We had a great Experience God Sunday yesterday, if you missed it, I feel for you. I literally feel for you. And I have no idea what that means...I suppose it means I am sad that you missed it for a number of reasons.
Reason number four. I "feel" that you had a great opportunity to be with the whole group. If you are a middle Schooler then you missed out hanging with the high schoolers. If you're the opposite, then you missed out setting an example for the younger ones (and their are some really cool middle schoolers this year!).
Reason number three. I "feel" that you missed a rare opportunity to do something different on Sunday morning. If you are tired of me or Scott (or Scott!?, yeah right) giving messages every Sunday then you missed out on hearing some wise people answer your life questions.
Reason number two. I "feel" for you because wiser people than me had some great Godly answers to your very unGodly questions. Just kidding about that last part, but we had some great questions from the heart of where you (teenagers) are today. Questions like "Do you ever feel like you can't do it anymore?" and "What did you do when you feel like God is trying to tell you something but you don't know what?" and "Can we have chairs hanging from the cieling?"
The number one reason why I feel for you is...boy, a lot of suspense for this one. If you missed this Experience God Sunday where you could have had wise people like Jim Ramsey, Kevin and Dana McClain, Kelley DeMoss, Matt and Brooke Edwards, and Carina Schubert answer some very tough questions (yes, tougher than the silly hanging chair one) then you will never be wise. Well, you can. It just takes some trial and error on your part, and it would have been easier for you to hear how older and smarter people than you went through the same problems and questions that you went through. So for that, I feel for you.
much Love,
johnny
Monday, October 27, 2008
Thursday, October 16, 2008
Sunday ReCap
In case you missed it, Crosstalk combined Middle School and High School last Sunday. They did so because most of the workers were down in Cali soaking up the sun on a youth worker convention. But if you did miss Sunday school, here is what went down. My great friend (funny how you can have great friends you have never met) Louie Giglio taught on how great our God is. It was all about Creation. Creation of the stars, but also creation of us...human beings. I have heard from a number of people that the video was amazing! It totally rocked their world with statistics and the like about how small we as humans really are, and then how intricate we really are. That picture of Louie is him explaining that in the center of a giant star is a black hole, and the hubble telescope looked in a took a picture of it...and there was that cross right in the center of the black hole. Wild! I don't really know what that means, but it is still pretty wild!
So if you want to see the video, maybe because you missed it, or maybe because you want to see it again...I have it. You can borrow it. Keep in mind that you want to set aside about forty minutes, and then another forty minutes to get your mind back together after it blows up. Just kidding, it won't blow up. Just kidding it will. Just kidding though, it is a figure of speach.
much Love,
Johnny
What a busy week!
It's Thursday. Last Thursday I remember getting ready to go down to California for the National Youth Workers Convention. We had a blast! After a 12 hour drive down through the middle of the night, we saw a handful of great speakers, were led in worship six times by Lincoln Brewster and Starfield, went to some great seminars on a plethora topics, and almost got kicked out of the hotel room. Good times! Most of the middle school team went and a few of the high school team. We got back Monday night and both Scott and I had to hit the ground running on finalizing the details for the normal weekly events (Connections and Transit), not to mention iron out some wrinkles in the Midnight Madness schedule.
Oh yeah, Midnight Madness. That will be fun...a little different, but fun. That reminds me, its Thursday and I better take a nap if I want to stay up all night for the madness fun. Get some sleep and I will see you there...7pm to 7am.
much Love,
Johnny
Oh yeah, Midnight Madness. That will be fun...a little different, but fun. That reminds me, its Thursday and I better take a nap if I want to stay up all night for the madness fun. Get some sleep and I will see you there...7pm to 7am.
much Love,
Johnny
Wednesday, October 8, 2008
The Great Pumpkin Chase
I was sitting down and planning out some things for the Great Pumpkin Chase and I am so excited to see what happens. This is my first year planning this amazing event and it is going to be madness. The idea behind the Chase is that you are going around to different locations within the Harbor and you have to solve the clues in order to find out where the great pumpkin is hiding. This year we are going with a secret agent theme. All the students will ne
ed to follow each clue in order to find the pumpkins Kins or baby pumpkins. We will have some cool prizes for which ever team finds all the kins and also for the most creative pictures. We will be showing the slide show the following week at Transit. So parents beware that your students will be on the hunt on October 30th. We will be starting right at 6:30pm sharp. So don't be late. If you have any questions about this incredible event please let me know.
