feeling loved, and often challenged.
3. Community– The short season of my life lived over coffee and the bachelor in a living room on Wednesday nights created a community experience that I wish we could give every single one of our students. It was a genuine time in my life where I felt a sense of belonging. This can happen in other avenues as well, but to have a true sanctuary where tears can be shed, words can be unfiltered, and a guard can be let down. I think it could be true that the love of Jesus shined so brightly in those moments through one another and our transparency that shame didn’t really have a chance to creep in.
You know, now having years of experience leading student small groups of my own, I often think back to the young, naive teenager that set in that living room all those years ago, and I wonder. I wonder if the adult taking the time to pour into us ever felt discouraged. I bet it was really easy to think you aren’t making much of a spiritual impact when all you’re doing is spending 80% of your night guessing who is going to get the “final rose.” I wonder if she ever felt really underappreciated by us because we always expected coffee and brownies to show up for us in the kitchen, and honestly… I’m not sure we always said thank you. You know, thank you for giving up time with your friends your own age. Thank you for spending your own money for our post dinner snacks. Thank you for putting your kids to bed early so we can hang out and talk about all our drama. In fact, I’m sure we never said thank you then. But 12 years later…We say thank you. That’s often how it happens in the world for those who work with students.
The other thing I find fascinating, is one would think with all the doctrine and theology C.S. Lewis has to offer, you would clearly think anyone sitting in on that study would have the better end of the spiritual deal. As I follow all of my old friends on social media who were apart of the C.S. Lewis study group, I see nearly all of them were a part of the statistics of those who somehow got lost in college, and culture ate away at their faith. It’s heart breaking actually to see people who you thought really had it, people who you cared for, walking away and being another statistic. It makes me thankful for people like my leader in high school who probably felt like she was giving us a watered down version of the gospel week to week, when really she was planting deep roots for us to grow. For us to experience real faith moments later in life because we saw what true love for Jesus and love for people looked like fleshed out. Twelve years later, each of us are still imperfectly pursuing a relationship with the one who loves us most. Quite possibly because a 24 year old mom decided to hang out with some highly hormonal, gossipy teenage girls. “Do we emphasize good behavior over character? Because good behavior won’t guarantee anything. If they don’t love Jesus and people, it matters zero if they remain virgins and don’t say the F-word. We must shepherd their hearts, not just their hemlines.” -Jen Hatmaker