Mike Yaconelli - Getting Fired for the Glory of God: Collected Words of Mike Yaconelli for Youth Workers

Getting Fired for the Glory of God
ePub Format
Copyright 2008 by Karla Yaconelli

Youth Specialties resources, 300 S. Pierce St., El Cajon, CA 92020 are published by Zondervan, 5300 Patterson Ave. SE, Grand Rapids, MI 49530.

ISBN 0-310-30909-3

All Scripture quotations, unless otherwise indicated, are taken from the Holy Bible, Today's New International Version. TNIV. Copyright 2001, 2005 by International Bible Society. Used by permission of Zondervan. All rights reserved.

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means electronic, mechanical, photocopy, recording, or any other except for brief quotations in printed reviews, without the prior permission of the publisher.

Cover design by SharpSeven Design
Interior design by David Conn

INTRODUCTION:
THE ELDER WITH THE
ADOLESCENT HEART

Four years after our dad, Mike Yaconelli, passed away, I stood preparing to deliver a morning talk at a Christian arts festival in England. Gathered around the makeshift stage was a crowd of three to four thousand people. I'd never given a talk in England, and I knew that the people wedged together in the grandstands and grass patches bordering the Cheltenham Racecourse had gathered not because of me, but because of their love for my dad.

Ten minutes into my talk, I noticed three women lying on the grass a few yards away from the stage, their eyes shut. After I finished my talk, a line of people formed to greet me. For almost two hours I stood and listened to people tell stories about my dad and the impact his words and presence had on their lives. Toward the end of this reception line were the women I'd noticed during my talk. They introduced themselves as London youth workers, paused awkwardly, and then confessed what I knew was on everyone's minds that morning.

We miss your dad terribly. Your voice sounds so much like your father's. After you started speaking, we closed our eyes and listened to your voice. And for a few moments, it was like we were listening to him. Their eyes welled up with tears, they hugged me, and they walked away.

My siblings and I compiled this book for the many youth ministers who continue to seek encouragement, truth-telling, and guidance within Dad's words. The field of youth ministry is populated with educational specialists, developmental theorists, sociologists, and church-growth experts. These people know how to design and organize successful youth ministries. Among these people, Dad is an anomaly.

Although considered a founder and expert on youth ministry, Dad was often the last person to whom you'd want to turn for advice on organizing and establishing a youth ministry program.

Dad was the guy you wanted to go to when you needed kindness, when you needed the truth, when you felt lost and hurt by the church. Dad was the guy to whom youth workers turned when they'd forgotten who they were, when they'd lost track of Jesus, or when they felt plain lonely in their ministries.

Dad was a seeker, a visionary, and an intuitive who could sense the Spirit of God within youth ministry and give words to what he felt. Dad wore his personal and professional frustrations on his sleeve. He was a truth-teller, unafraid of exploring the shadow side of ministry, church life, marriage, childrearing, and Christian living. Dad often claimed that part of his spiritual gift was a built-in crap detector that allowed him to notice and expose the lies, the pretending, the feigned humility, and the greed that infects the Christian church. He had a prophetic anger; an impatience with churches, pastors, youth pastors, and Christian celebrities who promoted a kind of perfectionism that left all of us feeling ashamed and discouraged.

Sometimes people found Dad too negative and critical; yet he believed another aspect of his spiritual gift was being a cynic. As he told one youth working audience, Someone has to balance out all those positive, optimistic Christians.

Dad was almost compulsively creative, looking for original words and unexpected interactions. He wanted to uncover and create a sense of surprise and wonder whenever he was among people. Sometimes this caused him to overstate things (see ,).

Be anything but lukewarm, Jesus says to us in Revelation 3:15-16. Dad took these words to heart. He'd rather have a crowd get riled up, yell obscenities, or walk out than just sit and nod their heads in polite agreement. (In this he was successfuland as a result, he received a constant stream of angry and critical letters throughout his life.) He wanted to catch people's attention, shake things up, and force them to think and question. He saw the Christian life as a risky adventure, and nothing upset him more than a Christianity that didn't keep people on the edges of their seats.

Most of the writings here were first published in a column titled Dangerous Wonder that Dad wrote for Youthworker Journal from 1999 until his death in October 2003. (The July 2001 columnan excerpt from his book Messy Spiritualitywas omitted.) As you'll see, these columns were soulful, edgy, funny, and often got him into trouble (see ,). We've also included Caring for Your Own Soul While Ministering to Others, an article Dad wrote in 2002 for an in-house publication with Zondervan. In addition to these writings, there are four audio and two video recordings of talks Dad gave to youth working audiences.

Selecting recordings for this book was difficult. First of all, we had to track them down. Dad had no interest in archiving his own life. And although most of his talks over his 40-plus years in ministry were recorded, Dad rarely saved any of these recordings (nor did he keep copies of published articles). He was more interested in what was coming next than in what had already been done. And yet after scavenging Dad's office, garage, glove compartments, and closets, we were able to come up with almost 50 hours of recorded youth ministry talks. Unfortunately, we could track down only one recording from before 1995a talk given in San Francisco at the closing general session of the 1986 Youth Specialties National Youth Workers Conventionwhich we've included here. (The sound quality on this cassette isn't perfect, but it was a rare discovery for us.)

As a young man, Dad won the Toastmasters International World Champion of Public Speaking award in 1966. He knew how to speak in a way that was both compelling and entertaining. However, as my brother and sisters and I listened to the various seminars and keynotes, we found ourselves drawn to the talks that were less polished, more freewheelingtalks in which Dad was raw and transparent, talks in which you can hear his relationship with the audience. Ultimately, we tried to choose recordings in which Dad's presence, his passion, his quick wit, and his love for youth workers was most accessible. You'll find our own notes and impressions for each of these talks included in the back of the book.

Before you engage in any of this material, however, the first thing you should keep in mind is that Dad loved Jesus. I know all of us within the Christian faith are supposed to love Jesus. Many of us who work in the church try to love Jesus and help others love Jesus. But often a more accurate statement is that we