An Advent Learning Experience: DRIVEWAY Christians

Group, Nov/Dec 2004 by Spencer, Linda Moore

Lead your kids in an unforgettable (and simple) experience that will help prepare them to honor Christ's birth

BY LINDA MOORE SPENCER

I lead a home group for teenagers, and my passion is to help them experience what a lifelong walk with Jesus is all about. To that end, I've used the following pre-Christmas exercise with great success. It requires a living room, a basement, a driveway, and a dark winter night. Let me walk you through it...

1 THE SETUP-We begin with everyone seated in my warm, cozy living room, with lots of lighted table lamps, soft music playing, and bowls of crunchy apples and chocolate-covered peanuts. I ask kids in the group to make a list of all their physical needs that are being met while we are seated in this space. They come up with words such as warmth, light, nourishment, companionship, soothing music, comfortable sofas, cushions, and chairs.

Next I casually explain the concept of "No pain, no gain," and ask if they're willing to do a bit of suffering in the name of learning something worthwhile. Everyone agrees, and I tell the entire group I'm going to have them stand outside in a small section of my driveway for 15 minutes.

2 THE DRIVEWAY EXPERIENCE-The moon is nowhere in sight; the air is crisp. As they walk out the door, I tell my teenagers to take 15 minutes on the driveway to see if they can find the things we appreciated in the comfort of my living room-light, warmth, companionship, nourishment, and so on.

I go inside and leave them to it, only sneaking an occasional peek out the window. At first the noises from the driveway are high-spirited and rowdy, but by the end of 15 minutes they're more than ready to come back inside. Before they do, I ask for one volunteer, and I tell that person to remain outside while everybody else hurries back inside.

3 THE BASEMENT EXPERIENCE-Next we all troop down to my rough, unfinished basement, where I ask them to look for other "living room comforts" they can find down here. Then we head back upstairs to the kitchen for hot cider and I invite my driveway "volunteer" to join us.

4 THE KITCHEN DEBRIEFING-As we stand sipping our cider, restoring warmth to toes and fingers, I ask them to describe the driveway experience. I ask them to compare it with the comforts of the basement and the living room.

They tell me they tried to make the most of things. For warmth, they huddled together or jumped up and down. For light, they discovered one girl's watch glowed in the dark. A few teenagers sat down in the driveway, but most said it was more comfortable to stand. One boy, ready to do anything in the name of science, ate some dirty snow. Most sang songs or listened to those who did, but everyone agreed it was boring and hard work to keep singing the whole time. While they said it was fun at first, they were quite willing to come in.

The girl who remained alone outside said everything changed once everybody left. The night seemed darker and more lonely. She tried to sing but she really didn't feel like it. She sat down for a minute, but said that felt stupid.

The reports from the basement experience were unenthusiastic. There was no place to sit. It was warmer, but dreary and dingy. There was little light, no food, no music. They were very happy to come back upstairs.

5 THE LIVING ROOM DEBRIEFING-We move now from the kitchen back to the living room, and I offer an analogy with all the usual disclaimers that any comparison between things will be limited some way and doesn't necessarily work in all of the particulars.

"Let's say," I tell the group, "that being a Christian, being forgiven by God through the work of Jesus on the cross, is like being anywhere on this property. For the purposes of this analogy, once a person is off the street and on the lawn, he is made right by Christ in the sight of God. However, from that point on, you have certain choices, ones you will carry out in your behavior whether or not you ever speak those choices out or not.

"You can live your Christian life in the driveway, jumping up and down to try to make your own joy and warmth, snacking on grey snow, singing to yourself, doing the best you can to stay dry when the winds blow and the rains begin to fall.

"Or," I say, "You might be a porch Christian. You find a little shelter there, closer to the house. Or you might be a mudroom saint, stepping indoors but never entering fully. You might even be a basement child of God, feeling warm but never really comfortable, never fed, never getting enough light, never hearing any music but the tunes you improvise.

"Or, now get this, you can be a living-room believer-warm, fed, comfortable, and in daily communion with your God. You talk to him, you hear back, and you listen to the music that some days sounds like the very angels must be singing. Or you can be a whole-house Christian, moving freely room to room within the confines of the whole house, which is analogous to your one-to-one, very personal relationship with God. You can go to the kitchen for the food you need, to bed to sleep, to every room in your relationship to enjoy the blessings there."