Prepare

This week’s study centers on Philippians 3:4b–14. Paul writes to a congregation he loves, likely from prison, and begins by listing his credentials: the right family, the right religious training, a spotless record. Then he does something surprising; he calls all of it loss, even “rubbish.” The Greek word, skubala, is cruder than most English Bibles let on. To be clear, Paul isn’t saying accomplishments are evil, but he is saying that accomplishments aren’t the central thing. What holds him up is that “Christ Jesus has made me his own” (Philippians 3:12).

Notice, for a moment, how honest Paul is about not having arrived: “Not that I have already obtained this… but I press on.” Paul is not certain about outcomes. He is convinced about who and whose he is. The difference between certainty and conviction is the heart of what we’re talking about today.

The other lectionary texts go there, too. Isaiah 5 contains some cool wordplay in Hebrew: God looked for mishpat (justice) and found mispach (bloodshed), and looked for tsedaqah (righteousness) and heard tse’aqah (a cry). And then in Matthew 21, tenants try to take over control of a vineyard that was never theirs. Both texts show what happens when people grasp for control instead of tending what God has entrusted to them. 

This session also connects to the 2027 ELCA Youth Gathering theme, “Imagine More,” drawn from Ephesians 3:20. That verse follows Paul’s prayer that we be “rooted and grounded in love” (3:17).

A pastoral note: the article describes immigration enforcement in Minneapolis. For some young people in your group, this may be personal. Listen well, and let the focus stay on care for neighbors… you know, the Jesus-y stuff.

Opening Exercise: Finding Balance Together

Invite everyone to find a position of imbalance that works for their body. They could stand on one foot, sit tall at the edge of a chair with feet lifted slightly, or sit with eyes closed and arms stretched out. Hold it for about 20 seconds, then notice how steady or wobbly it felt.

Next, form pairs. Partners face each other and press their palms together, then gently lean into one another until each is helping hold the other up. This works standing, seated in chairs facing each other, or from a wheelchair. For groups of three or more, sit or stand in a circle with hands joined or on one another’s shoulders. Keep it gentle, since the point is support, not strength.

Ask: What was different about finding balance alone versus with someone else? Where in your life right now do you feel a little off-balance?

Texts Read Aloud

Philippians 3:4b–14 (primary)
Ephesians 3:14–21 (optional)
Isaiah 5:1–7 (optional)

Rooted, Not Certain

Quick: where will you be in five years?

If you’re in high school, you’ve probably been asked some version of that question more times than you can count. Your calendar is full of classes, practice, rehearsal, work, and group chats, and everyone seems to want a plan. But let’s be honest and name the elephant in the room: the future can feel pretty squishy. The news changes by the hour. Adults in charge often seem to react to whatever feels scariest right now instead of asking what kind of world they’re leaving for you.

Here’s a secret from a pastor: I don’t have it all figured out either. And I don’t think faith is supposed to make us certain… I think faith is what happens when certainty reaches the end of its knowing.

Listen to Paul: he had the perfect résumé, came from the “right” family, did religion “right”, had the “right” achievements, and a spotless record. And then, poor guy, he had an encounter with Jesus and called all of it rubbish. (The Greek word is even ruder, but if it were translated honestly, grandma would clutch her pearls at the foul language!) Those achievements aren’t bad, but they just can’t hold him up. “Not that I have already obtained this,” Paul writes, “but I press on to make it my own, because Christ Jesus has made me his own.”

Paul isn’t certain about the future. He’s rooted in something deeper: he belongs to Jesus. That’s the difference between certainty and conviction. Certainty says, “I know how this ends.” Conviction says, “I know whose I am, and who we are together. Let’s GO!“

I learned this in a new way last winter here in Minneapolis. Neighbors on my own block– people I love– were being targeted by ICE agents. It was frightening. Chaotic. And none of us knew what the next day would bring. But I need you to know this: I watched the church in action. Congregations made sure people had groceries and rides. Neighbors checked in on one another and made sure everyone felt known and valued. Networks of love and care grew almost overnight. It looked a lot like the early church in Acts, where believers shared what they had so that no one went without. 

Nobody had a five-year plan or concrete plans. What we had was one another, and a God who shows up in the middle of the storm, every time.

