• Camp saved me

    Welcome to Camelot

    Taking my bag out of the car and heading into the main building was like coming home. Sure, I didn’t live here. But the week I spent at camp each summer was my home base.

    Inevitably, the hour-long drive south of South Bend to a small, PCUSA camp called Geneva Center was full of anxiety. Whoever was driving was taking their sweet time. We couldn’t have left early enough nor driven fast enough for me to get there. A stop for gas was tortuous. No, please don’t stop to buy anything! Let’s go. I just had to get there. Once I was there everything was OK but nothing could be OK on the day camp started until I got there.

    This was camp week. My Camelot.

    I looked forward to camp for then unexplainable reasons. If asked I would just say it was fun and I loved the people. It’d take me a few more years to develop a vocabulary for what was going on.

    Deep stuff happened to my heart at camp. Each time I was there the grounds became more and more sacred to me. Even now, a couple decades later, when I look at the pictures on the website my mind is flooded with memories of my connection to God on those grounds.

    Like the real Camelot my imagination had built up a fantasy about this place. Camp had a disorienting effect because you had a hard time knowing if the camp world was real and home was fake or visa versa.

    Cabin Life

    Each week our little cabin group became a family. These 3 room cabins had a central room for “cabin time,” a boys room and girls room. We had a two counselors and about 15 fellow campers in each cabin. Of course, I had a favorite cabin. Cabin 4. For some reason I always ended up in that cabin group. And each week spent in Cabin 4 meant that I’d develop fun friendships with other kids from other Presbyterian churches around northern Indiana.

    I Needed Camelot

    As I’ve shared many times, my parents loved me deeply but I got dragged through the mud of all that was going on in their lives. Home often felt un-Camelot-like full of conflict, turmoil, change, and other drama. But camp was always the same. It was a predictable. It was safe. It was age-appropriate. It was “for me.”

    My earliest profound encounters with God happened at camp. Going for hikes, sitting around a campfire singing silly songs, swimming in the pool, or making dinner outdoors with my cabin group. I suppose I learned some stuff about God while at camp. But what I remember the most is that Geneva Center was a place where I encountered God.

    Camelot Needs Help

    As you can imagine, the Great Recession has hit Christian camps hard. For many families sending their kids to camp is discretionary spending that they just can’t take the risk on. And for many other families (especially from lower income households) when a kid needs camp the most, when life comes unravelled at home by the stresses of a recession, mom and dad can least afford to send their child.

    My life is better because of camp. I don’t know what would have happened without my weeks in Camelot. Will you join me in donating $125 to sponsor a kid to go to camp this summer?

    Photo credit: Castle Hohenschwangau via DragonWoman (Flickr, Creative Commons)

  • The Fight

    For Rocky & the Karate Kid, they knew who their enemy was. They knew who to train to beat. And they were desperate to win.

    But what about you… Who is your enemy? What are you fighting for? When is your battle scheduled? 

  • How much is “enough?”

    I go to church on Friday night, volunteer in the high school ministry on Sunday morning, and help lead a high school small group on Wednesday night.

    That is enough. When I hear an announcement for something else I could do, or somewhere else they need help, or even something else I would really enjoy doing– I have learned to resist. I am doing enough at church. (If I’m being honest, I’m actually doing one thing too much.)

    Hierarchy of serving

    I know this is hard for my friends who work in churches. They have spots to fill and they feel like a failure if they can’t fill them. But there is a very real hierarchy of service we all need to bend our lives around.

    1. Serve your family, however that is defined for you. In my life, my kids are in their primary years of faith formation. The Shema dangles inches above my head. There is no mistaking it. My primary ministry right now is my kids, it needs to be my kids, and relying on the church– even expecting them to cater to my kids– is on the edge of sinful selfishness.
    2. Serve your neighbors, there is no other way to love them as yourselves. Jesus’ words couldn’t be more simple. Love God with everything you’ve got, love your neighbor as yourself.
    3. Serve your church, it’s a good thing. The New Testament talks a lot about community life, and Paul talks several times about the various roles of people in the body of Christ. And we certainly get a lot of joy out of serving the greater needs of the church.

    For where I am at in my life, with three young kids and two fledgling small businesses, that leaves me with just a handful of non-work, non-running-around-like-a-chicken-with-my-head-cut-off hours to serve. For the sake of simplicity we’ll say that is 10 hours per week.

    Within the hierarchy of serving for my stage of life that looks like this.

    1. Family – 70%
    2. Neighbors – 20%
    3. Church – 10%

    When I try to do more at church… it’s not like I get more than 10 hours per week. It’s that other areas of my life lose those hours. I sleep less, I rest less, I go to my kids school less, I lean on the fence talking to my neighbors less. And it means that less of what I need to get done, gets done.

