The church has left the building

as a youth pastor the last eight years

at some of the largest churches in

america

i’ve learned some key lessons in

connecting with and leading

gen z students and not to sound arrogant

but i know some things for instance i

know that teenage girls fall in love

about

five times a semester i also know that

for junior hires

fortnite is not just a video game it’s a

lifestyle

i also know that the social media app

tick tock is the universal language for

students

everywhere however one thing i didn’t

know was

how to lead young people through a

pandemic

the covet 19 crisis took the modern

world to a space that

we had never been not only did it shut

down businesses

close schools and demand that people

stay inside their homes

but it also forced churches temples and

synagogues all over the country

to close their doors on their members

the sacred spaces where millions

gathered each week to

pray worship learn teachings

were suddenly no longer available to

them

so during the first global pandemic of

the 21st century

one that instilled fear and panic into

an entire nation

people in the faith community were

seemingly left with no place to go to

find hope

the church had essentially left the

building

however as a result of this mass exodus

of physical congregants a new wave of

creativity and connection was

ushered into the evangelical church

through the utilization of

live stream technology an enhanced focus

on social media

and with more pastors preaching

ted-style sermons

the reach of the local church spread far

beyond its four walls

and instead became a global community

and

while some churches struggled to adapt

to the new normal of

online only services a research study

done by the barna group found that 44

of churches that went fully online as a

result of covid

saw a significant increase in attendance

and with no large gatherings to prepare

for many churches focused even more on

providing much needed essentials for

their communities

whether by converting buildings into

food banks

or by providing much needed counseling

to the drastic influx of people who are

struggling with

depression addiction and abuse the

church readily responded

with hundreds of students from my youth

ministry stuck at home during quarantine

i needed to find a creative way to

create engagement

and community so i launched a virtual

youth conference

on instagram called wait for it

quarantine con we brought in

musical artists movie producers and

speakers from all over the country

and it was a massive success over two

thousand people

from eight different states and five

different countries

all logged in it was as if the crisis

had forced us to reach a new level of

creativity

and we had finally found our footing in

the midst of the chaos

however coven 19 was just part of the

story of 2020

because america was about to face the

darker side of its proud history

and the church would be needed to shine

brighter than ever before

during memorial day weekend 2020

the video that shook the world was

released

a white minnesota police officer was

recorded killing an unarmed black man

who was already lying face down and in

handcuffs

the outrage was unparalleled and started

a global response of

protests and reactions from all over the

world

as a black youth pastor who leads at a

predominantly white church

i felt a strong sense of responsibility

to utilize my voice and platform

to bring awareness and change so when

our church was able to safely regather

the first message i shared was on how

christians should respond

to racial injustice i played the

horrifying video of the murder of george

floyd to my students and

i challenged them to not just see a

stranger or random black man lying in

the pavement

but to see me to see a husband

to see a father to see a community

leader

because the truth is every time i see

another black man killed by a police

officer

i see myself i shared my story with them

and explained how racial injustice is a

sad reality that i had personally

experienced multiple times

even within the church

i shared that the reason i needed them

to envision me

lying in that pavement being slowly

suffocated by

someone sworn to protect me is because

you will not

show a passion for those you have no

compassion for

and then something happened that i’ll

never forget

i give everyone a moment to just pray

and self-reflect

and during that time a young white woman

came up to me she was shaking

uncontrollably with

tears filling her eyes she said

justin all my life i’ve been raised in a

very conservative family and we totally

support the police

but i never knew what it was like to be

you

i’m so sorry for everything you’ve been

through

i’m so sorry for everything she then

hugged me while sobbing for

several minutes and it was in that

moment that

my faith in humanity and the church was

renewed

because i realized that even in the

midst of chaos the church could still

bring hope

even in the midst of outrage the church

could still show love

and even with millions suffering from

unjust systems

and practices the church could still

fight for justice

covet 19 proved that people in a healthy

community will always find ways to grow

regardless of the environmental

restrictions

and the racial justice movement gave the

church an opportunity to not just

talk about jesus but to walk like him

how ironic is it that through a global

pandemic and

racial justice movement the church would

discover a deeper understanding of the

message that

jesus christ had communicated over and

over again in his teachings

that the church was never designed to be

a religious organization

but rather a relational organism

because even when people can no longer

come to church they can then

become the church because the church has

left

the building

you