Is Your Christian Kid Ready for College? Jeff Myers

So I think one of the scariest moments in the life of a parent is when you drop your kid off of college. There's this joy. This is a moment you've dreamed and prayed about your whole life. But in another sense, you are handing your child off to professors and fellow students and people that have totally different mindsets and beliefs than you have raised your child their whole life. And now you're giving them to the wolves.

Yeah. Welcome to Family Life Today, where we want to help you pursue the relationships that matter most. I'm Shelby Abbott, and your hosts are Dave and Ann Wilson.

You can find us at familylifetoday.com. This is Family Life Today. So we've got Dr. Jeff Myers in here, who's going to call him every parent's fear, because you've done it.

And you lead a ministry, some ministries that really helps prepare our kids for this moment and beyond. Welcome back to Family Life Today, Jeff. Yeah, I love being here. This has been a lot of fun. It's fun for us, too.

You've done it. You know the fear. You know, you work with thousands, tens of thousands, probably hundreds of thousands of kids over 30 some years at Summit, right, who are walking into that world.

So how do we navigate that fear as a parent? We have the privilege of working with about 70,000 young people a year. I personally meet and talk to and work with 800 to 1000 of them. So they're 16 to 22 years of age. So I have some sense of what they're facing. And it doesn't matter if they go off to the State University, that's exciting and interesting. But maybe they're going into some sort of a vocational program, they're learning a trade or they're learning robotics or theater. There's so many different things. And it's simultaneously exciting because your child has an opportunity to experience a new world. Take some of the things that they've been working on and accept new challenges. It's a very big deal to graduate from high school.

That's a huge accomplishment. And so now they're off at the university. What a lot of parents don't understand, though, is that in the classroom, at most universities in the United States of America, the professors will propose to their children that a different world exists than the one they learned about growing up. And this doesn't matter what class it is. You're not talking about just a religion class.

This is a mindset. No, this will happen in, well, in the social sciences, for sure. Probably not in engineering. If you go to an engineering class and the professor says, you know, one plus one is a social construct.

I don't know. You know, drop that class. You do not want to learn engineering from such people.

But in a lot of classes, this could be true in all kinds of different areas. But they will propose that the world in which God is the creator and Jesus rose from the dead is not a world that actually exists, that a different world exists, one in which we evolved through random chance processes, starting with the first self-replicating molecule, and we have no truth to guide us, except our own internal compass of our feelings. So, this is very similar to what happened to Adam and Eve in the garden, where Satan came in as a liar. Now, the term, the idea of Satan in scripture, you know, Satan is real. Jesus talked about Satan and the work of the devil. He's a deceiver.

That's the core term. He's a deceiver. Well, when a deceiver comes to you, the deceiver doesn't say, hey, I'm about to tell you a lie, but I hope you believe it anyway.

No, the deceiver says, what you currently believe is a lie, and what I have to tell you is the truth. So, a lot of young people will say, well, my professor said this, and I just don't know what to do. I always thought that reality actually exists, and my professor was saying, no, reality is just our perceptions. We can't know anything other than our own perceptions. And personal experiences and social, we, we socially construct our own reality. And all of my classmates seem to believe it, you know, and then just act as if you'd have to be dumb to not believe it and not, I don't want to be dumb. And all of a sudden, then you're prepared to sort of imagine that a different world exists than the one you were raised with.

And then you go off to the parties, the social experiences, and so forth. And that combination of things can become toxic to a kid's faith. And then you tie in the fact that a lot of these kids that you go to the parties with are good kids. They're not really evil kids. They're good kids. And then again, I'm idolizing here.

Who knows if this is true as well, but then there could be hurt from Christian people, the church, the community that don't live out the faith that they're supposedly believe. And so it's that combination can cause a son or daughter to go, yeah, I'm out. But you know what it makes me feel too? I'm thinking of myself as an 18 year old going off to college.

