From now on, I will be posting new updates and will be slowly rolling out new things to the page.  It’s a very exciting time for me and this blog, so stay tuned.

So this year, we decided to bring in a local Christian non-profit come in and teach about it.  They came in and taught for 2 weeks (1 group for the high school students and 1 group for the middle school students).  Although I was grateful that they taught about this subject, it did not go exactly as planned.  Because of this, I thought of many things I that I did wrong during this process.  So, I figured I would pass on my lessons learned on in case anyone is getting ready to bring in an outside person to share to your youth.

Lessons Learned:

1. Meet with the teacher beforehand and share what you hope to accomplish during their teaching time. Although I did meet with our teacher beforehand, I did not let them know the make-up of our youth program.  Not all youth groups are similar in students that attend, so had they been better prepared for the type of students we have, they might have tweeked their overall presentation a bit.
2. Make sure you know exactly what they are going to share. You don’t want to be thrown any curveballs during the presentation as they may share something completely outlandish.
3. Be prepared to follow up afterwards.  When you teach on anything, it is always good to have a follow up strategy.  This is even more important when you teach on such an important subject or an outside teacher comes in to share.  One of the best things Katie, my Associate, did after one of our meetings was she grabbed a bunch of girls immediately after the presentation was over and began to process with them what was said and how they were feeling.  You may not need to do something like that, but following up in the next week would be a great start.
4. Do a thorough evaluation afterwards. Oftentimes organizations will give you an evaluation to fill out.  However, I have found that most of them are pretty generic.  This particular group’s evaluation was very generic.  Therefore, instead of writing out an evaluation, I went and met with the person who presented and gave them a verbal one.  I have found that when you write up something, people may misconstrue your comments.  So, if you have some harder things to say on an evaluation, it is better to talk it over with them rather than write it.  Speak the truth in love, but definitely speak the truth.

In the past we have had a variety of outside teachers come in and share and overall I highly recommend them.  Working at a non-mega Church, it can get overwhelming and you can drain yourself too much doing multiple teachings every single week.  So, if someone else can come and share competently with your youth, why wouldn’t you take the night off?  But, just great as it can be to have a night off, it can be a lot of work as well if not done right.

Have you had similar experiences and learnings?  Post them so we can all know how to do a better job on the front end so that we don’t have as much to do after they share.

As we talked about youth ministry and leadership, I began to think about why other youth ministers do certain things and how we can inspire each other to follow a good example.  When I was an Intern at my first Church, one of my first training assignments was to go interview 3 other youth ministers and learn from them.  I was to ask them a lot of basic questions as to what they do and why they do it.  As I was reflecting on this time, it made me curious as to how many youth minsters, myself included, take time to learn from and with other youth ministers.  By this, I mean, how often am I meeting with other youth ministers now to process ministry and see how they are doing effective ministry (or, even as Rick said, “Sometimes we learn as much or more from seeing what folks DON’T DO RIGHT”).

To me, this is more than just meeting with other youth ministers regularly to discuss life and ministry.  This was taking it a step further.  I didn’t want to just talk about ministry, I wanted to experience ministry with someone else.  Therefore, I challenged Katie and myself to “shadow” another youth minister and basically see what they do, why they do it and learn from them as I hang with them.  I have an email into a few people to try to coordinate a time I can shadow them for an afternoon and evening.

Have you ever done something like this before?  How did it go?  When did you last shadow someone else?  Shadowing someone else is probably one of many different ways we can learn from each other.  What are those other ways?  Share them so that others can try.

TAKE A MINUTE and…

1. Think through how you learn best from others?  Is it by talking with another person, reading blogs or shadowing others?
2. When you’ve picked out a way to learn that works best for you, take a minute to coordinate a time for you to do that.

