On a recent Sunday in our Sunday school class, our leader mentioning going to the local school board meeting. He told us about a conversation he had with one student.  The student revealed how many students were contemplating suicide.  That  comment struck me at a deep place in my heart.  I raised my hand and said it make me sad to think the condition of a large number of students in our school system has deteriorated to such a desperate state.  The blame rests with my generation. Instead of complaining about the condition of our youth, we need to share the “Good News” of Jesus with them.    

As I look back during the late 1940’s and 50’s, when I was growing up,  suicide was never on the minds of my buddies.  But today we have an environment in which fragile, insecure and deeply lonely students think about ending their lives.  This is black mark on our culture!    Research paints a picture of young students alone, despairing  and feeling hopeless.  As a nation we struggle with how to address this condition.

I was reminded of a passage in Amos, which I have been wanted to include in my blog.  This discuss regarding teen suicide in America gives me the opportunity to share the words of  prophet Amos.  “‘The time is surely coming,’ says the Sovereign Lord, ‘when I will send a famine on the land – not a famine of bread or water but of hearing the words of the Lord.  People will stagger from sea to sea and wander from border to border searching for the word of the Lord. but they will not find it.  Beautiful girls and strong young men will grow faint in that day.'” (Amos 8:11-13).  

What can we learn from these words of the prophet.  First, the warning  of what could happen in our day.  We need to pay heed to our moral and spiritual condition.  If we neglect nurturing young people by not sharing Jesus, who is the “bread of life” we will have to face the consequences of starving young people,  who hunger for real  food.  Secondly, God will bring about a famine.  There is  plenty of physical bread and water, but little guidance in helping young people to find the “bread of life” and “living water.” They will experience spiritual famine, as they wander in a modern spiritual waste land.  

Thirdly, we will see young people “staggering” and “wandering” all across our nation searching for a clear word from God, in whose image they were created.  I picture a whole generation being influenced by those we call “influencers” in the social media.  The conflicting messages  only distort reality and cause the young to live in an illusionary world – hunger and dissatisfied.  

Fourthly, there is a desperate search for some grasp of transcendence and heavenly voice. saying “you are loved.”  But as the prophet warned, “they will not find it.”  Like students in my local school system, kids live in a self contained bubble that is suffocating their sense of being.  They really are crying out, but not finding what they really are looking for in our culture.

Finally these are some of the brightest and best.  Amos warns us, “Beautiful girls and strong young men will grow faint in that day.”  In other words, normal, healthy, young people will end up having thoughts of taking their own life.  

Ecclesiastes gives this advice, “Don’t let the excitement of youth cause you to forget your Creator.  Honor him in your youth before you grow old and say, ‘Life is not pleasant anymore.'” (Eccl. 12:1).