I haven't dealt with any of my sexual abuse. If there is no God, if I'm the one that's in charge, and it's my truth, I would feel incredibly hopeless. Because I don't have in me what it takes to deal with the culture in the world. Do you think kids are feeling that? I have never in almost 30 years of working with young adults, seen such high levels of anxiety, depression, even suicidal ideation. It's to the point where young adults almost feel that if they don't feel bad, that there's something wrong with them. What do you mean by that?

I remember talking with a student who asked me, is there something wrong with me that there isn't anything big wrong with me? When you don't have a biblical truth about God is the creator, you're made in his image, Jesus Christ rose from the dead. We have hope in this life and in the life to come. If you don't have that, what do you orient your meaning and life around?

Well, there are really only a couple of options. One is that you're really tough and you can force other people to do what you want. The other one is that you're really broken and everybody should feel sorry for you.

That is where a lot of young adults are today. Really thinking of themselves as victims in the world rather than people who, through Christ, have victory. Well, I mean, Jeff, what has happened? I mean, you've been doing this several decades. You're saying it's worse than you've seen.

I think we know, but why? What is going on in our culture right now that you would say that? Well, at some point in the last maybe 50 years in our culture, we've shifted from what I call capital T truth. The idea that chapter one of your book chapter one of the by the way, we haven't even mentioned truth changes everything. That's the book we're talking about a little bit today. You thought about this for most of your life, but capital T. I like the way you describe that.

Yeah. So capital T truth says the truth exists. It's not easy to find.

You have to work at it. You have to seek the truth. We're seeking as believers. We're seeking truth biblically. This is the kingdom of heaven.

So seek first God's kingdom and then everything else will be added to you. That's the way Jesus put it, but it is a search. You can be found truth exists.

It's knowable. And then the other view, the one that's become more popular in the last 50 years is small t truths. The truth capital T isn't either doesn't exist or can't be known by us.

It's too remote. What we can know are the individual truths that we apply to our own life situations. So this is the battle capital T truth versus small t truths. The whole book of truth changes everything is just one story after another of people who believed not only that truth exists, but that Jesus is the truth.

Now think about that for a minute. You have the Greeks who all said, oh, truth exists and we can develop logical formulas and we can develop math and we can use all of these things to help us discern the truth. And John came along and the gospel of John and said, the truth exists. It's not just a mathematical formula.

It's not just a logical proposition. It's a person. It's Jesus in the beginning was the word. There was a person who united heaven and earth and makes it possible for us to understand and relate to God. Jesus says, I am the way. Jesus says, I am the way, the truth and the life. No one comes to the father, but through me. John 14 six. Jesus said in John eight 32, if you follow my teachings, you will know the truth.

Greek word Aliphia means reality. You will know the truth and the truth will set you free. This is where I start with young adults. Anybody would like to be set free. Is there anything you'd like to be set free from? Is there anything that you'd like to be set free to? Because freedom isn't just getting away from bad things.

Freedom is having the world open so that you can pursue good things. That's where we begin the process. That's how it starts. The truth exists. And it was people who believe that Jesus is the truth who changed the entire course of the world in all kinds of good ways. And we want to understand and study their stories so that we can figure out how we should live differently in our own time. As we read through the book, you have story after story of Jesus followers that made an impact where they were when God put them there at that time.

Do you have any like favorites? I thought that was fascinating. You like the stories? Yeah, I just thought, man, it is true of how godly people have changed the course of our world. And yet most people don't know anything about that. I would guess most kids don't know that hospitals or orphanages or so many things were started by believers.

Yeah. I started in the book with the idea of just the dignity of human life. We all believe that humans have dignity. We all recognize that bullying is bad and that you should never hurt someone who's vulnerable.

You should help people who are vulnerable. But why do we believe that? That kind of belief does not emerge out of an evolutionary perspective of life. It would not emerge out of a totally materialistic secular view.

It's got to be something else. Where would it come from? And it came in history with the biblical idea that humans have souls. Starting in the book of Genesis, God breathed life into the man and he became a nefesh, a soul.

He became a living soul. What is the evidence that human beings have souls? Well, there's a ton of evidence for this. We exist. We know that we exist. We know that we exist separately from one another. We know that we can act intentionally.