It was a fascinating class in which it made me ponder so much about how I am reaching students for Christ for the long haul.  If this is the truly the case and Dr. Horton is right (which I have no reason to not believe him) that a growing number of believers are leaving the faith during their college years, we, as Youth Pastors have a huge problem on our hands.  Of course this is not all our responsibility, but as overseers of the youth program, we have to play a part in transitioning these youth into adulthood.  How can we bridge the gap between the teenage years and adulthood?  I believe that it comes down to a simple change in focus.

What are we to do?

I believe that a critical step that we need to do in helping students stay strong in Christ for the long haul is to teach the Truth of who God is.  Now, you may be thinking to yourself, “Duh Tom, I do that”.  But, take a moment and think about your last meeting.  What was the most memorable part of it?  Was it the wild and crazy game you played, the creative and awesome video you showed, the funny skit guys who dressed up like cavemen OR was it the Truth of Christ?  Unfortunately for me, I have an easier time remember the crazy thing we did during our time together rather than the Truth of Christ that was revealed.

Students are not dumb.  They know that when they come to Church, people are going to talk about God and Christ.  So why, then, do we feel the need to play so many games and feel that we need to entertain them so much?  It is a very delicate balance because we want our group to be attractive to everyone while at the same time present the truth of Christ consistently.  I struggle with it constantly as I so desperately want our students to know the Truth but how do I present the Truth to students who are inundated in an MTV world where images come at them so fast?

One thing that sticks out to me is that it appears that we can get so caught up with making Christ attractive that we lose the fact that the truth of Christ is attractive enough.  It is almost like we have to come up with an angel to make Christ attractive to wild teenagers.  When we do this, I believe we miss the point that Christ is already attractive enough, we just have to share about him. Does that mean we have to stop being creative?  No, but the Truth should drive our creativeness, not vise-versa.  Do not get so caught up with the presentation and miss the content of whom you are presenting.

Christ says in John 8:31-32, “If you hold to my teaching, you are really my disciples. Then you will know the truth, and the truth will set you free.”  In this day and age, we can get so caught up with creative ways to share the gospel with our fancy PowerPoint slides, movie clips and dramatic performances (and believe me, I have done all those things).  It almost seems that we are trying to copy what MTV and the rest of the world is doing, but in a “Christian” way.  But, is that the right way?  Shouldn’t Christ and the truth found in Him dictate how we teach?  Do we have to go to such extremes if just knowing and understanding the truth will set us all free?

Effectively teaching students the Truth

Now, if you know me, you will know that I am not a Youth Pastor who gets up at the beginning of his meeting, opens my Bible and does an exegetical study.  I appreciate those who do that, but that is not how I am wired.  I love having fun with the youth and trying to find ways to create an exciting and attractive program.  But, Dr. Horton’s stat and subsequent challenge got me thinking of different ways we can be presenting the Truth of Christ so that students can have a committed, long term relationship with Him.

1. Use the different learning styles. In order to be effective in teaching the truth, we have to be aware of the different learning styles of youth.  There are multiple learning styles: audio, visual, and kinesthetic.  Don’t get tied into just presenting Christ in one way.
2. Repetition. The Truth of Christ is unchanging, so teach on who he is.  Andy Stanley has a great book, “The Seven Checkpoints” about this and gives some great insight on how repetition constantly reinforces important topics.
3. Engage and help them Discover. Teaching the Truth about God doesn’t mean you stand up and preach until you are blue in the face and that their ears and minds are ready to explode.  Engage them and discuss the subject with them.  Throughout your message, ask questions so that they can discover the Truth rather be told what the Truth is.
4. Strategically plan out our Meetings. What is it that we are teaching the students during our meetings together on Sunday?  Are we teaching them that Christ is all fun and just a little scripture?  Or, are we teaching that in all situations, Christ is present and relevant?
5. Create a Educational Flow from Childhood to Adulthood. Coordinate with your Children’s Ministry, Christian Education and Adult Education Director(s) about the Truths of God you should communicated at each level/stage of their life.
6. Follow up/through. Continue to earn the right and build relationships with students during the week.  Help them process the information you all discuss on Sunday mornings or at small group by following up with them throughout the week.
7. Involve Parents. This is especially helpful if you have Christian parents.  Parents are the ultimate spiritual heads of their children.  But, too often, parents believe it is the Church’s job to teach their children about God. The church is just a small part of presenting Christ.  The bulk of the work has to come from the parents.  So, let parents know what you are discussing so that they can know and follow up throughout the week with their children.
8. Set up Mentorships. This is to integrate the generations in your Church.  It is important to partner up the adults with youth so that the younger generation can learn from the older generation and their experiences.

