Spurgeon

Do you ever say, “I am overwhelmed with astonishment to find that the Lord has converted souls through my poor ministry”? Mock humility! Your ministry is poor enough. Everybody knows that, and you ought to know most of all; but, at the same time, is it any wonder that God, who said “My word shall not return unto me void,” has kept his promise? Is the meat to lose its nourishment because the dish is a poor platter? Is divine grace to be overcome by our infirmity? No, but we have this treasure in earthen vessels, that the excellency of the power may be of God and not of us. – Charles Spurgeon

Teaching is tough work

I am reading three books right now on how I can become a better communicator to the students in our community. In Speaking to Teenagers, Fields and Robbins offer a chart that shows what it takes to give a message and have it actually stimulate life-change in a student (pg.17). They got this list of questions from the book, The Human Connection. It's a list of questions that all require the answer of YES to move down the list.

1. Pay attention to the message?
2. Comprehend it?
3. Believe it?
4. Remember it?
5. Behave accordingly?

If you come up with a NO then there is no action and the student cannot move to the next question. We don't want a NO when we are speaking to our students! So before they behave accordingly, they have to remember, and before they remember, they have to believe, and before they believe, they have to comprehend it, and before they comprehend it, they have to be paying attention.

Great stuff to be thinking about next time we sit down to prepare a message, lead a small group, or spend time mentoring a student.

Game 4

Last night was AWESOME!

Out of Control Disciple

I shared this with my seniors on our retreat last weekend. It was awesome to sit around and hear which of these phrases grabbed their heart. I would love to graduate a slew of out of control disciples from our ministry in May!

“I am a member of the Church of the Out of Control. I am an out of control disciple. I’ve given up my control to God. I trust and obey the Spirit. I’ve jumped off the fence, stepped over the line. I’ve pulled out all the stops. There’s no turning back, looking around, slowing down, backing away, letting up or shutting up. It’s a life against the odds, outside the box, over the wall, the game of life played without goal lines other than ‘Thy will be done…’

“I’m done primping and pimping for the overdogs, the wonderdogs, the lapdogs, or even the underdogs. I’m done playing according to the rules, whether its Robert’s Rules of Order or Miss Manner’s rules of etiquette or Martha Stewarts’ rules of living, Louis Farakhan’s rules of America’s least wanted, or Merrill Lynch’s rules of money-minding, bottom-lining and ladder-climbing.

“I am not here to please the dominate culture or to serve any all-show, no-go bureaucracy; I live to please my Lord and Savior. My spiritual taste buds have graduated from fizz and froth to fire and ice. Sometimes I’m called to sharpen the cutting edge and sometimes to blunt the cutting edge. Don’t give me that ‘old time religion’ or even the new time religion. Give me that all time religion that’s as hard as rock and soft as snow.

“I can’t be bought by personalities or perks, positions or prizes. I won’t give up, though I may give in…to openness of mind, humbleness of heart, and generosity of spirit. In the face of adversity, I will no longer simply hang in there. I will stand in there; I will run in there. I will pray in there;

I will sacrifice in there. I will endure in there; in fact, I will do everything in there but hang. My face is upward, my feet are forward, my eyes are focused, my way is cloudy, my knees are worn, my seat uncreased, my heart burdened, my spirit light, my road narrow and my mission wide.

“I won’t be seduced by popularity, seduced by criticism, travested by hypocrisy, or trivialized by mediocrity. Just because the show must go on, whether in Hollywood, Washington, Nashville or Denver, doesn’t mean the show is worth watching.

“I am organized religion’s best friend and worst nightmare. I won’t back down, slow down, shut down, or let down until I’m preached out, teached out, healed out or hauled out of God’s mission in the world entrusted to the member of the Church of the Out of Control, a mission to unbind the confined, whether they’re downtrodden or upscale, overlooked or under-represented.

“My fundamental identity is as a disciple of Jesus—but even more, as a disciple of Jesus who lives in Christ, who doesn’t trek through history simply ‘in His steps’ but seeks to travel more deeply in His Spirit.

“Until he comes again or calls me home, you will find me not killing time so that one day he will pick me out in the lineup of the ages as one of His own. And then, it will be worth it all to hear these words, the most precious words that I can ever hear: “You are my beloved son, in whom I am well-pleased. Well done, thou good and faithful…out of control disciple.”

unChristian

I just started reading the book unChristian.

Here's the website for the book.

Here's the link to buy the book.

Here's an interview with the author.

Can't wait to get through this one!

The World Series

Today begins the Rockies journey toward their first World Series win. I am so sick of hearing how we are going to get swept or only win one game.

