Video Transcript: Treasure or Troublemaker?

Thank you, good morning everybody. How's everybody doing? I actually said  this in the breakout last night. 

I'm going to say it to you today. Do whatever you need to feel comfortable and to be engaged this morning. If you need to lay on the floor, if you need to stand on  the back, if you need to do somersaults across the back, do what you need to  do to fully engage, okay? 

Great. So, as you mentioned, I love kids in student ministry and I have been on  staff for several decades leading that capacity. And over the years, our team  began to realize that we did a really great job in creating these fun environments and welcome environments for kids and students to come and know Jesus and  grow in their faith. 

But in August of 2012, as we met, we realized that we were actually called to be  a welcoming place to all kids, no matter what their abilities were, no matter what  they'd experienced in their past. So, we began talking and training and reading  and most of all listening. And as we did that, we changed. 

And as we changed, families started coming to check us out. But when they  came, you could tell that they were very hesitant to tell us about their child. And  the reason for that is because they hadn't always felt welcome at other places. 

So, I believe the biggest opportunity and challenge for us in the local church is  what do we do with the kids that we don't know what to do with? How do we  respond to them in healthy and helpful manners? These are kids that have  behaviors that we don't understand and we just don't have the tools to respond. 

So, I've had such a great time with you guys yesterday. It's such an honor to  gather with like-minded friends and people. Well, you're just people. 

I'm not saying you're not my friends. It's just I haven't met you to call you a friend yet. But to gather together, to come up with new tools and strategies, and to  share ideas with each other on how we can all be churches and create safe, be  churches that are safe places for everybody to meet Jesus, meet some new  friends, grow in their faith, and belong. 

So, a friend recently shared a story with me. She was at church, and as she  walked into the lobby, her child, I'll just call him Robert, had a major  meltdown. And so, this mom sat right in the middle of the church lobby with her  child.

And the reason that she did that is because her kid, when he was having a  meltdown, would often yell, you're hurting me. So, she stopped in this public  place so people could see she was not hurting him. You see, Robert looked like  a typical kid. 

But over the first six and a half years of his life, he bounced from family member  to family member. And then he went into foster care. And then he went into my  friend's home where he was eventually adopted. 

And as she sat there, she said people would walk by, and some would kind of  look at her and then step up their pace a little bit. And she felt so alone sitting  there in the lobby. And then somebody stopped and said, I'm just going to stay  here with you. 

Somebody else stopped and said, can I get some water for you and your  screaming child? Another friend then came by and said, hey, I'm going to go  ahead and check your kids in to the kids area while you stay here. And she said  the people that did that, when they did that, she said, I felt seen and understood. And that was huge to her. These simple acts of kindness made a huge  difference. And many of us in this room have been there, sitting on the floor with  a kid having a meltdown, who's communicating with us in the only way that they  know how. 

Or maybe we're trying to remove a child from an activity that they love. And they are expressing in a very loud and enthusiastic way how much they do not want  to leave. And as that happens, we may feel judged by onlookers who actually  have no understanding of our story or our kid's story. 

So there we are trying to comfort our child while we're also needing  comfort. And when I think back to those friends in the church lobby that sat and  brought water and offered to check my friend's kid into the kids area, they  noticed somebody in need. They were aware. 

So rather than walk by, they got curious. They're thinking, how can I help? They  were humble. 

They didn't assume that they knew what was going on. They didn't make  judgments. And instead they did something. 

They offered tangible support. More of that, please. Right?

Wouldn't you like to see more of that in your church? But unfortunately, as I work with church leaders who are struggling to respond to challenging behavior with  kids and students, I often see a desire to fix the behavior. Or find the sin and  address that. 

I've been asked in a number of different ways by a number of different children's leaders, basically, what do you do when a parent thinks their kid has special  needs, but really there's a sin issue that needs to be addressed? I try to watch  what my face is communicating. Because it's not kindness. 

Because let me be clear. Most often, it's not a sin issue. It's a kid who's  overwhelmed, does not have the coping strategies to manage with what is going on. 

They may have needs or disabilities that affect their behavior. So I believe  instead of moving straight to judgment, saying that it's a sin, let's connect. Let's  bring water. 

Let's sit on the floor. Let's be curious. Let's be a friend. 

Let's be kind. And as followers of Jesus, we want to be more like him,  right? Does anybody in this room, would you like to be more like Jesus? 

Very good. And if your neighbor didn't raise their hand, then why don't you pray  with them and speak with them after this? So we want to respond to Jesus like  Jesus responds to them, right? 

