Many years ago, my husband and I were youth leaders for the junior high kids at our church. “This will be a good experience for when our girls get that age,” I said. We started with 15 kids and the number immediately swelled to 25 when word leaked out that we were easy prey. We were like the fatted calf.
Our church had renovated an old three-story school building with the sanctuary on the second level which was declared off-limits to everyone. We planned an overnight for our last activity of the year, and our rules were emphatic! No leaving the assigned floor for any reason! No water fights! No food fights! No noise after 1:00am.
After eating enough junk food to feed an entire continent and playing a zillion action-packed games, we decided to split the pack for whatever was left of the night. I won the third floor, and my husband claimed the first floor. By 2:00am, all was quiet.
At 2:01am, the girls and I started gagging and tearing from a horrible stench creeping up the stairway. I gave strict orders for the girls to remain in their sleeping bags while I dashed down two flights of stairs to investigate. I found my husband squinty-eyed and choking. The boys choked amidst laughter from the smoke bomb they had set off!
We flung windows open and set fans whirring. The scramble to get fresh air made the assembling of an Army troop during an air raid look like a funeral march in comparison. That’s when we heard pop cans crash to the concrete sidewalk from the third floor windows. Aluminum cans do not tinkle – they reverberate! Just ask the neighbors.
We reassured the police we had everything under control, and there would be no more disturbances. As a discipline, we decided to forgo breakfast. Instead, we had each of the kids call their parents at 6:00am to come pick them up. We figured the parents would do a better job of disciplining than we ever could. If we didn’t get fired from our volunteer job as youth leaders, we vowed that if we ever had an overnight again, we would not think like adults when making rules for young teens.
I thought of our rules which did nothing to keep the kids in line, and I wondered what is the difference between rules and commandments? A rule: a principle or regulation governing conduct. Behavior modification. A commandment: an order given by a person in authority. Heart change; not just behavior modification. Ah! The authority of the one giving the command is the difference. We made rules, but we did not have the power or the authority to change someone’s heart.
Jesus commanded us to “Love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your mind and with all your strength, and you shall love your neighbor as yourself.” That is a commandment – not a rule – given by One in authority. I thought that if man could keep just those two commandments, there would be no need for rules. However, we figured junior high kids still need rules in our inept attempt to control their conduct until they experience a change of heart.