NEW BLOG

Hey,

Until I figure out how to do a redirect, please visit my new blog:

http://getvision.wordpress.com

Soon, this page should take you there automatically.

Thanks.

B.

new book...

lane and i are reading this awesome book..

uncensored grace by my new author/boyfriend jud wilhite.

love this quote, you'll love the book:

"When I realized the value I have in God's eyes, it changed me. I began to reimagine myself as one loved deeply by God, irrespective of what I felt. I am loved before, during, and after my sin. I am loved when I feel unworthy. I am loved in spite of myself. I wanted approval from others to validate my worth, I wanted to show everyone I could make something of myself, I wanted to become someone. But that day I realized I would never find what I searched for because I already had it. I had to personally embrace God's grace in a life-transforming way."

enjoy...also, go buy this freakin' awesome book!!!!

on christmas eve...

I think it’s easy to get overwhelmed wanting to know scripture more, or walk in victory over this or that. It’s much easier to decide that today, knowing that God has given me all the grace and mercy I need to be all that He has made me to be, I am going to follow Him. Today I’m going to read and meditate on His word. Today I’m not, by his grace, going to give into temptation. Today I will be obedient to His leadings. Day after day following the long path of obedience in the same direction until, and if, we get to 70, drinking coffee early in the morning with lifelong friends…until then, day by day…until we are sitting at an even better table.

coldplay

it was three years in the making.

in september of 2005 i had tix to see Coldplay at the Verizon Ampitheater in Birmingham, AL. This was back when i lived in AL. They cancelled the day before. It took me a while to forgive them, but last night I got redemption.

Quick Recap:

attendees: Brett, Lane, J. Berry, A. Berry, J. Britt, N. Britt
dinner: california pizza kitchen (yep!)
opener: mind blowing
best feature of the show: center back projection round ballons
2nd best feature: camera work

our seats were actually pretty good. we got to see behind the curtain during the opener which was pretty cool.

enjoyed a great night with wife-0 and best friends.

Rock4Love

some updates from rock4love last night...

students: 1450
volunteers: 130
decisions: 218
eternity: changed

what a night...

Need a devo today?

here is a link to a devo that i wrote for 12Stone Church's new believer's class...called Day 1. Great name. Someone is really creative. Want to check it out?

http://downloads.12stone.com/shareLife/day1/BibleDay01.pdf

Biggie Fries

Sunday at 12Stone.
Dustin Ahkuoi
He played on my basketball team
He rocks the mic like a vandal
enjoy.

now it's locked...now it's safe...

52 great links for those who work with students

COMMUNICATION

http://www.twitter.com

http://www.simplyyouthministry.com/txt.html

http://www.blogger.com

http://www.blip.tv

http://www.ustream.tv

http://www.apple.com/itunes/

http://www.constantcontact.com

http://www.gmail.com

http://www.parentlink.com

http://www.skype.com

http://www.callingpost.com/

http://www.Bloglines.com

http://reader.google.com

http://www.plaxo.com/

http://www.meebo.com/



MEDIA/RESOURCES

http://www.vixy.net

http://stinkbot.com/Tubesock/

http://keepvid.com/

http://handbrake.fr/

http://www.morethandodgeball.com

http://www.wingclips.com

http://www.worshiphousemedia.com/index.cfm?hndl=details&id=10698&tab=MO

http://www.studentlife.com/resources/freevideo.php

http://www.bluefishtv.com/Store/Browse/Downloadable_Video_Illustrations/Free

http://flickr.com/

http://open.lifechurch.tv/

http://www.simplyyouthministry.com

http://www.thecountdowncreator.com/

http://www.vimeo.com

http://www.picnik.com/

http://www.jingproject.com



SOCIAL NETWORKS

http://www.myspace.com

http://www.facebook.com

http://www.bluechowder.com



METRICS

http://www.churchmetrics.com

http://www.churchteams.com



INTERACTION

http://wiffiti.com/

http://groups.google.com/

http://www.polldaddy.com

http://www.youtube.com

http://www.godtube.com

http://www.polleverywhere.com



TEAM

http://www.project2manage.com/

http://calendar.google.com

http://docs.google.com

http://www.yousendit.com

http://secure.box.net/landing1/

http://www.planningcenteronline.com/

http://x3watch.com/

http://www.rememberthemilk.com/



BIBLE/RESEARCH

www.youversion.com

www.biblegateway.com

Great News

Matt Chandler is blogging. Matt is one of the most thought engaging, honest, and transparent writers and speakers out there.

His blog is called Dwell Deep. You should enjoy.

Link: http://dwelldeep.net/

presidential debate in one minute

I love stuff like this..

Bobby Gruenewald over at Lifechurch.tv had this to say and it is just what i was thinking...

I would never use Google if it required me to leave my house and travel to an unfamiliar building on Sunday only once a week…listen to 30 minutes of unrecognizable music, followed by a person talking for 30-40 minutes, and still possibly have to try to find a person who looked “official” just to find “results” for my search. That would be absurd! But, that is a substantially abbreviated version of what so many churches put people through who are searching.

Great Information

Read this from Kurt Johnston's blog this afternoon and really learned a great deal about handling difficult situations. Hopefully, you will as well.