My prediction...Rockies win the World Series! Offense, defense, and bullpen will do it for us.

They will not be stopped. Everyone thought the Phillies were going to roll them...Bring home the hardware boys. Show everyone on the East coast who sleeps during our games who we really are. A legit contender.

Oh, and it's not going to be snowing this weekend! The weather is going to be awesome!

GO ROCKIES!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Facebook

At our leaders meeting last week I was strongly encouraged by Jen to get on Facebook and start getting a life. So, after her kind nudge I am on Facebook. I am still learning my way around it. I want to learn how to throw a sheep at someone!

But...here is the real value for me, I now have a gateway to keep in contact with students who have graduated from our church! It's so exciting to see the names of students pop up on my Friends list that I had the privilege to shepherd!

So to Jen...thanks for the nudge!

Do you...

This quote from John Piper led off our Senior Sneak this past weekend. I am praying that our seniors will let these words soak into their souls!

Do You…

Do you love the thought that you exist to make God look glorious?

Do you love the thought that all creation exists to display the glory of God?

Do you love the truth that all of history is designed by God to one day be a completed canvas that displays in the best way possible the greatness and beauty of God?

Do you love the fact that Jesus Christ came into the world to vindicate the righteousness of God and repair the injury that we had done to the reputation of the glory of God?

Do you love the truth you personally exist to make God look like what he really is—glorious?

I ask again: Do you love the fact that your salvation is meant to put the glory of God’s grace on display?

Do you love seeing and showing the glory of God?

Broncos and Rockies tickets

I was giving the gift of a Club Level seat last night for the Broncos game. Here is the view from the seat. My friend Larry Stair from Trak-1 technologies hooked me up with a ticket. We went to Colorado Christian together and then he served in the EFCA in the Rocky Mountain District before he left and went to Trak-1. We had a great time!

Now on to the Rockies...at 10:00 a.m. today tickets go on sale and we are hoping to snag tickets for Game 4.

Now back to the Broncos...the Packers come into town on Monday night and we can't wait to see Favre live!

Rockies Sunday (?) and Broncos Monday could be epic!

Laughing together

Last night I met with my amazing leaders who serve alongside me in our high school ministry. Something happened that wasn't on the agenda...an outburst of laughter! After our meeting we busted out the fortune cookies to top off an amazing night of eating awesome homemade Chinese food. We read the fortunes and added the proverbial "in bed" after each one and I lost it. We all lost it. There was an uproar of laughter. At one point I was in tears!

We built community last night through laughter. It was time to laugh!

Ecclesiastes 3:4 "A time to weep and a time to laugh; A time to mourn and a time to dance."

Relaional Youth Minsitry

Andy Root has a great MP3 on Princeton's new Cloud of Witnesses: An Audio Journal on Youth, Church, and Culture. It's free. I am sharing this with my high school leaders tonight. He has some very important things to say about how to make relationships the priority in our ministries. In addition, he clearly explains how many of us in the past have given lip service to the fact that we are relationally driven in our ministries, only using relationships as the instrument to get students to our events. His four hallmarks of a healthy theologically grounded practice of relational of ministry with youth is worth discussing with your leaders. I can't wait for tonight's discussion.

Check out the MP3 here.

Game 4 - SWEEP!

Here is the view from my seats last night! I can't wait for the World Series!

My wife, her mother and sister were decked out!

Senior Sneak

This weekend is going to be AWESOME! We are taking our seniors up to Breckenridge to spend some time with them. We will eat together, play together, pray together, cry together, wrestle with our purpose in life together and many other things. I've prepared a booklet for them filled with all kinds of stuff. Among several things I will share with them are these unbelievable words from Chuck Swindoll,

“SOW A THOUGHT, REAP AN ACT;

SOW AN ACT, REAP A HABIT;

SOW A HABIT, REAP A CHARACTER;

SOW A CHARACTER, REAP A DESTINY.”

A kick in the pants

This past week I realized something about my teaching. It needs a kick in the pants. After being gone from fulfilling this role and having stepped back into it, I realize I am rusty. I need a kick in the pants! So, I have these three books on my desk and I am going to devour them in the next two weeks.

Made to Stick: Why Some Ideas Survive and Others Die by Chip Heath and Dan Heath

The Big Idea: Focus the Message-multiply the Impact by Dave Ferguson

Speaking to Teenagers: How to Think About, Create, & Deliver Effective Messages by Doug Fields and Duffy Robbins

Anyone read any of these?

