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Simon Says > Jesus Says I saw this video from Francis Chan about making disciples and it really hits home when he compares how most of us have all played "Simon Says" as a kid, but yet we think that when Jesus says all we need...

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Heart Check For the Kingdom of God is not a matter of what we eat or drink, but of living a life of goodness and peace and joy in the Holy Spirit. If you serve Christ with this attitude, you will please God, and others...

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Keep Me Humble I occasionally publish notes on my YouVersion profile, but for some reason they don't always show up, so I will also post them here. After reading Luke 8:9-14 I decided to write a letter to God and...

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Merry Christmas 2010 This year seems to have flown by! I am not happy to see it end, but I am thrilled for 2011 to start. This past year I found myself in several interesting places ministry-wise. Many of you know that...

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My Light Will Shine This year I am taking the page from a friend of mine, Adam McLane, and I will not only be passing out candy for Halloween but I will also have some coffee and hot chocolate for the parents that are walking...

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Goodbye, Marko

Category : NYWC, Student Ministry

You will be missed. I have to admit that I was not very familiar with YS or NYWC when Mike Yaconelli was at the helm. So I never felt the great sense of loss and wonderment about the future of YS when Yac died.

However, I get that sense now. There seems to be a difference in this case though, because when Yac died Marko was already in place as President and kept the spirit and heartbeat of Yac’s dream for YS alive.

Now YS seems to be a ship with no captain. Zondervan, who bought YS back in 2007, has always been quite a bit more conservative then YS. I always wondered how that relationship would work out and it seems like we may be seeing that it really hasn’t. I had a friend say to me that it is like those cute little quirks that your fiancee has, but then when you get married you realize they annoy you. It appears like Zondervan has gotten annoyed with those quirks, which is the only reason why I see in them getting rid of the person who not only had the heart and soul of YS but was also it’s leader.

I think that this will be a huge win for Group and Simply Youth Ministry along with the SYM Conference. I think that a lot of people are going to jump to there products and to their conference, because they feel that YS is just not going to be the same.

However, I think that this could be a loss for youth workers. We will now no longer have that place where we can all gather together and be stretched in our think by the speakers. One of the hallmarks of NYWC is that we were able to hear from a broad spectrum of people and so it forced us out of our comfort zones and made us think. I just don’t see Zondervan continuing with that and I hope that I am wrong.

In the meantime I will be praying for Marko, and I agree with Len that “YSMarko now stands for You’re Special Marko”. Of course, Marko was always special. I look forward to what Marko does to bless youth workers in the future, even if it is just a return to blogging.

But I will miss his antics like this….

And this….

What R U Hearing from Students in your YG?

Category : Student Ministry

This is the reason why I am passionate about doing student ministry, why I love YS and why I am excited for this year’s NYWC.

HT to Gerrard Fess.

NYWC 2009

Category : Student Ministry

This gets me excited for NYWC this year. I hope that I can go.

I’m Ready Now

Category : Church, Faith

My beautiful wife posted this video on her blog yesterday and I had to re-post it here.

A lot of people who know my wife and I know that we have been on this long journey of searching for the place that God would have us to serve at. My desire since I was a young boy was to be a pastor and to serve God in full-time ministry. After leaving the church I was serving at as youth pastor for 5 and a half years, God led us on a path of healing and learning that I would not trade for anything. I have learned and grown so much as a person these past 4 years.

During that time there was something in me that knew that God had some work to do in me before I was ready to step back into ministry. I still pursued opportunities and sent out resumes all during that time and the whole time our prayer was that God would close the doors to the places we were not supposed to be at. These past 6 or 8 months I have felt that I am really ready now to take that position, so I was praying to God when I was in Pittsburgh for the National Youth Workers Convention about it and I felt that He told me that I was ready. The problem now is that the place He had for me wasn’t ready yet. I am hoping that it won’t be too much longer before they are ready, because I don’t know how much longer we can survive on unemployment. The song “Ready Now” by Desperation Band really captures some of what we are feeling. I posted the lyrics below in case you want to read them.