    It’s OK to tell your church leaders the truth. If you are doing enough and it wouldn’t be wise to take on more… don’t. (And don’t feel guilty about saying no.) There is no shame in doing enough! [Which is why it’s called, “Enough.”]

    And if you’re a church leader with spots to fill and no one seems to have the time to fill them, kill some things guilt-free. I know that sounds harsh, but if you’re people are already doing enough… why try to burn them out? Maybe this will even lead you to re-evaluate the priority what you’re doing?

    The Disconnect

    Here’s an observation from going from a church staff person to a volunteer lay leader. There’s a big assumption differentiation. As a paid staffer I constantly had this feeling that people were on the sidelines and largely uninvolved. “If only I could get them in the game, this church could really do some big things for the Kingdom.” But sitting on the other side of that coin I see the opposite to be largely true. People are very, very involved in stuff at the church and lots of other places. They are exhausted! They are doing too much. It’s not so much that they aren’t doing things for the Kingdom. It’s that their definition of Kingdom is bigger than your church.

  • How has suffering shaped your ministry?

    How has suffering shaped your ministry?

    That’s the topic for this week’s Slant 33 article. Here’s my answer to this question. My question for you is, “How has suffering shaped YOUR ministry?”

    Like a lot of fellow youth workers, I traded a business cubicle for a youth ministry office. Wide-eyed and overly optimistic Kristen and I longed for a career revolving around our faith and family while impacting the lives of teenagers. 

    And in ten years of working in the local church, our lives certainly revolved around our faith, family, and impacting the lives of teenagers. Some of our proudest moments have come in seeing that growth through the long haul. There have been so many times when I’ve grabbed Kristen and said, “This is so worth it!” 

    Conversely, I can’t tell you how many times I wished I could have traded in my pastoral role for my old corporate job. Yes, that career was unfulfilling. Yes, the longer I did it, the more bored I was. But at least it didn’t hurt so bad. When I was betrayed, I could speak up. When I was wronged, I could relay my issue to a human resources professional. And when I failed, I could deal with being passed over for a promotion or a raise. Sitting in a small group of my peers, I could talk about my job sucking or my boss being a jerk and get empathy from people in similar situations. 

    But in ministry the stakes are so much more personal. And it’s a very private struggle. The isolation and lack of camaraderie are ultimately what hurt the most. All too often when you reach out with a struggle, you are rebuked or even belittled. At least for me, this meant I carried a lot of burdens. Suffering became part of my ministry. 

    In truth, this personal suffering was enough. I understood it as part of the calling. But what caused unnecessary suffering was the impact of my vocation on my family. My wife couldn’t just be a wife and new mother. She had to carry the mantle of pastor’s wifeand receive unlimited and unwanted advice from the hens of the church. When our kids misbehaved, we felt the judgment from fellow congregants. 

    Early in my ministry, I allowed the weight of suffering to shape my attitude and self-image. If I were made of Play-Doh, my body would have been flattened. But, as I’ve gotten stronger, more used to the weight and its impact, I’ve learned that there is a healthy suffering that just comes with being a follower of Christ, which I can deal with. 

    But, there is also abuse that comes my way that I no longer permit to have the impact it once did. I’ve become like a junkyard dog in protecting my family and the families of my ministry friends. That’s the weight of ministry I no longer allow to shape them.

  • Relaxing in Rosarito

    One of the commitments that I made for 2012 is to rest better. I know, that sounds silly. But with all the stress and craziness of 2011 I forgot to take more than a few sporadic days off. That’s not healthy or sustainable. 

    With that in mind, and Kristen’s parents in town for the week, we jumped on the opportunity to take a 36 hour getaway down in Mexico.

    Hotel: We stayed at the Rosarito Beach Hotel. It was great. We stayed in the Pacifico Tower, which is only 4 years old. It’s gorgeous. We got a king suite with a beach view and balcony for a little over $100. The property is right on the beach, has great beach access, a kickin’ pier, and all the amenities. Free parking was a nice added bonus. We’re already planning to go back with the kids. Seriously, the hotel was like 45 minutes from our house. I really dig the old world charm of the older parts of the hotel. This thing dates back to the 1920s. All the stars have been there. I mean… Marilyn Monroe stayed there back in the day. How cool is that?

    Beach: I don’t know how long the beach is. It’s long. You can walk about a mile south of the hotel and… we got tired after about a 1.5 miles to the north. It was very clean and mostly empty. We thought it was cool that there were some fun things to do on the beach if you were into that. Like, rent a horse or ATV or drink a piña colada or eat shrimp. In the afternoons there is even a dude that will take you up in a sail plane. We didn’t do any of those things but it was all right there.

