YOUTHINTHECORNER

With all of this talk about financial crisis and the possibility of another depression and wide spread panic over the news it got me to thinking…
Youth Pastors are a luxury not a necessity. If the economy hit so bad that churches had to scale back and youth ministries would not exist as we know them today in our affluent society…what would I do? I have been doing this over 15 years. I am 34, which if you do the math, I have been doing this since I got out of high school. I went to college to do this. I have NO other skills, life experience or background.
I LOVE what I do but it has gotten to me lately that I posses no real-life skill. I can’t build anything, fix anything, grow anything or sell anything. So, I am going to be praying REALLY HARD for our economy.

What about you? If you couldn’t do what you do now…what would you do?

Last night we had about 220 youth and about 50 adults come together for the first Moncks Corner “Gathering”. We had some awesome times of worship, prayer and connecting with other youth ministries around the community. Our volunteers did an amazing job of making everyone feel welcome and part of the crowd. Of course our kids lit it up in worship! I love my Church, Youth Ministry and I love my job!

The Gathering was a time to promote an event called See You At The Pole. A day where thousands of students come together to pray for their schools, friends, and country.

This morning we had over 50 at the Berkeley High School SYATP, 40-50 at Berkeley Middle, tons at St Johns, Macedonia and Timberland had a good showing as well.

New series in October coming up. Here is the series intro…Whatcha think? Are you scared?

Tonight in Alive we are beginning our 2 service format. That is 2 services back to back, one for Middle School and the other for High School. It requires a large volunteer team, total organization and perfect timing. Well, what can I say…God blessed me. I believe that this is the beginning of a huge move of God in our church in the area of Youth. Last week we had 249, 48 in Small Groups and one of our students is starting a new outreach club at Berkeley Middle called Teen Extreme. God is good but we keep pressing forward.
Pray for us. I will let you know tomorrow how it went.

UPDATE

We had low numbers last night but WHAT A NIGHT! The 2 services were a hit! We had 90 in Middle School and 90 in High School. The High Schoolers worshiped like never before and the atmosphere was electric. Thanks for your prayers. I love my job!

How many times has someone shared news with you and you responded by saying, “I will pray for you”? How many times do you forget or simply toss up a courtesy line to god? How many times do you have a bad day or a frustrating situation arise in your life and you know you NEED to pray? In my small group last night during a discussion on prayer I felt the Spirit leading me to an idea that prayer is NOT the end. Prayer is the means to FAITH, which IS the end. Jesus never replied, “your prayers have made you well.” It is our Faith that heals.
How is your faith? The faith that God longs for requires prayer but not micro bursts of prayer based upon life’s circumstances, however it requires a LIFE of prayer. A constant connection to God.
Jesus healed many…not all. How did he know who to heal and who not to heal? It was his connection to the father. As we walk in faith there WILL be times when we can look at someone dying of Cancer speak to the sickness and watch them be healed. There will also be times where we pray for comfort and peace during these last moments. How will we know which one? We must walk in faith and be connected to the Spirit of God.

So, I encourage you to pray today…not so much for something as much as it connects you with the person of Jesus.

I lost 249 posts and almost 24,000 hits on my old blog. So I am gonna try this new blog site. It is a bit messier than typepad but hopefully safer. Anyway, stay tuned because I plan on blogging much more in the days to come.