You come like You promised You would
I want to surrender for good
I know that I need You
And I don’t want to keep living life alone

So take my heart
And make it new
Make it true
And make it like You
Take my hands
I lift them high
They’re Yours not mine to do
Do what You will (3X)

I feel like a blind man in Your sight
I know that I’m wicked in Your eyes
So wash me and make me shine like Your Son
I want to tell everyone
That You’re the only one

So take my heart
And make it new
Make it true
And make it like You
Take my hands
I lift them high
They’re Yours not mine to do
Do what You will (3X)

I’m ready now (3X)
Do what you will
I’m ready now (6X)
Do what you will
I’m ready now (3X)

So take my heart
And make it new
Make it true
And make it like You
Take my hands
I lift them high
They’re Yours not mine to do
Do what You will

I’m ready now (3X)
Do what You will
I’m ready now (3X)
Do what You will
I’m ready now (3X)
Do what You will
I’m ready now (3X)

Bloggin’ Through 2008

Category : Random

It is that time again to recap the past year, so I went back and looked at the first post of every month and provided a link to them below with a little commentary.

January - The University of Michigan started of the season with a dominating victory over the defending 2006 National Champion Florida Gators and the Heisman Trophy winning Tim Tebow. Unfortunately, that was the lone highlight for Michigan in 2008.

February - I posted about Three T’s. They were tired, Twitter and TV.

March - I talked about some Personal Triumphs that I had at the gym in running.

April - I asked the question What Movies Have You Seen? and I was shocked to see that I had seen 34 of the AFI’s Top 100 movies. How many have you seen?

May - I posted from my mobile phone my son’s Big Fish Story. I am still in shock that he caught that big of a fish in my dad’s canal. May was a crazy month in which we remodeled our bathroom and took a trip to Colorado in the middle of the project.

June - We got our bathroom closer to completion and it was nice to finally being able to go to the bathroom inside our house instead of in a outhouse, and to take a shower at my house.

July - July always starts off up north in Manistee, Michigan and we took a special trip to Michigan’s Adventure on the 4th. I also ran in my first 5K while we were up north.

August - With the political season heating up I had quite a few blog posts about the election and this one was about how I felt that John McCain Had Gone Too Far. I am so happy that the election is over. Anyone else?

September - Youth Specialties released a video promoting Youth Worker Appreciation Day and so I asked the question, Why Do You Do It?. And that was an excellent follow-up to a post from a few days before about why I love doing student ministry.

October - I reminisced about how we were celebrating 70 Years of the Winged Helmet and what great icon for the University of Michigan.

November - I once again had the honor of going to the National Youth Workers Convention and I finished an entry that I had started a few weeks before after being inspired by Andrew Marin’s talk. Basically, I said that As A Christian I Am Sorry and I will let you read it to find out why.

December - I asked the question, “Can Atheists Do Good Works?”. I was inspired by an article I had read in the USA Today. What do you think?

2008 was an interesting year and I am really nervous as to what 2009 will hold for me. I could possibly be laid off from my job or have the company I work for shut down all together. It is really scary and the economy in Michigan is so bad. But my trust is in God and I know that no matter what happens I will have my family and my faith in God, so I am not too worried. However, I would be lying if I didn’t say that I wasn’t scared.

More Proof….

Category : Fun, NYWC 08

That I have no problem making a fool of myself. Just wait for the guy in the blue shirt to jump on stage.

As A Christian I Am Sorry

Category : Church, Faith, Life, NYWC 08, Politics

I have been recently been watching One Punk Under God on the Sundance Channel, which is the story of Jay Bakker. Jay is the son of Jim and Tammy-Faye Bakker, who were the people behind the PTL Club and the original televangelists. He is also the founding pastor of Roveloution Church in New York City and the author of the book “Son of a Preacher Man”, which I have read and reviewed here.

His life story has really got me thinking about my life story and how I was raised as a Christian myself, along with the attitudes that I have developed as a result. As you can see from the picture I have posted here, which is a sticker from Jay’s church, it says that they are “sorry for being self-righteous judgmental bastards.” While that is pretty strong language I think there is a lot of truth to that statement, especially for me personally. As I have been really examining my walk with God and the way I live out my faith in the world around me I have realized that I have not been exactly living my life the way that Jesus would. I don’t believe that I have always shown people the grace and love that as a person who is a Christ follower should.

This recent Presidential election has really brought a lot of it once again to my attention and I realized how much of a jerk I had been towards people who thought different than me when it came to politics. But this post is about even more than just that.

I have been at the National Youth Workers Convention in Pittsburgh this weekend and have heard many compelling messages. One of the people that spoke was a gentleman named Andrew Marin, who is the mastermind behind The Marin Foundation that is “the very first organization that works to build a bridge between the religious and Gay, Lesbian, Bisexual and Transgender (GLBT) communities in a non-threatening, research and biblically oriented fashion.” Andrew challenged the youth workers here in Pittsburgh to really get out there and do what they can to reach out to gay teenagers and show them the love of God, and to be intentional about it instead of just waiting for it to happen. Unfortunately, the churches reaction to people in the gay and lesbian community has not been one of love and that has made the church one of the last places on earth that they want to visit, so being intentional and going to them is the only way for us to really show them the love of Christ.

