The Life of a High School Student
23/05/2009 9:00 am <>
Any weekday at 5:00 pm you’ll see a stream of 2~3,000 uniformed students pouring out of every junior and senior high gate. At 9:30 pm streets are crowded with cars, motorbikes and parents waiting to collect their offspring from cram schools. Upon arriving home, they complete homework, shower and crawl into bed around midnight to be awakened at 6:00 am to catch the 6:30 am bus back to school. Everyone must be in places by 7:30 am. Weekends and “vacations” offer students more cram school opportunities plus the inevitable tests and exams. Such is the life of Taiwan’s teenagers in their last 6 years of school life.
National exams take place at the end of year 9 and 12. Students not only face the pressure of parents’ and teachers’ expectations but also the competition with classmates as they vie for places in the best high schools, technical colleges and universities.
Campus Evangelical Fellowship (CEF) seeks to reach students in schools. Christian groups can be established in 2 forms: every semester has 7~14 hours of club time. Christian clubs led by teachers can teach Christian values along with singing and small group discussions. The club takes place on school property, in school time, so its freedom is often limited as principals can veto the content of the meeting. The other way is to have a school Christian Fellowship meeting between 5:00~7:00pm (between school and cram school times)
A Christian teacher with a university student often accompany the students as they eat, play ice breaker games, sing, hear Bible talks, and finish with small group sharing and prayer. Students say they sense the love expressed by the group, and feel important as opposed to being a cog in the education system. Within 2~3 years they are often willing to trust Jesus.
Ming Hwei as a junior high schooler had to sleep behind the huge altar shelf in her living room. She often had nightmares and saw spirits hovering around her. When her Christian boyfriend took her along to the Christian fellowship she sensed the peace of God. She found whenever she read the Bible before going to sleep, she had an undisturbed night. As the only believer in her family she wishes to help them know the true God and her earnestness rubs off on the fellowship members.
Yan Bwo grew up through the ranks of Sunday school and youth group but often felt rejected and was laughed at. After attending a CEF camp in year 9 and high school fellowship the next 3 years, he found the love of God to be real. Not only did he want to attend every CEF event but he was keen to share his faith with his classmates. Reading the bible daily, writing down his thoughts, he found God had given him the gift to express himself on paper. In his last year at high school his writing was published in the CEF newsletter.
Ying Da came to school fellowship because of his teacher’s persistent asking. When he found he was prayed for and prayers were answered he started questioning the need to pray to all the gods in his home and local temple. He has been attending for 18 months. Although not yet a Christian, he knows this is what he wants but feels he needs to understand more, to completely commit his life to the Lord.
These teenagers represent the fact that many students are willing to become Christians if there are people to tell them about Jesus. CEF could easily swallow up 100 workers, and churches need people to help in their youth work. Pray God will send willing workers committed to helping teenagers know Christ and how to live the Christian life and pass it on to their classmates and family.
Judith Jackson - Tainan
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