So how does Jesus respond? A great way to find that is to go to the Bible. So  I'm going to go to Matthew 19:14. And it says, Jesus said, let the little children  come to me, the clean and compliant ones. The ones who are able to move  from room to room on their own with no assistance. The children who are able to articulate their needs verbally with words. 

The children who always do what's asked the first time. Don't keep them  away. The kingdom of heaven belongs to people like these. 

Is that what Jesus said? No, he did not qualify what kind of children we're  supposed to welcome. So based on that, I'm assuming that we are to welcome  all children. 

But you know the images that hang in so many of our church halls of Jesus with  the really clean, compliant kids? The ones that are sitting there just looking at 

Jesus hanging on every word. I believe that those set up unrealistic  expectations of how children act. 

And so after coming home from a conference, I was complaining to my  daughter-in-law, Haley. And I said, that is not how I believe it was with Jesus and the kids. So she created these images for me. 

Because I believe this is a much more realistic expectation. I believe that when  Jesus is with kids, there are spills and tears. There are kids under the table and  kids standing on chairs. 

There are kids that are stemming. There are kids that are braiding hair. There  are kids that are laughing. 

There are tears. And there's also kids that are double dipping on the goldfish  crackers. So besides not having realistic expectations, I think we have another  problem. 

Research has been done that shows that about a third of families who have kids with disabilities have left at least one church because their child was not  included or welcomed. And I'm not okay with that. Are you? 

Are you? No. And in recent years, the research has shown that these kids that  are the kids that have been the typical focus of disability ministry, you know,  those with intellectual and physical disabilities, they are not the kids who are  being excluded. 

The ones who are being excluded have less visible disabilities like autism,  anxiety, depression, ADHD, oppositional defiance disorder, and  others. Disabilities that affect their behavior. And Karen Purvis, who was a  pioneer in working with kids who've experienced trauma, says behavior is the  language of children who have lost their voice. 

Many kids, like Robert, who was having trouble in the church lobby, they have  disabilities that aren't visible. So because of their past experience, their brain is  wired for survival. They feel unsafe even when they're with us. 

And we know that they're safe, but they don't feel that way. So they're  communicating their fears, their anxieties, their needs, their feelings to us. But  they're not using their words.

They're using their behavior. But rather than trying to listen to the behavior, often we tend to go straight to discipline and correction, eliminating the  behavior. Instead, what I believe we need to do is to stop and to listen to what  they're saying to us through their behavior. 

The only language that may be currently accessible to them in the moment. So I think another way to respond is I'm going to give us four steps. And first, be  aware of the people around us. 

Like the people in the church lobby that were aware that there was a mother in  need, sitting with a child who was trying to communicate. Second, be curious  about the behavior. What is underneath the behavior we're seeing? 

Rather than walk by, let's consider being supportive and inclusive. How can we  be a friend? And then be humble and open to new ideas. 

Don't assume that we know what's going on. Pray and listen to the Lord. Seek  guidance from Him. 

And then take everything that we've learned and observed and do  something. Sit on the floor, bring water, mow somebody's lawn, go shoot  basketball. The ways that we can do something are endless. 

You've seen the stats. People with disabilities are much less likely to attend  church than the general population. And you've heard the stories. Families ask to leave a church. Based on these statistics and stories, I believe  it's time for a change. But it's not about changing those who have disabilities. It's about the church, the people in the church, us changing.  

Decades ago, I took the less desirable approach and I was working with some  five fourth grade boys and I was trying very, very hard to change their  behavior. Very, very hard. 

Because when these five kids would show up, the destruction level would go  up. The chaos level would go up. So, if I can be totally honest, when these boys  didn't show up, there were tears shed. Tears of joy that they weren't there. 

So, our leadership team prayed for these boys that we identified as a problem  and we identified as troublemakers. We prayed that they would change. We  prayed that they would respond to our discipline.

We prayed that they would obey. And after months of this, nothing  changed. They still tore up stuff and they ruined our great plans. 

At least that's the way we perceived it. So, one day in a leadership meeting, one of the leaders said, maybe we should pray that we change. I said, what? Us? She said, yeah, I think we need to pray that our hearts change towards  these five boys. So, as we did that, we agreed to do something physical that  was a representation of our prayers. 

So, when they would arrive, we would greet them joyfully. Even if we didn't feel  joy, we would greet them joyfully by name and we would look them in the eye  and then we would exchange some physical touch that they were okay with. A  fist bump, a high five. 

One kid liked to bump on the forehead really enthusiastically. Like, whoa. As we  did that, we started to see the strengths in these boys. They were leaders. The  kids in the room were watching them. Also, they had high energy and were  enthusiastic. 

