Stupid Rosie, Tricks are for Kids

It seems Rosie has decided to become the spokesperson for millions of people who are just like her - wait, put down the bullhorn for a moment - are there really millions of people just like her? Some recent tirades of little Rosie:

• On Trump and Miss America
• On Asians
• On the value of human life
• On Clay Aiken
• On Kelly Ripa (Honestly - this is like attacking a baby kitten...)

It appears that she makes money by alienating people through hate. If I was the marketing director for the view I would fire her and get back star jones. While I am no fan of little Star, my knowledge of the american christian marketing machine tells me that Christian junk sells - lesbian junk does not. So if the view wants to cash in - it promotes just enough christianity to appease the oprahites and get rid of hateful lesbianism.

I will say that I am in no way trying to voice my support of christian television and am not trying to bash homosexuality. I love everybody - even crazy rosie! Wisdom says, however, that if you do things that people don't like, they will change the channel on you!

(editors note: if anyone ever finds my blog by doing a google search for lesbianism I will buy them a venti marble machiato and have quite an interesting conversation with them.)

White

Every now and then people come into our office at the church that need help. Today, I got to put $5 of gas into a couple's vehicle. They seemed on the level and tried to set up a way to pay us back, which we refused, of course.

Then I went out to their vehicle -I accopmanied them accross the street to the local gas station to put the gas into their car. On the back of their car are stickers about a particular viewpoint on the world that I tend to disagree with. You'd think that'd be a whatever for me, but it was one that came a little close to home for me.

Hmmm...XXXchurch taught me that Jesus loves porn stars - but does he people who hate?

I decided Jesus probably does love people who live hate-filled lifestyles and I decided to allow myself to be used in that way. I spoke with them, they asked about our Christmas eve service - I invited them to come with their kids and tried to give them to opportunity to start having a friendship with me...

We can only imagine the peace that Jesus could give these people...May He do what only He can...

Christmas is all aout RECEIVING

I am posting this in its entirety because it is awesome. It runs against the cliche with the sandpaper of truth...you can click the title link to see it in its original blog.

Christmas is all about receiving !

Christmas is all about giving!!
The lord loves a cheerful giver!!
Giving is better then receiving – or so they say
But what about being a good receiver…
It seems to me that receiving is much harder
And when we think about it isn’t receiving what Christmas is actually all about
Giving is relatively easy – it may challenge our selfishness or priorities
But giving doesn’t expose our needs

I don’t like surprises, why? Because I’m not in control..
What if I get something I didn’t like or want – what do I say?
Do I lie and say how much I like it, do I have to be grateful?
Knowing that I will either give it to someone else or give it to a charity shop.
Have you ever received a Christmas gift from someone you hadn’t expected one from?
What do you do? Do you feel guilty and rush out and buy them a token gift?
What happens if that gift is perfect, something you really appreciate and yet you had no idea that you would like it.

Mary was open to receiving an unexpected gift,
She welcomed and wondered at the gift given and created space within her to receive it.
This unexpected gift radically changed her life
She ultimately gave over her whole world to this gift.

Giving can make us feel powerful, competent, self-sufficient and capable sort of people, giving doesn’t expose our needs.
Learning the art of receiving calls us to intimacy, honesty, openness and evaluation.
To receive the love of another, calls me to intimacy, I have to expose something of my inner world, of who I am. To receive another’s love I have to allow my innermost self to be touched.
To receive I have to open my hands, ( I love the Eucharist in this sense, this childlike openness to receive the body and blood).
Inner growth comes from opening ourselves up to receive from others
Christmas is about receiving the love that Jesus offers to us.
To be loved means that I must bring myself with all my insecurities, pain and needs to be embraced by another.

To be on the receiving end of love requires that we see our lives not as our possessions, but as gifts. Emptiness is a gift, to have enough room, to not be too full. To be needy, poor, weak, can be a gift.
Ultimately the gospel is about receiving a precious unbelievable gift, the gift of God being born in us.
When Mary offered space, love and belief in her life, her life changed forever.
Learning the art of receiving is a powerful call to change.
In receiving I need to welcome the other
In receiving I need to make room and space to accept that which I frequently fail to realise I need.
In receiving – I change.

I do believe this will be used on Wednesday's Driven

Top 10 Bible Moments

with props to Json - here's my top ten wish I was there bible moments...

10. The Great Flood - except I want to be in Georgia when this happens. Then I would know if it was really the whole world or just the whole world.