Final Thought

As youth move into adulthood, like Dr. Horton said, I have had the unfortunate experience of seeing too many young people fade away from Christ and the Church.  The comment, “church/Christ just isn’t for me anymore” is not an acceptable answer, especially for someone who was very committed to Christ as a teen.  Sometimes I wonder, was it me?  Did I turn him/her off from Christ with what we did in our program?  I know that is not the right mindset to have, but it I still wonder.  I believe that in order to engage someone long term for Christ, we have to begin to look at what and how we are teaching our youth.  Christ never said he was just about fun and games.  However, he did say that he was THE way, THE truth and THE life (John 14:6).  Therefore, let us not do a disservice to our youth and present Christ in just a fun, comfortable way.  Rather, let’s present him for exactly who he is and see how our youth step up and take hold of him.

TAKE A MINUTE and…

1. Do this quick exercise.  Your Senior Pastor just gave you the challenge to share about Prayer to your youth next week.  Quickly, write down how you would organize your meeting?  You have to prepare an hour time frame.
2. Now, after you have prepared your mock meeting, answer these questions:

• What was your overall objective for the meeting?
• What was the 1^st thing you prepared?  Was it your game, mixer or social activity OR was it the truth about Christ you were going to present?
• Was your game tied into your teaching or was it completely separated and had no correlation?

For your next lesson, start with the Truth of Christ and then form the rest of your meeting around that. Let the Truth of Christ drive what and how we present.

The purpose of creating these was to identify values that we believe are vitally important in our ministry and commit to them.  It’s important to identify what your leadership team will be because it keeps you focused on what you view as important in your ministry.   As with all things, unless you make it clear what you are striving for as a team, no one will know for sure.  They will just be able to guess that what you are about.

At Cedar Run, we have 4 Core Leadership Values that we strive for.  They are:

1. Prayer is our work; ministry is merely the fruit of that work.
2. We can only take others as far as we have allowed ourselves to journey in Christ
3. Kids remember how we made them feel, and what they saw in us – not anything we taught them up front. Therefore, it is our relationships, not our programs that truly bear fruit.
4. Work together in unison with team members.  Be encouraging and uplifting at all time.

From my example, you can tell that we value Prayer, Personal Discipleship, Relationships and Encouragement.  What about your Youth Leadership team?  What are you about as a leadership team?  What are your goals and priorities?  Just like mission statements, there are no rhyme or reason as to what your core leadership values are.  It all depends on what you, as a leadership team, deem as important and worth striving for.

TAKE A MINUTE and…

1. Jot down some core leadership principles you want to be about as a Youth Leadership Team.
2. When you are done, present them before your volunteer leaders and together come up with your Core Leadership Values.

Since I made my purchase, I have been busy downloading Apps for my new iPhone. Whatever I am interested in, there definitely appears to be an “App for that”!  As I have been exploring this whole new world (can you feel the excitement I have been experiencing since I bought the iPhone?) it made me think about what Apps are in my Ministry Tool Bag.  What do I carry around with me that will help me minister?

Currently, in my ministry toolbag, I have my:

• MacBook so that I can be connected anywhere I go and able to work on messages. This contains all my major documents and resources we use for ministry.  Whether it is a video, a Bible or youth rosters, I carry my MacBook around whenever I can.
• Bible so that I can do my Quiet time or look through scripture for messages.  I could use my MacBook or iPhone, but sometimes I like the book form.
• iPhone (previously my Treo) so that I can stay connected to youth and the office.
• Spiral Notebook.  This carries my “To Dos” and Notes so I can scribble down some notes for an event or future talk if I don’t feel like pulling out the MacBook.

