Ecclesiastes 12:10

  Oscar Wilde said, “Some cause happiness wherever they go; others whenever they go”. I’m sure you know what he was talking about. Those folks of whom your best memory involves a door swinging shut as they walk out of it.   Yet they may not be the most damaging of folks.   It is those that leave yet somehow still remain. People whose caustic words till sting even after the sound has died away. The fellow whose bad job performance makes everyone question if the job is valid in the first place. A false teacher whose lies still confuse and distort truth even when they have moved down the road. Those that leave but leave a stain behind that someone else has to clean up.   You can’t do much about those people but you can make sure you are not one of them. We have a motto we use at camp, ‘Leave the place a little better than you found it.” It is a good motto for life as well. Instead of going out with a thud, leave on a high note. Make a mark, not a stain....

  I’m afraid that in too many of our youth programs in the church today we are forcing our youth workers to make bricks without straw.   You remember the phrase from the book of Exodus.  As a form of punishment for Moses meddling in Egypt’s affairs, Pharaoh made the Israelite keep making the same quota of bricks but without providing the raw material they needed.  Now not only did they have to make the bricks but also had to assemble the material needed as well.   For our youth workers, it goes like this. As a child reaches “youth group age” workers are tasked with assembling them into Christians able to handle the worldly pressure on them.  Yet they don’t have the parts to work with.  They can’t teach deeper principles of scripture since the kids are lacking basic Bible knowledge.  They can’t challenge young people to service since the young people have never been expected to do anything for themselves.  They must be parents si...

Young fool... only now, at the end, do you understand...!   The other day when the new Star Wars trailer came out, I realized I am not young anymore.  The stars of the movie of my youth are now old people.  Which then make me old!  I used to think of myself as a “young minister” but time is telling me otherwise.  The advantage of age is experience.  I am by no means fully experienced, but after a while you get to seeing some of the same situation again and again.  So I thought I would share some experiences and the lessons I’ve learned from them, so others might gain some insight. Here are in no particular order, are some things you might face in ministry [i] . 4. A New Hope The Story :  You have taken a new work and everyone is excited.  The congregation has been dealing with many different struggles and needs, but now YOU have come and everything is going to be perfect!  You will solve all the problems and bring everythin...