Now, sometimes their enthusiasm was geared towards less desirable activities,  but nevertheless, they were enthusiastic and they were excited to be at  church. They wanted to be there. So, as we prayed and engaged in more  positive ways, our hearts began to change. 

We began to deeply love each of these boys. We actually missed them when  they were gone. We realized that they were not troublemakers. They were  treasures. 

They weren't problems. They were precious. They were children of God. 

They were teaching us things. There were few places that they felt  welcome. Several of them bounced from home to home and they all struggled in school and with relationships, but during this time, church became a safe place  for them and I had the great honor to baptize several of them. 

We grew to love them and while we initially prayed for God to change them, God used them to change us. I was talking to a church leader a couple weeks ago at  a conference and she had a kid who, in her words, was a disruption. So, I'm  aware. 

Okay, she's got this kid that she thinks is a disruption. So, I got curious and I  started asking her questions and this child was non-verbal, but would, she said, 

shriek during children's church. I said, okay, are there particular times during  children's church that she shrieks? She goes, yeah, whenever the music comes  on, she is just shrieking. 

I said, okay, okay, I wonder what that could be. It's only during the music? She  said, yeah, pretty much just during the music. I said, okay, I wonder what that  could be. Like, what are other, like, so what's that time for? She's like, it's  worship. I said, okay, well, I wonder what she's doing and tears started falling on her face. 

She said, I'm trying to get her to stop, but I wonder if she's actually modeling to  us uninhibited worship. I said, yeah, I think she might be. So, this leader, she  was aware. This child was actually hard to miss due to her enthusiastic  worship. Then, she got curious about what could be behind the behavior. So, as  she described shrieking. 

Then, she was humble and open. Maybe it's not a distraction. Maybe it's this  child worshiping. Then, the leader decided to do something. She came up with a plan. She decided that she was going to go back to her church and in kids  church, she was going to invite the other kids to worship in whatever way they  felt called to. 

Whether it be dancing or screaming or doing their hands, rather than dictate  how we should worship. What we believe about the kids, if we believe the kid's a distraction, it's going to change the way we interact with them. It could be kids in our church, kids on the street, kids in the grocery store. 

When we see a child acting out, maybe they're really reaching out to us. They've got a need and they need our help in identifying it and meeting that. Maybe the  behavior is actually a connection issue. 

The five fourth grade boys that I mentioned, who are often viewed as acting out,  they were desperate for connection. They weren't getting connection in other  places. They were getting discipline and criticism. 

They were looking, they were reaching out, looking for an acceptance and  love. Ephesians 1:5 says, so he decided long ago to adopt us. He adopted us as his children. 

What if we believe that Ephesians 1:5 applied to every person in front of  us? What if we looked at every person through that lens? As a child of God,  fearfully and wonderfully made, a gift to us from above.

I love this quote, when a flower doesn't bloom, you fix the environment in which  it grows, not the flower. This applies to more than daisies and roses. What if,  instead of trying to change the kid, we work to change our environment so  they're all fully welcomed, loved and included? 

What if we looked around and were more intentional, being aware of the people  around us? What if we approached every person with curiosity, seeking to  understand and get to know them? And as we listen to them, what if we were  humble, knowing that we don't have all the answers? 

And then what if we did something? We took action. Be a friend. Be  inclusive. Invite them to serve with us. Invite them out to coffee. 

As I wrap up, I want to share a story of Father Joe, who's a great model to all of  us. He had a child in his church who had autism and was preparing for First  Communion. And Father Joe was aware of the challenges that First Communion might present to this child. 

You know, First Communion, you got a lot of people, you got scratchy new  clothes. And so, he got curious and he asked the family, what would be best for  your child? Such a simple question. 

And as he asked that, he was then humble. He was ready to hear their  ideas. And they shared what they thought would be challenges for him. So, Father Joe did something. He came up with a plan. This sweet child had his  First Communion midweek with only his invited guests. 

And Father Joe created a program, just like every other kid got on the weekend  First Communion date. Father Joe ordered flowers. Father Joe did something. And now this child is more comfortable and he participates in communion during Mass with the rest of his church community. Father Joe didn't make this kid  change. Instead, Father Joe identified the need and then changed the  environment to meet this child's needs. 

Father Joe did something. More of us need to be like Father Joe, asking what  do you need? What does your child need? 

So, may we all be more intentional and be aware of the people around us. Being curious about who they are, their interests and their needs. And may we stay  humble and open to new ideas.

Praying for inspiration and instruction from the Lord. And may we all do  something to make our churches, our small groups, our serving teams, a place  for people to find Jesus, find friends, find their place to belong. Thank you.