So, this being said, what is in your ministry tool bag?  Share your thoughts and why you have them in your bag.  It’d be great to see what others carry around and maybe we might be able to add that to our toolbag.

Also, if you have a cool iPhone app that I need to download, post it.

When I was the WyldLife Director for Northwest Fairfax Young Life, the volunteer leaders and I wanted to really seek the Lord and rely on Him and his provisions for our upcoming summer camp trip.  So, this one particular year, the volunteer leaders and I committed to get together each Thursday to pray during the spring and early summer for our camp trip.  We would first write on the dry/erase board our camp requests.  Then, we would pray from them and individual middle school students we really wanted to go on the trip.  When it was all said and done with, the Lord provided over 100 middle schoolers to come!  It was the largest camp trip we ever went on (and I believe the largest still) and we had a significant number of students come to know the Lord during that week!  It was a great blessing from God.

As I reflected on that camp trip, I realize that the only thing we did differently from previous years was that we strategically prayed for students and for the camp trip.  Oftentimes, in ministry, when in meetings or planning out events or curriculum, a common practice is to pray at the start.  Do you do this?  I am sure you do, but do you know why we do this? I don’t know about you, but when I pray, it is for God’s wisdom to come upon us as we make decisions so that more people may come to know Him.  As noble as this request is, should our prayer time before the Lord be more than just a thing we do before a meeting, event or a decision is to be made?

Remembering my summer camp example convicted me in how I am currently praying for the youth and the youth ministry.  I believe that if I am going to experience God’s blessings like my summer camp trip, I need to PRAY STRATEGICALLY for my ministry.   When King Solomon took over as King of Israel, the Lord gave him a chance to ask for whatever he wanted and it would be given to him.  So, in 1 Kings 3:5-14 Solomon asked for wisdom.  Why?  Because he was so young and with the responsibility he had to lead being so great, he needed God to be his wisdom and guidance.  In the same way, as Youth Pastors and Ministers, the responsibility we have to share Christ to our youth is so great, we need to be actively praying for God’s wisdom and guidance.  Why try to go at this alone?  We need to be asking God for wisdom and discernment consistently.

But, praying strategically is more than just praying for wisdom and safety for your students.  It is praying specifically for your students by name, your program for what you hope would happen and become, for your leaders (and for more leaders), and many other things on your heart.  As Christ points out in Luke 11:5-10, if we ask, seek and knock, God will provide and bless us.  So, if this is true, why wouldn’t we come before the Lord with boldness and strategically pray for our ministry.

So, how do you pray strategically?  Here are some examples:

1. Be specific.  Write down specific things you can be praying over so that, when the Lord answers it, you will be able to identify how he is working in your ministry.  Write down students by name and pray specifically over each student.
2. Pray for things that only God could provide and answer.  This isn’t an ultimate wish list kind of thing.  But, think through some areas that you know are beyond your reach and only God can do.
3. After you make a list of things to pray over, organize them to pray over them throughout the week.  For example, you can pray for your existing leaders and new leaders on Sundays and Thursdays while you pray for different students in your program daily.

Again, these are just a few examples, but as I have found out many times, it can be very easy to get into a routine and pray as we always have – not that there is anything wrong with that.  But, when we do this, I believe that we can miss out on what it means to pray intentionally and see how God blesses your prayers and your heart for others and your program.  Try something new this week and refresh or create a prayer strategy so that you can see God at work.

TAKE A MINUTE and…

1. Examine your prayer strategy.  Do you have one?  Do you need to update it or change it in some way?  Look over it and update it as needed or create one.
2. After you have created or updated your prayer strategy, have your volunteer leaders look over it and offer input to so that they feel included and a part of the process.