Next summer, thousands of you will come to Minneapolis for the ELCA Youth Gathering. I serve on the team planning what happens on the main stage at U.S. Bank Stadium, and we can’t wait to welcome you! The theme is “Imagine More,” from Ephesians 3:20, which says that God’s power at work in us can do immeasurably more than we ask or imagine. Just before that verse, Paul prays that we’d be “rooted and grounded in love.”

Rooted, not certain. That’s how imagining more works. When we stop needing to control every outcome, we make room to dream of a church more ready to welcome all of who we are, across all our beautiful difference. We also make room to dream of a world more just and beautiful than the one we’ve been handed. I’m so grateful that we’re all alive at this moment to materialize that vision together.

You don’t have to have it all figured out. You’re already held. So press on, together. Let’s go, buds.

Reflection Questions

1. What does Paul say he gave up, and what does he say he’s “pressing on” toward?
2. The article says certainty sounds like “I know how this ends,” while conviction sounds like “I know who and whose I am.” What’s the difference? Why might conviction help more than certainty when life feels squishy?
3. In the Minneapolis story, what did the church look like when no one knew what would happen next? Where have you seen people show up for one another like that?
4. If you didn’t have to be certain about your future, what might you imagine for yourself, your youth group, or your community?

Closing Activity

One Word, Together. Return to the circle or pairs from the opening exercise, with joined hands or palms together if people are comfortable. Invite each person to share one word for something they hope God will help them imagine more of.

Closing Prayer

God of immeasurably more,
when the future feels wobbly, and the world feels loud,
root us in your love.
Remind us that we belong to you and to one another.
Give us courage to let go of what can’t hold us up,
and to press on toward the life you are already creating.
Open our imaginations to dream of a neighborhood, church, and world
with more welcome, more justice, and more joy.
We pray in the name of Jesus, who has made us his own. Amen.

Bio

Pastor Ian McConnell is the Lead Pastor of Fabric, an innovative and experimental church in Minneapolis, and a career-long youth minister who serves on the ELCA Youth Gathering Mass Gathering Team. He’s a husband, a dad to two awesome kiddos, and a friend and neighbor. He’s a huge Timberwolves and Lynx fan and has recently gotten into the trading card game Star Wars: Unlimited to nerd out with friends.

Editor’s Note – Invitation to Small(er) Church Listening Project Survey:

To every smaller church leader faithfully serving week after week: we see you. The impact of your ministry cannot be measured by the size of your church, your staff, or your budget.

But too often, the voices and experiences of smaller church leaders get overlooked. The Small(er) Church Listening Project from Youth Ministry Consultants was created to change that, and ELCA Youth Ministry is excited to be part of this important work.

We’ve already heard from over 200 leaders like you and would appreciate hearing your perspectives whether you worship 50 or 250 on a weekly basis, find yourself in a rural, urban, or suburban context. Your voice and your ministry matters!

Take the survey here: https://www.surveymonkey.com/r/SmallerChurch

Prepare

Developmental psychologists tell us that one thing adolescents and young adults must do on the path to adulthood is convert the wise council of adults who have aided them in childhood into an internal council that represents their value system. As young folks mature, it is helpful to reflect with them on values like trustworthiness by considering the traits of trustworthy people in their lives and their own (and our own) capacity to be trustworthy.

Brené Brown writes about trust in her book Dare to Lead. She uses the acronym BRAVING to consider seven aspects of trust: boundaries, reliability, accountability, vault, integrity, nonjudgement, and generosity. You can see how she defines these terms here (you might even print this handout for your group to compare your answers in the opening exercise).

The religious authorities, the chief priests and scribes, ask Jesus, “By whose authority are you doing this?” Truthfully, authority is not exactly trust. Authority is about formal power for decision making. Trust, however, develops through relationships. At the same time, many people in authority will point out that without trust it doesn’t matter what formal power you have, no one will go along with your decisions.

Opening Exercise

Pass out sticky notes – three or four per person. Have participants list characteristics of trustworthy people. Have one person share one of their traits. Ask if anyone has a similar trait and cluster the similar traits together. Repeat with another person sharing and gathering similar sticky notes. Repeat until all the notes are shared. Ask, “What do you notice?” and affirm all answers.

Text Read Aloud

Matthew 21:23-32 (CEB)

Can I Trust You?

