Jared considered himself a veteran. By this point he imagined he’d seen just about everything in ministry. By the end of the year he’d complete twelve years in full-time youth ministry, and for some reason crossing this marker gave him great confidence. He felt particularly good about having logged these years in youth ministry. Nearly every year for the last five or six, he’d been asked to consider transitioning to another position. The council at his church gave him every opportunity to become the Associate Pastor for Formation, broadening his responsibilities from young people to all people. But Jared felt an overwhelming calling to youth ministry, choosing to remain the high school youth pastor. This decision he wore as a badge of honor. Jared had slowly but surely become one of the youth ministry leaders in his small denomination, using his new leadership as a way to encourage others to make youth ministry a long-term vocation, as he had.
But nine months ago, Jared nearly left youth ministry. The denomination had pegged him as the perfect person to plant a new church in a re-gentrified neighborhood of his city. Jared was honored; the possibilities and freedom were exhilarating to contemplate. For weeks Jared daydreamed of the opportunity, only rarely being tripped up by the challenges. Those challenges seemed small compared to what could be, mainly because the denomination was ready to financially support the endeavor. They were ready to give whomever the committee chose every chance to succeed. But this commitment meant the committee was ready to do its due-diligence in finding just the right person.
Before this, Jared always had a philosophy about interviews, something he had fallen into. Actually, retrospect is what made it a “philosophy.” This philosophy was: Never prepare for an interview; the less you know the better. This, Jared believed, allowed him to be his most authentic self. And, more importantly, if it worked out, it was a sign that it was the Holy Spirit leading him. This lack of preparation kept his anxiety low and his self-centered ambition at bay.
This approach had worked twelve years ago when he had taken his present job. Never had Jared imagined he’d work in a church; his dream was to own his own restaurant. With a degree in business and hospitality services, he had been the assistant manager at a popular chain restaurant when the pastor of the church he was attending invited him to apply for the open Youth Pastor position. Just six months earlier Jared had started volunteering in the youth ministry, leading a small group and going on the summer mission trip. He was shocked by the invitation to apply, and not really sure it was for him. After all, he had only been going to that church because the girl he was dating had invited him. Jared had met Tanya at the campus ministry during his junior year. They were just friends those years in college. But when they found themselves in the same town they began hanging out.
Jared went into that interview shooting from the hip, freely dreaming of what could be for the youth ministry. The next day he was offered the job. He took it, reasoning that it was better than overseeing midnight appetizers at the restaurant. But within a year not only had ministry become a vocation, but Tanya had become his fiancée.
Jared would use his philosophy again when he interviewed for seminary. Jared had little interest in seminary, just as he’d had little interest in becoming a youth pastor three years earlier. Tanya had just finished grad school and their next move was to start a family. But Jared’s pastor wanted him to pursue it, explaining that he could take classes while staying full-time in ministry. The church not only offered him the time for his online and intensive courses, but would also cover the cost of as many as three classes a year. If Jared could get a scholarship, almost all of the tuition would be taken care of. But to get this scholarship he’d need to interview, so dusting off his philosophy, Jared interviewed. Three weeks later a letter came granting him admission, and the scholarship, too.
Jared used this philosophy one more time when he applied to be on the denomination’s planning team for their tri-annual youth gathering. Jared had never even been to one of these gatherings when he was interviewed to be one of the three core people on the programing team. Again, his philosophy worked perfectly, and Jared was now a core leader in the denomination’s youth ministry.
But this church-planting interview felt different. So different that it caused Jared to question his philosophy altogether; perhaps it was nothing more than a cheap cover for his own insecurity or laziness. Jared realized that if he had a shot at the position, he’d need to know something more than the superficial about the neighborhood. So he decided he’d spend an afternoon walking, praying, and exploring it.
The neighborhood was billed as a mix between upwardly mobile young professionals, mainly in the technology sector, with an avant-garde art scene. People often called the neighborhood “Baby Brooklyn,” using it as both an insult and a compliment, meaning it was filled with earnest overly educated young adults. As Jared walked the streets, he recognized that the stereotype was mainly true. Much to his surprise, Jared began to feel more confident that this was the position for him; after all, working with young people was his specialty. Excitement gripped him as he recognized that this position would not mean leaving youth ministry, but a radical broadening of it. And that point, he thought to himself, would be the perfect way to start the interview! After all, some of the very youth who had been through his ministry now lived in “Baby Brooklyn,” and one of them, Aly, had agreed to meet him for coffee.
They decided to meet at a place called The Rusty Spoon, a coffee shop in the heart (that in many ways served as the heart) of the neighborhood. Jared arrived a few minutes early. As he walked through the door he noticed the colors. The floor was an aged Spanish tile of greens and maroons. Many of the tiles wore the marks of decades of traffic, broken and chipped in ways that somehow felt welcoming, like a worn soft pair of jeans. The ceiling was high and spotted with rust, gathered at the edges, and seams of the old, embossed tin panels. It appeared that at one time the whole of the ceiling had been white, but that was hard now to decipher. In particular areas whole sections of the tin had been removed to run pipes for air conditioning and ventilation. Yet like the floor, this seemed fitting.
The walls were covered with paintings and drawings. As Jared examined them it became clear that these were done by local artists, with small white tags in the right corner advertising a price. For a second, Jared thought he should get one, liking the idea that he was the kind of person who would appreciate such things. But after seeing no tag with a price less than $800, Jared gave up the fantasy, choosing a latte instead. A hurried young man took his order as a diligent young woman in turquoise, thick-rimmed glasses made his drink.