Peace,
Scott
ed to follow each clue in order to find the pumpkins Kins or baby pumpkins. We will have some cool prizes for which ever team finds all the kins and also for the most creative pictures. We will be showing the slide show the following week at Transit. So parents beware that your students will be on the hunt on October 30th. We will be starting right at 6:30pm sharp. So don't be late. If you have any questions about this incredible event please let me know.Peace,
Scott
Tuesday, October 7, 2008
Sunday ReCap
Okay, for those of you who were out of town, or slept in, or were watching the Seahawks lose; here is a reCap of Sunday's lessons for High School Crosstalk and Middle School Crosstalk.
In Middle School, Scott continued teaching on worship. This week was worship through prayer. I love how all of the students dove right in and prayed for nearly forty minutes! It was great to hear how you realized that prayer can be creative. Scott had nine different prayer stations set up through out the Cabana and the Middle School room. The stations ranged from praying through art, through rewriting the Lords prayer in your own words, and even through praying for the world over a map. It was neat to see that there are all sorts of ways we can worship God through prayer, not just the traditional close your eyes and hold hands till they get sweaty while thinking about what you will eat for lunch. Hopefully you can continue to practice these creative ways to talk to God, and they will freshen up your prayer life.
In High School, we started a new series! Our new series is called "the Bible Jesus read" and it is going to be an overview of the Old Testament. We learned that there are a couple of main reasons (among many I am sure) that keep us from studying and enjoying the Old Testament. Mainly because it can be boring to our suburban western culture. We don't get it because we don't have land wars, and water wars, and arranged marriages. The other main reason is because it seems like the God of the Old Testament (which is the same God as the New) can be mean and offensive. He cares so much about the perfect sacrifice (no bent winged doves or limping lambs) but seems to not care about a whole human ethnic group like the Amelikites (God told Saul to obliterate the Amelikites; man, woman, child, baby, camel, goat, cow, all of it). These are two fairly legitimate reason why we don't study the Old Testament; its boring and offensive.
But we countered those two points with three. We need to study the Old Testament for these three (and many more) reasons.
1. The New Testament authors treated it like it was important. All the books except Philemon, 2 John and 3 John quote or allude back to the Old Testament.
2. The Old Testament is still applicable to our lives today. We find our selves in the pages! When we get more familiar with the culture and the weird words, we start to enjoy it because we resonate with the people who wrestled with walking with God.
3. It is the Bible that Jesus read. It is the prayers he prayed. The stories he heard at bedtime. The songs that he sang. The more we comprehend the Old Testament, the more we comprehend Jesus.
Thats what we did Sunday! It was a blast, because we ended it all with coffee cookie fellowship downstairs! And in my opinion, that was better than watching a poor performance by the home town team (by watching I mean by skipping church) (and by poor I mean really really really ridiculously bad playing) (and by home town team I mean the Seattle Seahawks).
much Love,
Johnny
In Middle School, Scott continued teaching on worship. This week was worship through prayer. I love how all of the students dove right in and prayed for nearly forty minutes! It was great to hear how you realized that prayer can be creative. Scott had nine different prayer stations set up through out the Cabana and the Middle School room. The stations ranged from praying through art, through rewriting the Lords prayer in your own words, and even through praying for the world over a map. It was neat to see that there are all sorts of ways we can worship God through prayer, not just the traditional close your eyes and hold hands till they get sweaty while thinking about what you will eat for lunch. Hopefully you can continue to practice these creative ways to talk to God, and they will freshen up your prayer life.
In High School, we started a new series! Our new series is called "the Bible Jesus read" and it is going to be an overview of the Old Testament. We learned that there are a couple of main reasons (among many I am sure) that keep us from studying and enjoying the Old Testament. Mainly because it can be boring to our suburban western culture. We don't get it because we don't have land wars, and water wars, and arranged marriages. The other main reason is because it seems like the God of the Old Testament (which is the same God as the New) can be mean and offensive. He cares so much about the perfect sacrifice (no bent winged doves or limping lambs) but seems to not care about a whole human ethnic group like the Amelikites (God told Saul to obliterate the Amelikites; man, woman, child, baby, camel, goat, cow, all of it). These are two fairly legitimate reason why we don't study the Old Testament; its boring and offensive.
But we countered those two points with three. We need to study the Old Testament for these three (and many more) reasons.
