I am willing and able….well, ok…Im just able.

Have you ever had someone throw out a blank offer, one which you know they never expect you to take them up on? “Hey, let us know if you ever need any help” followed by a quick shuffle and then almost a sprint out the door as they run before you can say “actually….we could use you on Friday”.

Sometimes I feel ministry is full of those blank offers. Im guilty of doing it myself. We make ourselves open by saying we are willing and able, when in truth we are, at best able, but certianly not willing. I think over the course of the year we had 6-7 dinner invitations extended to us, and only one was ever followed up on. I think I offered to hang out with some of our girls upwards of a dozen times and maybe followed through on half of the occasions. There is something in us that feels if we extend the offer we have done enough.

This year we had a family offer to help us out whenever we needed it, and they truly meant it. They changed plans and brought thier whole family with them, but they did whatever it took to make it work. We were so so thankful for these people. Another couple offered there time and although they were not able to make it because of previous engagements, they prepared everything in advance and had it waiting for us when we got there. We appreciated thier help so much.

On the other hand, you have those times when you actually follow someone up on these offers, and they quickly and strategically manuever themselves out of the initial invitation. Or sometimes they forget that they even offered, or we have even had people selectivly chose which actvities they would help with and which kids they could handle. My favorite are those who think they have made themselves available, but have never actually spoken to you abotu it.

But, my oiint was not to tell stories, rather to define true willingness. I need to do more reasearch, but I think true willingness is displayed pretty well by a few huge bible peeps; the disciples, Ruth, Paul, Noah, etc…

After thinking abotu this, I decided that when I extend an invitation or an offer of help from this point on, I am going to make
sure that I :
– can follow through
– can make it specific so that I can follow through
– look the person in the eye
– have time to discuss the possible times/dates/locations

I want to make sure that I am not just able to help, but that I am truly willing as well.

Leaving Sucks

A couple of month ago my husband and I decided that we were stepping down from our youth ministry position. We currently live an hour away from the community that we do youth ministry in, which has become an issue (that is for next blog). We are also thinking of relocating.
Yesterday was the day we decided that we would tell our core group of teens. FRICK! While I stood there staring at gapping mouths and tear streaked cheeks, I came to this very profound conclusion: Leaving Sucks!
I dont know if there is actually an easy way to say it. Not only have we developed some pretty serious relationships with these kids, but they already have the Payton (OTH) approach to life “People always leave” and we just proved their theories right. Most of these kids come from broken homes, broken families or broken relationships. They are used to people walking out on them; they are used to feeling alone. We tried to be there for them and mend some of those wounds, and now…..all in vain.

Leaving Sucks!

Encourage your Pastor!

Ministry is tricky!
No matter how RAD we think we are, someone also thinks were pretty BAD. Just when we think we are being lead by complete obedience to God, someone out there thinks we are defying the very pleadings of the Gospel.
I guess that is where we found ourselves this past week. After months of confrontation and subtle gestures of disapproval, one of our youth helpers gave us the ultimatum of “My way or no way”. We had thought that we were able to resolve this issue between our youth leadership staff, but apparently we were unsuccessful. Ouch.
So, we called the Senior Pastor. I was anxious to say the least. What if he sided with this guy over us? What if we were wrong all along? What if…?
After a very fruitful conversation I realized two things: A) We have an amazing pastor who will back his staff even if it puts his own job on the line. He truely believes in us and what we stand for. That speaks heaps about him as a spiritual leader as well as a mentor.
B) There is no one way of ministry that is complete without the other forms complimenting it. Your form of ministry might be good, but it is not complete unless the other forms are working along side it.
So, I guess after dealing with this in the past weeks I have become very thankful to our pastor. I dont think we express this gratitude enough. I seached the internet to find some creative ways to help our pastor and show our appreciation for his Godly-ness, wisdom, willingness, and understanding. Here is what I came up with…

http://www.christianitytoday.com/tc/1999/sepoct/9r5035.html

(I like #3)

http://www.my-pastor.com/pastor-appreciation.html

http://www.victorious.org/blesspastor.htm (I really Like this!)

If you have any other ideas, let me know. Lets get creative!

Godtube no longer.

Im sad to see that Godtube is no longer. It still kind of exists with in the site www.tangle.com but just the name itself was killer.

