This past weekend I took our youth group Verve to “The Nightmare”, an outreach in Marshfield, Wisconsin. The outreach displays the top four killers of teenagers in America. It is a nightmare narrated by the devil and the youth were led through different scenes by a demon. As I watched all these teenagers led through a drinking party that ended in a car crash, a drug house, a gang shootout, and a suicide scene I was amazed at the effect that it had on them. It seems that so many of them have never really thought about the consequences of their actions. They were confronted with the reality that the choices we make will have an effect on us; in this life and in the life to come.
After the different death scenes the demon led them through Hell. There they saw people trapped and tortured. Demons were all around and the devil explained his plan for their eternity. It is a wake up call to those who see this life as all there is. Directly after Hell, they were led through the stages of the cross with live actors whipping Jesus, nailing him to a cross, and then Jesus dying on the cross. As the youth looked upon this bloodied man who had been whipped and hung to die for them, I could see the emotion on their faces. It was the first time that they had been able to see the physical price that Jesus paid to save them.
As I reflected with the youth after going through “The Nightmare”, there was an array of emotions; some were scared, some were sad, and others could not yet comprehend what they just experienced. For many of them life has not been easy, but as a teenager it is easy to believe that what we do does not matter when we are older. In today’s society high school and college are years of freedom. They are seen as a time to live life to the full without the fear of consequences as though consequences only happen when you are an “adult”. How unfortunate it is when the youth buy into this lie. They sacrifice years of their life to pain and suffering due to the choices of their teenage and young adult years. I pray that this past weekend has opened the eyes of the youth in my ministry and that their walk in life can be different from so many.