Church band will accompany highschool girls group Feb. 1st

In two weeks the Sunday service will be led by the highschool girls group. Several songs will be performed by the girls and accompanied by the church band. A flute and clarinet duet will perform Amazing Grace. Dana, the group leader, will give the prayer of the day. Sara will do the readings. Hannah will lead the children's sermon. Tessa is providing gospel news story headlines. Emma is singing a solo. Miranda will give the sermon. All of the girls will put on a flash mob to the song We Shall Overcome. Anna will perform an original song. Don't miss this special service.

Almost Done!

I'm a fairly happy pastor this week because I'm almost done with a project I've been working on since November.  It's a rundown for the synod, describing our youth ministry success.  I thought this would be a fairly simple project but it turns out that the roots of our youth ministry run deep into evangelism and our foundation theology.  Describing what we do doesn't cover it.  You have to understand the whys and hows in order to see the Spirit.  The kids themselves have let me know that.  More than one has come up and said, "I didn't think I'd like to do [insert name of youth event here] but it was totally fun and now I come all the time!"  As it turns out, what we do almost doesn't matter.  The events are just different ways of expressing the same love.

The problem is that churches haven't always been in the business of seeing or conveying that love.  We should have been.  We lost something when we drifted away from that purpose. In forcing us to re-learn how to be people of faith our youth have, in a sense, restored us.  That's one of the reasons it's important not to view youth ministry as a bag of handy tricks.  Another reason:  the same principles used in good youth ministry transfer to all of our other ministries.  The endpoints look different because youth are different than other community members.  But really, what is Theology on Tap but youth ministry for adults, plus a few beverages and minus the board games?  It's the same Spirit, the same process.  In opening one small door in what was an isolated, marginalized corner of our faith world we actually flooded the whole place.  Who would have known?

Nobody would have if the goal was to do "youth ministry".  When we began to do real ministry, evangelical, "Good News" ministry with youth...that made all the difference.  Once the Good News gets loose there's no stopping it.

It's been my task to try to explain this.  It's not easy building the layers of understanding you need to operate evangelically in your everyday life.  It's taken plenty of work to put it understandable form.  I hope I've been able to do so adequately.  I'm down to the last few pages and editing.  It should be done by this time next week.  Let's see how it goes.

--Pastor Dave (pastordave@geneseelutheranparish.org)

Thank You and Lent Reminder

Thank you to everyone who helped with our huge Youth Weekend, especially all the people who brought food:  Alice, Joyce, Betty, Patrick, and Dana.  The dinners really were a life saver because they allowed me to keep hanging out with the kids instead of spending an hour or two cooking and preparing food.

The weekend was a whole lot of fun.  We drifted between a low of 5 youth at once and a high of 14, depending on the day and time.  It was mix-and-match attendance each day so when you step back and look 18 different kids were able to come to some part of the weekend or other.  We discovered all kinds of games, ate plenty of good food, got to know each other better, and all of them took turns petting our cats...who were quite happy!  All in all it was a huge success.

Thanks again to everyone who helped.  And you youth-type folks can anticipate that we'll be doing something sort of like this during Spring Break as well...maybe not quite so constant and extensive, but there will be times to come over for sure!

--Pastor Dave (pastordave@geneseelutheranparish.org)

P.S.  Church folks, don't forget Lenten Evening Service this Wednesday at 7:00 at the Valley and the movie "Luther" as our first Lenten movie at 6:30 this Saturday at the parsonage.

Big Youth Weekend!

I've been taking a couple days off from most things in preparation for our Youth-a-Palooza this coming weekend.  Four days off of school and non-stop fun is in the offing!  Here's the schedule for those interested:

Friday:  1:00-7:00 p.m.  Board Games and Dinner
             7:00 p.m.-1:00 a.m.  Red Cliff Movie
Saturday 1:00-5:00 p.m.  Lord of the Rings Board Game Day
               5:00 p.m.-6:00 p.m.  Dinner
               6:00 p.m.-1:00 a.m.  Dokapon Kingdom Game!
Sunday   10:00 a.m.  Church
              11:00 a.m.-1:00 p.m.  Confirmation
              1:00-4:00 p.m.  D&D
              4:00-10:00 p.m.  Girls Only Dinner and Narnia Movie Marathon
Monday  1:00-8:00 p.m.  Board Games and Dinner

Youth 7th-12th grades are invited to participate.