If you have any thoughts or comments on it, post it hear and we can get a good dialogue going.

Although I have been very grateful for all she has done so far, I know that she has been overwhelmed at different times since her arrival.  A big part of this is because ever since she came on board in July, she has been swamped with what people are expecting her to do.  They will stop her on Sunday morning or send her emails about what they feel her job is.  Have you ever had people try to tell you all the things they think you should be doing?  I’m sure you have because as non-mega Church Youth Pastors, we are expected to be the “All-in-One”.  We are the face, heart and soul of the ministry (thanks for the phrase Barry Hill).  Because of this, it can be very easy for us to forget what our purpose in ministry is.

During times like these we need to step back and remember the primary reason we got involved in youth ministry.  That is to invest in students and win them to Christ.  The fact is for us to do effective youth ministry, we need to be out with students regularly getting to know who they are, what they like and building trust so that you can take them deeper in Christ one step at a time.  It is NOT to be locked up in offices from 9 to 5.  It is NOT to create cool programs or events.  It is NOT to send letters out.  And it is NOT to come up with the hippest run-on characters.  Although all these aspects are important and necessary, our primary responsibility is to be with students.

So, how are you doing with that?

TAKE A MINUTE and…

1. Examine where are you spending your time.  Are you spending enough time with students or are you getting trapped doing other responsibilities too much?
2. What could you do today and the rest of this week to invest in the youth in your program?

What is 5th Quarter?
5th Quarter is a weekly event we do every Friday night from 9:30 – 11:30 pm during the local high school football season.  We open our church up to any and all middle and high school students, although we see very few middle schoolers as it involves parents driving.

It is not an original event in any way, but what we do to it adds a little “Cedar Run” to the mix.  The purpose of 5th Quarter is two-fold:

1. Offer a safe alternative for middle and high school youth to come after the high school football games.  It is our hope that instead of them having nothing to do, hence getting in trouble or going to parties, that they would choose to come to Cedar Run and hang out in a great place where they can be themselves and have a great time doing it.
2. Be a bridge into our program.  We want others to start coming to Cedar Run after they experience 5th Quarter.

How does it work?

For us, 5th Quarter is simple.  We open the whole Church up (which isn’t huge) and allow the kids to pick and choose to do whatever they want.  If they want to go outside and play football or death hack, they can (if you don’t know what death hack is, it is a cross between hackie sack and dodgeball – lots of fun).  If they want to go upstairs and play video games or watch a movie, they can.  If they just want to sit at tables and socialize with their friends, they can!  Again, it is simple.

We have added different things to 5th Quarter throughout the 2 years we have been doing it.  At different times, we have added s’mores (usually when it gets colder), a coffeehouse format where we have leaders or kids perform in a corner for others, and we have even experimented with a dance party room.

Ultimately, our goal is not to to structure it too much, but allow the youth to come and just be themselves.  It seems like that is a great option for them as we draw around 60 students each Friday night.

How does it Bridge students into the Program?

This is just our 2nd year doing 5th Quarter, but already we have seen new students who come to 5th Quarter start showing up at other Cedar Run events, in particular Sunday morning.  What 5th Quarter shows students is that Cedar Run is a safe and cool place to come.  Therefore, it is our hope that they want to check us out on a Sunday morning or one of the Special events that we do.

When new students come to 5th Quarter, they are often blown away by the food, the hospitality, the fun and the simple fact that they can be themselves.  We don’t have a program and there is no outreach talk given (although we probably could do one).  We just give them a safe place to come and a positive alternative to other Friday night options.

