From Sampler to Sower

Weekend Teaching Series: Avatar

Message Title: Avatars and Incarnation

Sermon in a Sentence: We do not need to fear rejection when we approach God, because He chose us.

Text(s): Ephesians 1:3-14

Weekend Scale of Difficulty: 3 out of 10, Again, a fairly straightforward message that was fun to preach.

Message Summary:

We began by watching the following clip.  (The embedded copy is from YouTube.  We got our clip from WingClips.com.)

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Mythbusters: Water's Edge

Weekend Teaching Series: Mythbusters: Water’s Edge

Message Title: Myth #5: If you give up on hope, then you’ll be happy.

Sermon in a Sentence: Biblical hope does not disappoint because it is grounded in a God who does not fail.

Text(s): Ecclesiastes 9:3-5, Isaiah 38:18, Romans 5:1-5

Weekend Scale of Difficulty:8 of 10; This week’s lesson incorporated several videos which all had to be cued at the right time, plus shooting the best (and most complicated) of our Mythbusters videos.

Message Summary:

This week we wrap up our Mythbusters series with a sermon on hope. Originally we were going to complete the trilogy of faith, hope and love, but a couple of snow days and the fact that our next series is set to coincide with Lent means we have to cut it short and wrap up this week.

We began by showing a video from eleven72 called Change IS Possible.  It features a guy singing about hope.  Only he realizes as he sings that some people never change, and hoping they will really is meaningless.  The song ends with the line: “There is no hope.  Give up on hope.  If you give up on hope then you’ll be happy. Or whatever.” The video closes with text on the screen encouraging viewers not to give up on hope, but we made sure to stop the video before that.  Our fifth myth was the closing line of the song – “If you give up on hope, then you’ll be happy.”

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Mythbusters: Water's Edge

Weekend Teaching Series: Mythbusters: Water’s Edge

Message Title: Myth #4: All You Gotta Do is Believe

Sermon in a Sentence: Biblical faith moves from mental assent, to trust, to obedience, and ultimately to an experience of God’s grace.

Text(s): Genesis 15:6; John 3:36, 6:29; Acts 8;Romans 5:1; 2 Corinthians 1:22; Ephesians 2:8-9

Weekend Scale of Difficulty: 6 of 10 Yeah, we did another custom video (see below) but that’s nothing new.  The only “new” thing was having to convert a Quicktime video clip from wingclips.com so it would play in EasyWorship.  (We use Super for video conversions. I thoroughly recommend it.  I do not, however, necessarily recommend EasyWorship.  It has some real plusses, but also some significant drawbacks.)

Message Summary:

The message this week focused on what exactly the Bible means by “Faith.”

We started off talking about the “power of positive thinking.”  Showed a quick video clip from the movie Paul Blart: Mall Cop from wingclips.com.  If you haven’t checked them out yet, I’d strongly recommend it.  They have a detailed and current index of movie clips.  What is more, you can get the clips directly from them, including clips from movies that are in theaters right now, like Mall Cop.  Seeing a clip from an “In Theaters” movie instantly got students attention.  Next time it might not, but for the first time we’ve used Wingclips, it was an instant attention getter.

The clip we showed featured Paul Blart (Kevin James) explaining that “the mind is the only weapon that doesn’t need a holster.”

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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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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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Write Them On My Heart

Weekend Teaching Series: Write them On My Heart (A series on the 10 Commandments)

Message Title: Word Ten: No Coveting What Belongs to Another

Sermon in a Sentence: In a world filled with greedy actions motivated by self-interest, God calls his people to serve others from a heart of love.

Text(s): Genesis 2:9, 3:6; Deuteronomy 5:21, Psalm 19:9-10, 68:19, Song of Songs 2:3, Romans 7:7-8

Weekend Scale of Difficulty: 6 of 10, Pretty straightfoward service, only video was a pre-service countdown.  The only hard part was doing Chrsitmas songs for worship because we don’t play those a lot.  (That and the sleet storm that kept more than half our crowd away.)

Message Summary:

We wrapped up our 10 Commandments series with a review of the commandments so far.

