I’ve been reading a book entitled: Middle School Ministry: a comprehensive guide to working with early adolescents by Mark Oestreicher and Scott Rubin. Any book written by people who work closely with this particular age group consists of either extreme frustrations or extremely humorous stories. Marko and Scott’s writing and stories reveal two adults who view ministry with early adolescents as a humor-filled, life-long calling. I’m only halfway through the book and I have side-splittingly laughed constantly. I had to share one such story (found on pages 43-44):
The setting: A tiny, hot, fart-drenched small group room at church.
The context: Marko’s middle school guys’ small group–all 6th graders.The conversation:
Marko: “So Potiphar’s wife…”
Shane: “Oh! I’ve heard this! Isn’t she the one that said Joseph raped her?”
Marko: “Yeah, that’s right. She wanted Joseph to have sex with her…”
Matt: “We’re starting sex ed. next week in school.”
Shane: “We did it in our class a few weeks ago.”
Zack: “You did it in sex ed.?”
(Giggles all around.)
Zack: “That must be a new teaching method!”
Shane: “Ha! No, I don’t think our teachers have a license to do that.”
Zack (very serious, to me): “You need a license to have sex?”
Marko: “Yeah.”
Zack: “Really?”
Marko: “You have to apply for one down at the DMV.”
Zack: “Really?”
Marko: “No. Back to Potiphar’s wife…”
The guys joked about needing a “sex license” for the next three years that we were in small group together.
