Bakery Run #8 – Free, Unley

Pie Buddies: Tom Vaughan & Andrew Chan

Topic: Being a Christian in High School

A gluten-free bakery. I never thought I’d find myself in one of these places. But in God’s sovereignty, that’s exactly where I found myself on this particular day. My two guests were Tom and Andrew, who both finished high school just over a year ago. Tom can’t eat gluten, hence the choice of location.

To be fair, this place isn’t exactly a bakery. It’s more like a gluten-free mini-mart that also sells baked goods. There were a few pies, sausage rolls and pasties on display, as well as a few cakes. Not the sort of variety that a normal bakery would have, but enough to have a bit of a choice. All three of us got sausage rolls. I also got a brownie (which was dairy-free too), while Tom got a pastie.

The lady running the shop was delighted to find us saying grace when she brought the food over. “It’s good to see young people doing that these days!” she exclaimed. My sausage roll certainly wasn’t the greatest I’d ever had. It still tasted alright, it was a bit dry and crumbly though. Andrew, an avid gluten consumer, couldn’t finish his. Tom devoured both his pastries and enjoyed them. And the brownie was one of the nicest I’ve had in ages. So while this place certainly won’t top the list, it’s good to know that there are appealing options for people who aren’t able to eat certain foods.

We started the conversation off by chatting generally about their experiences of being Christians in their respective high school environments.

“I probably took on being a Christian about halfway through high school,” Tom began. “It was a bit of a funny situation, because I was at a Catholic school. And a lot of the stuff they believe is similar, but a lot isn’t similar. I found that a lot of the kids were completely turned off by the way they taught Christianity at school, which made it a bit harder for me to connect with them. My friends all knew I was a Christian. I didn’t get many questions about it, but I think I was still able to show my faith the way I did things.”

“Were you the only Christian in your group?” I asked.

“Yeah.”

“Was that a bit of a challenge for you?”

“It wasn’t too bad,” Tom replied, “my closer group of friends were all cool with it, but the wider circle of friends gave me a bit of flak. Just the odd snide remark, I was able to brush that off pretty easily. I reckon I had a pretty easy time.”

“I went to a non-denominational school,” Andrew began. “In years 8, 9 and 10 it was quite difficult because I often got shut down for believing what I did. But I started sticking up for it, because I realised that it was actually really important. I’d say I took my faith on in high school as well. My school friends gave me a lot of crap for it, but they eventually came to respect me for who I am because I did stick up for it. And we’re still friends, but I don’t really talk to them much anymore, because we’re just different people.”

I had experienced this drifting apart with many of my old school friends. “You really just find that you don’t have anything in common with them,” I agreed.

I was encouraged to hear how these two guys had been able to make a stand for Jesus at such a young age and in such a secular environment. In his letter to the Romans, Paul explains that the gospel is God’s message, and is to be proclaimed, not to be ashamed of:

I am not ashamed of the gospel, because it is the power of God for the salvation of everyone who believes. (Romans 1:16)

Tom and Andrew had understood that well.

I then moved on to the next question. “You guys both became Christians during high school. What were the big challenges you then faced?”

“Probably the biggest challenge for me was dispelling all these ideas people have, especially since it was a Catholic school,” Tom answered. “People get a really negative idea of the Catholic faith, and therefore the Christian faith. I’m constantly telling people that we don’t want gay people to burn in hell, not every priest rapes 12 year old boys, that sort of thing. And that I’m not all high and mighty judging them on every little thing they do.”

Andrew’s biggest challenge was the fact that as a Christian in a secular environment, he was fairly isolated. “For me, there were some other people at school that were Christian, not many. And there was a chaplain, but that didn’t really help strengthen me in my faith as a Christian.”

The Christian education at Tom’s school (high school Christian education is a subject which I’ll chat about at a bakery near you sometime soon) wasn’t hugely helpful either, it seemed. “We were told to buy Bibles at our school,” Tom said. “And we read a few chapters of Matthew sometime in year 9, but by then half the bibles had been lost and the other half had been completely defaced. There was a complete disregard and almost hatred of Christianity.

“Was that because it was forced on them?” Andrew asked.

“Yeah exactly. Kids just didn’t want to be there.” He went on to talk about how the multicultural nature of the school meant that there were many children coming from different religious backgrounds who didn’t appreciate having Christianity force-fed to them. Having said that, I don’t know what you expect when you attend a Christian school.

“What did you guys find helpful for your faith during high school?” I asked.

“Our youth group at church,” Tom replied, with Andrew nodding in agreement. Just having a bunch of guys the same age going through the same sorts of difficulties and having the chance to encourage one another.”

“Church generally, or mainly the youth group?” I asked.

“Specifically youth, for me anyway,” said Tom. “Just because everybody was our age, so they could see things through the same eyes we did.”

“So youth was probably the main thing for both you guys?”

“Yeah,” they both agreed.

“That’s interesting,” I replied. “I guess it says a lot about the importance of youth group, and what you’re missing out on if you don’t have that.”

“Yeah, and we were lucky too in that we had a lot of guys our age in our group.”

“Any mentors that you looked up to?” I asked.

“Yeah, our youth group leaders for sure,” said Tom. “They all had a massive impact on us.”

Andrew agreed. “It’s definitely good not just having them as leaders, but as friends.”

“If you guys were youth leaders this year,” I asked, “what would be the big life lessons that you’d be trying to impart to the kids, from your own experiences?”

“I’d really encourage honesty,” said Tom.

“Openness,” said Andrew.

“Yeah, said Tom, “and to work hard on strengthening their relationships with each other. That’s what gets you through. Leaders are awesome, but they don’t know exactly what you’re going through.”

“Definitely,” Andrew agreed. “There are things I’d tell Tommy about that I’d never tell any of my leaders, because there just isn’t that relationship.”

“Also, the whole Sunday Christian thing,” said Tom (that is, going to church on Sunday but living an un-Christian life outside of church). “That’s a pretty big thing. You’d want to try and get rid of that. It’s not only bad for the kids  who do it, but it affects the other kids too.”

“It lowers the bar for everyone,” I said.

“Yeah, that’s right. If they see this kid as a Christian doing all these things, they’ll think it’s alright. One kid can drag the group down.”

“And I think the older guys need to be role models,” Andrew added.

“Yeah,” Tom agreed. “Get the older kids to be role models. “Try to actively get them involved in the younger groups. Removing the segregation between the kids of different ages. When we went through fusion, we never interacted with the older kids, whereas there’s a wealth of wisdom with older people.”

From the chat we had, it was evident that the youth group ministry that both lads had been involved with during high school had a massive impact in shaping them as Christians. From my personal experience, having gone through high school believing in God but having no real Christian teaching or Christian fellowship in my life, I can see what a big hole this left in my development as a Christian. Their time at youth group was clearly valuable both in terms of growing their knowledge of what it means to follow Jesus, and also surrounding them with people their own age, at a similar stage in life, asking the same questions and facing the same problems. Neither of these things can be underestimated in terms of their value. Being part of a good youth ministry won’t guarantee that a child will grow into a strong Christian (that’s ultimately up to God’s sovereignty and their own decision), but as Andrew and Tom’s experience shows, it will hold them in good stead for a life of following Jesus.