On one of the sunny but crisp Sundays of September in my preteens, I entered the preschool classroom of my church. When I entered the room, a bubbly red-haired woman met me, eagerly introducing herself as the teacher for the room: Deborah Rowe. My church paired helpers to teachers, so a bit of ‘team’ was formed to make it more stable for the kids; I was paired with Deborah. I felt a bit nervous on my first day, but there was something comfortable and natural about being in the classroom. The combination of how my parents raised me and the gifts God gave me resulted in quickly acclimating to the classroom, helping Deborah as she taught, keeping the kids quiet, playing games with them. Soon Deborah could make eye contact with me and I would know it was time to prepare snack.

Within a few months of serving with her, she told me about her job and her other ministry working with CEF. My parents knew about CEF, but I never heard of the organization even though from infancy to my then 12 years of age I was part of the church and Christian circles. Though Deborah failed to convince me to join Christian Youth In Action (CYIA) for that first year, when I turned 12 around Christmas, I continued to periodically serve with her even though the  pairing system had been phased out. By the next year, she convinced me to join CYIA. I struggle to find the words to truly express how impactful CYIA has been on my life as a Christian; it’s my desire to see more and more teens participate every year. At CYIA I found my gifting of teaching; I continued to use that gift all through high school; I continued to go to 5 years of CYIA; I became one of the few classroom leads at my church at age 14, and I began college pursuing teaching as my major in college.

When I reflect on my teenage years, I wonder why I’ve heard people concerned about statements like “she isn’t mature enough for that role.” How does one become this elusive “mature?” How do we know someone is mature? What’s the measurement of maturity? What’s more, often times when we speak of missions for preteens and teens, I see so many people quantify this maturity on whether they even ask a Christian teen to join the program. As I witness this and think about my own life, how my parents raised me, how might I be so different as to be awarded this ‘mature’ label, what could I do to encourage more and more teens to receive the chance to be mature?

So, what does make someone mature? I believe it’s much simpler than most people think: all it takes is giving them chance over chance to be mature and tell them when they fail. My parents didn’t raise ‘children’, or ‘teens’, or anything in between; my parents raised adults. From my earliest memories, my parents spoke of increasing responsibility as we grew. Beginning at a fairly young age, I witnessed how she handled crying babies when she and my siblings volunteered for MOPs, and I benefited from her explanations of how to take care of kids. I don’t believe there was a time when I didn’t know I would grow older, and as my age increased, more and more would be expected of me. If I failed or acted improperly, my parents took the time to correct me and gave me another chance to prove myself.

There wasn’t doctrinal or theological issues they deemed  ‘too much’ for me to understand. The only topic I remember being age restricted was the topic of sex. We spent the evening often discussing biblical truth, defense of the faith, and many things I suppose some parents would write off as “that’s too difficult a subject for little kids.” My mother summed up their mentality to me when I was little, “People will only go as far as you raise the bar. If your bar is low, the goal is too easy, and not many people will exceed it. But if that bar is high, you might not have everyone reach it, but you’ll have most striving to reach it. More people will reach that high bar than will fail.” That was the life my parents prepared me for. The world is unforgiving, and my parents made sure the bar they held me and my siblings to was high enough so the world would not overwhelm us.

When we look at stats, hundreds of teens leave the church upon college and leaving the house. What this means to me is that we as a Christian community has failed to disciple the last generation well enough to stand firm when the world assails us. As the next generations come up, I want us to learn from our mistakes, and I have a wish for any Christian parent with teens. Urge your teens to grow, let them fail, give them difficult tasks and difficult topics so they learn how to progress. CYIA is one of those difficult things I think more parents should encourage their teens to do. Maybe some Christian parents in this country overlook CYIA because it doesn’t look like other camps that we’re used to. CYIA is not a ‘fun’ camp, meaning it’s not the fun, light-hearted summer camp that give teens that elusive ‘Spirit high’. CYIA is a camp that will challenge teens, and it will leave a lasting impact on them. It’s not easy, but I believe any teenager is capable of participating and succeeding at CYIA. True, not every teen will excel and love it, many will find it very difficult, but as long as the teen puts in the time and doesn’t goof off, they will grow. I believe strongly almost any teen that wishes to claim Christ should go to something like CYIA at least once. The verses I learned from the Wordless book I can still recite years later and when faced with darkness and evilness, nothing is quite as powerful as knowing the Gospel backwards and forwards. If you can explain the Gospel and Bible stories to a small child, you can explain it to an adult, and that’s the amazingness of CYIA.

How can a Christian grow if they are not challenged? This truth is true of everyone, adults, children, and teens.  Let’s give them big goals to attain, let’s challenge them to grow and equip them with the tools to do so, and let’s not dismiss a teen as ‘too immature’ to do big things. If given the chance, I believe many teens will surprise you.