--Pastor Dave (pastordave@geneseelutheranparish.org)

The Vision: The "Why's" Part 2

Yesterday we introduced our new Vision for the future direction of our church: converting the church parsonage into a youth/Sunday School/counseling center.  We addressed some of the "why's" of that vision by discussing the nature of, and theology behind, our youth program...the things that make it work.  Hopefully by reading that you understand the difference between the kids having a home and just having a place among us.

At least half the youth gatherings currently happen in the parsonage anyway.  It's more or less a necessity.  Part of that is psychological.  The same events that seem so natural sitting on a couch in a furnished house and an appropriately-sized room seem weird when held in a more clinical, less-comfortably-furnished, inappropriately-sized place.  The Fellowship Hall is too big for the things we do, the back basement rooms too dark and small.  Metal chairs are the only seating option in either, quite uncomfortable if you're spending more than a couple hours on an event.  Practicality rears its head too.  For example, you can't watch a movie in any of the church rooms.  There's no sight lines in the hall, no space in the back rooms.  Plus there's no equipment to show the Blu-Rays on which we have most of our movies and no speakers for sound.  The parsonage has all of these things plus chairs, couches, a comfortable environment.  It already feels like home in a way the church rooms never could.

Another quick example:  you should have seen the kids beam when some of the ladies of the church got them their own fridge for pop.  It was the first space that they could call their own.  They couldn't believe how lucky they were and you wouldn't believe how much easier it is for them to grab pops now than it was when the soda sat on somebody else's counter or in somebody else's fridge.  Even that much of a home--one appliance--made a huge difference.

For all these reasons and more, if an event is going to last more than a couple hours, if it requires any kind of technology, or if it's any smaller than a dozen people we just hold it in the parsonage.

The next natural question:  OK, so that's worked so far.  Why change now?

It has worked so far but we need to consider two important things:

1.  At whose expense has it worked?

2.  Will it continue to work?

The simple answers:  at the expense of me and my family and, for various reasons, no it won't.

The first reason it won't work is a happy one.  We're experiencing the same "problem" we had a few years ago.  We're starting to have too many events and too many kids to contain in my house.  People are feeling welcome.  They're inviting friends.  Those friends are discovering our church and inviting more friends.  On New Year's Eve, through simple word of mouth, we had 19 people show up for a couple of movies.  10 sat on our couch, 3-4 more in chairs behind the couch, another bunch sprawled out on the floor.

This is great, but realistically my house can't accommodate that many people while remaining my house.  We have too many things in the way, not enough seats, etc.  In practical terms that leaves me choosing between kids, deciding who to notify about events and who to not mention them to.

To be clear, we never turn anybody away.  That's a firm rule of mine.  Anybody who comes can stay.  But that also means that I can't broadcast certain events very widely otherwise we'll be overrun.  Usually how it works is somebody will text me and ask if I have time to do something on a given day.  I'll say, "Yes" and tell them about how many friends they can invite.  I know, then, that I can't let anybody else know.

Obviously this is not ideal as far as youth evangelism.  The people who text me most often get to come most often. Those slower on the draw get left out.  Since I get texted quite often and my calendar fills quickly I seldom get to make it up to those who are left out.  Not having a dedicated youth space is causing us to pick and choose who we'll serve instead of being able to take all comers.  It's limiting the effectiveness and growth of this ministry.

The second reason the current system won't work anymore is my family.  Before Derek came along this was easy.  Careen would just join in on the activity or curl up somewhere with a book while the youth and I hung out.  When Derek was a baby it wasn't so bad either, as all he needed to be happy was mom close by.  Now Derek is 5 and Ali is 2.  They need their space.  They need their house.  Ali sleeps four feet away from where we watch movies at night.  Careen is just down the hall and hears youth having fun at midnight when she has to get up early with the kids.  If I want to have an event in the daytime I have to ask my family to leave the house in order to make it work, as the kids can't be underfoot nor can we just lock them in their rooms for four hours.  I've made this request multiple times.  How many times can that happen before it starts being unfair?

