Ninth Grade

I don’t know how much you know about ninth graders today, but from what I am learning, it is nothing like what I experienced when I was that age. It was more than eye-opening when one of the boys in our neighborhood came over and spent part of his afternoon with Stacy and me because he was locked out of his house and no one was home. ​

We love Joey.* He knows it, and he feels safe with us—safe enough to be amazingly transparent and perhaps even vulnerable. So we were more than taken aback when he answered Stacy’s question about how he was doing by sharing that he was down (discouraged) for a while but was doing well now. It turns out another boy in his class asked him if he would be his boyfriend. He welcomed the attention after feeling like relationships with girls were not going well. He shared that his family was “Christian,” but he was a pagan and that he venerated Odin, a principal god in Norse mythology. He prays to Odin before his swim meets for strength and feels he was helped. 
            
Joey also receives dopamine, a pleasure-enhancing hormone, from his online gaming community, Warhammer 30K Discord, which refers to community Discord servers for Warhammer: The Horus Heresy (often just called 30K by fans). It is an outer-space fantasy with warring empires that fascinates Joey, who interacts with people of all ages, including a 50-year-old man who enjoys profanity-laced banter. That cannot be good. 
 
Meditation
Isaiah 43:11,12--I, I am Yahweh, and there is no other Savior but Me. I alone declared, saved, and proclaimed—and not some foreign god among you. So you are My witnesses”—this is the Lord’s declaration—“and I am God.
 
So where do we begin? How do we reach a young, confused soul, like Joey? Perhaps with fishing. Mark Cahill wrote in The Watchman, “If you’re not fishing, you’re not following!” That gains extra meaning with Joey, who told me he loves to fish. I gave him a fishing pole, and we let him know he can come over anytime we are home and fish in our backyard pond. He immediately went outside and hooked a good-sized bass. Then he took Diego’s kayak and fished further out in the pond. 
            
​I’m glad we can be a haven where Joey feels free to visit and know that we truly care about him. I’m glad his mom trusts us. We are witnesses for God. Odin cannot fill the hole in Joey’s heart. Only Yahweh can do that. So we’ll keep sharing how He blesses our lives and pray that God brings this ninth grader into His kingdom. 
 
Inspiration
“If we who have become God’s children do not show Him to be personal in our lives, then in practice we are denying His existence.”—Francis Schaeffer in The God Who Is There
 
*Not his real name
 
©2026 Daniel York  ARR.  Reveration is the weekly devotional ministry of First Cause.  To receive these devotionals, go to www.firstcause.org and click the “Click here to receive weekly devotionals” box.  Unlimited permission to copy this devotional without altering text or profiteering is allowed, subject to the inclusion of this copyright notice.      
 
Ecclesiastes 12:10—"The Teacher sought to find delightful sayings and to accurately write words of truth.”  (Holman CSB)