In the Zone

Tonight, we're doing something different. Instead of a pre-planned game and a carefully constructed youth lesson, we're going to kick back, eat some pizza and just talk.  No agenda.  No prepared topic we're attempting to land on.  Just adults, teens, food and conversation. Every once in a while in youth ministry, it's great to just pause on the talks and the lesson plans and let students drive the discussion.  Tonight is about putting students in the driver's seat and steering the conversation. I have no idea where it will go.  I don't know what topics we'll cover.  I don't have a clue as to the theological points we'll wander upon.  It's exciting. Every once in a while I do this with my youth group.  I call it "Brown-Table Discussions" because I don't have any round tables and all the tables we do have are brown.  It's a way for us to talk about our faith and our lives and how those two things connect.  It's a free-...

Undoubtedly you've heard that Icthus, the largest and oldest Christian music festival in America (and located in Kentucky), closed up shop.  Economic pressure caused the cancellation and closing of the festival after over two decades of operation. I never took a youth group to Icthus, but I know it has impacted many churches around the country.  It was a staple for years on the Christian music scene.  Often called the "Christian Woodstock," the biggest names in Christian music (and the biggest speakers) made regular stops in Ausbury, Ky. each summer for Icthus. In recent years, attendance has been declining.  Finally, last week, they announced Icthus would close down for good.  There will be no festival in 2013. How did this happen?  Allow me to ponder. Six year ago, while serving in Northern Kentucky, we regularly took our students to Christian concerts. TobyMac, Third Day, Casting Crowns and MercyMe were all concerts our students attended....

I've struggled with the news today. 27 people dead in a Connecticut elementary school. 20 of them students. My wife is a teacher in an elementary school. My daughter is 4 years old and just a year younger than some of the victims. My high school experienced a hostage situation featuring an armed killer. All of that converged on me today as I became gripped by the news of this tragedy. I felt instant compassion for those parents and that community. I sensed fear and concern as I thought of my wife, even today, teaching young children in a supposedly safe environment. I felt a kinship with the surviving students and mourned the loss of their innocence. I couldn't watch the news coverage. I decided to take the night off and spent it with family. We went to dinner and looked at Christmas lights. We needed that time together. I needed it. As I think about today, I remember something I read in the book Wild at Heart. It basically said why do we try to find blame or a r...

I'll never forget Christmas 2000.  It was six months before my wedding.  It should have been a happy and festive occasion.  One last Christmas with my family before I became a family man of my own. It should have, but it wasn't.  You see, my mom had already announced she was divorcing my dad once the new year began.  We all gathered - my mom, dad, brother and me - one LAST time as a family that day.  We exchanged gifts and pretended to have a normal family Christmas.  It was anything but. Tension filled the room.  Each gift was more like a last request than a joyous Christmas present.  It felt more like a funeral than a Christmas gathering around the tree.  True to form, about a week later my mom officially divorced my dad.  The next morning she gathered her things and moved to California.  I didn't see her again until my wedding. Divorce hurts.  It destroys.  It consumes.  Nothing is left untainted by ...

My eyesight is extremely important to me. Everyone in my family wears classes or needs to wear glasses.  My parents, my brother, my aunts and uncles, my cousins and my grandparents all wear glasses.  Somehow I got the recessive gene because I have 20/15 vision.  As such, I am the only person in my entire family that does not require glasses or contact lenses. I value my eyesight.  I get nervous when an object or a finger gets too close to my eyes.  I don't want to compromise my eyesight because I know what a hassle glasses can be. So when Jesus says in Matthew 5:29-30 that if your eye causes you to sin you should gouge it out, it causes me to pause.  My eye has caused me to sin many times.  The thing I hold dear sometimes ensnares me in sin.  Should I gouge out my eyes? Of course Jesus doesn't mean that scripture literally.  He also doesn't mean we should cut off our hands.  What he does tell us is that nothing should be m...