I have to speak from the heart. I am proud of our youth! It is very easy to castigate them, to say it wasn't like that when I was young, and to offer all sorts of trite solutions to today's problems. Yet those we condemn are often a minority – albeit ones who make the headlines. After all, who is interested in reading about six hundred teens having a good time at a Christian camp, or a couple of thousand travelling to a 'Creation Fest' in Cornwall, or the many that involve themselves in youth clubs, community projects, Duke of Edinburgh schemes or the like. I've even discovered, to my bemusement, that those hard nut hoodies who frequent my local park melt under the loving adoration of my collie spaniel dog. The hard faces crack into smiles as they bend down to stroke her. The reality is, those kids just need some attention – and if they can't get it positively they will find other ways.

 

I am a Seventh-day Adventist – and as such that makes me a minority within this country. It also made my children minorities when they were at school, particularly because they went to church on Saturday (Sabbath) and kept the whole day holy. I could give you a whole Bible study on the subject but that is not the purpose of this column. What it did mean is that my 'minority' children either had to conform to the expectations of their peers – or they needed to influence their peers to something they felt to be positive. My son chose that second route – sharing with his friends at school how much fun he had at church, in youth club, and in the many camps and retreats we used to be involved with. His friends came to those events, came to our home – and discovered life as a positive 'minority' could be fun. Now an adult, he works with disadvantaged youth, playing basketball with them in the local park, taking them surfing, opening his home for a film night – and for some, sharing the spiritual values that shape his behaviour and lifestyle. He works with the kind of kids that might otherwise have been seen looting shops or starting fires in streets across the UK this summer. But these kids have found something that makes a difference.

 

Part of that difference is rest. Jesus said, "Come unto me all you who are weary and I will give you rest." [Matt 11:28] He said it to the Pharisees struggling with legalistic belief. He said it to the poor, the burdened and oppressed. And in the 21st century I believe His words make a very strong statement to the consumer society. Just take a break! Move your mind away from the latest gadget, the pressure of achieving, the stress of the work-a-day week, the need to climb the ladder, the feeling of being dispossessed – just rest from the pressure around you.

 

A few weeks ago I listened to Rabbi Naftali Brawer on the BBC Radio 4 programme, 'Beyond Belief'.[i] I was intrigued by his interpretation of Levitical law to mean that for him, Sabbath is a technology free day. By sunset Friday the mobile phone, the internet and the computer are all switched off. The evening is spent in a long and leisurely meal with the family and with friends and the Sabbath is a real break from consumerist pressure. It is, for him, an oasis in a high pressure world. Could that be why God instituted it as a day of rest – knowing that we needed a time to turn away from the 'all consuming'? I was intrigued by his interpretation of Levitical law to mean that for him, Sabbath is a technology free day. By sunset Friday the mobile phone, the internet and the computer are all switched off. The evening is spent in a long and leisurely meal with the family and with friends and the Sabbath is a real break from consumerist pressure. It is, for him, an oasis in a high pressure world. Could that be why God instituted it as a day of rest – knowing that we needed a time to turn away from the 'all consuming'?

 

I rejoice in the many positive youth I meet and work with – but perhaps all of us could learn from Rabbi Brawer that it is good to switch off our consumerist values and spend at least one day a week focused on fellowship, family and worship. Perhaps changing our own attitudes and priorities, finding the joy and celebration of a true day of rest away from the commercial pressure, could actually be one small part of the jigsaw that would help start to build up what many are now calling a 'broken society'. I would like to think so.

 

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