Common Grace in Youth Ministry: Equipping Teens to See God’s Goodness at School
As I write this, teenagers across the United States are either getting ready to go back to school, or have just started. My local Walmart is bustling with parents and kids getting their pencils, notebooks, lunchboxes, and clothes that they will need for the upcoming year. Families are returning from their vacations, preparing for the annual rhythms that the school year brings - football games, dances, fundraisers, pep rallies, field trips, class parties, and more!
While many teenagers enjoy school and look forward to the routine, others approach the next 180 days of education with dread. The thought of yet another school year seems like a heavy burden. Are they really expected to do everything they did last year AGAIN? How are they going to navigate all the distractions and stress while trying to live out their faith this year? How can youth workers help students and parents think differently about school and its various activities? Maybe what is needed is a reclaiming of the theological concept of “common grace.”
Common Grace: What is It?
John Murray defines common grace as “every favour of whatever kind or degree, falling short of salvation, which this undeserving and sin-cursed world enjoys at the hand of God.” There is a kind of grace only believers know: special grace, by which we are saved; but every person on earth has experienced, is experiencing, and will experience some measure of God’s common grace. Put more plainly, common grace is grace God shows to all of humanity. In a negative sense, we see God’s common grace at work when He restrains evil and wickedness.
In a positive sense, it speaks of God giving good gifts for humanity to enjoy, except for salvation. Jesus makes it clear in Matthew 5:45 that, “[God] makes his sun rise on the evil and on the good, and sends rain on the just and the unjust.” Jesus’ point is that God doesn’t just send rain on the fields of the Christian farmer, but the non-Christian as well. He satisfies the hearts of both believers and unbelievers with food and gladness (see Acts 14:17).
Thus, good gifts of friendship, athletic ability, and graduation are undeserved gifts God gives to both Christian and non-Christian students. We call these gifts of grace because we do not deserve them. Because of our sin, we deserve nothing but death (see Roman 6:23). God does not owe us any good thing, yet, out of His care and love for ALL humanity, He bestows good gifts upon us.
Helping Students See Common Grace
Youth workers have a unique chance at the beginning of each school year to disciple their students into seeing the daily, weekly, and annual activities on the school calendar not as something to endure, but as moments to celebrate God’s common grace in their lives. Common grace, rightly understood, should cultivate hearts of gratitude. Seeing these seasons of life as more than just cultural markers, but as blessings from God, can change how students approach them. Consider starting conversations with your teens about how they can enjoy these gifts and view them as more than just events imposed by their school’s administration. These can be times to remember God’s kindness toward them!
Students might begin to see how pep rallies and school dances are gifts that God has given them. Fundraisers could be chances to give back and express gratitude to the coaches and teachers who have poured into them. Field trips can be times to use their God-given abilities to learn and have new experiences. Award ceremonies can become a celebration of God’s gift of athletic ability or academic excellence. Practices and games are times to enjoy the physical gifts of exercise, discipline, and teamwork. Teacher appreciation is a time to thank their teachers for all the hard work they have put in this year (yes, even the ones they struggle to like).
Helping Students Embody Common Grace
As you seek to change how students view their school calendar, ensure that you are also reminding them to reject negative viewpoints they may be hearing at school or on social media. It’s common for teenagers to be negative or pessimistic about things that go on at school, either out of genuine disinterest or out of a desire to seem cool by appearing disinterested. It will be far too easy for our students to fall into that trap (“ugh, another pep rally”, “I can’t believe we have to go on another field trip.”) Instead, encourage students to speak positively (yet genuinely) about the things going on, and to try and embody a life of thankfulness, even if the event isn’t their favorite. Remind them that they are to “do all things without grumbling or disputing, that you may be blameless and innocent, children of God without blemish in the midst of a crooked and twisted generation, among whom you shine as lights in the world… (Philippians 2:14-15). The way they carry themselves, even in situations they don’t enjoy, can be an example to their unbelieving friends.
Approaching school events as evidence of common grace will make it difficult for our students to feel comfortable grumbling. Instead, they will see their whole life - including what happens at school - is from the hand of a God who gives good gifts to His children, as James writes, “Every good gift and every perfect gift is from above, coming down from the Father of lights, with whom there is no variation or shadow due to change” (James 4:17). The very fact they woke up today is an act of God’s grace and is reason enough to praise and thank Him, and yet God has showered us with so many “extras” in addition to this that we often take for granted.
Helping Students Use Common Grace
Seeing these events and traditions as pointing to God’s grace can provide an open door for evangelism to students’ unbelieving friends and family. After enjoying an event together, students could even ask questions to kickstart spiritual conversations. For instance:
“I had so much fun tonight hanging out with you tonight! Isn’t it awesome that God has made us to have friends?”
“Last night’s football game was a blast! Have you ever thought about why we love to play and enjoy sports?”
“I’m not overly excited for this field trip, but I know our teacher has worked really hard in planning it. What’s a way we can show we are thankful that God allowed her to be our teacher?”
By connecting these times of celebration and enjoyment to God and His grace, it provides students an easy opportunity to talk about God, His kindness, and why we don’t deserve these good gifts. All of life is of grace. In an age of hyper-individualism and mindless scrolling, that truth is often pushed to the side. But as we lead students to resist this tide of selfishness and pessimism that’s so common today, may they discover the reality that everything they have is from the providential hand of a loving Father.