I picked the lesson topic for tonight at 6.30pm (for a youth group that starts at 7pm). Talking about the Bible, why it’s important, what it is, does it matter how we view it (literal, inerrant, metaphors…), etc. The discussion was going pretty lame until I mentioned something about the two creation narratives and someone asked, “Well, if God created everything, then who created God?” Good question…so that just opened the floodgates of questions for kids who typically do not give a rip about anything I’m talking about.
Who created God?
What was before God?
How could there be “nothing” – was God just floating around in space?
How could there not be darkness before God created?
What’s nothing?
How can we believe all of this?
Do you really think that a dude got swallowed up by a whale? Well, big fish? Whatever.
What about Noah?
How can we believe this?
I want to know the answers!
The conversation was actually really good. But here is where Wendell is politically-INcorrect. Someone was trying to explain God and how God is not really like a person, and a girl asked, “So, he was just like a floating brain up there?” And the reply was, “Well, God doesn’t have a brain.”
Then my favorite freshman guy said, “GREAT! SO WE’RE FOLLOWING A RETARD!”
Needless to say, the conversation was great, they were asking good questions and were actually engaged. We didn’t leave having many, if any, questions answered. They didn’t leave necessarily more sure if there was a God or not. But they left having wrestled with God (whether they knew it or not), and that is pretty good for a night of youth group…