First United Methodist Church
Birmingham, Michigan
January 12, 1997
Believe it or not, I was an eighth grader once. But I don't remember it all that clearly. And I don't remember it all that fondly. One tiling I do remember is wondering why eighth grade girls always went to the bathroom in packs. There you'd be at a school dance....or a church dance. Suddenly, one girl would get up to go, and every other girl would get up to .go with her. Don't ask me why. It never made much sense to me. Most boys went alone. Most girls went in packs. I figured that it was a "female thing" and that my father would explain it to me later. But he never did. And nothing ever changed.
Grown up women still go in packs. Except they go to the powder room. Eighth grade girls never go to the powder room. At least they never call it that. Just the other day, I asked Kris whether women really "powder" in the powder room. She said that most of them do. That's one reason people get married, so they can ask each other things like that. Then,...seeing as I was on a roll....I asked her why teenage girls always go at the same time. And how do they know they are supposed to go together? Do they read it in some book? Do their mothers tell them? Is it genetic? She told me to ask my daughter. So I called Julie and asked her why teenage girls always go at the same time. Julie told me that girls go together so they can talk about boys..,.who likes who....who doesn't like who....that sort of thing. So now you know. Assuming, that is, that you cared to know.
But I didn't come to talk about "powder rooms." If I had, the sermon title would have read: "Don't Go In There Alone." Instead, I came to talk about the world. Which accounts for the title: "Don't Go Out There Alone." It's a warning we have heard for years. We went to summer camp and they forbid us to go swimming alone. We had to have a "buddy." And we had to know where our buddy was at all times. Every time the lifeguard blew the whistle, we had five seconds to find our buddy's hand and hold it aloft. That way, the lifeguard knew that if anybody had drowned, they had at least drowned with a friend.
And when our youth group went to Cedar Point, we were never permitted to wander off alone. We had to be in groups of three or four. Our counselors figured that there was safety in numbers. Besides, it was their way of making sure that shy kids didn't get left to fend for themselves.
On the campus where my daughter went to school, girls were warned about walking alone on the campus at night. In fact, there isn't a campus in America without similar warnings about walking alone at night. Today's campuses have lights everywhere....phones every where....and "campus safety escorts" who will walk with you anywhere.
Even at First Church, we take precautions. Every Sunday, when we take the offering to the bank, it is church policy that no one go alone. The presence of company reduces the potential for thievery.
The world is full of places we shouldn't go alone. I bet every one of you could make a list in the next 10 minutes and come up with 20 such places....leading to 20 such warnings.
Of course, in order to go with someone, you would have to know someone. And not everybody finds it easy to know somebody. There are all kinds of kids who are deficient in the art of friend- making. I serve as the Trustee of a very good small college here in Michigan. All of you confirmands should go there, five years from now. Its name is Albion. Remember it. Tattoo it on the frontal lobe of your brain. You won't regret it.
At Albion, we just spent $6 million of Kellogg money to build a state-of-the-art student center.... which is a fancy institutional name for a "place for kids to hang out." Prior to our building it, kids said: "We don't know each other at this school. We need a place to get together." So we built such a place. It's beautiful. Tt's functional. It has everything a kid could ever want....including a Taco Bell. But where social interaction is concerned, the new building guarantees nothing.
The problem on most campuses is not the lack of buildings for coming together, but the lack of social skills for coming together. In short, it's a human problem. It's that way on every campus. And those of us, who oversee such campuses have done a lot of things to make the problem worse. We have actually increased feelings of student isolation. All with the best of intentions. Consider telephones. Today's dorm rooms have their own phones. Kids don't have to walk down the hall to make a call.... like we did. Today's dorm rooms also have computer terminals which can access information all over campus. Which means that kids don't have to go to the library....like we did. Today, every kid brings a TV set to college. Therefore, nobpdy has to go to the lounge to watch the big game....or General Hospital....like we did. And most newer dorm rooms are air conditioned. Which means that kids stay inside when the weather gets warm, rather than congregate in the quadrangle.... like we did.