We know that we have a substance that's continuous. You know, I had my appendix out at age nine. I didn't wake up from anesthesia less than Jeff. I was still Jeff. My cells change over every seven years.

I can't get out of traffic tickets from seven years ago as a result. So I am the same person. I also know that there are mental states that exist that are not physical. All of these things are indications in the world of philosophy today that that idea of a soul makes a lot of sense.

But because we have souls, because we bear God's image, then we have dignity. So all the way back in time, one of the people I looked at was Catherine of Siena. And she's very famous for those who are listening, who are Catholic.

You would, you would know about St. Catherine's feast day. She was a young woman who during the time of the plague ran toward the people and the cities rather than away. She was told, you got to get out, come with us. We'll keep you safe.

She said, no, I'm going, I'm going back in. Well, why? Because I want to be with Jesus. Well, Jesus is everywhere. No, Jesus sits with the suffering and I want to be with Jesus. That became the basis of modern medical care. And even today in a secularized world, probably 20% of the hospitals are run by Christian organizations, Catholic organizations, Lutheran organizations, Baptist, Moravian brethren, Adventist.

Why? Because it was the basic belief that human beings bear God's image and we all have dignity. It is always wrong to intentionally kill an innocent human being, even formed how we understand war. The idea of just war doctrine that you can't just go to war for any old reason. You've got to have reasons why you do it. It's got to be a just cause. You know, these are all principles. Even when we know we can't live in peace, the biblical idea that human beings have dignity still guides our actions to this very day. And that comes from the foundation of absolute truth, right? Amago Dei is based in there is truth. It's a person. You don't get there apart from that. That's correct.

Yes. That's what surprises people because they think, oh, well, what is truth? Ultimately, it's got to be sort of like a math program or something. You know, it's got to be very logical. Dr. Spock would understand it perfectly. But when you realize, oh, no, from God's perspective, the truth is he made human beings to bear his image and that we all have value and dignity and worth.

That we are identifiably his. I'll tell you, this changes the lives of students so much. I was visiting with a student the other day. She came to our program and had some pretty profound disabilities, not able to communicate very well. But she came to me after I spoke about the idea every human being bears God's image. There's nothing that could be wrong with you that would ever change that. You are identifiably his. And she came to talk to me and she was able to communicate to me.

I've never felt that I could do anything for God because of my disability. And I said, so what do you think now? And she said, just watch me.

I thought that's what I want. That's the story of success right there. That God looks at her disability and doesn't see a person who can't make a difference in a world like ours. He looks at her and says, you're my child.

You go for it. That's beautiful. And it also makes me think, you know, as you think of the social media world we live in where Jesus followers are trying to influence through this thing called the Internet that we can communicate with people we don't even see all over the world. Often, at least my perspective, is the Jesus follower is not responding to an unbeliever or a skeptic or a questioner with the grace of God to someone made in the image of God, but more like judging and canceling back and forth.

And that can't happen if we understand the image of God in every—am I right? One of the things we want to try to accomplish in the two-week Summit Ministries program that we have for 16 to 22-year-olds is not just help them understand the truth, but learn how to communicate it relationally. So, people tend to swing back and forth from passive to aggressive. Passive is, well, you have your truth. I have my truth.

Whatever you believe is true for you. And the aggressive is, watch this. This video shows this Christian speaker, you know, just demolishing in 30 seconds the argument of his atheist opponent or whatever. Because we just sort of—we want vengeance. We want revenge. We feel powerless. And we just feel like, yeah, that's great.

Give me the mic drop moment. What we want to do instead of just going back and forth between passive and aggressive is transcend it. Become an advocate.

That's how we phrase it. And one of our team members, Jason Jimenez, talks about this in his book, Challenging Conversations. You become an advocate. What do you advocate for? Advocate for the truth and you advocate for the other person at the same time.

What's that look like? So, you're talking with someone who is, say, in the LGBTQ community. And they say, well, you know, you Christians are bigots. Say, you know, I wonder if we stopped thinking about our differences for just a moment and asked the question, what is life about? What are we actually searching for? What is true? If truth could actually be known, would we want to find it?

