Alison Lea Photography
I don’t make it a habit to take pictures of unassuming strangers in public places. But when the Great I Am is a few feet away, it isn’t a hard decision. Is it weird that I felt an urge to go up and give him a hug?
60 degrees means youth group goes outside! I’ve been waiting all winter long (and I emphasize “long”) to be able to run around outside. We play games each week at youth group and in the cold months, we’re inside in our small cramped fellowship space. But tonight we busted out the orange field cones and ran around in the grass.
The change in seasons are a beautiful thing. The Midwest is awesome that way. The appreciation that awakened Minnesotan hibernators have for Spring’s eventual warmth is, I think, a bit like falling in love. It’s fresh and exciting and way better than you remember it being the last time. Seasons are a reminder to me that God uses change in our lives to teach us some important stuff. My life has seemed to be a swirling ball of transition over the past several years. And I somehow know that God is in the middle of it all.
May we embrace the unfolding Spring in our lives.
Thanks for following the yellow brick road to this new blog. Okay, so it’s not really a new blog. You’ll see all my old posts and comments are all here. Just a new host. Good bye Blogspot, hello WordPress.
Day 2 of Shift 08 has been amazing! I’ve been pondering the Lord’s Prayer today. Speaker Brian McLaren observed yesterday that the prayer underscores the pervasiveness and imminence of the Kingdom of God. “Your Kingdom come, your will be done on earth as it is in heaven.”
Tonight we were treated to an acoustic set and Q and A sort of ‘living room’ session with the band Switchfoot. A song that front man Jon Foreman sang, called “Your Love is Strong,” sets the prayer to music in a fresh way. I thought it was awesome!
“Heavenly Father, you always amaze me
Let your kingdom come in my world and in my life
You give me the food I need to live through the day
And forgive me as I forgive the people that wronged me
Lead me far from temptation
Deliver me from the evil one”
So I’m here at Shift 08, the Student Ministries Conference at Willow Creek in South Barrington, IL. It’s been a full–and wonderful–first day. Experiencing three great large group sessions and some great time with the people who came with me (some of the best youth volunteers in the world) has been awesome! So many moments stick out in my mind as I sit here in my hotel room, reflecting. One cool experience was listening to Brian McLaren this morning. He gave a sort of macro-level perspective of the most urgent global crises…and it’s already been a messy, wonderful, impossible journey to try to mentally unpack it all and think about how to apply it to my ministry with students. So, I think I’ll go sit in the hot tub and let these thoughts move around my head some more.
Below is a video clip from the session today with McLaren. Food for thought for you.