9. In prison with Paul - just to hang out and talk and pray together.

8. David and Goliath - for two parts, really - I want to know what posesses a jr. high age boy to hack off someone's head and then I want to chase down the Philistines and play braveheart with them.

7. In the Garden - with Adam and Eve. What was that like?

6. The Parting of the Red Sea - I wonder if there were like walls of water on either side, or if the water just tidal'd away? If there were walls, then I wonder if any fish were just swimming along and just flew out?

5. Genesis 1:3,4 - What was light and dark like before god separated them?

4. Acts 5 - Annanias and Saphira - are people like giving hand signals and stuff to Saphira? no, no, no...don't say that!!

3. At Jesus' tomb - what did the resurection looks like? Was it bright and stuff?

2. Peter walks on the water...why did no one else get out? Would I get out?

1. At the writing of Hebrews. I want to know who she was...

what's yours?

Dancing

Let's get together and get rid of the metaphor of a Christian walk. Walking is boring.

Let's make it a dance. Instead of asking people how their walk is going, we can ask how they are dancing? Can they feel the beat? Is the music moving them? What music are they listening too.

Why you ask? Two reasons:

1. I hate the way the word walk feels in my mouth (and group, pants, and shoulder too! ); it is just a yucky feeling word.

2. It's biblical. Luke 1, Psalm 150, I Thessalonians 4 - it's my teaching for tonight at Driven. We are going to have a dance. I know - it's crazy...

So - what do you say? Want to join the Dancing Revolution?

Rain

A rain has settled in today. Here in Oregon there's either on and off again rain or there's rain that has settled in. When it settles in it means we are getting 10 plus days straight of rain. Hopefully it won't rain the entire time the rents are here - yep - the rents are coming for Christmas, it's very exciting around our house because Christmas is only 20 chocolates away and Gramma Grandpa Jim are coming even sooner!

I did the Jesus Freakend this past Friday night. Great time. The 9th graders get an assignment to find Jesus in the mall - it's nearly impossible. Cara is on the upper level of the mall and sees me on the lower level and, excited because of her finding of Jesus, leans over the rail and yells, "JAMES! I FOUND JESUS!" She has no idea that all sorts of people are now looking at her and at me as if we are crazy...just one more reason why I love high schoolers - they don't care if you think they are crazy! Great weekend overall - fantastic first urban exposure for new high schoolers...we'll be looking for them to join God's mission very well over the next few years....

NYWC - DAY 3 - SATURDAY

So, recapping these events is taking me forever, but I will continue for posterity sake...when I'm all done, I put links up to conflagarate things.

10am - we rolled out for the 10am general session...missed the early 8 am seminars...too bad...then we noticed the speaker was Matthew Barnett from something called the Dream Center - this was not enough motivation to keep us away from Downtown disney

11am-2pm - Downtown Disney - my kind of dream center.

2-4:30pm - Afternoon Seminars. The first one I attended was MarkO's "Leading Change" It was nice and helpful with some key ideas for me to apply.

• He took some stuff from Collins' Good to Great on Level 5 leadership and reconciled it with a gospel understanding.
• he then talked about how most youth-pastors are classic self-promoters, which keeps them from level 5 leadership. This is mainly because youth pastors are always playing the martyr (see my notes on the late night future of youth ministry forum...)
• had a great quote towards the middle:

Find the best person you can find and hire her/him; unless s/he's a jerk, then hire the second best person. Because life's too short too work with jerks.

About half way through I jetted (there were no more blanks, and the rest was referenced to books that I can pick up) and went over to the Marriot and picked up some starbucks and brought some too Heather. I got frustrated with the stupid Hilton lobby's lack of cell phone service and the absolutely ridiculous elevators. I learned the hotel's stair system.

We all went to disney again for dinner with everyone in our larger group - it didn't work as well in practice as in theory. Good to touch base though. Heather and Lacy bailed early to get to the rock show, and shortly thereafter the boys did too.

7:30-10pm - Front row for Crowder again - is Jeremy losing his sanctification by getting us these seats? One of the opening singers was Shaun Groves who is no longer with a label and so said he would email whoever wanted his album for free. I love that Christian musicians are acting more and more like givers instead of celebrities!! Then there was comedy and then, I think it was tonight, there was an illusionist and Lacy got up on stage as his volunteer. She was shaking, there's video!! I need to post in in you tube - right as soon as I feel like it. the Speaker was Mike Pilvachi - last time I heard him I was 7,000 people back - it's amazing what proximity can do. His talk was personally the best for me - I really heartly appreciated him and his communication with us.

