like a fire

I remember the alarming call of the robot from Lost in Space. It was a great show and set a standard for warnings. Apparently others were taking note, because eleven years ago someone started a wackiest warning label contest. Basically, people send in their favorite warning labels and someone picks the best. Winners receive cash prizes of up to $500.

This year’ first prize goes to this label (shown right). That’s right folks, avoid death. There are details about how to avoid death in this particular vehicle, which is somewhat helpful. Second place went to the label “Do not iron while wearing shirt.” and third place went to “Do not put child in bag.” from the maker of plastic bags.

Well, I guess we have been warned.

Despite being warning by most of my friends in the PCA, I started reading N. T. Wright’s Simply Christian about a month ago. I was somewhat apprehensive, just because of the controversy surrounding the Pauline Perspectives and the outrage from those writings (which I still don’t understand). I have to confess that I am very pleasantly surprised and am starting to scratch my head at the conflict between Wright and some conservatives.

I really like the book - a lot. It is written in a style that is very engaging and insightful. Wright is a story-teller, and his ideas are very fresh to me. Having grown up in the Christian culture of America, anything fresh is very welcome. There are many ideas I like in the book so far (I haven’t completed it yet), but one really sticks out for me right now:

“It seems we have to hold the two together: beauty is both something that calls us out of ourselves and something which appeals to feelings deep within us.” P. 44

I really love this expression, and, as a musician, it voices something I have tried to communicate for a very long time as a definition of art. I did extensive studies in graduate school in aesthetics and this is one of the best ideas I have heard.

So, if you are so moved, go out and get this book. I highly recommend it.

Just finished this spoof of the TV game and thought I would make it available for anyone to use. It is here as a flash file, and I think you can download it (though it’s pretty big). If you can’t let me know and I’ll try something else. I also have it in Keynote and would be glad to share it with you as well.

Basically this is a power point presentation with a lot of linking back to the menu page. We played it last night and had a great time with it. It takes about 45 minutes to play the entire game and we did it with groups instead of individuals. Each group made up a buzzer sound and that was the name of the group. So our groups were: Buzz, Yeeee and Ennhhh (not sure about the spelling of some of those).

I hope someone else gets some use out of this since it took about five hours to do.

Through the years, it has been more and more evident that most people just don’t have any idea of what their job is or maybe just how to do their job. Ask anyone who has talked to the people in customer service and you will probably hear story after story about how they talked to the most unhelpful, unfriendly person - ever. That job is one that is fairly straight forward. Talk to irate people who are displeased with your company and try to help them with their problem and in the process help them feel better about your company. There are many jobs that are not that clear. The presidency, for example, is a job that is very complex and requires many different functions. Few people probably know what it requires to live a life in the day of the president. Yet we all know when there are things that aren’t going the way we expect. Enter youth ministry.

In youth ministry, there are many expectations in the church. There are expectations placed on the youth pastor from the pastor and staff, the parents, the teens and the rest of the church. It is easy for anyone to struggle with what exactly they should be doing. Obviously clear dialogue is important to manage expectations, but expectations are not always a great source for what we do. Some expectations are unreasonable and some are just unrealistic. I served a church once where the expectation was to bring at least 10 families into the church through the youth ministry per year. In a church where the population was in steady decline and started at about 300, that probably isn’t very realistic. The point is, we have no shortage of voices telling us what to do, and at the end of the day, we all want to know that we are doing our job.

So what should we do?

I think this question is the one that plagues the work of the church. Every person I know got into ministry to help people. When they made that decision, they were passionate enough about that work, that they committed their most vital resource - time. Somewhere along the way, they start to hear voices of expectations. They wonder and question if they are doing the right things, and that questioning undermines there sense of success.

To help myself not drift with the tide of expectations, I made myself a list of things I couldn’t do.

I can’t save people.
I can’t draw people to God apart from the Holy Spirit.
I can’t minister out of a life devoid of the presence of God.

These statements of what I can’t do help me to see more of the things I can do.

I can love people.
I can be in Gods presence enough where some of it leaks out onto people.
I can point to God in the great and hard times.

My criteria for youth ministry is a bit more simple lately. Follow God in his work of transforming people into new creations. I can’t transform anyone by myself, yet God invites me to join him in his work. Transformation only happens in the presence of the Living God. It can be practiced by the disciplines of Bible study, prayer, meditation, etc., but it only happens through the presence of God acting on our lives. That makes my job even more simple. Get people into God’s presence. Help them to linger there. Pray for them to be filled with a longing for the Christ who saves lives today just as he did 2000 years ago.