5th Quarter is a great bridge event that works for us because of 3 key groups of people:

1. Leaders – Each week we have 5th Quarter, we get a lot of our leaders to come out and participate.  When they do come, they quickly see that this is a perfect opportunity for them to do contact work with new students.  It is a blessing that our leaders are very relational with students so this event is a great opportunity for them to come out and build new friendships. As new students get comfortable with the leaders, it increases the likelihood that they will come to Cedar Run.
2. Students – Our leaders are able to meet so many new people each week because our students bring their friends out.  A lot of our students (especially the core student leaders) are very outreach oriented.  They want their friends to come meet Christ and so they have no issue with bringing them to Cedar Run.  Without them bringing their friends when we first started last year, this could have easily turned into a Cedar Run only event – which is not the intent.
3. Parents – This is a great way to involve parents.  We have parents bring food, help serve the food and even mingle with the students.  Last week, we found out that one of the parents can is a get card magician.  He had half the group hanging on his every trick!  What a great opportunity for students to see parents involved and that they care about their children. Without parents there to help and take care of the food, it would mean that our leaders would not be able to hang out and do contact work with the students as much.  Plus, it gives parents a sense of what we do and who we are ministering to.

5th Quarter is a great bridge event that works very well for us and I believe it can work for you all as well.  So, while it is still fresh in your mind, TAKE A MINUTE and…

1. Think through whether or not you can do a 5th Quarter.  It is not too late to do at least 1 or 2 of them this year.  We plan 5th Quarter every Friday night after the football games. So, when the football season ends, our season ends.  So, you still have time to organize and put one on.
2. If you feel that 5th Quarter doesn’t work for your area, what could you do that is similar enough to 5th Quarter, but be called something different?  The key for us is that your church is a safe place for people to go to instead of going out and getting into trouble.  So, is there something you could do instead but have the same effect?

Like this post or have a different idea, post a comment so we can be encouraging each other reach students for Christ!

Robbie (far right) and some students from an Adventure Discipleship Trip

Following Jesus is an adventure.  No, following Jesus is the greatest adventure that anyone will ever undertake in their entire lives.  When Jesus called his disciples, He called them in simplicity and in power.  This ragamuffin group of individuals was a motley crew and Jesus’ challenge to them was unmistakably clear, “He said to them, ‘Follow Me, and I will make you fishers of men.’  They immediately left their nets and followed Him.”  The early disciples could not have known what Jesus had in store for them as they went out to be with Him. In Matthew 8:19-20, a certain scribe came, and said to Jesus that he would follow Him wherever He went, and Jesus said to him, “Foxes have holes and birds of the air have nests, but the Son of Man has nowhere to lay His head.”

The disciples were called to give up everything they knew to be safe and secure and to follow their Rabbi, to learn from Him, and to help accomplish His mission.  They were called into community and mission that radically changed them and the world as we know it.  As Jesus led His followers, He equipped them to lead to do the work that He had for them to do.  The church was born out of Jesus’ work and His work in His first disciples.

We are also called by Jesus to make disciples as Jesus commands us, “Go therefore and  make disciples of all the nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all things that I have commanded you; and lo, I am with you always, even to the end of the age.’ Amen (Matt. 28:18-20).”  We are called to radical obedience in discipleship and in disciple making just as these early disciples were called out of what they knew to be comfortable into what God meant to be an adventure of a lifetime which wasn’t always comfortable.

At the onset of the early church, we see the beginning of this community as one who, as Acts 4:32-35 puts it, “Were of one heart and one soul;  neither did anyone say that any of the things he possessed was his own, but they had all things in common.  And with great power the apostles gave witness to the resurrection of the Lord Jesus. And great grace was upon them all.  Nor was there anyone among them who lacked; for all who were possessors of lands or houses sold them, and brought the proceeds of the things that were sold,  and laid them at the apostles’ feet;  and they distributed to each as anyone had need.” This following of Jesus is an adventure like no other.   It is wild and demands our full attention and affections if we are to “Take up our cross and follow Him (Matt. 16:24).”

