Our youth group is a place of comfort right? A place we all come so we can hang out, and have a great time. Well that’s all good and gravy, but we’re not accomplishing anything if we’re not here for the right reasons. We all know that there’s clicks, clicks in school, and clicks at church. If you haven’t noticed, then one day, walk in slowly...a little late, and don’t try to be noticed. You can see that there are the groups that hang out together, the ones that don’t mean to exclude people, but it happens. And I’m not saying it’s bad to have you’re group of friends, or have your tight nit circle of friends that keep you accountable, but you have to be open for new people to come in. In romans 15:7 it says~accept one another, then, just as Christ accepted you, in order to bring praise to God. This meaning that we all have to accept each other to be able to praise god as god intended us to praise him, because in Matt. 18:20, it says~ for where two or three people gather in my name, there am I with them.We can’t form clicks because that’s not what God intended. He intended everyone to be accepted. Which leads me to my next points. Popularity and reputation. Everyone wants to be the cheerleader, the quarterbacks boyfriend, or part of that band... it doesn’t matter, because everyone wants to be part of the popular crowd, and if you don’t, you’re only fooling yourself. But usually the most popular kids are the ones who get themselves into the most trouble by going to this party with him, or dating her.... everything that you do represents your character, and your reputation. And then comes the factor of, well if I’m Christian, then I can’t have fun. That’s completely wrong. I know. All the kids in my culinary arts class laugh at me because I had on my absolute surrender bracelet, and someone asked me if I had gone clubbing the night before....and everyone just laughed, because they know I’m Christian, and they didn’t think I ever did anything fun. And I explained it to them. Then not even five minutes later, I was asked why Christians never had any fun. And I explained that Christian’s do have fun. We just do it in a different manner. We don’t have to drink or do drugs, or anything to have a good time. And then I was asked why Christians ignore other people that aren’t Christians, and my answer was...”We don’t, why would you think that” and he said, because you ignored me when you found out I drink and do drugs. And I looked around...and I have 2 real friends. One of them is my sister. And the other one is Katie. Both of them are hard core Christians, who I know wouldn’t ever experiment, or would try to get themselves into trouble. They don’t care if they’re popular, and don’t care if their reputation is being labeled “Christian” . And neither did Jesus, obviously. But Jesus went to dinner parties with the non believers, the sinners, and the leapers. Being Christian doesn’t mean that you can’t go out and have a good time, it’s about what you do with your time that counts. And your reputation is determined by your character. Jesus was more popular with the non believers, than he was with the believers, because most believer’s felt threatened by Jesus. They felt because he went out with the sinner’s, that he was blackening his reputation. And ruining his character. But he wasn’t. He was gaining the trust of non believers loving them the way that other people wouldn’t. Which is exactly what we need to do at church, at school, and everywhere else we go. We need to not be afraid to let other’s in, even non believers. To show them the love of Christ. To show them that Christians aren’t perfect, just forgiven, and all of your reputation, popularity, and character, are determined in the manner that you do this. Don’t be like me, and then look back and regret that you weren’t friends with someone because they went to parties and did things that I didn’t do. Because now I have to earn back the trust of that person. I have to show them the love that I should have shown them when they told me they partied, because who knows...It could have been a cry for help. But I was too ignorant, and stubborn to look at it that way, I was looking at it like...well they’re going to try to corrupt my beliefs. Which, if I were strong enough in my faith, I would never have thought of that. I remember when Brittany sang the song “Awesome God” at one of the fund raiser’s we did in August, and I looked at the lyrics, and one of the lines says “and I want this world to see who you are, you are an awesome god, the only one, an awesome god you are. You’re an awesome god, the one that I sing of, an awesome god you are” and All of us in here talk about how we want this youth group to grow, how we want to go out and do things that contribute to the community. But our community starts here. We have to show the people who come here, who God is, we have to show people at school who God is, we can’t just expect people to know who God is. Especially if they don’t know. So I challenge you. Instead of closing your circle of friends to the one’s that you can trust. Let people you don’t trust into your circle. Show them love, and trust them and they’ll trust you and love you too. And it doesn’t matter what people think your reputation is. Because as long as your Character reflects God, then it doesn’t matter what your reputation, because people gossip, people lie, all to make themselves look better, when they’re jealous of you. And your reputation may be ruined, but when they realize that you don’t care because when you have God on your side, nothing else in the world matters