Do you have openly gay students in your youth ministry? Thanks to John for the poll suggestion – vote in this week’s poll right now!
JG
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Josh Griffin has been in youth ministry for 16+ years in a small church and a big church. He currently serves as the High School Pastor at Saddleback Church in Lake Forest, CA. [read more]
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Geoff Stewart serves the Jr / Sr High School Pastor at Peace Portal Alliance Church in Surrey B.C.
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Chris Wesley serves as the Director of Student Ministry at Church of the Nativity in Timonium, Maryland.
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Colton Harker serves with Josh at Saddleback Church. He is currently in his second year in youth ministry.
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I’d love to see some follow-up on how pastors with openly gay students navigate those waters.
What do you do about room assignments on overnight trips?
Ben… not sure exactly what you mean by: “I’d love to see some follow-up on how pastors with openly gay students navigate those waters.” I’m not assuming that you mean something bad, just not sure how to respond exactly.
As a guy who answered “YES”, I’d answer this way. Their students just like the rest of them. Just recently we went through a sex and dating series. During that series we took a week to talk about the subject of homosexuality. I can tell you that we didn’t come at the subject with the “Westboro Baptist” mentality, but we didn’t sugarcoat things either. We spoke the truth from scripture and ultimately asked everyone in the room, homosexual or heterosexual, if we could let our sexuality be a part of God’s story. We also shared a story of a guy a little older who has struggled with homosexuality for his entire life, the good, the bad and the “shh, don’t talk about that in ‘church’”.
It opened up some really healthy conversations, which is our goal from each service.
Levi, as for your question… I (as far as I know) haven’t had someone who struggles go on a trip. All of the students who have come through and opened up enough to say that they struggle have kept most people at arms length, because they are afraid of a judgmental attitude. We live on the buckle of the Bible belt here in Lynchburg, VA… they prefer Jesus with the whip around these here parts.