    Food: There’s no lying about it. One reason you go to Mexico is to get your eat on. And that we did. The star of the show is El Yaqui. They basically do one thing and do it very, very well. They have a skirt steak taco (perrones) that is perfect. The steak, onion, guacamole, cheese, and tortilla make love in your mouth to produce a love child called delicious. We had 4 tacos and 2 sodas for like $11. You can’t beat that deal. For dinner we went to a divey place on the main strip and shared a fish combination. We had shrimp, white fish, calimari, and lobster plus drinks for $20. I mean, get real. It’s so cheap and good and fun! For breakfast we grabbed coffee and a couple of pastries and walked the beach. Simple and magical.

    Shopping: Kristen had actually never been to Mexico. So we had a good time exploring Rosarito’s shops. The main market has dozens of little stalls with every souvenir you could imagine. We didn’t buy much but had fun. The main thing we bought stuff was in a big candy shop! They had everything you could ever want to put in a piñata. $10 in that place could get you a very serious sugar high.

    Safety: I’m so sick of hearing how unsafe Mexico is. Yes, if you’re in a gang or you buy drugs or you’re in the red light district at 2:00 AM… Mexico is probably dangerous. (Um, just as dangerous as Omaha or Dallas doing those same activities) But it’s also a country with millions of people who are very proud of their homeland. Believe it or not, not every person in Mexico wants to illegally immigrate to the United States! I’ve been to Mexico several times in the past year or so and never once felt the slightest bit in danger. In fact, when we walked back to the hotel after dinner at about 7:45 PM the streets were basically empty. If you’ve stayed away from Mexico because you heard it was dangerous… my experience in TJ/Norther Baja have been awesome.

    An invitation: Whether you are thinking about bringing your youth group/church to Mexico for a mission trip or maybe you’d like to find a sweet getaway spot. I don’t know any other way to make it OK for you than to simply invite you to come down. Drop me a line. I’d be happy to either connect you with some friends who live/work in Mexico or, if I have time, take you myself.

  • Why youth ministry can’t just become family ministry

    Why youth ministry can’t just become family ministry

    There’s a growing movement within the American church that puts youth ministry under the umbrella of family ministry. There are youth ministry organizations, publishers, conferences, and lots and lots of people highly interested in this model.

    To over-simplify: The idea is that youth ministry should be an extension of the over all family ministry of the church. So, youth ministry is really just another part of the organizational chart which fits nicely between kids ministry and young adult ministry.

    I think we need to push back from this organizational simplification. There’s a very good reason why youth ministry is the way it is. Namely, modern youth ministry emerged in the 1940’s to reach lost students the church didn’t care about. (The church, as a whole, was late to minister to adolescents. This gave birth to parachurch movements like YoungLife and Youth for Christ.)

    Youth ministry sprang up to meet the need of teenagers who wouldn’t naturally go to church. Or who didn’t fit in because their parents don’t go to church. Or those who will never fit into the stiff collars of a traditional church. Youth ministry has always been the organizational oddity that helps those students experience Christ.

    Any attempt to fold youth ministry into a church that isn’t currently reaching those kinds of kids and adults… is destined to make youth ministry sterile. 

    Putting youth ministry into the box of family ministry is misunderstanding that it’s historical place in the church is missiological. Historically, we are more tied to evangelism than we are discipleship.

    Don’t Misunderstand the 1-eared Mickey Mouse

    Chap Clark, very poignantly and famously pointed out that youth ministry too easily becomes an organizational island, what he called “the 1-eared Mickey Mouse” in the church. In other words, many youth groups have their own mini-culture, their own goals, values, and norms.

    I love Chap’s observation. It’s true. But I would argue that it’s not altogether bad. Further, I would argue that maybe the church needs a few more 1-eared Mickey’s to start reaching some more types of people. (But that’s another rant for another day.) The problem is that when you let the business people run your church– having a 1-eared Mickey Mouse is a bad thing. And so some of these emerging models of family ministry have at their core a desire to kill the 1-eared Mickey, folding youth ministry in.

    But don’t forget– if that 1-eared Mickey Mouse is reaching people the rest of the church organization fails to minister to, that’s a very good thing. And some of what you get when you fold it in is backfiring.

    Sanitizing Youth Ministry is a Bad Idea

    As I read the books, listen to the speakers, and read between a few lines… I think that the motivation for some people is to make youth ministry tidy. Some of these folks who say that youth ministry is really just a step in the family ministry food chain attend/work/consult with churches who reach a very sterile, homogeneous group of people. It looks like they are reaching a lot of people but they are really good at reaching a certain kind of person while excluding large, growing portions of the population.

    Bottom line: If you make youth ministry revolve around the family you automatically exclude students who don’t have families who go to church. Sure, you don’t exclude them by name or even intentionally. But when you start having father/son trips and retreats for the whole family– if you lived in a home with your grandma who didn’t come to church, how welcome would you feel?

    If you make youth ministry fit around the vibe and rhythm of your church instead of the local school system you’re automatically limiting who you reach.

    On and on. Youth ministry can be very powerful as an organizational island.

