Lessons learned in a week of camp

Well I just got back from Butler Springs Christian Camp with my group of fifth and sixth graders from the church I work at. It was an amazing week and I am truly sad to now be home. This week I experienced a side of ministry I had never experienced before. I had a great group of kids in my team that I mentored and even learned from myself. 

This week of camp was called "The Mess" and was based off of the book "Messy Spirituality" by Yaconelli. I have yet to read this book but after this week it is now on my list. It was an intense week culminating in me preaching last night for us to reach out and cry out "Abba Father" or "Daddy" like a little child. However, I saw more than just running to the father this week.

Wednesday was the most intense day of the camp for everyone. We had a morning activity where we had to do certain tasks in order to find puzzle pieces to put together. First team to put the puzzle together won. My team was amazing. I had seven girls and 3 boys in my specific team and we were one of eight teams. My group came together and did everything that was asked of them. We had to dress alike at one station, pick up trash at another, give the dean a drink, and at one even run over a mile. When my team got our final puzzle piece there were two other teams already putting theirs together, but my team flew through the puzzle and got it together first. We had come in first. However, this was not a good thing actually. 

See, the game was all to show how we serve the world. Dress alike, be fit, watch TV, and other things. It showed the idols that we worshipped. I knew this the whole time but my team didn't. (I was still proud of my team because they hustled beyond all belief) So we took all the kids up to the gym and Jason, the dean, told them of the secret behind the game and that they had to be punished for their sins of serving the world. Jason had prepared a slip and slide, but this had baby oil, shaving cream, rotten milk, and the left over liquids from the bucket that everyone had been pouring their leftover stuff in all week. And each kid had to go through it. It was their punishment.

So since my team won we walked them down to the slip and slide. I had girls crying in my group. I had to put my arms around them to get them going but I had to keep telling them that they had to go through. So we got to the slip and slide and we were ready. Jason called one of my kids up to go first. Right before the kid took the slide I got in front of him and told him not to move. Jason then told Carly to go. "Don't move Carly!" I yelled. People later told me that they thought Jason and I were about to fight and that I would be kicked out. Jason kept calling kids forward and I yelled for each one of them to stay put. When Jason yelled at me that someone had to go through my response was "This is my team! This is my team! I love them! I will go through that for everyone of them! They don't have to go through it!" Jason yelled at me that it was their crap, their mess and I just yelled back "Not anymore!" I slid through the baby oil, the rotten milk, the backwashed drinks, the dirty nasty water from the creek. I took it for my team. It was possibly one of the grossest things I've ever done. 

When do we look at our mess in a visual form? Faith has been watered down to the point of almost non-existence anymore. For those of us who have been in the church for a while we forget everyday what Christ went through for us. How we deserved death, yet we do not die. We deserve damnation, but with Him we have life. And how many times do we run to him crying out with joy for what He did? You see, I just went through some nasty stuff. But for my team it didn't matter. After I had cleaned up and changed clothes I went down to my team meeting spot. And every single one of my kids ran to me and wrapped their arms around me. I felt a joy at the appreciation they had for me. I felt a joy that I could do that for them. And it was just a glimpse to what God must feel every time one of his children runs to Him and wrap their arms around Him. I was a team leader and a dorm dad to those kids, but I'm nothing compared to the Abba Father I have in heaven. So my thing for the day is just try to put the wages of your sin in visual form. Try and think of what you should owe. What you should have to go through. You will find a new appreciation for the sacrifice laid out for you. And if you do this, never again will you just think of Christ's death as a normal thing for you. A new appreciation will be found for the everyday life and relationship we have with our Abba Father. When we cry out to him like a little child saying, "Abba, daddy, I love you."

Preaching and criticism

I apologize now for the continual posts on topics such as God, Religion, Church, and theology. As a Bible College student I really can't help it. I know two things very well. My faith and sports. And seeing how nobody wants to hear me rant on about the Cincinnati Bengals (I probably will at some point however) or the Reds who have absolutely sucked the past eighteen years then my faith should have to provide sufficient amount of ideas and topics for me to post. To anybody reading this (all though I don't know who would listen to a barely experienced nineteen year old Bible nerd) you should understand that I get carried away in my writing. I have a style that I have deemed theological throw-up. When I am writing something I will just start typing/writing everything that comes into my mind on the subject. It is only later that I organize and add supporting details and facts to what I have said. Since this is a blog it is very possible that you will simply receive tons of theological ideas in an apparently unorganized and non flowing passion, simply because I doubt I will receive grades for what goes on to these posts. But don't worry, for some of the tricky stuff and when I say outlandish things I will break down and throw in a quote or two and more likely than not some scripture. However, this post should not be overly theological, but we'll see what happens. I never know myself.