And what do you think about those kinds of things? Then maybe we can walk alongside one another to understand what the truth is. And maybe that would help us figure out what the purpose of sex is and how we should relate to one another and how we should handle the situations where we know people feel like they're victims because of their differences. But do you see it's just it's automatically moving toward the other person rather than away, rather than bumping heads. It's seeing ourselves as side by side, moving toward the truth. Yeah. And I was picking up not only, Jeff, what you're saying, but how.

That's what I'm thinking, too. Tone. Oh, yeah. Whether it's online or in a personal conversation. But I was also thinking of a family like this is dad, this is mom. How are we responding to our son or daughter's questions tone wise? Are we aggressive and are we loud and are we like, are you got to be kidding me? Are we loving and listening?

I mean, that's what I'm picking up. If I could go back in time, we all know, like Dave and I know, I would lose it with our kids sometimes when we talk. She has fun when she loses it. She'd be stomping around the house. We talked in a previous episode where you're like, you know, I want to listen to your music.

You know, I'd listen to their music. Are you kidding me? This is insane. And then I throw it in the trash.

So. Literally threw a cassette in the trash. And then Dave, thankfully, Dave's so different.

He took it out of the trash. He said, let me listen to it. And then they had a great conversation about it. So for those of you who have maybe made mistakes, maybe you can relate to this. But I do think the tone is everything and our desire to know them, wanting to know them is everything. But I'm curious, your subtitle of your book is How People of Faith Can Transform the World in Times of Crisis. You're saying that we as believers can still transform the world. And what do you mean by crisis?

What's that look like? I mean, we're in one right now. Are we? Certainly feels like we are. We see rising crime levels. We see purposelessness among young adults. We see a nation.

And I'm speaking because we're recording in the United States right now. I'm speaking of, you know, this environment. It feels like our nation is fractured. I work with students from lots and lots of different countries and our summit ministries programs.

The story is the same. They all tell me their nation feels fractured. It feels like bad people are getting away with things that they shouldn't even at the highest levels. All of these things are are bad. Oh, then we've got the environment and then we've got, you know, poverty and all of these different things. 70 percent of people right now say they don't think the government can be trusted to solve these problems. Yeah. Well, if the government can't solve it, who is going to solve it?

Because it's just too big. There's just too much going on. So we do feel like we're in times of crisis. I was doing an interview just a few months ago and they said, well, this is the worst time ever.

Right. Like things are getting worse and worse all the time. I said, why would you say that?

Why would you assume that? Because the evolutionist assumes that things started out bad, you know, first self replicating molecule and they're getting better and better all the time. That doesn't mean that we as Christians have to say the opposite.

Things are getting worse and worse all of the time. Instead, we look back in history. We let history guide us. We want to learn from history.

Why? Because we're part of God's story. It's not just the story of your life.

It's the story you are in history is going somewhere and it's going there on purpose. So we look back in history and we see that our time of crisis pales in comparison to some of the things that have happened in the course of history. Far, far worse times. One of the things I look at in the book and this seems so morbid now that I think about it, I just look back at the black death. Okay. What could be worse?

Yeah. A third to half the people die. The most gruesome, excruciating death you can imagine. Imagine a third to half of the people you're interacting with today gone and it's horrifying. So you would think, you would think people would say, well, clearly God has abandoned us. We're going to abandon him. We don't need him anymore. We're just going to change.

We're going to turn off the lights, go away. But instead, what happened after the black death, and this is what I talk about in one of the chapters of the book, something very surprising. People didn't say God has left us. They said God is with us through Jesus. He's right here suffering alongside of us. You see it in the art magnifying the suffering of Christ. You see so many of these paintings about the suffering savior.

Why? Because they didn't just see God as out there someplace. They saw God is right here through Jesus.

