The Way to Grace
The Teen Mania Honor Academy is focused on creating leaders for the next generation of the Church in the world. While this seems like a very praiseworthy goal, I believe it misses the mark of how leaders are created, trained, and commissioned into their work in God’s Kingdom. In an effort to raise up young people who will have a positive influence in the future, the Honor Academy starts from the end goal, and works backwards. If a leader is time oriented, then you should be time oriented. If a leader is in peak physical condition, you should be in top shape. If a leader is sure of themselves and confident, you should eliminate doubt and weakness. In education circles, this is called a deficiency model of assessment. A goal or level of performance is defined and things are adjusted until everything comes into alignment. In Christian circles, we call this a law mentality. You are measured against the standard and found wanting.
I believe that the end oriented structure of the Honor Academy is simply a well packaged law/works mindset. It wasn’t until years after my internship experience that I came to grips with real Grace. I was studying in China, after attending the Urbana Missions Conference. Two years since graduating from the HA, I was a sophomore in College, working with a local 600 student youth group, and trying to pursue a lady friend. As I left for 6 months in Asia, I felt nothing but crushing defeat and failure about my life. The sins of pride, lust, and sloth tainted all I saw around me. My intern year proved to be a massive case against organized Christianity. My college experience was empty and lacking. My relationships with fellow alumni and new college friends were empty and blank. The work I did with the youth group worship band, small group Bible studies, and organizing activities for the teens every week was hollow and broken. It was then that I came to my Wesleyan/Chambers moment…either there wasn’t anything to this life, or I had the wrong end of the stick. There on my cot in Xiamen China, I prayed earnestly…and considered ending my life.
That’s when He spoke to me. That’s when I saw the altar of my life before God. While I’d accepted Christ’s sacrifice and his plan for my life, along the way, with my evangelical upbringing and the Teen Mania years I’d bought into the idea that I needed to repay my debt to God with service and commitment. This mindset drove me to as much Christian work as I could accomplish, but as Paul teaches in Romans, all of my effort only fed my sinful nature. The altar of my life was littered with “Good works” and effort. What an insult to Christ’s Sacrifice! The idea that we could, by any of our own effort, add to the price paid by Christ to make us Holy. No amount of habit adjustment would help. No guidelines or accomplishment would make God happier with us. He loved us and wants good things for his children. At the very start of that, God wants us to stop hurting ourselves by playing this spiritual game of chess with God or the Devil as our opponent.
So, instead of killing myself, I decided to stop playing silly spiritual games. I returned to the states at the end of my study abroad and spent the summer with a church that was really committed to Christian service and Evangelism, but even more – they were committed to authentic spirituality. They weren’t concerned with the “aura of a statesman” or “21 laws of leadership” or upholding the tenants of the Trailer Club. These were believers who wanted to find brokenness and heal it as agents of God’s Kingdom.
Over the next few years I moved further and further from what TM would have its interns do. My fear of drinking and smoking vanished, the “appearance of evil” and “stumbling weaker brothers” took on more defined and practical meanings, and finally my spiritual wellbeing wasn’t lost whenever I had a bummer day. Distance from a lifestyle of falsehood proved to expose the HA for what it actually was: In an effort to train leaders, the HA creates false spirituality and encourages over spiritualization of the wrong bits of life. This is specifically the problem with Pharisees. Powerless to create real change, the HA has become a place where young people with genuine faith and excitement are sidetracked into ineffective lifestyles. The victory of our spiritual enemy the devil is not rampant sin, but the deception of the faithful.
This blog is a record of the problems within one organization, but these are not isolated to TM alone. The corruption of every manmade structure is assured, and it’s clear that TM has been tainted by hubris, pride, folly, and error along the way. This is to be expected and could be repaired with time and close inspection; however, the central problem in the HA mindset is one that would require repentance on a deeper level. TM, like much of “Christian” culture, must repent from trying to replace God’s method of growing his followers with a faster more efficient system. There’s a reason Christian leaders emerge from turmoil and genuine intensive growth experiences. These things cannot be faked or simulated by any program. In the end, they fail the “integrity check” not because of a slight moral failure or trickle down morality…it’s the lack of conviction that we are broken and are only restored by the work of God.
6 comments:
Bensays:January 27, 2010 8:44 AMReplyThis post has been removed by the author.
Bensays:January 27, 2010 8:52 AMReply
i got nothin. you nailed it brother.
it’s so great to hear people’s stories end in genuine joy in the gospel. 🙂
Eric P.says:January 27, 2010 8:56 AMReply
Very well said indeed.
h.says:January 27, 2010 10:53 AMReply
Caleb, it’s like you took everything i feel [or have been feeling] and wrote it in a far more eloquent, thought-out manner than i ever could. man. thank you for this.
the third paragraph–WOW. seriously, just wow. that moment was simultaneously the most freeing and most grievous moment of my life thus far, i’d have to say.
“Distance from a lifestyle of falsehood proved to expose the HA for what it actually was: In an effort to train leaders, the HA creates false spirituality and encourages over spiritualization of the wrong bits of life.”
— yes. yes yes yes.
“These things cannot be faked or simulated by any program. In the end, they fail the “integrity check” not because of a slight moral failure or trickle down morality…it’s the lack of conviction that we are broken and are only restored by the work of God.”
–i’ve said it before, and i’ll say it again–the HA is fantastic at spirituality-driven behavior modification, NOT real Holy Spirit-inspired heart change.
katydidsays:January 27, 2010 5:35 PMReply
as the above posts say—wow wow and wow, and very well said..
“however, the central problem in the HA mindset is one that would require repentance on a deeper level. TM, like much of “Christian” culture, must repent from trying to replace God’s method of growing his followers with a faster more efficient system. There’s a reason Christian leaders emerge from turmoil and genuine intensive growth experiences. These things cannot be faked or simulated by any program. In the end, they fail the “integrity check” not because of a slight moral failure or trickle down morality…it’s the lack of conviction that we are broken and are only restored by the work of God.”
Also, “No amount of habit adjustment would help. No guidelines or accomplishment would make God happier with us. He loved us and wants good things for his children. At the very start of that, God wants us to stop hurting ourselves by playing this spiritual game of chess with God or the Devil as our opponent.
Caleb–thanks for putting it so eloquently and praise God for your spiritual growth
IWantToBeAClonesays:November 21, 2011 11:43 AMReply
This is a beautifully written series of posts, and even better it is exactly right. Thank-you for taking the time to think this through and sharing it!