There are very few preachers that I will go out of my way to listen to. In this exclusive list includes such people as Mark Driscoll, Andy Stanley, Louie Giglio (spelling? didn't feel like finding it) and my brother simply because he is my brother and not because he is an amazing preacher. I come from a church called Lakota Christian Church. It was a great place to grow up. The Minister there is named Dr. Stephen Sams. Stephen was a great pastor in the sense that he truly and deeply cares about people. He is one of the greatest pastoral men I have met. However he is not the greatest speaker. Despite this fact I would not trade him for any other minister to come into Lakota. This brings me to my first point to acknowledge the fact that there is more to a pastor than his preaching. My mom at times would complain that Stephen was not doing the greatest job preaching. I would argue that he spent a lot of time taking care of the church and the congregation. However my mom would not understand this as part of Stephen's job. "He's being payed to preach," she would say. However, if you hire a minister there are always going to be people demanding his attention. There is never enough of one man to go around to a congregation. Which brings me to the point that if you expect some type of amazing preaching (depending on the size of the congregation) more people will need to be hired for the regular pastoral duties. I am interning at a church this summer called First Christian Church. It is a church of about 1700 people right now and they are still growing rapidly. They say (all though no one in the world knows who "they" are when they start quoting statistics like this) that they are the third quickest growing church in America. Very possible since they have gained over 600 people in a brief 18 months. This church however has hired a "Pastoral Care Minister" whose job is simply to watch over the people. He does hospital visits, house calls, counseling, talks with people, baptism consulting, and things such as that. This frees up the Senior Minsiter, Craig Grammar, to do the preaching at which he is very talented. Also at my home church Lakota there have been new hires which has allowed for Stephen to further his ability in speaking. All I am saying in this point is to encourage your pastor if he isn't doing the greatest preaching job. Maybe he isn't that great of a preacher but despite his abilities he is probably having way too many things thrown his way. Encouragement and help will go a lot further than simply criticizing.

However, there are those speakers out there that you have to be wary about. Some preachers have such charisma that a congregation or any type of audience through any type of medium will take that speakers word as truth. There are two men especially that come to mind when I think of this problem. One of them I like and the other I think could emerge as the anti-Christ or something along those lines (I say that sarcastically because I won't go into Revelation much in my posts). The first man that I like is Rob Bell. Bell has the amazing ability to connect with any type of audience. You just have to simply watch his Nooma videos to fall in love with what he says. Also there is the book Velvet Elvis which is absolutely amazing. However, the problem with Rob Bell is that he is not always correct, nor is any other human being. But this means that for serious followers of Christ we cannot simply stop searching and just agree with everything that Rob Bell says. In his book Velvet Elvis he even talks about this to an extent. I do not have the book here with me right now so I won't put the quote in but what he essentially says is that our personal study and devotion and wading through the tough parts of the Bible is a true form of worship, not just listening to earthly men speak. Rob Bell is great though for new Christians, or anyone who is looking for some extra advice and words of inspiration in their personal studies. 

The other speaker I think of though I cannot stand. If there were ministers that I could say I hate the two of them would be Benny Hinn (because he is ridiculous) and Joel Osteen. Joel Osteen has incorrect doctrine, theology, and ways of ministering to people. I laugh every time I see one of his books in the stores because its just his face covering the entire book. I think he should be the president of the Narsicissts of America club. I mean he's a minister but I honestly have to think he just loves seeing his face everywhere because if the words Joel Osteen are mentioned you will most likely see his face nearby (except on this blog). If you want my true feelings of Joel Osteen you should go to this link:  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7IuiUOapK1w. I have to agree with Mark Driscoll that Osteen is preaching an incorrect message. It is a problem that pastors like Joel Osteen have such influence as they do (mainly because 75% of the church is women looking at him because apparently he's good looking or something). Thats something that gets to me all the time is the fact that most Christians today do not know what it means to study for themselves. I have seen many people that had to have everything spoon fed to them. I may be spoiled with the speaking that I have heard because I've had access to sermons from Driscoll, Stanley, and my former youth minister who was incredibly talented when he spoke once or so every other month. True he had more time to prepare for each sermon he preached at our church but he was very charismatic and applied things to our lives all though I had to pull myself out of the trap of just accepting everything he said and losing my own personal devotion. 