Once, when I was a teenager and a new driver (no, there were no dinosaurs then…though there were also no smartphones—yikes!), I went to a youth group Christmas party at someone’s house. My parents were concerned about parking and suggested I park down the block a bit to avoid any problems with other new drivers and their cars. But when I got there, it was dark and I was too nervous to park far away and walk. When it was time to leave the party, things happened as my parents feared: I avoided one collision, but in doing so scraped up someone else’s car. I worried that I had betrayed my parents’ trust by not parking where they’d told me to. Yet, when I explained the situation to them, they had enough trust in me to have made a choice based on that situation: walking a far distance, alone at night.

Trust is complicated. How do we know who to trust? What makes a trustworthy person? And how do we become trustworthy people ourselves?

It is a tense scene in today’s story from Matthew. We’re late in the gospel—the Monday of Holy Week. In the story’s timeline, yesterday Jesus entered Jerusalem (awkwardly, riding a donkey and its colt at the same time) and drove the moneychangers from the Temple. On the way into the Temple this morning, he cursed a fig tree because it didn’t have any fruit. And now, back in the Temple, he is confronted by the chief priests and elders. They are scared.

Between the big parade and the brouhaha in the Temple, they are worried the people are getting stirred up. And if that happens, there’s no telling how Rome will react.

Can I Trust You?

When the chief priests ask Jesus, “By whose authority are you doing this?” they are asking Jesus, “Can we trust you? Can we trust you to keep the people safe, teaching in ways that lead to life and not to death?”

The early Christians who first heard Matthew’s Gospel had many of the same questions. In 70 AD, in the recent past for them, the people had gotten stirred up and rebelled. Rome came and squashed the rebellion, killing over a million people and destroying Jerusalem and the surrounding countryside. They wonder if Jesus is more of the same, and if following him would be risky. Can they trust Jesus?

The poet Maya Angelou was quoted as saying, “If people show you who they are, believe them.” This is Jesus’s response to the chief priests and elders—in a parable. There were two sons, one said he’ll work in the vineyard and doesn’t; the other said he won’t work in the vineyard but does. It is as if Jesus tells the chief priests, “I could tell you all day by whose authority I do these things, but why would you believe me? I could tell you that I want life for the people, but why would you believe me? You will only believe me if I show you.” And, by the end of the week, he will show them on the cross. Jesus is how God says, “You can trust me.” Trustworthiness isn’t proved by saying the right thing. It is revealed when our actions match our words. And in Jesus God makes and keeps God’s word to us.

Reflection Questions

1. When the chief priests ask, ‘by what authority are you doing these things?’, what things are they talking about?
2. Why are the chief priests and elders wondering if they can trust Jesus?
3. Thinking about what you know about God from your experience, from worship, or from Scripture, what makes God trustworthy?
4. What practices or disciplines can we try to become more trustworthy people?

Closing Activity

Like the sons whose words don’t match their actions, play the improv game “What Are You Doing?” The first person mimes an activity like doing their math homework. The second person comes in and asks, “What are you doing?” The first person must answer with anything other than what they’re actually doing: “Playing ping pong.” Now the second person must mime playing ping pong and answer (with something else!) a third person’s question, “What are you doing?”

• After everyone has had a turn, reflect together: What happens to trust when our words and actions don’t match? What helps someone become a person whose actions show that their words can be trusted?

Final Prayer

Faithful God, in Jesus you show us that we can trust you. When we are uncertain, unsure, or afraid, put trustworthy people in our lives to help us. Grow us into trustworthy people who mirror your love and faithfulness in the world, in the name of Jesus. Amen.

Bio

Adrianne Meier serves with the people of God at St. Thomas Lutheran Church in Bloomington. Right now, she is furiously picking and preserving the harvest of her garden and learning to play the tin whistle.

Prepare

Jesus’s parable of the workers in the vineyard has been seen as a story of “who gets to heaven when and how.” It’s interpreted almost like a “gotcha” Jesus plays on the Pharisees, who Matthew’s gospel loves to paint as grumbling rule followers. This reading turns the parable into an allegory, with each character representing someone in Jesus’s world—or ours.

The trouble is parables aren’t allegories. They’re not even fables with a moral lesson at the end. Parables are like prisms. Pick them up, hold them to the light this way and that, and see rainbows here, there, everywhere! I love how Jerome Berryman describes parables in his Godly Play curriculum. The props for telling the parable stories are housed in golden boxes, and the storyteller picks up the day’s box and wonders aloud with the children, “I wonder where it will open today?”