When Aly arrived, she was warm but distant. It felt odd to Jared, as if he represented something she missed but wished not to return to. It made him feel old, or at least out of place, or something he couldn’t quite put his finger on. She sat down and Jared offered to buy her a drink, but she passed, explaining that she was “off” things like caramel lattes and was now only drinking her coffee black with a teaspoon of coconut oil and tumeric. When Jared said he’d get her a cup, she shot back that she had already had her two cups for the day—saying something about antioxidants, caffeine, and the blood system that Jared couldn’t quite follow.
Jared was happy to see Aly. He’d watched her grow up. Aly’s dad was a mean first baseman on the church softball team, and Jared had vivid memories of her from when he first arrived at the church. He remembered watching twelve-year-old Aly wandering the dandelion-filled park before the games. He also remembered retreats, mission trips, and confirmation lessons he’d shared with her as the years passed. It was great to sit across from a now twenty-four-year-old Aly. Jared felt a deep sense of appreciation as he recognized that Aly was now an adult.
For the first fifteen minutes, their conversation took them to reminiscing. Aly described how she had loved going to church, stating that her parents loved church and so did she. “It was great,” she explained. “I felt safe, I guess, I mean I felt connected.” Not quite directly enough for it to be awkward, but enough for Jared not to miss it, Aly thanked him for how much church and youth group meant to her growing up. “It colored almost every part of who I was,” she said. Yet, like a snag in the conversation that brought a chill to his body, Jared got stuck on “who I was.” It shifted him so off balance that he found himself asking like a reflex, “Who you were? What does that mean?”
Aly froze. It was as if she had come to their meeting with a secret, telling herself when she reached for the door of The Rusty Spoon, whatever happens keep it hidden. Now she was outed, and the look on her face gave it away. “Well, I mean it is still part of me . . .” she stumbled. “I mean it was . . . I mean, well, honestly, I’m just not sure about the whole thing.”
“What whole thing?” Jared asked, trying his best to catch himself, pushing down any signs of defensiveness, or worse, the existential crisis that his whole ministry had been impotent.
Aly paused, and then like someone standing on a tall cliff readying themselves to jump into a cold lake below, she breathed in deeply and jumped. “Well, I mean, I think church is still important; I’m just not sure that there is, like, a God who does stuff in the world. I mean, I understand why people in the past believed that, and that was really true to them. They lived or died because of what God did. But we now know about things like disease and germs and genes. I mean, that’s what I studied in college. And now I work with this start-up that is working on the tech end of gene therapy. I guess I confront it every day, that people’s genes make them what they are, and maybe with the right technology we can heal some illness or make people better. It makes no sense to wonder if God makes infants sick for some, like, cosmic purpose.”
“Wow,” Jared responded. “Those are important thoughts.” The existential crisis could no longer be completely contained, so Jared asked, “Did you have these questions back when you were in the youth group?”
Aly responded quickly. “No . . . well, I mean, yes.” Taking another deep breath, she said, “Yes. I mean, I couldn’t have put it like that, and I had no understanding of genes or gene therapy or anything like that. But, I really did wonder a lot, like tossing and turning in bed, about whether God causes things in the world. But I was too young and scared to face the facts, I think.”
“What facts?” Jared asked.
“I mean the fact that God is mostly unnecessary. Like, I have this friend, Ronny, who plays guitar here on Tuesday nights, and he says, ‘You can’t live without science, but you sure can live without God.’ And he doesn’t mean that as, like, some lame punk statement of rebellion; it just seems true. Like, I know so many people in this neighborhood that have no need for God at all, and yet they do so many good things, marching against corrupt corporations, starting charitable-giving apps, and doing all kinds of ecological activism. And almost none of them do it for God, or even think they need God.”
Shocked by the unexpected direction their conversation had taken, all Jared could think to respond with was, “What about your family?”
“What do you mean?” Aly replied.
“I mean they still believe and go to church, right? I mean I saw them at the late service last week.”
“I guess.”
“You guess?” Jared asked
“Well, yes, it’s surely part of their life, and honestly, both that and my own experience at church keeps me from, like, totally abandoning and turning my back on what I learned growing up. I watched my mom’s faith make such a difference when my sister got sick. But then again, it was science that healed her. And my parents may have been praying, but they were also driving hundred of miles and cashing in their 401Ks to see specialist after specialist, hoping that science would save their daughter. So it just seems to me that if there is a God, he just creates problems that science seems to be able to solve. I mean, I have to be honest, science saved my sister. God just allowed her to get sick in the first place. Or maybe it is just easier and more logical to believe it wasn’t God at all, but her genes or bad luck.”
Aly then stopped herself. “I’m sorry, Jared, I know you didn’t come to talk about this . . . I guess I’ve just grown up.”
GROWN UP. Jared thought, what does that mean, grown up?
Aly said this with an air of confidence; there seemed to be a certain bravado in those words.
Jared could only ask, “Growing up means . . . ?”
Aly returned, “It means I know enough now that I can choose science over God—I think.”
Just as Jared got tripped up over Aly speaking about her faith in the past tense, he felt the same snag on Aly’s “. . . I think.” But now wasn’t the time to follow that trail. They spent the next forty minutes discussing the neighborhood.
Jared left “Baby Brooklyn” ready for his interview, but now with a stab of desperation. And this stab bled a little. He had the split-second thought that if he was asked to plant this church, then he wouldn’t have to deal with the questions Aly’s experience raised in regard to his ministry. He felt the intoxicating lull that directing our minds toward a future dream or desire can be to the anxieties and burdens of the present. Jared knew that the impact of the conversation with Aly would not soon leave him, but he had little time to consider it. His mind was swimming in the warm waters of his future ambitions.