My advice to anyone out there is to find a preacher that speaks to you. I have given you a few ideas here and each one has a podcast like Mars Hill sermon, North Point Community, or even Lakota Christian Church. Check these out and find a pastor that can relate things to you. Listen to Rob Bell, listen to these other guys, but follow it up with your own personal search. Follow it up with your own walk to be more like Christ. If you do these things, then you will begin to find a system for personal devotion like you have never discovered before. I love preaching, but I loved it even more when someone at school told me that something I said pushed them to find something in the Bible. A preacher's job should be to take a text or lesson, apply it to someone's life, make it personal, and push them to make their own discoveries, ideas, and personal revelation. A preacher should be a guide, not just an information database. To next time I hope I've given you some stuff to chew on. I'll be getting even deeper into my crazy mind soon....

First Post; Look at the Blog Name

As I just said, if you look at the Title of my blog page, then you can guess what this post is going to be about. For the first post in my first blog I will have to rant, criticize, and uplift the ins and outs of a student at Johnson Bible College. Now I know that many people who hear the phrase "Bible College" immediately think of a previously home schooled kid that was sheltered and doesn't know a lot about true life. Well at the risk of sounding arrogant that is not who I am at all. 

As a student at Johnson, I take joy in the fact that I don't adhere to the traditional stereotypical mindset of a Bible College student. I went to Lakota West High School in West Chester, Ohio, the home of the Firebirds. I graduated with 600 other students, most of whom had rich parents. So most of the people I knew in high school had too much money and too much time on their hands. That got me out of the sheltered classification quickly. When I applied to Johnson there was a form called the Johnson lifestyle agreement, which I signed. It said that there were certain things that I wouldn't do. I signed it realizing that there was no way that I would listen or adhere to most of those rules. My extensive movie collection alone is enough to show that I do not listen to these rules. The next big thing on the form was that I would not use tobacco products, even though it was legal for me to do so. I signed but continued my ways of smoking cigars once a month or so (but I will never touch a cigarette). I wanted to rebel against the institution of Johnson Bible College, while at the same time was so glad to be going there.

Now here I am a year later after my first year of college. I still want to smoke, but I'm trying to quit for reasons still truly unknown to me. Its not because I'm addicted that it is a struggle to stop, because it only happens about once a month, but rather because I love the feeling of sitting on my back deck with my friends, listening to music that ranges from country to acoustic to classic rock, and lighting up a stogey. Still a bit of a rebel, I am now much more experienced with life than what I was before this school year. 

My first year at Johnson seemed to fly by quicker than a single semester at my old high school. My favorite class at Johnson was entitled Basic Christian Beliefs, taught by a 31 year old professor that has already received his doctorate; Rafael Rodriguez. This class was a theological class and was anything but basic. It was the hardest course I had all year, especially the take home final exam which took me 25 pages double spaced to answer ten short questions. I learned countless amounts of theological ideas in this class. I quickly got the opportunity to do some preaching. Over the course of the year I preached twice in student led chapel and twice at an evening church service called The River, which we have on, well, the river in Knoxville. Since then I have been asked to organize speakers and lead student led chapel next year and I was also asked to lead The River speakers. I agreed to do both and can't wait for the fall to begin in furthering my own speaking and administrative abilities. 

Johnson is a place of opportunity for me. At Johnson I'm not tested so much in class as I am with how I relate to people. There are people at Johnson that I simply cannot stand. However, I have to learn to cope with them, and even minister to them at some points. I have been given the opportunity to become a better speaker even though, again at the risk of sounding arrogant, I know that God has given me the ability to preach. As a freshman I was known by most of the 715 students at Johnson. Johnson is also the cheapest private school in Tennessee, allowing me to go to school for simply 12,000 a year for everything. So I love Johnson and probably always will simply because of the experience I gain from the school.

However there are frustrations as well. Johnson tends to be very uptight and stingy on rules. If the administration knew I smoked (or at least used to), knew all the R rated movies in my room, or knew my thoughts on Church and the Body of Christ and how we minister to people, I would probably be kicked out. We have a curfew, which is new to me because my parents were never home. The girls are allowed in our dorm rooms only one night a semester which gets frustrating, and there are numerous other things that drive me crazy about my school's rules and administration. However, nothing is going to change while there are many traditional alumni walking around still alive and giving money to the school. 

So there you have a bit about me and maybe a little more about what to expect from my later thoughts and ideas which will be posted. I love my school, I love the opportunities, my professors, most of the people, but sometimes Bible College can keep the exciting spark of ministry tamed with the ways of the past. For anybody else reading this post, especially if you go to Bible College, don't let these traditions and rules stop you from going on the never-ending search for truth and the ways of less traditional leaders so that you may become a Christ follower dedicated to bringing more glory to His Kingdom. Until next time...