Teenager, are you in a jam? Have you been caught red handed shoplifting or listening to the rap music or indulging in some heavy petting in the school gymnasium? Will people in your church be talking about the scandal of your misdeeds for weeks on end? Is your future career as a preacher boy or pastor’s wife in jeopardy?

There is a simple solution that is 100% guaranteed to get you out of the mess you’re in and even turn it into a net gain: Get Saved Again.

That’s right, boys and girls, take a trip down and old fashioned, red-carpeted aisle to the mourners bench and confess that all these years you’ve just been “playing church” and just today when the pastor preached on how the Democrats are ruining America (as found in Judges chapter’s 6, tapes available in the back after church) you felt the conviction of the Spirit and made a choice of your own free will to get saved. Again. For the eight time. But who’s counting? This time it was real!

Now, if you’re going to commit to this, course of action the details are very important. It helps if you grab an available adult by the arm and drag them down to the altar with you to pray with you. And you’ll need to it on the second verse of the invitation hymn so that it doesn’t seem too premeditated but also doesn’t risk that the invitation might conclude before you go. Note that tears are not optional. Neither is snot. If your church doesn’t supply tissues at the front then pack your own. Finally, be careful not to run the aisle on the same night as some other troubled teen is pulling the same stunt — unless it’s someone who was actually involved in your own scandal.

It’s almost impossible to lose in this scenario. The church gets to write off your past wrongs as the indiscretions of a lost person and avoids the embarrassment of admitting that their own young people are prone to evil. They also get another soul saved for the yearly report. And you get a clean slate as long as you don’t do anything too bad for a month or two. Buying a slightly larger Bible than the one you currently carry is also a nice piece of window dressing.

There are two warnings for this particular strategy. First, you can’t do it more times per year than your church has Bible conference. Second, it really only works until you graduate from Bible college. After that, it stops being cute and it really doesn’t impress the members of the jury at all.