Sometimes God’s sovereignty shows up in what seems to be the most ridiculous of ways. This week, it appeared in the form of a big, beautiful chicken.
On Monday, my wife, Deb, noticed her clucking around our yard. This is notable because we live in a normal U.S. neighborhood in Arvada, a typical U.S. suburb, just northwest of Denver. We aren’t surrounded by dairy farms and hen houses. We’re surrounded by more houses.
So it surprised us both to see a random chicken pecking away at the leaves in our yard. Deb’s natural response was compassion: “We should catch this chicken and return it to its owner before it gets hurt by a coyote or dies of starvation or freezes to death!” she exclaimed.
My natural response was to preserve my dignity: Well, my sweet wife has obviously forgotten the chicken-chase scene in Rocky II. If Rocky Balboa had a hard time catching a chicken, then I would too, I thought.
“The chicken will be fine,” I told Deb. “Chickens are made for the outdoors. I’m sure its owner will find it sooner or later.”
Chasing Down a Chicken
But all evening, my sweet, animal-loving wife worried about that chicken. So that night, I turned on my iPhone flashlight and went on a chicken search around our big side yard—all to no avail.
Deb worried about that chicken all night.
As she was leaving the house the next morning, she excitedly beckoned me outside. “Greg, get out here!” she called. “The chicken is in our yard, and his owner’s here trying to catch him.”
Enter Jason Zaboth, chicken owner. I came outside, and the two of us tried for a while to get the chicken cornered. No go. Finally, Jason chased it across the street, and I went back into the house.
I thought the chase was over, but it wasn’t.
I looked out the window and saw that Jason was still trying to catch the chicken, who was now stuck behind my neighbor’s hedge. I knew that if I got on the other side of the hedge, we’d have that pesky chicken cornered. I ran out of the house and across the street to help him, with my wife’s words reverberating in my mind, “Catch that poor chicken, Greg. You can do it!”
Finally, with me on one side of the hedge and Jason on the other, the chicken jumped and got caught in the hedge. Jason caught the chicken. (“Yo, Adrian! He did it!”)
Raising Up Teens
As exciting as our chicken-chasing escapade was, what’s more exciting is the conversation Jason and I had during and after it. I discovered that Jason is the area YoungLife director and lives one street over. I also discovered that he believes the keys to reaching a generation of teenagers are prayer and mobilizing teenagers to reach their own peers with the gospel! This approach is the core of the youth ministry philosophy of Dare 2 Share, the ministry I founded more than 30 years ago, and we call the approach Gospel Advancing.
To be honest, I had never met a YoungLifer who fully embraced this philosophy.
Now don’t get me wrong—I love YoungLife, because I know of no other ministry in the United States that reaches more teenagers for Christ. But I’ve always been a bit frustrated with them because I’m convinced that if each area director and all their adult leaders mobilized their campaigners to not just invite kids to their meetings and camps but also engage them directly in Gospel conversations, their effectiveness would skyrocket.
Jason was the first YoungLife area director I’ve met who wholeheartedly believed that and was consistently putting it into practice. He assured me that there are many more like him who I just don’t know about! He also reminded me that this was nothing new. It was the original DNA of YoungLife, infused into it by Jim Rayburn’s passion and Christ’s commission.
Jason mobilizes and equips the teenagers of Arvada to share the gospel with their peers and then holds them accountable for it.
May his tribe increase!
Joining in a Movement
Chasing a chicken got my physical heart rate way up. Meeting Jason and hearing his vision for the teenagers of Arvada got my spiritual heart rate way up.
I told Jason all about Dare 2 Share LIVE—a global, youth evangelism-training event launching on November 9. I told him we have almost 5,000 churches in more than 100 countries who will be mobilizing teenagers to share the Gospel that day, including several churches that are uniting to pull off an event in Arvada.
He was pumped.
Pray for Jason as he seeks to mobilize a generation for Jesus in Arvada.
Pray that YoungLife area directors across America and around the world will follow Jason’s lead.
And pray for that chicken (named “Chicken”) to stay in her pen.
This article originally appeared on gregstier.org and is reposted here by permission.