TRBC Youth Blog

In these days, where we want broadband instead of 14.4kb, where we want MMS instead of SMS, where we want to go at 110kmph when the speed limit says 90, it seems, nobody looks deeper anymore. Nobody bothers going deeper and seeing the people behind the facade. Everybody looks, but nobody SEES anymore.

And the strange thing is: everybody seems to be okay with that. Even in our church.

Yes, OURS. I'm not talking about "the world in general", or "everyone else". I'm talking about our own church, the one at number 45, the nice new beige-ish one, the one with the gorgeous sanctuary, the one with the idiosyncratic lifts.

We seem to be content with what we see in people. Oh, he's the holy-moly one. Oh, she's the one who never brings her bible. Oh, he's the one who only comes because the church bus comes to fetch him. Oh, she's the rich one, comes to church in a mercedes. He's the one, she's the one, he's the other one, she's that other one.

The trouble is, we've got many "ones" within us. He may be the holy-moly one who's also the rich one, who also is the one who drinks a lot of water, who may also be the one who actually has a problem. She may be the one who never brings her bible, who is also the one who talks very loudly, who is also in debt because she bought a new mobile phone beyond her means.

I'm dissatisfied with this state of affairs. I'm guilty of the "hi-kisskiss-bye" phenomenon that's so prevalent, but I'm still dissatisfied with this status quo. Perhaps it's just me, but I think that church, especially the youth, should be spending more time with each other of their own volition, and work together because they like each other, instead of being pushed into it by the older folk.

I used to hate it when the older folk would go "Hey, we need some young people in here... let's just call XXX and YYY lah, they are young, let them do it." Like I was part of some mindless mob, lumped together because we were of a certain demographic. As I grow (up? heh...) OLDER, I find myself slipping into this pattern.

I'd really rather not.

The solution, though right in front of our noses, is not at our doorstep. At least, not yet. Youth have got to hang out together, got to learn about each other, go past the hi-kisskiss-bye phenomenon at church, and start interacting, engaging each other, and start either hitting it off and creating sparks WITHIN the group itself. This is, of course, messy, but aren't human relationships always that way?

Let's try. Get involved. Don't just answer "fine", when someone asks you how your week was. Share a little. New Radicals (and the theme song of that i-forgot-the-name show that was on a couple of years back, Shake? Turn? Spin? Round? Something like that) did sing "You Only Get What You Give", and it's something of an anthem when I teach my kids in school - you only get as much from my coaching as what you give it. Come prepared, and I'll work on your material with you. Come with nothing, it'll get multiplied, but when you multiply nothing with something, it's still nothing.

Go deeper. With God, and with each other as well.

I want to go deeper
But I don't know how to swim
I want to be meeker
But have you seen this old earth?
I want to fly higher
But these arms won't take me there
I want to be, I want to be
- Deeper, Delirou5?