Handling Conflictfrom Simply Kurt by Kurt JohnstonI've mentioned our new monthly outreach event that took place last Friday night called "The 3". It was an amazing event that turned out almost exactly how our team envisioned it would. However, while parents were picking up their kids, a very upset mom grabbed one of our volunteers and frustratingly blurted something along the lines of, "I thought this was a church event! Why was there freak dancing? My daughter won't be coming back!" By the time the volunteer leader found one of our paid team, the mom was long gone.

But she wasn't gone for long. The following morning she shot an email off to Pastor Rick who forwarded it to me. I share the following email exchange in the hopes that it will encourage you as you deal with conflict in your ministry setting. while I've certainly learned that not everybody response the way we hope they will, this exchange was a powerful reminder of the importance of quickly dealing with concerned parents.

SHE WROTE:
Pastor Rick,
Why are our youth leaders allowing "freak dancing" at the youth activities??? My daughter was at the Refinery last night and came home with this disappointing news. She won't be going back.

I WROTE:
Dear Mrs. O’Brian,
My name is Kurt Johnston and I’m the junior high Pastor here at Saddleback. I wanted to shoot you a quick note thanking you for expressing your concern over the dancing at last night’s junior high event. You would be surprised at how few parents are willing to let us know when they have a concern. I’m the parent of two young teens myself and, like you, I expect church events to be an appropriate place for them to attend.

It’s important that you hear from me personally that our ministry in no way “allowed” freak dancing to be part of last night’s activities. There were leaders in the room and whenever we saw anything that bordered on inappropriate, we addressed it right away (in fact the dancing was a very minimal part of the night…maybe 50 kids participated). Obviously with over 700 students at an outreach event, many of whom have never stepped foot in a church before, there will be some students who push the envelope and who don’t have the same boundaries as our “church” kids do.

In fact, that’s why last night’s event was created; as a monthly front door experience for un-churched kids. If, out of 700 students, there were zero instances of cursing or rebelling or even freak dancing, then I would be a bit saddened because it would mean that we did an outreach event and nobody showed up who needed to be reached. Our student ministry department is committed to helping junior highers grow in their faith and in their walk with Christ, and we are also committed to reaching out to students who have yet to experience God’s amazing grace. In an interesting twist, I asked two first-timers last night if they had fun, and their response was a strong “NO!” When I asked them why they said because we played music that was too clean and didn’t let them dance the way they wanted.

Last night was an amazing night. We had food, a skate park, smores at the fire pits, a scavenger hunt, giant earthball games, outdoor volleyball, and classic tv shows in the theater. Yes, we had a few students who danced inappropriately at times, but our staff worked hard to keep that to a minimum. I understand your decision to not allow your daughter to return to “The 3” next month, but I also ask you to pray for our junior high ministry as we continue our efforts to expose lost kids to the good news of Jesus Christ.

Please feel free to call me should you have additional questions or concerns about our junior high ministry.

God Bless,
Kurt Johnston
Pastor To Students

SHE WROTE:
Hi Kurt,
Thanks so much for your reply. I appreciate the time you took and the information you gave. I feel a lot better about our church and youth group now that I have read it. My daughter brought three girlfriends last night to "The 3" and we brought the same girls tonight to the 6:30 service. Hopefully they will continue to attend, hear the power of God's Word and have changed lives!
Thank you for your commitment to the youth and thanks again for your response. I will definitely be lifting you, your team, and the jr high ministry in prayer.
In Him,

I WROTE:
WOW....3 friends to church last night, awesome! Hopefully 'The 3' will continue to open doors like that. Please tell your daughter that wildside is proud of her...that is exactly what we hoped students would do. Good for her!
kj

Yesterday @ 12Stone

great service at 12stone yesterday morning. here's the video that we did to cap off our "awakening," service.


Awake O'Sleeper from Brandon McCormick on Vimeo.

Saturday Night Question

I'm going to begin posing a question each Saturday night in order to see if you guys can help me come up with some answers.

Tonight's question is this:

How do you know when you're being selfish?

I should have thought of that

Introducing a regular-looking pizza box with a special touch. The difference is that the box can come apart once it's delivered by your local pie dealer. While it starts out the size of a standard pizza box, customers can break the platter-size square into four plate-size sections using scoring and perforations.

And of course...we all know who really invented it, Al Gore. (not really but it seems like another idea he could take credit for.)

new sunday morning series for middle school

much thanks to Ryer for the bumper/promo video for the new Sunday morning Encounter series that we are doing in middle school. 6 weeks. all about jesus.

I um...I just..What is...Just Watch: Part 2

oh yeah. this is happening.

theosthetics

Ray Boltz...You've got to be kidding me!!!

I'll admit it. I have been to a Ray Boltz concert. I even raised my fist high in the air when he sang my favorite hit, "the anchor holds." Years later, when I should have known better, I was moved to tears when a Honduran pastor that I was serving with on a mission trip decided to sing our group the song, "thank you," our last night in the country.

But all this to say, I thought that I would never blog about or read blogs about Ray Boltz again...at least apart from the "stuff christians like," satirical site.

But today I hear about this. Ray Boltz has come out of the closet to announce his personal life to the world. I am blown away. Shocked. Really.

You can read about the story in Christianity Today