Well the student launch is over and I sit here today thinking about all the work and energy that went into the evening and I am so amazed. 800+ students all worshipping and seeking to see their friends come to know Jesus. Epic. I am just as excited about the flurry of conversations that are happening within our little network of youth pastors. There's a new generation there and we all seem to be thinking similar thoughts about ways to engage young people with the message and life of Jesus. I love being creative and dreaming with other youth workers about ways to do things and there's a lot of cool...
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So, these are two guys from the whole North Point / Catalyst world who are really funny. They hosted Catalyst this year and did a fantastic job. They are sort of like the younger version of the skit guys. Anyway, their videos are hilarious and I like them a lot. Check them out at trippandtyler.tv.
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Wow! Hard to believe Bedlam is now over but what an incredible experience. The first time I've been able to communicate to middle schoolers in that way and it was awesome! I loved all the people I met and the great conversations. Thanks for listening and being a part of the Bedlam experience. I think what made it so much more amazing was the incredible team I got to work with to pull it all off too. It was hard to wear both the hat of coordinator and speaker and without the help of such a great group of fellow leaders it wouldn't have been possible. Thanks to Sue, Kaleb, Chris, Shawn,...
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Wow, I can't believe it's been so long since I last posted on the site. This is just a quick update to say how excited I am about our son Ewen. He's been incredible. Still keeps us up at night but today, he smiled at me, for the first time, on his own, without gas! Ha ha. He's growing and changing and becoming more himself. He does have a congenital heart defect and we are praying and hoping that it will heal itself. Please pray with us.
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Wow. What a great week! I was blown away by the number of students that joined us for both our high school and middle kickoffs this week. It's been an exciting journey getting to kickoff week and even though our high school kickoff didn't go exactly as planned it was still fun. We had hoped to have a whole WipeOut theme but unfortunately the blower on our giant obstacle course broke so we had to change our entire night in about 3 minutes. Wow! Ha ha. I think for me the highlight was seeing so many fresh leaders be a part of student ministries. The kickoff for high school especially...
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Wow. The past month or so has been amazing. I have been working with a group of 16-year-olds in an intensive leadership development program. I've had the opportunity to share some thoughts with them, watch several of them make key decisions in their life about the role Jesus will play in their future and had others blow my mind in terms of their capacity for leadership and their potential for impacting their community with the message and life of Jesus. This first few weeks of the summer has really helped to affirm some conversations I've been having with God and others around me for the last...
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I had an interesting conversation with a young adult recently who talked about a sibling of theirs who was afraid to wear nice clothes or be fashionable because they were worried someone might think they were gay. Wow. Talk about a wake up call. Because of my personal investment in the life of this sibling it hit pretty hard. It got me thinking a lot this week about the reality of fear and what our students are really having to endure through middle and high school. I have to admit, I was pretty frustrated. I was frustrated because I thought I had been doing a good job of commending,...
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