We’re all here, unloading & looking forward to God working in great ways! It begins.
Middle School Winter Weekend Update
February 5, 2010I am staring at The Weather Channel on my computer monitor as I write this. We ARE going to Streamside and we ARE leaving tonight.
We would like to move the departure time up about an hour so we can get out of here in plenty of time before the snow begins (TWC is saying it will begin here @ 8:00).
We will be gathering here in the church parking lot @ 5:30 instead of at 6:30 and will leave as soon as everyone arrives.
Thank you all for praying for us. I will try to post something here when we arrive tonight to let you all know that we made it safely.
Middle School Winter Weekend
February 5, 2010It is 8:07 Thursday night. As of this moment the retreat this weekend is still on!
We are monitoring the storm coming very carefully and weighing all of our options. We won’t plan to make a final call until between 2:00-4:00 tomorrow.
Check back here on on the main website for more info then.
My Chicken, My Everything
February 1, 2010
Pics from the HS Dodgeball Tournament and the Wing Bowl coming soon.
Acting suprised when God doesn’t seem close
January 13, 2010Read this today by Jon Achuff on his blog, Stuff Christians Like.
“Are you OK?”
That’s my wife’s polite way of saying, “Why are you being such a distant, distracted jerk right now?”
She said that to me about a week ago and she was right. I was distant. I was distracted. I was a jerk. Above all, I was surprised.
When I hit funks like this, I like to act shocked. I put my hands on my head and say in quiet wonder, “What is going on? Where is God? How come this Christmas season feels so awkward and scattered and ill fitting? What’s going on God, what are you doing?”
It’s better that way. The blame isn’t on me. No one likes to throw themselves under the bus. That would be bananas. But I have no problem acting surprised when God feels far away. If I was honest though, if I really looked at the last few weeks with a filter of truth, I probably would have instead said something like this:
“Wow, my quiet times have been wildly inconsistent this holiday season. I mean I often struggle with them during vacations because my normal patterns are all jumbled up but I reached new lows this Christmas. I’m not starting my days with God right now. I’m not praying actively like I usually do. I’m not centering my mornings and my days on who he is and who he made me to be. It’s been a week since I’ve cracked my Bible and in it’s absence I’ve been filling my head and heart with junk.
I’ve been watching shows on Hulu that I never watch. I’ve been aimlessly surfing online which is usually a deathtrap for me. I’ve been nudging my boundaries all over the place. I’ve been reading and listening to things I usually avoid. Hmmm, I wonder if any of that will have a consequence?”
It does. It might take me a while to realize what I’m doing but when I finally come around it seems so obvious. When I remove quiet time and add junk, things get gross, fast. How am I surprised? How am I shocked that my decisions get shady? How am I perplexed that it’s suddenly a little easier to lie and twist the truth?
I don’t know if you ever do this, but I’m exhausted by it. I don’t like whimpering out of 2009 spiritually but even more so, I don’t like limping into 2010.
Let’s put aside our surprise. Let’s stop pretending. Faith is a day by day, decision by decision, breath by breath kind of thing. And when we spend those days indulging in poison, we get poisonous lives.
The cat is out of the bag. Farewell surprise.
Photo Caption Contest
January 11, 2010
Best Caption From the HS Group Wins a Prize!
Leave your captions as comments.
Have Fun!
Thoughts To Start The New Year
January 4, 2010I read this on Seth Barnes’ blog today and thought it was well stated. And since it is a key part of our purpose and mission as a student ministry, it is worth posting for all of us to read.
Your Purpose on Earth by Seth Barnes on 12/31/2009
Tomorrow starts a new year – time to look at the big picture of life, answering questions like, “Why am I here – what’s my purpose?”
Just a few thoughts about that: Your primary purpose on earth is not to do good works. If you follow Jesus, your purpose is to embrace the ministry of reconciliation. Though we’re separated from God and feel the distance, we were born to be with him and to bring others into his presence. He reconciles us in our broken state to himself and asks us to invite others to the party.
Maybe that sounds like evangelism to you. The word “evangelism” sticks in a lot of people’s throats like a bone. They equate the term to acting like a kind of a religious used car salesman in a cheap suit. The problem is that when Jesus asks us to share the gospel wherever we go, we complicate his assignment with threadbare words.
My guess is that if we really understood how so many people feel, it would be much easier to embrace the ministry of reconciliation.
Perhaps you’ve never experienced the sense of utter despair that comes when you feel abandoned by God. Perhaps you’ve forgotten what it was like to feel God’s embrace for the first time.
People all over the earth feel ugly, forgotten, and estranged from God. The Bible calls them “children of wrath,” and that’s how they feel – at odds with themselves and the God who made them, living in a scarred and forgotten place. Listen to a missionary friend of mine describing the Islamic culture in which she works, “The legalistic religion dictates every aspect of culture turns their lives into little more than an empty performance of religious acts from cradle to grave. The streets also teem with the various categories of the hopeless. Twisted forms of the crippled, deformed, and indigent hobble down the sidewalks or lie on cardboard mats begging for small change. The lunatics wrap themselves in filthy blankets and rail into empty space. The poorest of the poor are labeled sinners and treated as soulless outcasts. The sense of oppression is thick.”
How do you respond? I think, “Someone needs to launch a rescue mission to set these people free.” And if you were to launch such a mission, people would call you a “missionary.” And you might blanch at the thought. What do you feel as you read these words? Perhaps you feel a small twinge of the pain they describe. Perhaps the word “missionary” conjures up a picture of people being preached to who are quite content to be left alone. Whatever your response to the words, don’t let them distract you from your purpose. We mustn’t let words trip us up or water down the urgency of our assignment.
As a follower of Jesus, your purpose is a noble one. You are called to partner with God to help people realize their belovedness, to see a God who is lovesick and wants to woo them back to himself. It’s the task of setting things right, of restoring the natural order to things – orphans brought into a family, parched lips feeling the refreshment of a cool drink, lonely hearts feeling the glow of companionship.
Jesus described his kingdom as a place where lost things are found. When we’re that lost thing and he finds us, we realize the treasure we are in his eyes. And we get to join him in helping others to see themselves that way too.
It’s an incredible thing to partner with God. It’s wonderful to help a person see that God loves them. If you’ve experienced it, it may have been the high point of your life. To join with God in helping others experience his love is a privilege that we we need to grasp. It’s a purpose to which we must commit.
Steve Taylor Week – Final Day
December 13, 2009Two final Taylor videos for today. The first is the actual music video and the second is just the song – couldn’t find a video for it.