10-11pm - Late Night Theology Forum with Tony Jones - I said hi to Brock Morgan on my way up to this one, hea taught Aaron, Lacy and I at the Core a while back. The talk was nice because it was YP's talking theology with published authors in the room and professors at Princeton and students at Princeton there also. It ended up focused on prayer though, which I thought was an unusal choice...but the important thing is that a theological discussion is going on at a youth ministry convention - moving our vocation in a healthy direction. Also - I noticed there were basically two kinds of theological discussers: those who try to pin you to the wall and those to try to move forward with you...I hope to be the latter, I'll have to watch for that in me.

11:45 - picked up our pizza in the lobby and had a little pizza, pop and heartburn party in our room with the whole sacc gang. Went to bed around 2 am.

Pop-Up

I am still trying to get rid of those heaven forsaking pop-ups. It's like the reorient is working hard to please you. And...they are driving me crazy...

Starbury

When I was in high school I loved Shawn Kemp for his basketball skills and for his commitment to only endorse snakers that were under $100. Then I loved Shaq for his bball skills and for his commitment to offer Starter brand (a subsidery of Nike) kicks for under $30 at Payless. Now, I have fallen in love again. This time it is with Stephon Marbury. While I still struggle to understand his move out of Minnesota where he was teamed with KG21 (other than the snow), Starbury has now put out a line of shoes and clothing that are all priced at a little under $15. Stephon does not have to be doing this - he could have a big old shoe deal (of course, he may need to get out of the Knicks locker room to make that a reality...lol). Here's his quote:

“It costs less than $14.98 to make a $150 shoe. That’s not what people are being told. We are allowing kids to become more edu­cated. Through this world of trying to live an exclusive life, kids are being lost in translation. Kids are not allowing themselves to see the big picture. And the bib picture is not having a $200 pair of sneakers when your mother’s income is $15,000 to $20,000.”

I've looked, but I can't seem to be able to purchase them online. Looks like a trip to a washington mall is in order...

I hope that his shoe line does fabulous and becomes a move that forces the big three (nike, reebok, addidas) to acknowledge the cause and effect relationship that they are a part of that is detremental (sp?) to youth culture.

ps. as a side note, I wonder what a guy like Shane Claiborne does with something like this. Surely these shoes were made with cheap labour, but does making them affordable for the poor carry some weight?

Catch

Catching my son's puke in my hand is one of the specialist moments in my life. My son has taught me more about God and Jesus than most of you who read this ever will - most likely because God chose to reveal Himself to us in a Father/Son/Spirit trichotomy (prolly not even a word). So, being a father teaches me about the Father.

A prayer for today...

God, thanks for catching my puke in your hand.
thanks for wiping my chin and giving me juice.
thanks forlaying next to me while i sleep.
thanks for taking me out and treating me well and carrying me when i am tired of walking.
thanks for loving my son.

you're welcome

I got rid of the pop-ups. I think.

Rebuttal

I love learning new things. Yesterday I learned that when people call me a relativist (unjustly for sure) I can counter by asking them about their addiction to absolutism. By then, the conversation will be over. Sometimes I make short posts that say very little, but say it so dangerously....

Baptism Cannonball!

Ht to Debbie for sending me this.

Adam

Adamic perfection does not imply a lack of imperfection. At the very least we must admit that there was relational lacking in the pre-fall garden. Adam was alone and it was not good. Adam was perfect in a holistic manner; not in a individuated manner.

PESM 2.3

I finished the emerging church book by Gibbs and Bolger last night at dinner. Then went through 30 minutes of the biographies at the end. One said that when he went to Seminary he learned that it is not a place to develop and grow imaginatively theologically; rather it is a place to reinforce already held belief systems. hmm.

Day 2 - Friday, sunny but windy

NYWC – Day 2 - Friday –

10-1130am – Heather bailed on her “leading students in worship” course because it really had nothing to do with leading youth – it was just worship leading in a general sense. For us, it was the biggest disappointment of the entire convention. Won’t go into it too much, but it wasn’t worth it – and joined me for Dan Kimball’s seminar on changing youth group kids into youth missionaries. I already agree with Dan, but wanted to sit under his humble, wise teaching. Here are my gleanings:

Ø What is the role of missions trips in youth ministry? What is the next step?
Ø 1 Chronicles 12:32
Ø Judges 2:10
Ø Citizens of the Bubble vs. Citizens of the Kingdom
Ø The American Idolzation of the Church: we evaluate the services instead of praise God for encounters
Ø Bono’s quote: “Christians are hard to tolerate. I don’t know how Jesus does it.”
Ø Dan’s story of telling the girl at the gym his vocation as a pastor and tripped up reaction
Ø A question that I continued to struggle with is how to address when students are saying, “That other church over there does this – I want to go there.”

