Frying chicken, boiling coffee and wafting smoke mixed together to form that distinctive Waffle House smell as I took a seat with a friend of mine at the booth. Normally, I would have a triple order of hashbrowns smothered with onions and covered with cheese, but tonight they were clearly understaffed so I decided to settle for a diet Coke with a slice of lemon. The waitress was evidently frazzled from a full night of serving customers, and it seemed to take a long time before I could even get her attention to order my soda. It wasn't long before I was ready for a refill, but the waitress was too busy with other customers to even check on our table. After a while I left, unsatisfied.

That poor waitress. She wanted to meet every need around her. But there was more to do than she alone could handle. The result of her ineffectiveness was unhappy customers and an overwhelming sense of tiredness. That's what I understand happens to a lot of youth workers. There is too much for them to handle, so they feel forced to choose between concentrating solely on a very few teens and ignoring the rest, or trying to divide their energy equally among the masses, so that everyone gets a little but no one gets enough. Either way, the result is often burn-out and a sense of failure.

This does not have to happen. You see, I've discovered a little secret. I could easily have walked over to the drink machine at the Waffle House and poured myself another soda. That would have been one less thing for the waitress to do, and I could have had enough diet Coke to balance out the hearty meal I had earlier (the more you drink, the more weight you lose, right?). The same concept is true for me as a youth worker. If I show the teens how to use the spiritual Coke machine and give them permission to get refills for themselves and their friends, no one is going to go thirsty. Some of them can even begin to work the grill and serve up spiritual food.

I feel blessed to be a part of Cornerstone Church of Rockingham's DOCSide, a ministry that practices youth empowerment. It doesn't mean I can slack off as a leader, but it does mean I can focus my energy on training and supporting the teens who want to serve their friends. It's absolutely awesome to see how the guys I work with are constantly growing in their own faith as they minister to others. They know they're perfectly capable of exercising every spiritual gift they have, even as teenagers. And they go to it with an energy and enthusiasm that is encouraging and challenging. Hey, sometimes they even minister to me when I'm spiritually thirsty. Maybe I should head over to the Waffle House and let the waitress know there's a better way.