Yaconelli, Mike. Getting Fired for the Glory of God. El Cajon, CA: Youth Specialties (Zondervan). 2008.
Mike Yaconelli was one of the founders of Youth Specialties and one of the pioneers of youth ministry as a career calling. He died in 2003 in an auto accident. He is greatly missed by legions of aging youth workers like me.
Getting Fired is mostly a collection of columns that Mike wrote over the years for Youth Specialties (then) flagship publication, YouthWorker Journal. Most of the articles are short since they had to fit in one page. The book also contains a couple of longer presentations by Mike (2 videos and 4 audios) in front of 1,000s of youth workers usually at a National Youth Workers Convention (another flagship innovation by Youth Specialties).
I liked Mike's writing and speaking. Like most thinking people, he irritated me sometimes and scared me at others. But he always challenged me and made me think. Sometimes you didn't know if he was being satirical or using hyperbole, or if he really was that radical and just didn't care what others thought about what he was saying. I know that some of his ideas had no chance in the world of ever being useful or even possible, but Mike did live in the world of possibilities and he loved a God who can make all things possible, so who knows.
As one reads this, keep an open mind, try to understand the youth ministry world which spawned Mike in the late 60s and early 70s.
Over the top? Maybe. Radical? Definitely! Perhaps (on a very small scale) emulating? Possibly. Entertaining and thought provoking? Absolutely.
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