Parents of our students

Wednesday of this week I met with several of our high school parents to pray and talk through some things while their kids were in i2i groups around the church. It was awesome! They were engaging, full of ideas, their prayers for our ministry were thoughtful and I think we all walked away with this one purpose:

We are a team that needs to be working together to help our high school students become faithful followers of Jesus Christ.

We've got a great team!

Sharing our humanness with students

Larry Richards said, "To communicate the reality of God we must share our humanness...that inadequacy of ours which made us need Him."

We don't just simply meet for the sake of meeting on Wednesday nights in small groups. One of our goals is to get to know each other, hopefully at the deepest levels.

And this begins with our leaders modeling for our students what it means to share their humanness...their inadequacies, within appropriate boundaries based on the maturity of the group.

Tickets to the NLCS

Random thoughts about tickets and the NLCS.

- All NLCS Rockies games are sold out. If you want to go you will pay HUGE money from a scalper.
- As of last night the Diamondbacks still had 12,000 tickets for Thursdays game. What?
- I have tickets to Sunday's and Monday's games at Coors Field!
- I am officiating a wedding on Sunday night at 6:00 p.m. which means I can't use my ticket to the game on Sunday night. :( AHHHHHHHH!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
- I will be at Monday's game no MATTER WHAT!
- My father-in-law, who bought the tickets, has to travel on Sunday and Monday to Arizona. He can't go to either game. Oh man, is he bitter!
- Monday I will be at the game with my wife, her sister and her mother. Not to mention the Guido will be there.
- Who will be the two lucky people on Sunday night to go to the game?
- Who will be the lucky person on Monday night to go to the game?

Prayer walk

Last Wednesday night our students participated in a prayer walk for our adoration time. Our i2i groups walked around the building praying for our search for a new senior pastor, their high school leaders, that their passion would grow to live for Christ in their schools, and for their friends who do not know the power of the resurrection. And these are just a few of the things on the list. I am excited to move more of our adoration time from the large group setting to the small group setting.

One of my hopes and prayers is that this prayer walk will translate into them praying while they walk around their schools. We want a group of students who are learning to walk with God in the daytime and hear his song at night!

Psalm 42:8 "The LORD will command His lovingkindness in the daytime; And His song will be with me in the night, A prayer to the God of my life."

Eagle Scout Ceremony

Yesterday I got the privilege to pray at the beginning and end of the Eagle Scout Ceremony of one of our students and two of his fellow scouts. It was an awesome ceremony. Harrison's (right) project was to build a garden at Chatfield State Park.

The one thing that stuck out to me throughout the entire ceremony was the community that was in the room. Everyone knew everyone. Stories were told of each young man and everyone laughed like they knew that would have been true of them.

I want to be a part of a high school ministry of students and parents that know each other that well. I want to be at the Senior Salute every May and have that same kind of community.

joy & pain

Rockies = joy

Broncos = pain

2-0

The Rockies are on FIRE!!!!!!!!!! Early reports tonight are possible snow showers for the game on Sunday if we don't sweep the Phillies on Saturday.

The fever has spread all over our student ministry. As students were gathering last night the buzz was around the Rockies. Several of them watched the game in their classes. Others had to sneak into the choir room.

This is awesome!

Gates vs. Jobs

The Presentation Zen has a great post on what we can learn from the presentations of Bill Gates and Steve Jobs. It's really fascinating to see the difference. I want to present more like Jobs.

At the end of the article he makes this statement, "If your ideas matter, then the presentation matters, right?"

For student ministry leaders the answer is YES! For me it's YES! I am back in the saddle this week after not having prepared a message since July 1st. The ideas I am presenting from the first installment of our study of church history matter. This challenges me to consider not just what ideas I am going to present, but how I am going to present them. This is especially true when it comes to using PowerPoint slides, audio and video. Hey, it's one more thing to do to get ready, but I truly believe that this is a skill more of us should develop. Subscribe to the Presentation Zen's blog today to keep getting encouragement and skills to help you further this skill!

EPIC

Rockies 9 - Padres 8

Worship as Evangelism

Worship as Evangelism is a great read and worth a discussion among leaders in your student ministry.

Sally writes, "Can the W-word [worship] be saved?" Saved from the definition that it's just what goes on inside the tent? From the lie that worship is a place you go, not what you do or who you are?"

How are we in student ministry contributing to the right definition of what worship is and what the wrong definition of what worship is with our students?

ROCKtober

Today the Rockies play the Padres for a chance to go to the playoffs.

I am going to the game! My mother-in-law called Chris and I last night and said she wanted to take her son-in-laws to the game.

Tear. Rejoice!

78 degrees at game time. It's going to be crazy!