Smiley Face Stickers are a Thing of the Past

Today in one of my classes a group did a presentation, and for listening they were giving away a chocolate bar. All we had to do was answer a simple fill-in-the-black quiz. Of course, my ears perked up as soon as I heard the word ‘chocolate’. I answered that quiz with determination, and when the group asked if anybody wanted to volunteer to give the answers, my arm shot up like a flare from a flare gun.

I answered all the questions right and it was time to get my chocolate bar! One of the group members walked over and handed me a tiny little chocolate bar. One of those chocolate bars that you would get from trick or treating on Halloween. As you would expect, I was extremely disappointed. You could probably even see the smile fade right off my face. I had expected a full sized chocolate bar. Would I have done the quiz had I known it was for a wimpy one bite Crispy Crunch? Heck no.

It was then, during my disappointment, that I realized the sad state I was in. I had turned into a greedy little present generationer. (Yes, I made up that word. Stay with me here, I’ll explain).

Present generationers are the people (mainly teenagers) who need more and more to be happy. Kids used to be happy with a smiley face sticker when they did well on something. And they sure did love those stickers. Remember in Sunday school when we used to memorize our Bible verses and we’d get stickers for a job well done? Well, kids don’t do that anymore. If you tell a kid to memorize a memory verse, they just stare up at you like you’re an alien with no clothes on expect for a pair of fuzzy pink socks. Stickers are a thing of the past.

Kids now need bigger and better things as motivation. I’m living proof. While I’m not a kid, I’ve been conditioned to want bigger and better. My own Sunday school teenagers would never accept anything less than a full sized chocolate bar as motivation. They want ipods and flat screen TVs now. Frankly, it’s just plain annoying.

But, I wonder…did we do this to ourselves? I mean, really, how did this start? Was there a Sunday school teacher who stopped giving stickers and started giving candy, and when candy wasn’t enough, chocolate? Everybody should have just stuck with smiley face stickers.

Perhaps these kids who started getting candy and then chocolate started telling other kids in other Sunday school classes about their awesome prizes. These kids who are now aware of what’s going on in other Sunday school classes want what their friends are getting. And so that teacher starts giving candy. And the cycle continues.

I’d like to meet this Sunday school teacher who ruined everything for us. I wouldn’t need a full sized chocolate bar if it weren’t for this teacher. Okay, okay, I know this probably wasn’t what happened and there was probably never a Sunday school teacher involved, but I can make up scenarios, right? Maybe it was the video games, who knows? But whatever happened changed me too, and I don’t like it, not one bit.

And why in the world does a group need to hand out chocolate bars as incentive to listen! How did the world get this way!? We should want to listen either way! I’m not saying that I listen; I’m just saying we should want to listen.

I don’t want to be present generationer, but I think it may be too late.

Image from: http://www.partydelights.co.uk/images/stickers/STICSMIL_th.jpg

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