It may be that your group needs to be reminded that God’s grace is for everyone, falling equally on people who’ve been a part of the group for a long time and for new people. Seeing cliques? Maybe there’s something here that speaks to our human tendency to break into factions.

It may also be that your group is keying into injustice in the world. Perhaps there might be space to wonder aloud with them about what happened the next day. Would the first-hired come back? Or would they risk not working in the hopes of having a few hours off in the morning? Would anyone ever work for this guy again? What does your group make of the landowner’s retort that he can do what he wants?

parable of the workers in the vineyard

Eventually, I drew the parallel to group projects, at least in part because my tweenager had her first honest-to-goodness group project already this school year. Unfortunately for her, one of her parents has taught group communication for years, and there may have been a mini-lecture on Bruce Tuckman, a psychologist and educator, who taught that groups cycle through stages: forming, storming, norming, performing.

In other words, it is common for groups to go through rocky periods and to learn how to work together. If your group took a summer break and is newly reunited, perhaps this group of workers might provide the opportunity to think about why you gather. I appreciate Tuckman’s theory because it reminds me that conflicts are normal in a group and give us the opportunity to name our expectations of one another and remind ourselves what we’re about. I wonder how the early church heard this parable. We know that a unique feature of early Christianity is that it grew among interesting and unexpected groups of people: widows, slaves, outsiders. Perhaps this parable encouraged them to include others in unexpected ways.

Opening Exercise

Using well-known cartoon or animated movie characters, describe what you are like when you have to work on a group project. Why did you pick that character? (Bonus question: is this another character that describes what you wish you were like when you work on a group project?)

Text Read Aloud

Matthew 20:1-16 in The Message

Laboring Together

I thought my high school chemistry teacher liked me. Then he assigned a group project in class. Not only that, but he assigned the groups, separated my friends, and put me in a group with this guy who was surely too old to be in high school and taking chemistry for at least the second time. If he wasn’t screwing around in the back of the class, he was asleep. We both knew who was going to carry the weight of this project. It didn’t seem fair at all.

This is pretty much what happens to the first-hired workers in the vineyard. They work all day, but on payday they get the same amount as the people who come in to work hours later. It doesn’t seem fair.

In Jesus’s time, many people worked as day laborers, depending on each day’s work to provide for their families. The laborers would stand in a common place each day, hoping wealthy landowners would hire them to work on their farms, fishing boats, or in their industries. Most of the time, they would get just enough to keep their family fed, but not enough to restore what had been lost.

But what if morning turned to afternoon, then to evening, and you waited and waited, yet were not hired? Do you even bother to go out into the field if you think you’d only bring home pennies? What is fair for these last-hired workers, who equally need to feed their families?

Laboring Together

And yet, the first-hired workers needed all the other laborers, even if they didn’t want to admit it, because, if the conditions are right for harvesting, you harvest. Neighbors help neighbors to bring everything in before animals eat it, weather ruins it, or it overripens on the vine.

The landowner kept bringing in more people to help, giving the earliest hired the opportunity to rest and pace themselves. In the end, the harvest happens because of every character in the story. The landowner needed the workers; the workers needed enough money to support their families; the workers needed each other.

I would love to wrap this up with a beautiful story about how I learned this lesson on my group project. But I can’t. I spent the project resentful and frustrated and whiny. I finished the project, mostly by myself, while that guy goofed around. Occasionally, though, he told a joke that made me laugh and untangled my overly serious self for a second or two.

Group projects are hard because we have to figure out what we’re doing, how we’re going to do it, and who is going to do what work. We must figure out how to include different personalities and learn how—for at least a little while—to trust each other to get the work done. We have to admit that we need each other, even if it is only for a few jokes and a finished chemistry packet.

Reflection Questions

1. What makes this a difficult parable?
2. What does it mean to be fair? How do you determine if something is unfair?
3. Is the landowner fair in this story?
4. How do you include others in groups you are a part of? What has been particularly helpful in including new people?
5. What does it feel like when a group is working well together? When a group isn’t getting along?

