Kids, Coke, and Caffeine
Sunday, October 8, 2023
I have told you these things, so that in me you may have peace. John 16:33, NIV.
I spent nearly five years of my life as principal of a Christian boarding high school. About 260 teenagers studied there, each of them testing the boundaries and pushing the edges as they grew through adolescence.
One of the rules they pushed the hardest was the "Thou shalt not use caffeinated drinks on the buses" rule. The school used buses and vans to take the kids home on vacations and to transport them to the mall, to snow skiing, on band and choir trips, and anywhere else groups of teenagers could devise to go. But "no caffeine on the trips." Since it was one of the rules I inherited from the previous regime, I asked about it in faculty meeting. The response was swift and direct.
"Caffeine turns these kids into little monsters."
"They'll tear the bus apart."
"You'll go crazy if you're the faculty member on the bus."
Never having heard Coke advertise such responses to its cans of soda, I decided to try an experiment. Who's right, the faculty or the kids?
I was using the old Greyhound bus and driving the band to Sheridan, Wyoming. On Friday, with a busful of hyper kids eager to get off campus, I enforced the rule. No caffeinated drinks. They argued, but drank 7-Up and acted like normal teenagers all the way to Sheridan.
Monday, the bus filled with exhausted kids "eager" to get back to school, I offered to bend the rule. The 7-Eleven manager sure sold a lot of Coke that morning. It was a carefully monitored nonscientific study. Their exhaustion turned to energetic hyperactivity, and the kids just about tore the bus apart. I drove onto campus humbled and more willing to trust the judgment of wiser minds.
A little caffeine does a great job of bringing tired teens awake. It also grants them energy beyond what they are able to control while traveling in confined places. Much caffeine has them bouncing off the walls.
I wonder, what does caffeine do to their hearts that makes their bodies go bonkers?
Could I be taking anything into my body or mind that is making my life go bonkers? God, who created us, knows our bodies run best on healthful food—and noncaffeinated beverages.
I spent nearly five years of my life as principal of a Christian boarding high school. About 260 teenagers studied there, each of them testing the boundaries and pushing the edges as they grew through adolescence.
One of the rules they pushed the hardest was the "Thou shalt not use caffeinated drinks on the buses" rule. The school used buses and vans to take the kids home on vacations and to transport them to the mall, to snow skiing, on band and choir trips, and anywhere else groups of teenagers could devise to go. But "no caffeine on the trips." Since it was one of the rules I inherited from the previous regime, I asked about it in faculty meeting. The response was swift and direct.
"Caffeine turns these kids into little monsters."
"They'll tear the bus apart."
"You'll go crazy if you're the faculty member on the bus."
Never having heard Coke advertise such responses to its cans of soda, I decided to try an experiment. Who's right, the faculty or the kids?
I was using the old Greyhound bus and driving the band to Sheridan, Wyoming. On Friday, with a busful of hyper kids eager to get off campus, I enforced the rule. No caffeinated drinks. They argued, but drank 7-Up and acted like normal teenagers all the way to Sheridan.
Monday, the bus filled with exhausted kids "eager" to get back to school, I offered to bend the rule. The 7-Eleven manager sure sold a lot of Coke that morning. It was a carefully monitored nonscientific study. Their exhaustion turned to energetic hyperactivity, and the kids just about tore the bus apart. I drove onto campus humbled and more willing to trust the judgment of wiser minds.
A little caffeine does a great job of bringing tired teens awake. It also grants them energy beyond what they are able to control while traveling in confined places. Much caffeine has them bouncing off the walls.
I wonder, what does caffeine do to their hearts that makes their bodies go bonkers?
Could I be taking anything into my body or mind that is making my life go bonkers? God, who created us, knows our bodies run best on healthful food—and noncaffeinated beverages.
Used by permission of Health Ministries, North American Division of Seventh-day Adventists.
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