He is walking alongside of us. He's suffering with us. That changed their perspective on everything. The economic structure changed, the art reflects this, the music changed, the development of medical care, the development of science. Everything came out of that. It's like a revival on steroids, isn't it? It's like a revival that applies not just to our human hearts, but to everything. So times of crises are often used by God to produce phenomenal change. And we see it happening around the world right now. I have an American centric perspective that's not good in this situation because I miss, I miss the work of God that's taking place around the world. Hearts are being changed. Lives are being changed.

We are never to give up. We sometimes think of, well, God is silent. But you know, in scripture, God brings us into the desert, not to abandon us, but to be with him. God hangs out in the desert. Silence is not evidence of God's absence. It's an invitation to presence. If we can take on that perspective, and yes, maybe we're on the brink of a world war.

I really don't know. But as Christians, we're never to say, we now have permission from God to give up because everything is bad. Instead, if we're the ones who are willing to say, you know, everybody else is retreating. I have the opportunity to advance.

Everyone else is trying to escape. I have the opportunity to engage. You're saying that's how we transform the world. You can bring so much transformation. I give a lot of examples in the book.

One of them is in the area of education. John Wycliffe was a professor at Oxford University. He decided to translate the Bible from Latin into English. This was very risky for him to do because Latin was thought to be the perfect language. If you translate it into English, you're making it vulgar.

It's like adding curse words every third or fourth word. And he said, no. Moses heard from God in his own language. The disciples heard from Jesus in their own language. People need to be able to hear from God today in their own language. So, he translated the Bible from Latin into English. The English language was not well formed.

There are 1,100 words used for the first time in print in the Wycliffe translation of the Bible. Nicholas literally formed the English language to communicate biblical truth to everyday people. And now, today, English is the number one trade language in the world.

It has led to a level of prosperity that is unprecedented in the course of history. And it started out because a guy thought, people need to hear from God in their own language. You don't have to control everything. He didn't say, you know, I can't make a difference unless I can become the king of England. It's like, no, I'm just going to translate the Bible into a language that people are actually using.

Form the language, make it better, and then history changes as a result. God takes those little efforts. Hey, stick around because Jeff's got some encouragement for us to stand firm in our faith, despite what's going on in our current culture.

I'm Shelby Abbott, and you've been listening to Dave and Anne Wilson with Dr. Jeff Myers on Family Life Today. You know, Dr. Myers has written a book called Truth Changes Everything. How people of faith can transform the world in times of crisis.

Many people believe that we're living in a time of crisis right now. Whether or not you believe that, this book is going to be helpful for you as really a call to action to defend truth in our turbulent times. You can go to familylifetoday.com and click on today's resources to get your copy. Or you can give us a call at 800-358-6329.

That's 800 F as in family, L as in life, and then the word today. You know, Family Life Today is a donor-supported ministry, and you hear us talking about people partnering with us to make this ministry happen. Now, if you enjoyed conversations like the one you heard today, and you'd like to be a part of making something like Family Life Today happen, we want to invite you to join us.

You can go over to familylifetoday.com and click on donate now to partner with us because we love being partners with you. Thanks so much for making this ministry happen. All right, now let's hear from Jeff with some encouragement for us to stand firm in our faith. There's a perspective of faith that's super powerful here. I am not a Christian because I want to turn the clock back to the 1950s.

I'm a Christian because I want to preserve the core principles from scripture that allow for flourishing and blessing of the nations. When a child walks away from the faith, it's not just that we have one less kid filling the pews. It's that they're walking away from reality and the opportunity to be a blessing, to be a giver rather than a taker. That's part of what we want to restore. Now, coming up tomorrow, we're going to try to answer an important question that a lot of parents are asking, and that is this. Will video games ruin my kids?

I know a lot of parents are asking that question as they're wrestling with how to deal with the subject of video games and their kids. Drew Dixon is going to be with Dave and Ann Wilson tomorrow to talk about just that. We hope you'll join us. On behalf of Dave and Ann Wilson, I'm Shelby Abbott. We'll see you back next time for another edition of Family Life Today. Family Life Today is a donor-supported production of Family Life, a crew ministry helping you pursue the relationships that matter most.