If you're in youth ministry and you want some tried and true, in the trenches materials then cruise on by Download Youth Ministry.com
It just got a HUGE face lift last week, all the graphics and downloadable art was totally updated and revamped. It has some great content and is inexpensive enough to try out stuff without breaking the budget.
In the next few weeks i'm sending 3 more teaching series to the site and an awesome resource of learnings for when the big church stuff comes your way and you're asked to plan the all church baptisms and such. You know, like those times when your job description expands from youth ministry to everything else. Stuff like what to do if you have been asked to do a wedding or are called on to do a funeral or even a resource for when you have to engage in some dreaded church discipline for someone who is simply way out of line.
But regardless of whether it's stuff I wrote or Doug or Josh or Matt wrote, there's tons of great stuff there and more to come each week. So go ahead and bookmark it and let your life get easier at a price that might be against minimum wage labor laws in 13 countries. Read more...
If you, or someone you know would benefit from a book about trying to live some semblance of a healthy life in the midst of crazy demands of family, ministry, marriage, career, and about a zillion other pressures we all wrestle with, then game on!
I'm with you in that struggle and I wrote a bunch of thoughts you might enjoy on the subject in a book called "As for Me and My Crazy House: guarding your heart, marriage, and family from the demands of youth ministry [read busy life]".
Have you ever made a list of pros and cons for a decision? I have. And my observation/experience is that most of the time, the pro side is filled with little white lies of promises no one can back up. As I thought about it today, I thought that maybe what we should do is instead of labeling the list "pros" and "cons", what if we made a list called "truths" and "lies".
My experience says there a lots of lies that have subtly walked into the room and someone needs to have enough guts to call them out.
You know that voice in your head that says you're a loser. Yeah, that's a lie.
The one that says if you married so-and-so your life would be better. Yup, that's a lie.
The one that says there is a marriage that is not work to keep going cuz they are just so ridiculously in love it comes naturally and birds sing and they live in the land of Disney. Seriously people? That's a lie.
The one that says some other family has perfect kids. Liar.
The job where you make a million bucks a year and never work before 9am or after 3pm. Lie. Lie. Lie.
The one that says if you made a million bucks a year you'd be happy. Ok, I'd be lying to you if I didn't tell you that I really want to try this lie out to see if I'm right. Like a million dollars a year sounds like it would solve all my problems. But I'm pretty sure. It's a lie. I know a guy who got a divorce and he makes a million bucks a year and has to pay a crap load of it in alimony. He's not happy about it. Guess it must be a lie.
The one that says changing churches will fix your problems. Bummer. It's a lie.
The gym equipment that will motivate you to work out. Ut oh. You smell the lie right?
That hero of yours that you're pretty sure your life would be awesome if you walked in their shoes. Bad news. You'd hate it. It's a lie.
The new thing that will make everything easier for you once you get it. Don't buy it. It's a lie.
The super food that will make you super. Super foolish. Super lie.
The mythical perfect man, perfect woman, perfect date, perfect family, perfect body, perfect friend, perfect job, perfect pretty much anything... all of it. Lies lies lies.
But just cuz they are all lies, doesn't mean we don't secretly think somewhere, somehow, in some crazy world or just down the street or in someone you know's house, well in there, that thing you know is a lie is somehow true for them. But nonetheless, it's still a BIG FREAKING UGLY LIE!!!
I watched The Help again last week because I taught on it during our God at the Movies series in Encounter. My task in teaching was to ask God if there was anything redemptive in the movie that aligns with Scripture. Yes there are some obvious ones- like about race and equality. But as I watched this film, I realized so many people in it had been lied to. Blacks had been lied to. Rich white people had been lied to. Lies are everywhere and on a real deep level in this film. One thread that runs through the film that is not about race is actually about beauty and value. It's the lie that is told to every girl - in her head she's got a voice that says she's ugly.... Every girl! In this film, it's the plight of even the white girls. So I pulled on the thread of the lies we believe and called them out.
Constantine says the same thing that Aibilene tells the little girl she's a nanny for. "You is kind. You is smart. You is important." You're gonna do something BIG! Everyone of those statements is contrary to some lie little girls get told. Every freaking one of them. This scene I embedded has the quote in it, but it must be an out take or something, cuz it's not in the film. But I still Love love love love this quote from the movie regardless.
Go ahead. Call some fictitious voice in your head a LIAR today. You'll sleep better if you do. I promise that's not a lie.
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