Nevertheless, I made our youth group a tangle account and hope that it gets as much use as Godtube did.

Generosity

This past Friday the youth group that my husband and I lead in a little dinky rural town of 900 people, we had a fundraiser. It was a mystery dinner. Let me explain. We had a chef prepare some amazing food, but we made the menu names very mysterious and a tad bit risky. Diners at our restaurant had to order every detail of thier menu from cutlery to dessert. We had elders in our church eating spaghetti with a skewer and a soup ladel. It was absolutely hilarious.

We did this as a fundraiser to go to an up-comming youth conference in our area. Our goal was to raise $1000.00, which we thought was a bit high, but we really wanted to make a dent in our expenses. To make a long story short…we quadrupled our goal!

We worked really hard to prepare for this dinner, and the youth did a tremenous job of serving, hosting, cooking and cleaning up afterward. But the one thing that stuck out in my head when the night was over was “WOW, People are generous!”

Some of the people who came have never stepped foot in a church before…but they gave. Some people were born in that church….and they gave. Some people just sold a multi million dollar company…they gave. And some people smiled as they gave the last small change in thier wallet.

Why?

Was it the cause that people got excited about supporting? Was it the kids? Did people need a quick tax write-off? Were some people tired of being asked to help, so they decided to do thier good deed by donating?

I refuse to believe that anyone there gave out of guilt, pity or through gritted teeth. Each person left with a smile 4x the size they walked in with and no one was clutching their wallet as they ducked out the doors. The were truely cheerful givers.

That impresses me.

So, I guess my challange now is “how do we pay it forward?”

Any idea’s?

Blessings when we least Expect

I havn’t been doing youth ministry for very long…not in comparison to people who have been at it for decades anyway, but I never cease to be amazed at how BIG God really is.

This past week I was completely and utterly discouraged! There wasn’t a nice thing I could say about anyone young person in my group. They had all let me down in one way or another. On our way into the youth bible study that my husband and I lead, I had a little breakdown and explained through gusts of steaming “DUHHHHHHH’s” that I didnt want to see any of them for a whole week so that we could all make it out of a room alive.

When we arrived there was only one person there. I thought that God had really answered my prayers and was giving me a night off to cool down. Suddenly, I van pulled up and 7 kids poured out of the doors. It took a few moments to register the events. To anyone else that sight may not have meant anything, but to my husband and I that was BLESSING #1. You see, we have been praying and encouraging our scattered group to develop a comradery of sorts within the group. To become dependable on each other and to be able to rely on each other in times of need. We wanted them to start looking beyond the clothes, jobs, homes, & hair and to look at what they have in common…JESUS. This group had decided after church that they should all go to one members farm and try to milk a cow…how random!

The SECOND BLESSING came when I saw the last girl slide through the quickly closing van door. It was someone we had been praying for since we began as youth leaders. She had never come to a bible study and was pretty sparse at anything other than the “fun” events. I could not believe that she came! I was so excited I kept telling her how happy I was to see her out…until she started looking at me as if I was some sort of weirdo.

Going into the night I had a very well thought out message to present to the youth, one on grace. Moments before we walked in the door I wanted to change it to something based more one “Respect, Rolemodels, Responsibilities, and Dissapointment” to suit my mood better, but I decided that I had already poured all this work into the lesson on grace that I might as well use it. I was already a bit emotional, so I gave out the official warning to the teens. I was going to cry. And I did, But I also got through the whole thing. BLESSING #3 came when I realized that the kids were actually listening and taking this stuff in. They were responding, they were smiling and then…..they were crying.

The crying was actually BLESSING #4. Remember the gal I mentioned above? Well, something clicked that night. We spent a good part of the night sitting in the woman’s washroom (thats kinda where our girls like to hang out…I know its weird) talking and praying about what we had just read/ learned/ saw.  Very Cool God!

And finally, BLESSING #5…I had a parent tell me later in the week that there teen had come home and told them that it was one of the best bible studies ever.

I know it had nothing to do with me, God gave me all of it. And in addition he gave me all these blessings. Its funny that the moment we think that we can no longer go on, God just pulls us back up by the scruff of the neck and wipes off all the dirt, tosses a new shirt our way and says “You and me can do this!” Its that empowering grace that God gives us when we finally realize that we can’t do it by ourselves.

This is the vid I used to close the lesson. Powerful.