Newbie

I feel stuck right now. I know, I've only been at this job for two months, but right now, I just feel like I'm spinning my wheels.

I've seen some amazing stuff happen in my personal life over the past year. 

-I've gotten married. 

-I've almost graduated.

-I've moved.

-I've started my new job as a youth pastor.

-God has taken care of us in ways that I couldn't imagine.

-I've got an office with a desk and a stack of business cards.

It's all the stuff that I have been dreaming about for the past five years. I have never been in a better spot in my life.

So why the emo-ness then? Because I am currently in the process of discovering that I am depressingly new at all of this stuff that I've been training for and talking about and reading about and complaining about for my entire post-secondary career. 

I'm discovering now more than I ever have before that just because I've been educated and have a stack of cards with my name and job title on them, I don't get an automatic in with the students in my ministry.

Right now, I've got a grand total of three students who aren't awkward around me. I've got five who actually interact with the lessons. The other 23 automatically slip into a glazed over state of semi-consciousness that's leaving me wondering what I've got to do to get them engaged. 

I've given two lessons so far, not once have I gotten a laugh. For me, a guy who seemed to get a chuckle everywhere else, it's left me wondering what I'm doing wrong. 

I've got an event coming up next week that I've been plugging for a month, and so far I haven't gotten a single response. Not even on Tuesday nights.

I'm trying something a little different this week. I'm going to see what happens. I know in my head that it's all just a matter of time before they start warming up a little bit, but in the mean time, it's hard facing a group of kids who don't really have a reason to care about what I have to say.