Closing Activity

Divide into groups of three or four. Tell the group, “In a few minutes we will pray together. We will hold hands, and squeeze the hand of the next person as we are finished praying. Today, you have to pray for someone else in your small group, and everyone has to be prayed for. So, in the next few minutes, decide who is praying for whom and then share one thing you’d like others to pray for. It doesn’t have to be complicated or deep, it can be about an upcoming test or sports game or a project you’re working on.”

Give them roughly two minutes per group member to share, then gather them for prayer. If your group is only a handful, listen carefully to one another and have each person pray for the person on their left. Consider starting or ending the group prayer with the prayer below.

Final Prayer

Loving God, when we work with others, help us to be gracious, fair, and kind to each other and clear about our plans. In the groups that we are part of—youth group, sports teams, after-school clubs, and even groups of friends—be with us; help us to include and care for one another and to be included and cared for ourselves. In Jesus’s name. Amen.

Bio

Adrianne Meier is an ELCA pastor who serves among the people at St. Thomas Lutheran Church in Bloomington, Indiana. When she’s not working—and even when she is working—you can find her furiously knitting.

Prepare

In Romans 14, Paul turns from love, the focus at the end of chapter 13, to welcome. It is a practical explanation of what that love looks like when we are living together with people who believe and practice differently than we do.

The church in Rome is struggling to get along. There are significant differences among the believers, especially around faith practices that affect daily life: what foods they should eat and which days should be treated as holy. Paul refers to some believers as “weak” and others as “strong.” Some scholars believe these differences also carried an ethnoracial component, with the former consisting primarily of Jewish followers of Jesus and the latter primarily of Gentile followers. Whatever the exact circumstances, these are not abstract theological disagreements. They affect how people eat, worship, and live together.

And Paul does not tell them to stop caring about these differences. In fact, he says, “Let all be fully convinced in their own minds” (verse 5). Conviction is not the problem. The problem is what happens when our convictions become a reason to judge, despise, or exclude another person.

Paul calls the church to hold deep conviction alongside deep humility. We may be convinced of what we believe, but our certainty does not make us God. We do not belong to ourselves; we belong to Christ. Whether we eat or do not eat, whether we observe one day or another, we do so for the Lord. Christ alone is Lord, and judgment belongs to God.

So how do the strong and the weak, and all those who hold different convictions, live together? They welcome one another. They hold tightly to what they believe without using those beliefs to push someone else away. Christian community does not require the disappearance of difference. Instead, Paul imagines a community in which conviction is accompanied by humility because all are held together by something greater than themselves: the love of Jesus Christ, Lord of all.

Opening Activity

Tell about a time you met someone who practiced their faith differently than you. This could be another Christian, someone of another faith, or someone with no faith at all. How did you discover your differences? How did you respond? Did it affect your relationship? 

Text Read Aloud

• Romans 14:1-12

Holding Conviction and Practicing Welcome

It’s been 25 years since 9/11. I was in second grade, Mrs. Claxton’s class when an announcement over the PA system told all the teachers to turn on the news. I couldn’t fully understand the magnitude of what happened that day. In the weeks that followed, I remember a strong sense of unity and people rallying together. It was only later that I learned not everyone experienced those weeks that way. Muslim Americans faced suspicion, discrimination, and violence in the wake of the attacks.

Most of you know 9/11 only as history. Yet, the way Americans view Muslims today is not something of the past. Just this week, Pew Research Center reported that 42% of U.S. adults say Muslim Americans have a negative impact on the country. Meanwhile, 59% of Muslim Americans say there is a lot of discrimination against Muslims in the United States.

What would it feel like to walk into school knowing that roughly four out of ten adults believe people who practice your religion are bad for the country you call home?

The church in Rome knew something about the damage judgment can do to a community. In Romans 14, Paul is not talking about people of different religions. He is addressing Christians who hold different convictions and practices. Some eat only vegetables while others eat meat. Some observe particular holy days while others do not.

Paul does not tell them to stop caring about what they believe. In fact, he says, “Let all be fully convinced in their own minds.” Conviction is not the problem, Paul tells them. Your judgement is, because it’s tearing apart the community.

That is where humility comes in. We can hold tightly to what we believe while remembering that our certainty does not make us God. Whether we eat or do not eat, observe a day or do not observe it, Paul says we do so for the Lord. Christ is Lord; we are not.