The next speaker after Andy was Soong-Chan Rah, who spoke on the issue of race in the church, which sadly is still and issue that our Presidential election has showed to be something that is a problem. The whole reason why Soong-Chan Rah was invited to speak was because of a skit in one of the books that Youth Specialties published that had stereotyped Asian-Americans in a very bad way. You can read Marko’s apology for it here, but the most important thing that rose out of it was the dialogue that was started regarding racism in the church. We were challenged by Soong-Chan as to whether some of our beliefs were based on a cultural faith based in predominately white America or was it really based on the Bible.

If you want to hear either Andy or Soong-Chan’s messages you can get them here.

This journey that I have personally been on has been great. I think that taking steps back every so often and looking at your life in light of the life of Christ is such a valuable and important thing. I know for me it has caused me to open my eyes and reflect upon the way that I treat my neighbors and even the way I treat fellow Christ-followers. So as a Christian I am sorry that the way I have lived my life has not caused people to see Jesus in me. But I am going to do my best to make sure that changes from here on out.

So Much To Say….

Category : Life, Politics, Random

So little time to blog. That is the story of my life right now. We have been so busy as of late. With Caleb in flag football, Hannah in ice skating, me playing indoor soccer and [a href= “http://mrssnuffy.blogspot.com”>Kimmy doing all that she does; it seems like we haven’t slowed down. The weeks just seem to fly by. In fact, over the next few weekends I have things planned.

Today, we were supposed to go to a birthday party for a friend of ours from church but it got canceled, so Kimmy and I are going to go out on a date. I can’t remember the last time we had an opportunity to do that, which is very sad. Then next weekend Caleb has his last flag football game, I am playing flag football with some guys from church and then we have a Halloween party we are all going to. Then the weekend after that, which is Halloween weekend, I am going to the National Youth Workers Convention in Pittsburgh. So I will be gone from Thursday, October 30th, until Monday, November 3rd. Then the weekend after that Kimmy and I am going up to Traverse City, MI so I can do the wedding for one of the girls that used to be in the youth ministry at the church I was a youth pastor at almost 4 years ago. So as you can see it is crazy!

A few weekends ago I was playing flag football again with the guys from the church and I strained my hamstring and sprained my finger. So I have been rehabbing my hamstring since then and it is much better now. And I should be back to pretty much normal by the time we play again next week. Although I am taking the next month off from playing soccer to make sure it is back fully before I start that up again. I have been able to run on the treadmill for about 20 minutes this week and that is a good sign. I am going to even go out for a run later on.

While I have sworn off talking politics on my blog I do want to say one thing that has been going through my mind a lot lately as I have seen people battling over this whole thing. Our pastor used Ephesians 6:12 the other day in his message and it got me thinking about this election. Here is the verse for you….

For our struggle is not against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the powers of this dark world and against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly realms.

I realized that amidst people saying that if __________ gets elected that it will be “God’s judgment on the U.S.” and other such similar statements. Along with seeing people in the Church fighting with one another over their choice for President. It has really made me really sad because I think we are losing perspective. Our fight is not with other people, but against our spiritual enemy. The reality is that whomever becomes President of the United States will be the very person that God wants to be in that position and we need to pray for him and ask God’s blessings upon his life.

I regret how much bitterness and anger I felt towards President Bill Clinton, because I didn’t realize that my fight was not against him. Instead of praying for him, I spent more time speaking against him and praying against him. I pray that the Church in America can really rise up during this economic crisis and show America the grace and love of Christ instead of showing America bitterness like so many of us did during the President Clinton’s Presidency.

Okay, that was more than I planned on saying, but I needed to get it out. My faith is in God alone and not in this country or it’s President. That is the perspective I am trying to keep.

Funny/Scary Videos

Category : Mobile Blogging

This video has been making it’s rounds on the net and I wanted to share it here.

As disturbing and even slightly funny that that video is, I find it very funny that when David Crowder does it and somehow makes the song so much better. And I would love to hear it on his next album or even performed at the National Youth Workers Convention.

One Last NYWC 2007 Post

Category : NYWC 07

I was finally able to get the video I took from the NYWC in Atlanta off of my phone. Here the youth pastors have gone wild with some finger rockets and Marko and Tic have foolishly gone on stage to stop us. Silly little men!

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