1. The New Testament authors treated it like it was important. All the books except Philemon, 2 John and 3 John quote or allude back to the Old Testament.
2. The Old Testament is still applicable to our lives today. We find our selves in the pages! When we get more familiar with the culture and the weird words, we start to enjoy it because we resonate with the people who wrestled with walking with God.
3. It is the Bible that Jesus read. It is the prayers he prayed. The stories he heard at bedtime. The songs that he sang. The more we comprehend the Old Testament, the more we comprehend Jesus.
Thats what we did Sunday! It was a blast, because we ended it all with coffee cookie fellowship downstairs! And in my opinion, that was better than watching a poor performance by the home town team (by watching I mean by skipping church) (and by poor I mean really really really ridiculously bad playing) (and by home town team I mean the Seattle Seahawks).
much Love,
Johnny
Monday, October 6, 2008
Youth Ministry (2 month)
So I just celebrated my second month of being at Believers. There are a couple things that I have learned and am really excited about so I wanted to share them with you.
1. I've learned that at BF parents really do care about what is going on in the life of their students. In youth ministry that is not always the case. Here it seems a lot different. The parents are interested and truly do love and care about their children. It really became evident through our Parent/Student Transit night.
2. I've learned that Middle School Students get it. By "get it" I mean they are hungry for God's word. Through Transit I have seen so many students ask questions like "what was Jesus doing until the age of 30" and "why is the genealogy of Jesus important?" It is awesome to see a student ask a question like that and find hope in the Bible through wrestling through the text.
3. I've learned how to truly rely on the Holy Spirit more than ever before. I think for people who are doing God's work a lot of times we forget this. We forget that God is in charge and no matter how awesome these events look and how much I plan, I still need to rely fully on God. It's amazing how when you step back and let God do God's thing it turns out so much better than you could have imagined. I have been blown away at how God works. God is doing something in the life of the Middle School ministry and it has been fun to see how God cares about these students so much.
4. I have learned what a great church Believers Fellowship is. Walking into this new situation can be very intimidating but everyone at BF has welcomed Carina and me with open arms. It has been so great to get to know your students and to see how God is very much alive and active in their lives. We have felt so much love from everyone at church during this transition phase. We are so blessed to be in this community and to see what God is doing in Gig Harbor.
I have learned a lot more and can't wait to share some more stories with you soon.
Peace,
Scott
1. I've learned that at BF parents really do care about what is going on in the life of their students. In youth ministry that is not always the case. Here it seems a lot different. The parents are interested and truly do love and care about their children. It really became evident through our Parent/Student Transit night.
2. I've learned that Middle School Students get it. By "get it" I mean they are hungry for God's word. Through Transit I have seen so many students ask questions like "what was Jesus doing until the age of 30" and "why is the genealogy of Jesus important?" It is awesome to see a student ask a question like that and find hope in the Bible through wrestling through the text.
3. I've learned how to truly rely on the Holy Spirit more than ever before. I think for people who are doing God's work a lot of times we forget this. We forget that God is in charge and no matter how awesome these events look and how much I plan, I still need to rely fully on God. It's amazing how when you step back and let God do God's thing it turns out so much better than you could have imagined. I have been blown away at how God works. God is doing something in the life of the Middle School ministry and it has been fun to see how God cares about these students so much.
4. I have learned what a great church Believers Fellowship is. Walking into this new situation can be very intimidating but everyone at BF has welcomed Carina and me with open arms. It has been so great to get to know your students and to see how God is very much alive and active in their lives. We have felt so much love from everyone at church during this transition phase. We are so blessed to be in this community and to see what God is doing in Gig Harbor.
I have learned a lot more and can't wait to share some more stories with you soon.
Peace,
Scott
Thursday, October 2, 2008
I love Connections!
We had Connections again last night. Yes, every Wednesday from 6:30 to 8:30 we will meet and do a number of things. Last night was great. We talked about the Bible being trustworthy and reliable. Indeed it is. I love connections. I really really like it. Here are a couple of reasons...
I love Connections because...
much Love
johnny
I love Connections because...
- I get to eat a good meal
- I get to see people I like
- I get to work on relationships with people that don't like me
- I get to worship God
- I get to spend time with adults who care about students
- I get to spend time with students who care about God
- I get to spend time with students who don't know God
- I get to study the Bible
- I get to meet in a small group
- I get to make memories
much Love
johnny
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