Month: January 2007

  • Someone you should know

    I’ve never met Jeremy Del Rio in person, but I greatly respect him as one of the great practitioners of urban youth ministry in America today. Even without the "urban" label he’d have to be in my top 20 list of great practitioners of youth ministry. He’s very involved with social justice and street level ministry in New York City. While he has gained notoriety for his very public debate with then Mayor of New York Rudy Guiliani in 1998, he is more than just a figure head… he’s the real deal.

    Today he published a video blog post of Pastor Harley.     You may recognize his involvement in ministering to families, police officers, and firemen at Ground Zero shortly after September 11, 2001.

  • A post for my dog

    Dsc08037This is Stoney. He isn’t the brightest dog, but he is our beloved pet. Alright, the truth is that Kristen and I love the dog and the kids don’t like him at all. But that’s not really important.

    Stoney is lazy and sleeps nearly the entire winter. He either sleeps or passes gas until April. Yet, one thing gets him excited when there is snow on the ground. When we let him out to do his personal duty, it is his duty to the McLane family to scare the little obnoxious turds out of all squirrels within a block of our house.
    And this, he does well. We open the door and he chases the squirrels and barks like crazy. In Stoney’s mind the squirrel is little more than the rodent version of Martha Stewart. He seeks to chase and one day eat him a squirrel. Until then, all of his dreams will be unfulfilled.

    Luckily, Stoney is not alone. There is a man who also knows the truth about squirrels. His name is David Crowder. Here is a true story about squirrels that prove once and for all, they are evil.

    (more…)

  • Windows Vista

    WownowLast night at midnight, Microsoft released it’s new operating system called "Vista." This is the first major release since Windows XP in 2002 or something like that. I’ve seen some screen shots from Vista and it looks fine enough. I wouldn’t recommend anyone buying it unless you are getting it free with a computer. I just haven’t seen a compelling reason to upgrade right away.

    Now look at the picture (May need to click on it to see the large version)
    On the screen it says boldly… "The ‘Wow’ starts now" But look closely at the stage. Not a smile there. Instead I see "ugh" and "why bother." There is simply no "wow" on that stage. If you compare that to Apple’s big announcement of the iPhone you look at the image and you get excited because Steve Jobs is excited.

    Iphone_steveie
    This is a simple principle in action:     People will naturally be more excited about a product that you are excited about. Whether it’s me telling a group of middle schoolers about a game or me telling a group of adult about MainStreet or a politician telling me his plan or a Wall Street executive telling me about a great stock pick. If a person is interested and excited… I am much more likely to feel the "wow" and get on board.

  • A list I’m definitely not on

    The Church Report just issued a list of "The Top 20 Youth Ministers" in America. Well, not on the list. Interestingly enough I am not familiar with most of those people. In fact, most of them aren’t published authors and seem to be pure practitioners. Youth Ministry speakers and authors seem to be completely missing.

    Missing from the list? Interesting that Doug Fields isn’t on the list. He is clearly the most influential youth minister in America and at one of the most influential churches in America. If you ask people that I know "Who is the biggest name in youth ministry?" I would bet 7 out of 10 would say Doug Fields.

    Honestly, it would seem that in order to be considered you would have to be on CR’s "Top 50 church" list as well.

  • An e-zine?

    YmxpodcastOver the last few months we’ve been in the process of converting YMX to more of an e-zine format. Basically what that means is that is going to be a little more intentional about driving the content in the forums towards what the community is writing about and visa versa .

    Starting in March 2007, the primary articles on the site will be thematically the same. Of course, there will always be the odd ball because sometimes stuff "off-topic" is fantastic and timely. But Amy is working really hard to add lots more content to the site on a more regular basis and even up the ante a bit on the quality of what we’ve published to date. Get a sneak peak of what we’re up to by checking out the YMX storyboard.

    More work for Adam? Actually… the current set-up is a lot less work than it was before. I think it’s been a huge win-win for the site. Too hard to explain, but it just is less work and more gain to do it this way.

    p.s. This isn’t the big announcement. More on that Thursday morning.

  • Pink Eye

    I just got back from the doctors office. It was a good thing that we kept Megan home from school today because the doctor told us she thinks Megan has pink eye.

    Conjunctivitis (commonly called "pinkeye" in the USA and "Madras Eye" in India) is an inflammation of the conjunctiva (the outermost layer of the eye and the inner surface of the eyelids), most commonly due to an allergic reaction or an infection (usually bacterial or viral).

    So, looks like she’ll be home from school for 2-3 days until this clears up. So far she is taking it well.

  • Cool fundraising widget

    Chipin Just found this and I thought it was worth passing along. This would be perfect for anyone raising money for anything. Mission trip. Camps. College education. Pointless computer upgrade. It’s pretty slick. What I really like about it is that it’s a widget that people can take from your site, if they believe in it, and put it on their site really easily. Best part… you can collect money via PayPal if you don’t want to use their collection system. Check it out at Chipin.com.

  • Yes, eldery people can like new styles of worship too

    I caught this on a blog I’ve just started reading, the harmonyblog. (Thanks gman for pointing it out) It documents a man taking his elderly father to church. This wasn’t just getting him to go to any church, this was getting his dad to go to NewSpring, one of them big fancy deals with 1 billion people. OK, not a billion but they have quite a few people there. Also,  this is one of those churches that is big and loud and as uncomfortable to traditional church goers as they come outside of the church planting scene. So, check out the video. Quite interesting.

  • Wednesday Night Revelation

    This may shock some people, but to others who do what I do… they’ll know what I mean. On Wednesday night at Light Force, while I was doing the talk, I had some swirling thoughts going on. Nothing revolutionary altogether… but a revelation nonetheless.

    Background: Part of this thing I’ve coined the "One church model" has meant that I use my talents where they are most needed in the church… and that has meant doing less youth ministry for the good of the whole ministry. Such as, I lead an adult small group, not a student one. I create and develop a monthly outreach for the kids ministry, not Light Force. I spend a lot of energy making Sunday morning’s worship service great, but a little time and energy preparing for Wednesday night. On and on. What it means as a youth guy is that I’m not doing a lot of what I love… spending countless hours with students and investing in them directly. Instead, I spend a little time doing that while doing all these other things. In all honesty… since August I haven’t "felt" much like a youth pastor. At least not in the traditional "youth pastor" mode.

    (more…)

  • Feeling better

    I woke up this morning feeling much better. Most of the sourness and spinning head-ness is now gone. Now I’m just back to my same old crazy. Not sick & crazy anymore! Reminds me of a song….