From Sampler to Sower

Your Peek Behind the Curtain

Okay, this is a new one for me.  I don’t know how, or even if, this will work, but I’m going to give it a shot.

You, dear reader, are hereby offered a All-Access Backstage Pass to our youth ministry’s creative process.  We’re bringing you backstage, and inviting you to check out what’s going on behind the curtain.

Of course, that means you’re getting a glimpse of a work in progress and not the finished product.  As such, this post, and others like it will probably be rambling and scatterbrained, big on ideas, short -at least at first- on actual implementation.

As you know if you are following my weekly updates, our youth ministry is currently in a teaching series called Mythbusters.  It’s set to conclude on Tuesday, February 17th, following our final three lessons focused on Faith, Hope and Love.  That means we’re just under one month out on our next series – high time to get working on what’s next.

Next on the teaching schedule is a Lenten series, culminating, like most Lenten seasons, with an Easter celebration.  Our teaching will be guided by the Lectionary’s epistle readings.

My goal, every Lent, is to very intentionally challenge students to develop the daily disciplines which will ground their faith in an ever deepening relationship with the God whose name they claim.  That’s not to say that during Epiphany I attempt to help they develop a superficial version of Christianity that only affects their Sunday mornings and Tuesday nights – it’s just that Lent provides an intentional time every year to teach them to focus on the presence of God in every part of their life.

And so, I find myself wondering what we will do this year to help move us toward this goal.

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Normally about not I’d be posting a weekly update about what happened this week at Water’s Edge.

However, with the Indianapolis area getting its biggest snow in 13 years Tuesday night (tied for #6 biggest accumulation since they started keeping track) we didn’t have any midweek services this week.

(Honestly, 12 inches doesn’t seem like that much, for someone from the land of lake effect snow, but hey, who’s counting?)  Here’s some proof of the snow instead.

Photos courtesy of my wife, Michelle.

My son, Bryce, lying in wait.

St Francis Contemplates the Accumulation

Emergency Yodel Button

Okay, it’s official.

Christmas list 2009 has been started.

I want one of these.

The Shane I Remember

I spend five years teaching Shane.  He wasn’t part of our youth ministry when I first started.  Born in 1986, he was still to young in 1995 when I first began youth ministry at the Decatur Trinity Church of the Nazarene.  But when I left Decatur in 2002, he was a long time member of our youth group and one of the kids I could count on to be at every event.  By then, I could hardly imagine a youth ministry without Shane in it.

Now almost seven years later I find I’m going to have to start imagining a world without Shane in it.

It’s still not really clear what really happened, at least not to me.  Apparently on Friday night January 16, Shane (22) went to the hospital with some breathing problems.  By 7:30 the next morning this young man was dead.

And so last Friday I climbed in my car and headed back to Decatur, IL to attend his funeral.  This was a new experience for me.  I’ve been fortunate.  After 14 years in youth ministry, this is my first funeral for someone who was or is a part of my youth ministry.  I realize that many of my colleagues have had to face tragedies like this before.  But up until now, I had not.

And so, as I made the four hour drive back to Illinois, I did a lot of  thinking and, understandably, a lot of it about Shane.  I began to realize that while I had spent five years teaching Shane, Shane had been teaching me.  Here’s what I learned:

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I was back in my old stomping grounds in Illinois last weekend. And it was nice to be back.  I spent my first seven years of ministry in Decatur, in the very heart of Illinois.  Prior to that I spent three years at Olivet Nazarene University in Bourbonnais earning on my undergraduate degree in ministry.  Ten years creates some strong connections with a state.

Chicago's 50,000 Watt Blowtorch

During those years I fell in love with talk radio. It was before the age of iPods and podcasts.  It was before I discovered the beauty of audiobooks.  Talk radio was the easiest way to keep my mind engaged when doing otherwise mindless tasks.  Yes, I fell in love with talk radio.

I’m not talking about the bile and vitriol of nationally syndicated programs like Limbaugh, Colmes and Schlessinger (at least those were the big names back then).  I’m talking about local talk. Don Wade and Roma in the morning, Roe Conn and Garry Meier during the afternoon drive, and especially Jay Marvin’s late nights – the local lineup back in the day for Chicago’s “50,000 watt blowtorch” WLS 890 AM.

Illinois Governor Rod Blagojevich

During my recent return to the state I left seven years ago, I was thrilled to discover that WLS hasn’t gone the way of so much talk radio, trading local talk for the glitz, glamor and low production costs of syndicated blather.  (Or at least, not completely.  I did run into a rebroadcast of Sean Hannity’s show around 7 pm) and quickly fired the iPod back up.)  Roe Conn wasn’t on air that Friday but his spot was being filled by another local voice and even better, they then rebroadcast that morning’s 40-some minute Don Wade and Roma interview with embattled Illinois Governor Rod Blagojevich whose impeachment trial on corruption charges is slated to begin today.

Now, while I myself may be a bit of a political junkie, and I am known to twitter about politics from time to time, I don’t intend this to be a political blog.  I normally wouldn’t write about this interview here.  But one part of the interview in particular caught my attention.

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Mythbusters: Water's Edge

Weekend Teaching Series: Mythbusters: Water’s Edge

Message Title: Myth #3: It’s to late for me to go home now

Sermon in a Sentence: You are God’s child, and there will always be a place at home for you.

Text(s): Matthew 12:31-32; Luke 15:11-24

Weekend Scale of Difficulty: 6 of 10; Again, about the only difficult thing was producing another episode of our Mythbusters spoof videos.