I think this comes from their own parents church shopping consumerist mindsets, but I am struggling with how to turn students from consumers to missionaries and this seminar was a huge help. Dan has powerpoints available from the Vintage Faith site. It’s not there yet, but he said it would be. I’d look after the last conventions are over.

11am-1pm – lunch at ihop. Eating anywhere with Jeremy is so much fun.

1-330pm – we rolled into General Session 1 late and ended up sitting up pretty high. Crowder led worship though and I was pretty overwhelmed during the song, “You Are My Joy” – if you know me, it wasn’t crying, it was overwhelmed. I am so glad that God is my joy – and not anything else. Then Kendall Payne sang – she’s awesome, every girl who follows Jesus ought to buy her albums – Khobi will definitely own Kendall Payne and Pink albums. Then Kenda Creasy-Dean spoke. I was pretty cranked for her teaching because of my appreciation for her books. Here’s what I gleaned in her message:

Ø An original idea of mine: BURST – an evangelism movement focused on getting out/popping the bubble mentality…needs more thought, maybe a good book title
Ø Doing theology sideways
Ø Presbycusus: inability to hear certain frequencies
Ø 1 Samuel 3:1 – while, today…80% of people don’t feel the presence of God in worship, 50% have had no connection with God in their worship service in the past year, 75% think worship is for us and not for God. The theological implications of that thought line is very dangerous.
Ø St. Benedict: “Go often reveals what is better to the younger” – he often included the youngest monks in the most important monastery decisions
Ø Eli’s ministry had become an embarrassment to God – He chose Sam to tell him that, yet Sam needed Eli to discern God’s voice.
Ø “IS WHAT WE ARE DOING WORTHY OF THE LIFE, DEATH & RESSURECTION OF JESUS?”
Ø Leadership knowledge: 10% school, 20% other people, 70% past failures. So if you are always successful, you are 70% bad leader…addendum added by me.
Ø Nothing but Nets – stopping malaria worldwide

4-5:30pm – Seminars. I first dropped by Dan Kimball’s “The Importance of Theology in youth ministry” The hand out seemed like some rehashing of his thinking from the NPC that I was at in San Diego last February. So I nabbed the handout and bailed. I ended up in Tony Jones’ seminar on adolescent neurological development and recent developments in research therein. I always appreciate Tony and his deep thinking influence on youth ministry. Here’s my gleanings:

Ø Spoke of Erikson being the prophet of adolescence and his thoughts on moratorium. I think that, if Erikson has any validity, that moratorium in decreasingly available to adolescents today – which contributes to the abandonment dysfunction that is rampant in western adolescents.
Ø Carol Gilligan as a critique of Erikson (because all of Erikson’s research was done on males) and her book “In another voice” – which purports that girls are beings in relation.
Ø Another author was Emmanuel Levanis who wrote on a relational ontology. We are who because we exist in relationship. I need to read this in order to further form my thoughts on the necessity of the Trinity for the very existence of God.
Ø A woman’s brain is more active during sleep than a man’s brain is while watching tv. Think about that next time you change the channel.
Ø Jones mentioned a Columbia (Colorado?) University study that showed that kids learn better from teachers of their own gender. Right away I think of our church’s children’s ministry and it’s staffing of near 100% women. Is it any wonder that the percentage of mature Christians and the percentage of church attendees and the very percentage of Christians in our culture is a majority of females? How can we complain of the spirituality of males when we do not have males teaching children in our churches?
Ø Jones brought up “Harwired to Connect” – a new study from medical doctors and such that is finding that the mental and behavioral health of American children is deteriorating because, as a society, we have failed to recognize broad societal environmental problems because of a lack of interpersonal connections.
Ø Neurologically the brain stops forming around the ages of 15-16, I think that, if this is true, then there should be a major split/change in paradigm in youth ministry around the age of 15/16. I will email Tony about this.
Ø Jones had some further points that were really detailed and involved the prefrontal cortex. If interested, he offered to email the powerpoint to people who were interested. You can find his email on his blog.

4-730pm – skipped dinner, hung out, watched Jeremy and Aaron sneak in a side door to the general session. Met Marko when he asked me if I was the high school guy that belonged to this middle school guy, pointing at Jeremy. It was hilarious. Watched Jeremy sneak backstage looking for Crowder. Man.

