#maiunagioia
#maiunagioia (never a joy), this is the hashtag of the moment between high school and university students. The hashtag is ironically associated with moments of daily life where unexpected or improbable small things provoke a small amount of frustration and nervousness for the misfit students. While all this is tackled with great irony, it hides a real and profound generational discomfort. “Economic crisis”, “youth unemployment”, “uncertain future” are everyday expressions for students, expressions which they identify with and can identify themselves.
We find ourselves too, in front of generation #maiunagioia, made up of young people without goals and ambition in life, who are left to lose, who do not fight for anything, who are not passionate about what has a real ethical and moral value, but can however talk at great length about the latest episode of “Games of Thrones” or the latest results of reality TV. It is an inept and apathetic generation that has lost its compass, who does not know who to turn to and who does not know who to trust. It is a generation that does not believe. Neither in itself, nor in anyone else.
In this bitter description, which certainly does not include all the students of today, there are still a good number of students and young people (and adults) who attend evangelical churches. We see it in our GBU groups and, indeed, in our churches. How is this possible?
Doesn’t Jesus promise to give us his joy if we keep his commandments? Is there not complete joy in thinking that our names are written in the book of life? Is it not entirely comforting to read God’s promises and stand in his presence? Isn’t the Holy Spirit who dwells in us called the Comforter? And how many other questions like these could we ask …
Yet in fact many Christians live without joy. Why? I would say a lack of a true and authentic relationship with God. If this relationship exists, it is not possible not to enjoy it. Of course, it doesn’t mean that there are not moments of discouragement. These may come, but sadness cannot be the leitmotif of a Christian’s life.
The joy that the world offers is a sensation, moments of escape that make our hearts jump for joy. The joy that a Christian feels, however, is not a moment of happiness, an emotion, even if given by a particularly amazing and intense moment experienced in the church or at the GBU conference. Joy is a condition of life, founded not on experience, albeit extraordinary, but on the truth of the Word of God.
As a condition of life, we do not expect a Christian to be jumping around all the time, but we expect his life to be full of Christ, his peace and his joy, and that in difficulties that can make him suffer terribly, the joy given by the sacrifice of Jesus, by salvation, by the fact of having the omnipotent GOD as father will not fail.
Many Christian students know this truth, but they don’t live it out fully. And so their faith and hope in God becomes just a crutch that helps them to keep going in this sad, difficult and unsatisfactory life. This is often the faith that is shown to our friends and colleague and therefore a reason that they don’t come close to Christ.
I think of the power of the Gospel and I think that if students at universities were filled with this power, the Italian Universities would be hit like a tsunami. I think it is fundamental, therefore, that students realize the profound joy of belonging to Christ, the #veragioia (true joy). I believe this can happen if students start looking for an intense relationship with Christ. So more than organizing events or strategic evangelism, there will be students full of joy, zeal, and the Spirit to make the difference and to proclaim the Gospel message with conviction and effectiveness.
Domenico Campo
Staff GBU
This will be the theme of our National Student Conference at the end of April!
Translation from Italian by Emma Cooper
