Hi Friend,

As a young minister one of my first responsibilities was working with young people on field trips.  At first, this meant raising money from car washes and fruit sales so the kids could take a trip to a recreational area, stay in motel rooms, eat at restaurants and enjoy the adventure.  It did not take long for us to realize that this system provided very little value to the youths.

After the first experience I decided to teach the kids what I had learned as a Boy Scout.  We abandoned the hotel rooms, bought a set of tents and taught the kids to cook over a campfire, make up their beds and pick up their clothes.  There is much to be learned by erecting a tent improperly.  When we encountered the inevitable rainstorms, those who weren’t diligent got flooded and had to get up during a pouring rain in the middle of the night to reset the tent correctly.  Both youths and adults learned the value of instruction.

Once, while camped on the Snake River outside Kelly, Wyoming with our youth group, we watched a wagon train passing by on a nearby highway.  That’s right, a wagon train, pulled by a team of horses just like our ancestors used 200 years ago. It was a group called VisionQuest that worked with delinquent children.  In some cases, the kids were hardcore inner-city criminals while others were just headed down the wrong road.  Their aim was to straighten out juvenile offenders through programs centered on outdoor and wilderness challenges.

VisionQuest put them to work on a wagon train traveling over 1500 miles. Each morning they rose early, folded their tents, rolled up their sleeping bags, cooked breakfast, cleaned the camp and cared for the horses before starting down the road.  Then they would stop in the early afternoon and set up camp before beginning schoolwork.  They were learning to be self-sufficient.  Over 80 percent of the young people trained by VisionQuest never return to crime.  Over 80 percent of inner-city youth who enter the justice system become repeat criminals.

As I watched the wagon train move slowly down the road it occurred to me that we were using the same principles with our church group as they were with inner-city delinquents.  We learned that a system that worked well for kids from troubled families carried even more benefits for kids from stable families with Christian values.  Our success rate was astounding.

The concept of self-sufficiency is biblical.

During the period of the Judges in Israel, before Saul became king, there was a man named Jephthah who was the illegitimate son of a woman who later married and had other sons.  Jephthah became an outcast from the family and the community so he left home to eventually become the leader of a renegade paramilitary group. But Jephthah learned to depend on God.

During that period the Ammonites threatened the people of Israel who turned to Jephthah to save them from destruction.  Jephthah gathered an army from all the tribes of Israel except Ephraim.  He led a counterattack and destroyed the Ammonites, only to be castigated by Ephraim.  Jephthah responded to the leaders of Ephraim, “I asked you to help but you refused so I took my life in my own hands…and the Lord gave me the victory.” (Judges 12:2) One commentary translates the verse “I took my life in my own hands and trusted in the Lord.”

One of the principles of self-sufficiency is dependence on God, which inevitably means decreasing dependence on man.  It is axiomatic that politicians encourage citizens to depend on government.  It is a self-defeating relationship since a nation can only be as strong as the collective strength of its citizens.  When individuals are weakened the nation is weakened.

Self-sufficiency makes a person stronger.  The intent of God is to strengthen the character of the individual, so He offers the help we need if we depend on Him. By this, we learn that He is God and we become strong. It is the essence of worship.

In the article, “The Government’s War on Christianity,” Bob Livingston says that American social welfare programs “are destructive to the individual and the family unit because they absolve the parents of their parental responsibilities and promote dependency on government.”  Today there are 5th-generation welfare recipients.  They are perpetual wards of the state.  They depend on the state to provide income, housing, transportation, healthcare and entertainment. Livingston continues, “They know nothing of individuality or personal responsibility. Their provider is the state, and the state is their god.  It is the 21st Century Baal worship.”

America needs a politician with the wisdom of Jephthah who would turn the citizens to depend on God rather than the government.

Until next time,

Jim O’Brien