When our group came back from CIY Summer Conference this summer is was great to see all the teenagers doing their daily devotions. They were keeping each other accountable in love and talking about what they were learning, it was great. But as the first 30 days finished up and we started the next the excitement began to wane and slowly so the the energy level of the group. And before long the group was pretty much back to where it was before we went the conference. I don’t entirely place the blame on not doing daily devotions because of the environment CIY creates, the spiritual high from being in a Christian Utopia and the deep level our group went to by taking off everything that separated us and truly caring for each other cannot be sustained from an event like this. But I know that daily time in God’s word helped carry all of that longer than the hype from the event itself could.

Sometimes I think that we don’t put any weight on the influence parents have in the lives of our kids and miss opportunities to teach them things that are important to us. I hope that most of you are trying to do some kind of devotions a least of couple of times a week and if you aren’t please let me encourage you to and that end of this post will be some resources for you to download and use. Those who are doing them probably wait for a quite time when the kids are gone or asleep to do them which makes them easier to get through and focus on but what if you did them out where your kids could see you in the morning at the kitchen table while they are getting ready for school or in the evening right after dinner in your favorite chair in the living room.

Our kids learn so much from watching what we do and I know this translate out to devotions as much as it does anything else. Try doing your devotions out where they can see you and maybe after a month ask them to sit down in the same room and you do yours and they do theirs as a family. Just a thought.

Resources- (to view these Devotions you must have Abode Reader for PDFs)
How to turn any bible chapter or verse into a life applicable daily devotion and journaling plan.
30 days with Jesus
30 days Beginning in the Bible
30 days in Psalms
30 days of Stories You May Have Never Heard Of

[tags]Parents, Daily Devotions[/tags]

Yesterday morning after church we had a great parents meeting. We brought all the parents together to mainly talk about Small Groups and some ideas we wanted their opinions on. It was great to see them really champion small groups and get behind them as a part of our student ministry. One of the reasons we wanted to talk with the parents was like many churches across the country our teens are busy with homework, sports, work, sibling schedules, parents schedules and the like and trying to fit a small group into their week is tough. We talked about doing small groups on Sunday Nights as an extension on our existing programming but we all agreed that their is a certain atmosphere created when doing small groups in homes and how much more likely people are to open up and talk when they aren’t at church. After some discussion we all agreed that some concessions had to be made in all of our lives for God and that we could work small groups into our week because of their inherent value to the teens.

We also talked about better ways to communicate with them. We talked about a weekly email that would talk about upcoming events, what we are teaching, other important communications that we need to get to them and we talked about disseminating other types of information through my blog. Here at CCDS I’ve never told anybody about my blog. Although when I ask my self why I blog and parents as part of the audience comes to my mind. I told the parents that I would commit to blogging at least 3 times as a week and talk about purpose, vision, direction we as a student ministry are going, what I’m reading and what is affecting and influencing me, not all in one week. I really think that both of these forms of communication could really benefit all of us parents, adult leaders and me (the youth minister).

So without further ado I want to welcome all the new audience members to my blog!

Tonight I brought a few high school seniors from my youth ministry to Florida Christian College and tonight and tomorrow is their program to introduce juniors and seniors to the college classes and college life. We sitting here in one of the dorm rooms talking with a current student and reminiscing about the good ole days when I was a student. We had no satellite TV only rabbit ears, no wifi internet just dial up, now there are no guys on the dark side these days I never lived on the light side (dorm nick names). Its cool to be back on campus and talk with new students about the school and their ministry aspirations and show my seniors around. Tomorrow we go to a class in the morning, lunch with the faculty and staff, and an FAQ with Financial Aid.

Lots of stuff going on still not making much time for blogging and beginning to remember some of the reasons I started, mainly and outlet for stuff going on up stairs and now that I’m not its gotten pretty crowded and no room for much more. Anyways, there are some pretty cool stuff going on here and on the web that I thought I’d share.

-I’m taking a group of 3 high school seniors to visit Florida Christian College for Senior Salute, their come experience college event. Pretty excited, 2 of them are most likely going next fall and the other is on the fence.

-The Florida Christian Youth Convention is 60 days away, we have finally secured a location which proved to be pretty difficult without laying out obscene amounts of money. We have a great line up of speakers, worship and workshops for high school and middle school students.

-Almost done with Irresistible Revolution, it is a deep book piled on top of not making myself read daily. It has really challenged a lot of my positions on pacifism (not a give peace a chance philosophy but from the prospective of the stance of the early church), the poor and what it means to really minister to those who need it, how much of the New Testament we don’t give any attention to as modern American Christians (because it makes us uncomfortable, requires intentional work with the poor and to give more: whether time or money)

-New Dove (the soap company) initiative- Campaign for Real Beauty and their new video Onslaught, you can watch it on their front page. Having a 4 year old daughter (who is mentally about 30) I know I need to start now to build her self-esteem and understanding of real beauty. Go watch the video.

-Los Whittaker a worship guy on staff at Buckhead church was on LA Ink last night. Got a great tattoo of Paul on the road to Damascus. He shared in story about faith and ministry and they did an awesome tat.

[tags]Florida Christian College, Dove, Onslaught, Campaign for Real Beauty, LA Ink[/tags]