A lot of kids are finding it hard to come together under such circumstances. So they say to campus administrators: "Solve this. Make us happy. Build us better buildings so that we'll have more stuff to do....so that we can meet more people....and make more friends." Maybe it would be cheaper to take out the phones, the computer hook-ups, the air conditioning, and ban TV sets everywhere except the lounges. Then people would have to come out of their rooms and get together.
"Don't go out there alone." Which means that you had better know some people to go out there with. But not just any old people will do. You've got to be selective. That's because you can "hook up" with the wrong people. When you go out into the world, some people are going to help you. But other people are going to hurt you. And you're not always going to know which ones are which.
To be a teenager is to have everybody checking out who your friends are....who you are hanging out with...,who you are going out with....who you are talking on^he phone with. That's because smart people know how easy it is to influence all people. And I mean all people. I am 56 years old. I am also a life-long Christian....professional clergyperson....community pillar...,husband....parent....all around good guy. But I can still be influenced (for good or ill) by the people I'm with. So I pay attention to the people I'm with. Because I can't be strong and self-reliant 24 hours a day. No one can.
I've never met a kid in trouble (and I've met plenty) who didn't, at some time or another, blame his or her problems on his or her friends. But it's never all that simple. I'll never forget the kid who said that his friend always to managed to get him in trouble, until one day he learned that his friend was saying the same thing about him.
I know a kid who has a problem with cocaine. Not in Detroit. Not in Ferndale. Not in Royal Oak. But in Birmingham. I could remove my robe right now and run to this kid's front door without breaking a sweat. That's how close he lives. To the best of my knowledge, this kid has never used coke alone....bought coke alone....or gone cruising for coke alone. In fact, he doesn't look like the typical "druggie." The only time he "does coke" is when his friend calls. His only friend.
The world is full of people pulling other people down. My friend, John Gross, is a former Channel 7 sportscaster trying to make it as a motivational speaker. John says he understands how people get pulled down as a result of watching the behavior of lobsters. Now I know that most eighth graders don't eat lobster. That's because they don't serve lobster at Taco Bell. But it's never long before kids discover that one of the quickest ways to drive their parents crazy is to order lobster at a fancy restaurant, especially when there's no number at the right hand side of the menu (but simply the words "market price").
A couple of Mother's Days ago, I decided to cook dinner for Kris. In addition to several delicacies that I purchased from a ready-to-go gourmet shop, I bought some live lobsters at Krogers. Then I borrowed a large aluminum pot from the church kitchen and set out to boil them myself. While I was waiting for the water to boil, I took the lobsters out of the Krogers container, removed the little rubber bands binding their claws, and set them on the kitchen counter. They, of course, commenced to move....which Julie thought was absolutely gross. But what she found even "grosser" was the thought that I was going to boil these babies live....which, of course, is how one cooks them. So in order to hide the plight of the lobsters from her troubled eyes, I covered the pot as they boiled to death. But that meant that I wasn't able to test John Gross' observation. For John claims that when lobsters first hit boiling water, they instinctively scramble up the sides of the pot to safety. And some might make it, were it not for another activity that quickly becomes second nature to lobsters, namely clawing their neighbors and pulling them back into the very water that is about to kill them.
Don't go out there alone. Find some people to go out there with. Pick and choose them carefully. But what do you look for? Toughness? Cleverness? Strength? Guile? What kinds of comrades will best serve you in the world? Street fighters? Smooth talkers? Strong-armed people? Well- armed people?
Lots of people think that way. Lots of people think that the way you make it in the world is by surrounding yourself with people who have clout. Several years ago, I was invited to the home of a friend of mine....a "minister" friend of mine who lived in a nearby town. In the process of showing me the parsonage, he came to the room of his teenage son. At which point he said: "You don't want to go in there." But then he reversed himself. "Maybe you do. Let me show you something."