We noted:

• They aren’t really commandments — with the exception of #5, none are in the imperative case and the Bible calls them the 10 “Words” or “decalogue”.
• They aren’t commandments because commandments are essentially options.  Rules provide ultimatums – either do this or if not, the consequence will be . . .  – and then leave the choice to obey with the hearer.
• The 10 Words are statements of fact.  They are not optional.  If we are God’s people, this is how we will live.  God does not say “Don’t murder or else. . . “  He simply states “You will not murder.”
• The first “half” (1-4) deal with our relationship with God the second half (5-9) deal with our relationship with others.
• And while the common approach to the Ten Words is to reduce them to a list of rules to hang on the wall and force others to abide by them, God actually desires to write these qualities on our heart, making us into the type of people he describes.

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Whoo-hoo!  According to the comments, Josh Griffin of morethandodgeball.com and Saddleback Church has been to the site and checked out the weekly reviews.  That matters to me because Josh was the inspiration for this series of posts.  Now, if more of you youth pastors out there would start posting weekly reviews I’d really be happy.  Post one on your blog, and post the link in the comments so we can check it out.

Weekend Teaching Series: Write them On My Heart (A series on the 10 Commandments)

Message Title: Word Nine: No False Testimony

Sermon in a Sentence: The ninth word prohibits using our words to hurt others through dishonesty, fraud, gossip, complaints or bullying.

Text(s): Deuteronomy 5:20; 1 Kings 21; James 3:6; Ephesians 4:29

Weekend Scale of Difficulty: 9 out of 10, couple of videos, couple of new songs (at least that we don’t play on a regular basis) and an attempt at using Twitter to help reinforce the message meant this was anything but the same old, same old for our staff.

Message Summary:

We began by looking at the story of Naboth’s vineyard from 1 Kings 21.  Long story short, when Queen Jezebel found her husband whining because Naboth refused to sell his vineyard, she arranged for two false witnesses to testify against Naboth.  Naboth is stoned for a crime he didn’t commit.  Ahab seizes his property.  And Elijah confronts the wicked king, pronouncing God’s judgment on the crime of false testimony, underscoring how seriously He takes the ninth commandment.

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Weekend Teaching Series: Write them On My Heart (A series on the 10 Commandments)

Message Title: Word Five: You will Honor Your Father and Mother

Sermon in a Sentence: God calls us to understand the importance of our parents in our life, and to treat them with the respect they deserve.

Text(s): Deuteronomy 5:16; Ephesians 6:1

Weekend Scale of Difficulty: 7 of 10; Two video clips tonight, including one that needed some editing.  Lots of unusual buttons and cues for tech crew.  But what really made it tough was the subject matter.  If you’re honest and faithful both to scripture and the realities in which your teens live, this subject can be messy and brings up tough questions that defy easy answers.

Message Summary: We started by breaking out the Beat Box and kickin’ it old school.  The year was 1988.  It was the summer after my eighth grade year.  (And yes, that really is me on the right.)  I was at Purdue university, enrolled in their Star program, taking classes in Biology and Chemistry.  I was walking from my dorm to the science building for class when a car drove by with windows down.  And for the first time in my life, this boy from Nowhereville, Indiana heard rap.  It was DJ Jazzy Jeff and the Fresh Prince with their 1988 hit “Parents Just Don’t Understand”

(Did you know that iTunes actually sells this old music video?  It was at this point that we played it. Or at least the first “verse.” Before you show it, take time to examine the graffiti in the background and edit out any you find too offensive. It goes by quick and is hard to notice, but you might want to redact some of it.)

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I’m stealing an idea from Josh Griffin at morethandodgeball.com.  Here’s a brief rundown of what went down last week at Water’s Edge.  I always find Josh’s interesting.  Maybe you’ll find ours the same:

Weekend Teaching Series: Write them On My Heart (A series on the 10 Commandments)

Message Title: Word Four: You will pay careful attention to the Sabbath

Sermon in a Sentence: God instituted the idea of a Sabbath rest to challenge the way we understand our place in the world.

Text(s): Deuteronomy 5:12-15

Weekend Scale of Difficulty: 5of 10, The message pretty much wrote itself, and the music wasn’t a challenge, but there were multiple video clips to challenge the tech crew.

Message Summary: We flipped the service again this week.  Sermon first, music afterward.  Began by using the Highway Video’s Identity video to ask the question “Where do you find your identity?” Then we talked about how we see ourselves.  Used several “About Me” sections from students’ facebook pages to look at the words we use to describe ourselves.  From there we transitioned into the categories the world uses to identify us.  Here we played a clip from Baraka (a great movie you’ve probably never heard of) to provide visuals while I spoke from the back of the room.

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