Did I forget to mention that your ultimate Boss is regarded by some as distant and irrelevant and that the combined forces of evil in the universe will know you by name, and, if you do take the job, they will do their best to hamper anything positive you do?
Anyone want to sign up?
Well I did, and as odd as this may seem, I consider it a great privilege to have my job, as described above. I look after the Youth Group at Casuarina Baptist Church in Darwin in Australia's Northern Territory.
The main reason I took the job, is because of my Boss.
To me, my Boss is anything but distant and irrelevant. Even though He doesn't carry a smart-phone or some other device that will need to be updated every 6 months, I can still speak to Him anytime of the night or day.
Even better, he doesn't judge success by the numbers of kids who attend my youth group, or any other 'outcome' that it is now routine to judge some businesses and academic groups by. I don't need to fill in forms and tick boxes about the activities and minute-by-minute details of my work. He simply wants me to faithfully stick to our Bible Studies and prayer and to continue to do our best with the things He has given us. In other words, all I have to do is to stay faithful to the task and to stay faithful to Him.
He knows that all who serve Him will be tempted to give up. Sometimes that serving will seem boring, unrewarding work. This feeling will often hit when we are at our most vulnerable; but my Boss knows that we will never be tested by being asked to do more than we can cope with.
My Boss is much more than just the head of some organisation. He is the God who created the universe. He created the air I breathe, the land I walk on, and the crocodiles I look out for when I go for walks near my house in Darwin.
He created my family, my friends, and the tiny materials that make up everything including my awesome 1999 Starwagon. He gave me Life and He gave His life for me.
He left His place in heaven, to come to earth as a human, to suffer and to take the punishment that I deserved for my sin. God is by far the most part of my life. Without Jesus, in my world, I am nothing.
I even get to see God each Friday night in the actions of the great bunch of youth leaders who lead the Bible Studies and run the activities. I see Him in the lives of the youth who have made Jesus their Lord and Saviour. I see Him in the lives of our Pastors and Elders who support the youth group.
Spending Friday nights to be part of a wonderful team of people whose aim it is to tell others about the amazing love God has for the world, is one of the highlights of my week.
I started this piece with a job description of serving that may be common to many in Christian leadership positions. It is true that in a worldly sense, some may see what we do is of little value.
What I do with so much effort and time commitment may seem like foolishness to the world. But it not the world that counts. The only thing that counts, in my view, is what God thinks. I am to love what God loves and dislike what He dislikes.
With God's help I am to love the lost, the lonely and the unlovely, and I am to dislike selfishness, arrogance and greed.
I take this youth group because I have an awesome Boss. He died on a cross for me. The ultimate question I ask each of the charges He has placed in my care, is: "Who is your Boss?"