I have put together a program and outreach called Adventure Discipleship that attempts to get back to this wild side of discipleship in our tame and cultivated culture of safety.  Adventure Discipleship focuses on a series of interactive and experiential activities and lessons in the wilderness, and other untamed environments, to teach discipleship and leadership.  These activities include service projects and short term missions, backpacking and hiking, canoeing and kayaking, mountain biking, rock climbing and rappelling, low ropes, leadership, and initiative activities, and hands on carpentry, construction, and repair classes.  Using these activities as a jumping off point, teaching about following Jesus naturally occurs through teachable moments and active learning, through doing and experience, and “ah hah moments.”

Backpacking is one of my personal favorite adventure discipleship opportunities because you get to live in Christian community together, like in the Acts 4 scripture above.  You also get the opportunity to break bread together, and lean on one another as you “’Love the Lord your God with all your passion and prayer and intelligence.’ and ‘Love others as well as you love yourself (Matt. 22:36-40).’”  Backpacking provides time and space for intensive periods of worship, learning, Sabbath, recreation, fellowship, service, and encountering God out in His creation as Romans 1:19-20 puts it, “But the basic reality of God is plain enough. Open your eyes and there it is! By taking a long and thoughtful look at what God has created, people have always been able to see what their eyes as such can’t see: eternal power, for instance, and the mystery of his divine being. So nobody has a good excuse.”

When Jesus started His ministry He was led into the wilderness to encounter testing and He was ministered to by Angels.  While Adam failed to obey God in a garden paradise, Jesus obeyed God in a deserted wilderness (Matt. 4).  Just as God led Jesus into the wilderness, God calls his followers to wild, uncommon, uncomfortable, and unsafe places in life to learn of His desire for us to have fellowship with Him, know of His goodness, and follow His mission.  God has a history of growing intimacy between Himself and His followers, and shaping and growing His disciples, in the wilderness.   Discipleship is wild and adventurous because our God is wild and adventurous, which is why following Him is the greatest adventure of a lifetime!

Adventure Discipleship seeks to put discipleship back into adventure and adventure back into discipleship.  We so often tame the gospel in how we present it.  God has so much more in store for us than the ordinary when we seek to follow Him and seek Him out in all we do.  This could include sleeping out under the stars and considering what it would be like to “have no place to lay your head.”  It could include making personal sacrifices to “give a cup of cold water to the least of these.”  It could be finding out that faith is not blind but that it is in something.  As you rock climb and trust your equipment and are belayed, “faith being sure of the things that are hoped for (Heb. 11)” takes on a whole new meaning.   It could be learning how to lead and make disciples as you lead your group on a hike.  It could mean a deeper understanding of suffering and “picking up your cross and following Him” as you carry your mountain bike up a mountain and think of a wounded and beaten Jesus carrying His cross up a mountainside for us.  It could be contemplating Jesus walking on water or preaching from a boat as you canoe a lake or a river.

Discipleship is an adventure and so is living for and following Jesus, so shouldn’t the way we learn about the gospel and following Jesus be an adventure as well?

To learn more about Adventure Discipleship or to read my blogs on discipleship, check out: http://www.adventurediscipleship.com/ and http://robbiepruitt.blogspot.com/ .

So, as I process (and get overwhelmed), I wonder if anyone can identify with my craziness and post how they deal with it all.  Here is what is running through my mind:

• What leaders and I meeting with this week to go over their personal and ministry goals for the year?
• How can I deal with a fellow staffer accusing my newly hired Youth Associate of dressing inappropriately (when she was not dressed inappropriately)?
• I need to start working on my weekend retreat talks and finishing planning the weekend retreat.  When am I going to do that?
• I need to find more parents to help at our Friday night 5th Quarter event.  Who are they?
• I need to get a letter out to our parents ASAP explaining our upcoming Sex and Dating series.  How can I do that when I don’t even know how to mail merge??
• I need to get a leaders email out to get them focused on the week ahead and how to follow up with students.
• When am I going to take a day(s) off this week since I’m gone on Saturday and back for Church on Sunday morning?

CAN ANYONE RELATE?????  It’s kinda funny?