Message Summary:

This week I decided to offer something even better than a summary.  If you’re interested, I’ve posted the full audio of the sermon in our Senior High Service.

Of course, if you’d rather read a summary, here it is.

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Last week was a crazy week.  Didn’t get much done by the way of blogging unfortunately.  But I didn’t forget you all . . .

Here it is, the Week in Review for our second night in the Mythbuster’s series.

Mythbusters: Water's Edge

Weekend Teaching Series: Mythbusters

Message Title: Myth Two: God Doesn’t Speak to People Any More

Sermon in a Sentence: If we want to hear God’s voice, we need to stop reading the Bible and start eating it.

Text(s): Deuteronomy 11:18; Joshua 1:8;1 Samuel 3; Psalm 1:2; 2 Timothy 2:15; James 1:22; Revelation 10:9

Weekend Scale of Difficulty: 7 of 10, now that our set is set, this service was fairly easy.  The only real challenge was making yet another episode of Mythbusters: Water’s Edge

Message Summary: We started with the story of the calling of Samuel, a young man dedicated to God by his mother Hannah, who grew up in the Tabernacle serving God and the High Priest Eli.  Late one night the Bible tells us that Samuel heard a voice calling his name.  He got up, went to the side of the aging Eli the priest, as he probably did fairly often, and asked “What is it you want?”  Eli tells Samuel that he did not call him, and sends him back to bed.

The Bible tells us this happens three times before the High Priest realizes what’s going on.  Finally it dawns on the old priest that God is calling the boy.

Now we can understand why young Samuel might be confused.  What doesn’t make sense is Eli’s response.  How can the High Priest of Israel fail to recognize the voice of God?

I suspect it’s because Eli fell for our second myth: God doesn’t speak to people any more.

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August Gottleib Spangenberg (1704-1792)

It started again yesterday.

About once a year I teach a course entitled “Exploring John Wesley’s Theology” for the Northeastern Indiana Church of the Nazarene’s School of Ministry.  And it’s that time of year.  My fifth session of that class started last night.

I’m not complaining.  I really enjoy the class, far more than the ethics class they made me teach last year.  And the students are great.

But as I worked my way back through the story of John Wesley’s early life something stood out to me.

Anyone who is familiar with Wesley’s biography understands that the young Wesley was constantly torn apart by fear and doubt, particularly about the status of his soul.

These feelings of despair only deepened when in late 1735 he left England to come to Georgia (the American colony) to serve as a missionary.  During their winter crossing of the Atlantic, about one week before their arrival in the colony, the  ship in which they traveled was caught in a severe storm – or at least it seemed severe to Wesley who appears to have had an incredible fear of the ocean up until that time.

When the storm struck, Wesley – who served as the ship’s chaplain – was worshipping with a group of Moravians, German Christians who were followers of the teachings of Ludwig von Zinzendorf.  In his journal, Wesley recounts what happened.

In the midst of the psalm wherewith their service began, the sea broke over, split the mainsail in pieces, covered the ship, and poured in between the decks, as if the great deep had already swallowed us up.  A terrible screaming began among the English.  The Germans calmly sang on.  I asked one of them afterward, “Was you not afraid?’  He answered, “I thank God, no.”  I asked, “But were not your women and children afraid?”  He replied mildly, “No; our women and children are not afraid to die.”

But while even the Moravian children were not afraid of death, Wesley was.  And that fact troubled him given his doubts about his own salvation.

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Sacrifice 10 Friends for a Free Whopper

First of all, I have to give all credit to Lifehacker for first bringing this to my attention.

Burger King is currently running a hilarious viral promotion.  They’ve developed a new Facebook app which will allow users to “sacrifice” 10 friends in exchange for a free whopper.  Install the app, drop two handfulls of friends, and get yourself a coupon for free food.

According to their promotional materials, an entry will even appear in your timeline highlighting the fact that your former confrere has been flame-broiled in pursuit of the king of sandwhiches.

The coming of Epiphany also marks the beginning of second semester for our school students.  And it marks the end of Christmas break and the return of our weekly youth services.  So, here it is, our first Week in Review of 2009.

Mythbusters: Water's Edge

Weekly Teaching Series: Mythbusters: Water’s Edge

Message Title: Myth #1: It’s the motions that matter

Sermon in a Sentence: It’s time to stop going through the motions of Christianity and begin seeking God as our first priority and greatest desire.

Text(s): Deuteronomy 4:29, 1 Samuel 13, 2 Chronicles 15, Matthew 5:6, 7:7-8

Weekend Scale of Difficulty: 10 of 10; This was a lot of fun, but a lot of work.  Christmas Break was blessing and curse.  Gave us some extra time to get our Christmas set down and the Mythbusters set up, but vacation also ate up some of that extra time.  Also, a we launched a series of in-house Mythbusters episodes which added a lot to the complexity.

Mythbusters Set, for more info and higher res, click on picture.

Message Summary: This message in a nutshell was the tale of two kings, Saul (of Israel) and Asa (of Judah).  Saul became king of Israel during a time of war and unrest.  He was anointed by the prophet Samuel who gave him some pretty clear instructions: “Go to Gilgal and wait.  In seven days I will come and we will offer sacrifices.  But don’t do anything until I come and tell you what to do.”  Saul obeyed – gathering the armies of Israel to do battle with the Philistines.

When they arrived they were shocked and awed by the enemy facing them – 3,000 chariots, 6,000 charioteers and more soldiers than they could count.  The soldiers of Israel are scared, but Saul tells them “Just wait, Samuel’s coming.”

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