Theology is imperative to youth ministry! Every opportunity with a student is a chance to teach theology… Realizing this more & more everyday.

Do you know what this plate of pasta shows to me? This plate of pasta shows me just how big the kingdom of God really is! I’m serious. This plate of pasta was made and provided by my new friends the Micah and Justine.

I met Micah and Justine yesterday at around 9:00 at night, when I drove into Joplin, MO and pulled into their driveway to stay the night at their house. In fact, I am living at their house for the next four days while myself and s small team from LifeBridge work with a church in their efforts to love their neighbors who have been affected by the F5 tornado that devastated this city.

Justine, the wife, is about 7 months pregnant and has a cute little one already, running around laughing at everything and everyone. She made the plate of pasta, along with amazing salad and some of the best brownies I’ve had!

What does all this have to do with the kingdom of God? Well, I have been humbled to see what impact the love of Christ and His kingdom has on people. When people open their homes to strangers, make them meals, and serve them as if they are family or more, the kingdom of God has been demonstrated and realized!

Pasta, friends, and the kingdom of God…

Recently, I posted about a conversation a few others were having about a new strategy for discipleship and church growth (the original posted can be found here Adam McLane). Within the blog post and ensuing conversation, I commented some of my thoughts to the blogger of the original post… I thought it would be helpful if I shared my thoughts on the conversation. Also, this whole conversation started with a blog post he did on reaching parents of students – The Parent Gap.

Below is what a posted in the comment area in response to Adam McLane’s post on finding a new strategy…

“As a church, we have been praying and thinking about the command by Jesus to in-short “love God and love our neighbors.” Through this, it has caused us to rethink the how we do church, our measurements for success i.e. “wins” and over-all strategy. We are nowhere near having things figured out, but the conversation of being the best neighbor our neighbors have ever had, and loving our neighbors not because we want them to be Christians, but because we are Christians have caused us to have deeper discussions of how church would look different, be different, and act different.

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We are faced with a tiny percentage of the population actively involved in the local church. (>10%) Yet, I’m continually perplexed to see no one looking hard at the big, obvious problems of bottlenecks & gatekeepers which keep churches small with a strategy that lost its effectiveness 25 years ago. Most churches have the same exact strategy. It’s the manifestations of that strategy which differ.

TO read the whole article, click on the link…The problem with one-size fits all is… One-size doesn’t fit all.

Back in March, we took over 35 high school students to Oklahoma City, Oklahoma and worked with an urban missional community called The Refuge OKC. This trip was not only life-wrecking and life-transforming for our high school students, but it also had the same impact on me and my family as well. This video captures the essence of what The Refuge OKC is all about (I got this video from Tim Ulrich, one of the leaders of The Refuge OKC)…

As a church, LifeBridge (and other churches, individuals, and Christian organizations), has been wrestling with the whole concept of what it means to love your neighbor. Rick Rusaw and Brian Mavis have been instrumental in our church in causing us as a church staff and a as church to think about what it means to be the best neighbor our neighbors have ever had or to love our neighbors not because we want them to be a Christian, but because we are Christians… We are praying for God to show us how to love our neighbors – unprogrammed style…This video sure sketches out what many are thinking, now we just need to color it in!

You can follow both Rick Rusaw and Brian Mavis (and LifeBridge) on Twitter.

Community and The Refuge

Day 3:
LifeBridge high school students are amazing!!! I haven’t seen high schoolers work so hard. We are all definitely being rocked by the Father. Our hearts and eyes are beginning to see people and all His creation in a new and different way.

Praying we can finish strong and for the people we met today.