7:30pm – sat in the front row for general session. Family Force 5 preformed. Dang they are a wicked live set band. Totally great – deny categorization. Then Crowder led worship – again really great. I have to youtube some of the video we got of “I saw the Light”. Then Effrem Smith spoke. Really great. Gleanings:

Ø Colossians 3:1ff – What do you love most? Is my loving watching kids grow a dangerous idol?
Ø Matthew 9:35
Ø Matthew 1 – Jesus was an Iraqi – Abraham was from Ur in Genesis 11
Ø O.I. = God wants to love the hell out of you.

Also if you want to laugh go buy Steve Case’s “A to Z” Guide to Youth Ministry and look under F.

Killer.

10:15pm – went to the future of youth ministry forum with Lacy. It wasn’t that fantastic. Alright host though. Young youth pastors with a lot of zeal, no experience, lots of complaints about parents, senior staff, school sports, etc. I hate sitting around and complaining, it doesn’t get anything done.

11:59 sleeping.

Zondervan Youth Specialties National Youth Worker Convention 2006 Anaheim

I am going to record here by day my experiences, teachings, ideas and questions while at the NYWC in Anaheim, November 2-6. I’ll go by hours so that it makes sense.

NYWC – Day 1 – Thursday

12:00am-3:15am – I packed and stayed up and took care of my household. I had a few construction type things to take care of so I was up working like a meth addict in the middle of the night.

3:15-4am – Sleep. With the lights and tv on in my clothes – I was nervous of sleeping past my 4am wake up time.

4am-6am – travel to airport

6am-11am - flying

11am-1pm – travel from airport to hotel

1-5pm – wandering, reading, sleeping, eating

5-7pm – bought the noomas for a significant discount

7-9pm – a vague nothingness. Walked around the vendors.

9pm – went to see Leeland. I like them. But they are really freaky. They make me feel weird. I bet their mom finds this and comments me really nasty stuff about homeschooling gone wild.

Later – went to sleep

Cottonpatch Gospel

This is Romas 6 from the cotton patch gospel. Read it until you see why I like it...

So what are we advocating? "Let’s wallow in sin, so more grace may pour forth"? Hell, no! How can we who died in sin still live in it? Or are you unaware that we who were initiated into Christ Jesus’ fellowship were initiated into his death realm? Therefore, through our initiation into the death realm, we are entombed with him, in order that, as Christ was raised from the dead by the Father’s glory, so we too might walk in newness of life. For if we have been fellow plants in the garden of his death, we shall also be fellow plants in the garden of his risen life. We are convinced that the person we used to be has been strung up with him, so that the sinful nature may be wiped out, and we no longer need be addicted to sin. For in dying, one is released from sin’s claim on him. Yet, if we died with Christ, we believe that we also shall live with him. It is clear that Christ, who was raised from the dead, doesn’t die any more. Death no longer has a grip on him. As far as sin is concerned he died once and got it over with; but as far as God is concerned, he lives and lives. In the same way we think of ourselves as being dead in relation to sin but very much alive in relation to God in Christ Jesus. Therefore, don’t let sin be king of your fragile group, so that it becomes obedient to sin’s desires. And don t hand over your members to sin as tools of wickedness, but hand over yourselves to God as people who were dead but are very much alive. Commit your members to God as instruments of justice. Sin shall not lord it over you all, for you are not under compulsion but under kindness.

You can get it here.

PESM 2.2

Day two of session two - early start.

Yesterday was prayer filled, lots of circling around and filling the echos of the throneroom with our voices. Nice.

Great discussion with Darrell, Jeremy and Dr. Odell about the Albany multi-site revlution. Great stuff - Dr. Odell also gave some understanding on my prof's understanding of holiness. The difference between a theological and a devotional presentation of the holiness movement's tennants.

And! Josh brought me a gingerbread latte! Who cares if I am sitting in a chair all day!!

Best Life Possible

In reference to my previous post on James 3:1 - it is such a blessing to see those we have been entrusted with teaching develop to the point where they are discovering truth themselves. Click on the title link to see a true and honest post by Theresa, a brand new freshwoman at OSU.

This is where, i think, a lot of youth ministries eat it. They teach the kids to know/believe/do all the right things - my goal, however, is to teach students to figure out how to know/believe/do all the right things. So, maybe my students don't listen to Christian radio, have fish bumper stickers, yell stupid chants at rallies, hate sinners, etc. like yours do...but Driven students develop and keep developing and love like they are completely nuts for the gospel.

A blessing for the Driven:
May you love to love.
May you learn to learn.
May you think about thinking.
May you worhsip your God like a nut.
May you be Driven.