    Moreover, youth ministry was created to take some risks. To do things that got the Jones Memorial Carpet ruined. To reach the lost kids instead of the right ones. To connect the unconnected to the most important family they could ever have.

    The answer isn’t a sanitized family ministry. The answer is a realistic integration strategy that gets people of all ages and backgrounds out of programs and into community.

    This rant has exceptions: Let me point out, and cut off some of the negative feedback I get when I post things like this, that while I’m making generalities there are exceptions. The church we attend is one of them. They head this off because top to bottom they are reaching “the wrong people.”

  • World’s Largest Rope Swing

    All. day. long. Sign me up.

  • There are crappy days ahead

    There are crappy days ahead.

    Reading blogs and Facebook updates and happy tweets from your friends, you might begin to think that you are the only one who has truly awful days.

    This past week I heard from a friend who told me how wonderful my life is going. “Keeping up with your blog and stuff… boy, things sure do seem to be going great.”

    My response was one word: “Editing.”

    My life is just like yours. There are good days, bad days, and days when the well-hidden excrement of my life hits the quite literal fan to spray proverbial crap all over my life.

    This I can promise you: There are crappy days ahead. James says it way more politely than I have.

    Consider it pure joy, my brothers and sisters, whenever you face trials of many kinds, because you know that the testing of your faith produces perseverance. (James 1:2-3)

    Notice James didn’t say, “If you face trials…” He said, “whenever.” Hard times are coming. It’s inevitable. Hard times are a guaranteed investment.

    So the question isn’t, “How can I avoid hard times?” If we’re realistic the question is, “Whatchagonnado when you have a crappy day?”

    Here’s a few things that have helped me, maybe they are helpful for you?

    1. First– Am I just being sensitive? Sometimes I just get bent out of shape over things that aren’t really that bad. Am I mislabeling something as a crappy day when it’s really just a day when things didn’t go my way?
    2. Perspective helps. There will be days in life when your spouse is disappointed in you, or your kid gets in trouble at school, or you end up in the hospital, or your bank account read -$128.32. But any day you aren’t dead is another day things can get better.
    3. It’s OK to laugh. I don’t mean laughter as a way to hide from what’s going on. But sometimes the circumstances of our crappy days are just plain ridiculous and laughing about it is great medicine.
    4. Grab a friend and a drink. For millennia people who have had a bad day have met up with a friend for a beverage to unwind. Text a friend and go out for coffee, a beer, or a glass of wine. I’m not talking about getting drunk… I’m just talking about relaxing and getting some fresh air.
    5. Go for a walk, a jog, a bike ride. Anything physical seems to help me. Even if it’s late at night. This will help relax the tension so you can sleep. Oh, it’s the dark night of the soul which we all must avoid! 
    6. Just shut up. Sometimes when I’ve had a bad day I run my mouth. I say too much, I think too much, I worry too much, and I fall into anxiety about stuff I can’t control. All of that makes matters far worse!
    7. It’ll be better tomorrow. Nothing cures a crappy day like waking up the next morning.

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    Photo by Dennis Wong via Flickr (Creative Commons)

  • Discover something brand new

    One of the biggest lies floating around is that there is nothing new under the sun.

    That’s only true if your name is God.

    But God is creative and He has shown us before that He can create something brand new whenever He wants. (Genesis 1) Yes, Ecclesiastes 1:9 does say, “there is nothing new under the sun.” Again, it’s all about perspective. If you’re God that is true. If you’re a finite being we learn and discover new things all the time.

    Case in point, check out this tiny chameleon discovered off the coast of Madagascar recently.

    Read more.

    There is lots more to discover in this world. Whether you are a parent trying to figure out how to best raise your children. Whether you are a pastor trying to learn how to best communicate the Gospel in your community. Or whether you’re a biologists looking to cure a disease. Keep seeking. Keep chasing. Keep hunting for new stuff.

    There’s lots of new stuff to discover in this world. And you are perfectly positioned and equipped to discover it.

    We’re typically not held back by the capacity of what’s possible so much as we’re held back by the smallness of our dreams.

  • Tid for Tat in Politics

    The word compromise is somehow bad in Washington these days. Apparently, conservative Republicans have moralized things to the point where meeting someone in the middle is equivalent to a moral  failure. Consequently, it’s nearly impossible to get anything done in Congress because neither side is willing to compromise. Compromise isn’t a moral failure… it’s how you get things done in a multi-party government. Duh.

    Slowly, so it appears, compromise is coming back into vogue. Here’s a compromise on the payroll tax cut extension that cracked me up. This extension, which is a big deal for every working American, passed because one side agreed to a couple of the other sides demands.

    Here is my favorite:

    Also, welfare beneficiaries will be banned from accessing public assistance funds at ATMs in strip clubs, liquor stores, and casinos.

    Source