So we went into his son's room and headed for the closet There on the closet door was a poster. The poster featured a grotesquely-huge hulk of a man. With hair flying and muscles bulging, he had looks that could kill....and a club that could finish the job. And the poster's caption read: "Though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil....because I am the meanest SOB in the valley."
It wasn't very long after that that my friend's son gave his life to Jesus Christ and threw away the poster. Not because he had outgrown it, but because he no longer believed it. The goal (he discovered) is not to go out there with strong people who can defend you, but with good people who can support you....affirm you....encourage you....and even love you. That kid found those people. That kid went to seminary. That kid became a Methodist preacher. And that kid served five years as my associate.
Moments ago, I read a portion of Paul's letter to the Christians at Ephesus. Paul is saying: "Hey, it's tough out there. So don't go alone. And don't go unarmed." But Paul is not saying: "So take clubs, whips, slingshots, zip guns, mace, bullets, or even bullies....but take Christian weapons like truth, righteousness, faith, prayer, peace, the Holy Spirit and one another. That's the way you'll make it. And those are the weapons that will ensure that you make it."
It's tough out there. It's a lot harder to be a Christian than when I was confirmed 44 years ago. The world is no longer filled with people who believe the same things we believe and behave the same way we behave. I was talking to a college chaplain at a major university. He said that a kid, who had never been involved in any previous religious activity on campus, came into his office and asked if there was a Bible study group he might join. "Sure there is," he was told. "But why now?" To which the kid answered: "Do you have any idea how hard it is to be a sophomore and a Christian at the same time?"
Don't get me wrong. You can find good people outside the church. And you can sometimes find bad people in it. But, by and large, I'd rather take my chances with people who believe in Jesus Christ and who are struggling to figure out....every day of their lives....what Christ might want, and what difference he might make. For every time I think about the people who have made a difference
in my life....guided my life....touched my life....directed and redirected my life I realize that (with one or two exceptions) they have all been Christians.
I have another young preacher friend out there. His name is Eric. He lives in eastern Pennsylvania. I have yet to meet him. But having read something I had written, he wrote and asked if I would mail more stuff. To which I said: "Sure, if you'll occasionally mail some of your stuff." Which is how I learned (just last Thursday) that the church in which he was raised was the church in which they filmed the movie, "The Preacher's Wife."
Seeing his old church on the screen brought back memories, he said. "Because that was the place where seeds of faith were planted....where I accepted Jesus as Lord and Savior....and where I first received a call to the ministry." Then he added:
My testimony to you is this. What I learned inside those walls made all the difference for me. What I learned inside those walls gave me more energy than any stupid bunny beating any stupid drum ever could. What I learned inside those walls sustained me more than I could have been sustained by any beer mug or street drug.
What I learned inside those walls sparked more dreams, provided more ideas, and nurtured more hopes than all the Hollywood stars and recording artists combined. And what I learned about love (from those people) went beyond anything I could have experienced in the backseat of any car.
I doubt that Eric had all that when he was an eighth grader.... knew all that when he was an eighth grader....or could have articulated all that when he was an eighth grader. But it all began there....as an eighth grader, when he first got his marching orders for the world....in church.
At the height of the Civil Rights Movement (when blacks paid a terrible price to march down a public street, eat at a public lunch counter, register to vote in a public election, or enter a public school), someone asked Martin Luther King if blacks were getting their courage from the major civil rights organizations of America. To which Dr. King said: "There are only a few thousand of us enrolled in civil rights organizations here in Atlanta and elsewhere. But there are millions of us enrolled in Baptist churches (and other churches) everywhere." Which means that they didn't have to go out there alone. And neither do you. So don't even think of going it alone. Because you aren't alone. There's Matt and me....Doris and Chris....the kid on your left....the kid on your right....the people behind you....and those in the balcony above you....not to mention all the kids who ever knelt at this rail before you or will kneel here after you. And there's Jesus Christ. Who will go all the way with you. And for you. For it is Christ who calls us. Not just to the bathroom (to powder our noses....comb our hair....or talk about each other), but to a life of nothing less than saving each other. And saving the world.