And humility makes welcome possible. If I do not need to be your judge, I can make room for you even when we disagree. Welcome does not mean pretending our differences do not matter. It means refusing to let those differences become a reason to despise, exclude, or push someone away.

Paul is speaking about relationships among Christians. But that posture should also shape the way Christians approach neighbors who do not share our faith.

You may have a teammate fasting during Ramadan, a Catholic friend who attends Mass every week, a friend who is atheist or agnostic, or a classmate whose family has different beliefs about food, prayer, or holidays. What does your faith ask of you when you believe you are right and the person sitting next to you believes something different?

Be fully convinced of what you believe. Hold that conviction with humility. And let that humility lead you toward welcome: loving, listening to, defending, eating with, learning from, and being a neighbor to another person.

Reflection Questions

1. What differences among believers are causing conflict in the church in Rome?
2. What do you think Paul means in verses 7 and 8, about not living or dying to ourselves?
3. Paul tells believers to be “fully convinced” in what they believe while also warning them not to judge one another. How can conviction and humility exist together?
4. What do you think Christian welcome looks like when we genuinely disagree with someone or believe differently than they do?
5. Think about your school, team, workplace, friend group, or family. Where might you be tempted to judge or distance yourself from someone because of what they believe or practice? What could welcome look like instead?

Closing Activity – Conviction Line

Create an imaginary line across the room, from “strongly agree” on one end to “strongly disagree” on the other. Read each statement below and invite participants to stand somewhere along the line based on what they believe.

• Respecting someone’s beliefs means you should not tell them you disagree.
• Having a strong conviction means trying to convince others that what you believe is true. 
• It is easier to welcome someone when you understand why they believe what they believe.
• You can be completely convinced you are right and still be humble.
• Welcome does not require agreement.

After each statement, invite a few people from different places on the line to explain why they chose their spot. Encourage participants to listen rather than argue or try to change someone’s mind.

• At the end, notice what happened: you held different convictions, listened to one another, and remained together. How might we practice that same kind of humility and welcome beyond this room?

Closing Prayer

Holy God, we give you thanks for all our neighbors: those who believe and act like us, and especially those who don’t. Where our beliefs differ, give us humility. Where judgement threatens our relationship, increase our welcome. Bind us together in the love and grace that only comes from you, Jesus Christ our Savior and Lord. Amen. 

Editor’s Note: Many churches and youth groups embark on summer service trips. This Faith Lens post is a reflection we hope you’ll use with your group prior to your trip to spark conversation not only about what you are doing, but also why you are doing it and what outcomes you hope for.

This post is the first in a two-part series designed to help groups reflect on their service work both before and after their trip. The second post, a post-service trip reflection guide, will be published in early July.

Prepare

So you’re leading your youth group on a summer service trip, that’s great! As people of faith, freed by God’s grace, we are sent into the world to love and serve our neighbors. Whether we’re painting houses, stocking pantries, working in gardens, or cleaning up blight, we hope not only to serve but also to learn, listen, and reflect God’s love.

But is it safe to say that all service is good?

Are there forms of service that are not actually good, even when they are well-intentioned? There are forms of service that can perpetuate systems of inequality. For example, a food drive may provide temporary relief without ever addressing why families are food insecure in the first place. Other acts of service can give the appearance of humility while subtly reinforcing the superiority of the server, who serves out of freedom, while others receive out of necessity. Still others may make us feel good without accomplishing much good at all. Before engaging in service, it is important to talk about both the kind of service we are doing and why we are doing it.

Often we assume we know why we serve. We serve because Jesus calls us to love our neighbors. Yet if not all service is good, then good intentions alone cannot be enough. We need to think carefully not only about what we are doing, but also why we are doing it. Are we serving in ways that genuinely help our neighbors? Are we listening before acting? Do we understand our own motivations? If we hope to serve faithfully, these are questions worth asking before we ever leave for our trip. 

A thought-provoking article that can help frame this conversation is Adam Davis’ “What We Don’t Talk About When We Don’t Talk About Service.” Give it a read, and then use this guide as an opportunity to reflect on service before engaging in it. My hope is not that this conversation will discourage service, but that it will help us serve more faithfully, thoughtfully, and lovingly.

Opening Activity

• Tell about your favorite service experience or service trip. What made it meaningful? Was it the work itself, the people you met, something you learned, or something else?
• If the upcoming trip will be someone’s first service experience, ask: What are you hoping for on this trip? What would make it meaningful? What do you hope will be different because you went?

