The year was 1969, and Fred Rogers (yes, that Mr. Rogers) testified before the U.S. Senate Subcommittee on Communications after the Nixon administration proposed a reduction in federal funding for public broadcasting from $20 million to $10 million. Fred had one job: persuade Senator John Pastore not to support the proposed cut. It was a tall task for any advocate, let alone a relatively unknown (at the time) television personality.
His testimony lasted just over six minutes. In one of the most memorable moments ever captured in a congressional hearing, Mr. Rogers spent the final minute simply reciting a children’s poem he had written, What Do You Do with the Mad That You Feel? Immediately following the recitation, Senator Pastore simply stated, “Looks like you just earned the $20 million dollars.”1
A congressional committee preserving $10 million in funding after a six-minute testimony that included a children’s poem? How is that even possible?
There’s something beautiful about an argument that persuades not merely because of the facts it presents, but because of the character and genuine conviction of the person presenting them. Youth ministers would do well to remember that lesson as we seek to model and teach the spiritual discipline of Bible study. Too often, our appeals sound something like this: “Read your Bible. Make sure you’re doing your quiet time. Are you spending time in the Word?”
There is certainly nothing wrong with those exhortations. They are necessary and should continue. Nor is there any shortage of excellent tools that teach students how to study Scripture—HEAR, REAP, and SevenArrows, to name just a few. But what if our strongest argument wasn’t another method or another challenge? What if the most compelling reason for a student to open God’s Word for personal study wasn’t because we told them they should, but because they couldn’t help but see that we ourselves treasure every opportunity to open it?
Consider these three considerations below.
1. Reverence and Conviction in Scripture Reading
“For the word of God is living and active, sharper than any two-edged sword, piercing to the division of soul and of spirit, of joints and of marrow, and discerning the thoughts and intentions of the heart” (Heb. 4:12).
Not everyone is a theater major or gifted communicator. Thankfully, perfect enunciation or carefully timed inflections are not what convey genuine passion. But how is Scripture being read in our gatherings with students? Do we read it with the same monotonous lack of enthusiasm as someone reading a manual on transmission fluid or the migration habits of the spotted owl? Or do we read it in such a way that our students can sense we have spent time praying through the passage, deeply wrestling with its meaning, and being personally transformed by its truth? Or do we read hastily, as though we simply need to get through it in order to arrive at the message?
Spoiler alert: It is the message. Scripture is the living and active Word of God, breathed out by the Creator of the universe. It pierces the soul, spirit, and heart of everyone who hears it. We should read it that way to and with our students.
2. Sufficiency of Scripture
“All Scripture is breathed out by God and profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, and for training in righteousness, that the man of God may be complete, equipped for every good work” (2 Tim. 3:16-17).
Imagine this familiar scenario: a youth leader spends thirty minutes encouraging a student through questions about relationships, discipleship, calling, or sin—and never once opens the Word of God. Perhaps Scripture the leader quotes Scripture from memory. But what if, instead, that leader opens the Bible with the curiosity of an explorer unfolding a map to a world the student has never seen before?
Ask the student to read aloud a passage related to his situation. Invite him to explain it in his own words. Then ask:
- What is this passage saying?
- What does it reveal about God?
- What does it reveal about people?
- How does it speak to the situation we’re discussing?
Scripture is profitable in and of itself. It needs no human improvement. Let it speak and teach. Let it reprove and correct. And let it train, both you and your students.
3. Faith in Action
“…so that even if some do not obey the word, they may be won without a word by the conduct…” (1 Pet. 3:1).
Few sermons are more persuasive than a life wholly devoted to Christ and his mission: Working an honest forty-hour (or more) workweek. Treating a server with dignity and respect, even when service is slow or mistakes are made. Loving your spouse and children more than your ministry. Repenting quickly when you sin. These are among the most beautiful and powerful sermons any Christian will ever preach.
After serving as a student leader for more than thirty years, I can honestly say that I have failed in each of these areas. Too often, I have treated the Bible as a prop in the play called “My Life” rather than as the living, active Word of God. At times, I’ve been content to see Scripture as merely useful—which it certainly is—without stopping to behold it as beautiful.
Tim Keller once wrote, “There’s nothing more useful than finding God beautiful.”2 The same is true of his Word. We will never persuade students to treasure Scripture if we ourselves see it as merely useful instead of infinitely beautiful. So each day, I return to the cross. I lay aside my pride and selfish ambition, asking the Holy Spirit to transform me from the inside out. Before I can teach students to love God’s Word, I need him to keep enlarging my own love for it.
And perhaps one day, just as Senator Pastore responded to Fred Rogers, a student might look back and say, “Looks like you just taught me to love God’s Word.”
- https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fKy7ljRr0AA ↩︎
- Tim Keller (@timkellernyc), “You should never go to God because he’s useful. Go because he’s beautiful. And yet there’s nothing more useful than finding God beautiful.” December 20, 2019. ↩︎
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