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Marketing Jesus?

25 comments Published Wednesday, July 26, 2006 by Gerrard Fess.




What are your thoughts on Christian becoming an adjective rather than a noun?

YM & The COC

0 comments Published Friday, July 21, 2006 by Gerrard Fess.

So I was looking at the COCOnline site about youth ministry. Almost looks like it needs to be updated. Articles from 2001?

Though some good links there. Check it out.

Here


Thoughts? Any links or articles you would add there?

Mission: Homelessness

1 comments Published Thursday, July 06, 2006 by Gerrard Fess.


Article


The article helps on how we can use our ministries to maybe stage a real life situation to help our students combat and focus on the issue of the homeless.

Reflections from Afar.

2 comments Published by Gerrard Fess.


So Jason got me thinking from his first 2years post, and the disconnection of teens of what I would do differently starting youth ministry. After doing this thing called youth ministry for over 12 years as an ordained minister, and then several years as a volunteer and youthworker. And entering into my 4th year here at my current ministry, here are some things I'd do differently.

1. I would definitely Pray more. Spend more time in prayer.

2. Delegate more. The better you can inspire and administer things, the better balance to your own life.

3. Have better resources. PDYM, and My First 2yrs in YM weren't written yet. I wish someone told me these things long ago.

4. Take care of my own soul. So often I so busy trying to save the world, I forget to feed myself.

5. Take more retreats. With my family, youth, and feed students. There is nothing like NWYC, CIY, Marriage conventions.

6. Choose wisely. I think some of the ministries I went to, I didn't choose wisely until recently.

7. Leadership is everything. Be a leader. Influence. And make sure your leaders are behind you.

8. Make the most of every moment. Today for example I hung out with a youth intern @ another church to build a relationship and encourage. Having the parents more involved.

9. Know your strengths and weaknesses. I think knowing thyself is a good thing. Personality tests, and such come in handy.

10. Loving God and loving students more. I think this essential helped me stay on focus and wish I did it more.

Any others you would add?

Teens and a faith disconnect

0 comments Published Wednesday, July 05, 2006 by Jason Retherford.

In my observation working with youth, the biggest challenge that our young people are dealing with is the disconnect of their faith between Monday and Sunday. It seems that many of the teenagers in our congregations have a form of faith, or religious devotion, but to them the faith they embrace is more similar to the gadgetry they toy with than the transformative relationship we witness in Scripture.

Let me explain. In the big NSYR study of spirituality in the lives of American teens, what they observed is that kids have a faith that resembles moral therapeutic deism. In other words, Jesus is a "get out of jail free card," with little or no active involvement in the world today. Spirituality for most American teens is just merely furniture in their lives, or like I observed above just another gadget they toy with.

I am not saying that all teens fit into this mold, but our young people are buying into the allure of what the world offers, and missing the radical call to revolution that Jesus teaches (Matthew 5-7).

Can we remedy this seemingly desperate situation? I think so. It won't be easy. We have got to heed the call in 1 Peter 2:11-12 to live our lives as aliens on this planet, not attached to the stuff that advertisers feed to our desires and wants. And we must live authentically in our world, and let our teens see how faith and the practice of that faith affects the entirety of our being and the world around us. I think part of the problem of our thinking has been a misunderstanding of the "kingdom of God," and a lack of emphasis on the cross for our lives today. The kingdom of God is the place where God rules, and if we are in Christ and the Spirit of Christ dwells with us we are to submit to the rule of God in our lives, and this should effect the way we live and interact with others. Because of the victory of the cross we can live with victory now. I think if we had a better understanding of the kingdom and lived with the cross in view we would be better disciples ourselves and I think we would be able to make better disciples also.

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