I did a 5-minute promo to our High School Ministry volunteer small group leaders this week. I talked for about 5 minutes describing The Landing and why hurting students would need to go. I also explained the packet which contained the items below: 1. A snazzy envelope with our bookmark printed on it along with [...]

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I wrote a post about generational youth ministry for my friends over at Generation to Generation Youth Ministry’s website. Here’s a clip. You can go there for the rest: To raise up a crop of believing servants, youth workers must: – Watch for potential: You can’t mentor every student. Look for the ones who are [...]

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Tonight I counseled with a student who wants to get rid of a bad habit. As one of the action steps, I suggested that he tell the person supplying him with the material to do his habit. His response was an aggravated, “Don’t you think I thought of that?” (The implied comment was that he [...]

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The Landing used the Children’s Ministry Center tonight so our Jr High Ministry could have a huge party in the space we normally use. The Children’s building is pretty sacred ground to the Children’s Ministry. They aren’t in the habit of letting other ministries use it. It’s stayed pretty nice that way. We were one [...]

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This week I was counseling a student about some recurring issues in his life. He was pretty bummed about his lack of progress in spite of his deep desire to change. This was a great opportunity for me to explain the difference between commitment and decisions. We make commitments all the time: – I will [...]

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I asked one of our worship leaders at The Landing to give his take on leading worship there. Here’s what Robbie wrote: Leading Worship at The Landing at Saddleback Church is a super sweet experience. In the past year God has taken me on an adventure that I never thought I would be a part [...]

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This week our small group lesson was about developing habits that would lead to spiritual growth. One of the biggest barriers to spiritual growth is our preoccupation with things that distract us from God. The best way I could think of to help this sink into my students was to have our small group in [...]

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We had some special guests at today’s staff meeting. Martin Sheen and Emilio Estevez came by to show their new film The Way. They stayed around afterward to take questions and pose for pictures. They were super cool and easy to talk to. They stayed around for a long time like they were neighbors from [...]

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Scott Johnson (a former small group student of mine) does amazing light shows on his house every year for Halloween and Christmas. Tonight he put this on my Facebook wall so I thought I’d share it with te youth ministry world. Any guesses what he wants to do for a career and where he wants [...]

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I LOVE traditions, rights of passage, etc. I believe it’s a great way to build anticipation for students from one year to the next. When I saw this post over at GenToGenYM.com, I had to share it. Good job Steven! This might be my new first night of small group tradition in future years. Every [...]

Filed under: Creating Culture, Generation to Generation, Try This | No Comments »