Read Aloud

• Matthew 25:35-41

Motivations, Inequality, and Good Service

Summer service trips are great for lots of reasons. They are a wonderful opportunity to make or deepen friendships, travel to new places, engage in new experiences, and live out one’s faith in new ways. But what about the service itself? Is all service good service?

It sounds like a crazy question, right? Of course service is good, we think. Everyone tells us to do service: churches, schools, clubs, parents, and more. In fact, we assume that all service is good so much that we don’t feel the need to talk about it before or after we engage in it. But I think we are overlooking two aspects of service that require our attention: motivation and inequality.

Maybe you are going to stock shelves in food pantries, work in community gardens, clean up neighborhood blight, build or repair homes, or help with kids or senior citizens. Whatever service you are doing, we need to ask ourselves why we are doing it. It is easy to say, “Because Jesus tells us to serve.” That’s true, and that may be your primary motivation. But it’s rare, if not impossible, to have only one motivation.

Yes, you are doing this because your faith encourages you to do so. But maybe you’re also doing it because it sounded fun, which isn’t a bad thing! Or maybe you are doing it because you genuinely care about hunger and people who suffer from it. Empathy is a powerful emotion. Perhaps you feel like you need to, as if God won’t love you if you don’t. Or maybe you’d feel guilty or worry about how others might see you if you stayed home. It’s likely that more than one of these motivations is at play. And that’s okay, because that’s human! We will have both good and not-so-good motivations because we are, as Luther reminds us, at the same time both saints and sinners. What matters is recognizing the complexity of our motivations rather than pretending they are perfect.

What’s also complex is the relationship between service and inequality. When we think about it, inequality is often at the heart of the service work we do. We have time, money, and resources that we are choosing to share. The person on the other end of the service lacks one or more of those things. A church group may spend a week repairing homes because homeowners cannot afford the repairs themselves. That need reflects an inequality in resources and opportunity. The server chooses. The served often does not. The server acts from relative freedom. The served often acts out of necessity. That is inequality. We need to ask ourselves: Does our service work perpetuate that inequality or challenge the systems that create it?

So if service is more complicated than we often admit, how should we view the people we are serving?

Image by Kelly Latimore. Used with permission. Copyright Kelly Latimore Icons.

Dorothy Day, the founder of the Catholic Worker movement, dedicated her life to living beside and serving neighbors in need. When asked how she saw Christ in the people she served, many of whom were impoverished, she responded, “The mystery of the poor is this: That they are Jesus, and what you do for them you do for Him. It is the only way we have of knowing and believing in our love.”

Perhaps what matters most is remembering that the people we encounter are not projects to complete or problems to solve. They are our neighbors, and they bear the image of God. When we begin there, our motivations become clearer and our service is more likely to challenge inequality rather than reinforce it.

Reflection Questions

1. Is all service good? Why or why not?
2. How does service work relate to inequality? Can you think of examples where service might challenge inequality? Can you think of examples where it might reinforce it?
3. What do you think Jesus and Dorothy Day mean when they say that serving those in need is the same as serving Jesus himself?
4. What are your motivations for going on this trip? Which motivations feel strongest for you right now?
5. What good do you hope comes from this service trip—for you, your church, and the people you will encounter?
6. How might seeing the people you meet as neighbors, rather than projects or problems to solve, change the way you approach this trip?

Closing Activity

• Look at the icons of Jesus created by Kelly Latimore. As a group, choose the icon that best reflects the service you are preparing to do or the neighbors you hope to encounter on your trip.
• Share why you chose that image. What does it reveal about how you see the people you will serve alongside? What does it teach you about seeing Christ in your neighbors?
• If your budget allows, consider purchasing a digital download of the icon and printing a copy for each participant. Encourage students to keep it with them throughout the trip as a reminder that in serving their neighbors, they are serving Christ himself.

Final Prayer

• Pray this over your group:
  • Holy God, prepare our hearts, our minds, and our bodies for the work that you have called us to. Root our motivations for service in love, humility, and faith. Help us to see you in each person we encounter. May our work not perpetuate inequality, but reveal its causes and ignite a passion to work toward justice in your name. We pray all this by your grace and for your glory. Amen.