I'm starting to have to reject youth events for this reason.  For example, last year we had a very successful movie and dinner night for High School youth.  It was fantastic and well-attended.  We wanted to start it again this year, to build on that success.  But I couldn't do it.  I sat down and looked at having Careen and the kids leave the house every second Sunday and I finally decided I had to draw the line.  So we're not doing it.  The sad part is, that event was drawing kids we don't always see at the other events.  But what can I do?

This may sound self-serving but I think I've earned the right to say it.  For years I've sacrificed and done, by most accounts, an amazing job ministering with these kids.  There's been no mystery to it.  I've given them the time, energy, and space that they needed to flourish and enjoy themselves among us.  But this has been on the backs of me and my family.  We have been paying for this vital ministry.  We've shown it can be done.  We've demonstrated why it's not only good, but indispensable to our church.  How long do we have to keep paying the price to show that to everybody else?

At a certain point the church has to decide whether it thinks this ministry is vital enough to support.  If the answer is "no", then I've been wasting my time with this (at least from a church perspective) and I need to stop doing it.  But if the answer is "yes" it's time to throw our support behind this ministry...for everybody to throw in some support for it.  I'm eager and willing to continue growing the ministry and working with the youth of our town but I can't keep doing it without the right tools and space.  And I can't keep making my family pay--not just financially but by sacrificing their home--for something the whole church should be supporting.

We haven't even talked about the Sunday School and counseling aspects of this Vision.  We will do that next time when we lay out the floor plan and what the final product would probably look like.  And you should get excited about that, because it is way...cool.

As always, feel free to ask questions and make comments in the comment section below or via e-mail.

--Pastor Dave (pastordave@geneseelutheranparish.org)

The Vision: The "Why's" Part 1

As you've probably heard, the new vision that we talked about in Sunday's annual meeting involves converting the parsonage into a center for youth ministry, Sunday School, and counseling.  My family and I would move to a different house, clearing space for those ministries to flourish.  We'll talk about what such a center would look like plus the steps we'd need to take to get there in subsequent posts.  For now, let's just cover the "whys" of this vision.

Those present at the annual meeting saw a short film showing some of the youth who come to our church in order to participate in its ministries.  We only caught the ones who were there when we were filming our Sunday School movies.  We still managed to catch 17 youth on camera.  Very few of those came specifically to do the movie project.  We just recruited kids who had come to hang out and do other things.  That's 17 youth picked up more or less randomly in just four months of filming.  We actually have contact with more.

Why do these youth come to be with us?  Over the years people have attributed it to me.  I'll take some of the credit, as I've made this a priority...seeing the great need.  But really, it's not my personality that draws them.  It's our theology meeting their need.

Our teenagers are growing up in a world we never imagined.  They have more information, more choices, available to them than we ever did.  Their lives are also more organized, scheduled, and goal-directed than ours ever were.  This combination means they also have less real, human interaction than we ever got, especially with adults.  Much of their time is spent in isolation, in front of a screen of one sort or another.  They have a connection to a game or social network or what have you but it's through electronics, not face to face.  They also have adults aplenty in their lives but all of those adults want something from or for them.  Parents are parents...they want what's best for their children and feel the responsibility to raise them right.  Teachers are under pressure to get these kids to meet standards.  Coaches are under pressure to get them to win games.  Bosses are under pressure to get them to learn their jobs well.  None of this is wrong.  But put it all together and every relationship with adults kids experience comes freighted with performance expectations.

Now consider that kids nowadays are involved in one or another of these pursuits non-stop, as society has decided that "idle hands make the devil's work".  Imagine this was your life:  get up, eat breakfast quickly, shuttle to band practice, school, after-school activity, sports practice or game, home, eat, do homework, try to find an hour or two for leisure (staying up late to get it), collapse into sleep, get up and do it again.  Imagine every adult in your life was in the business of making sure you stay (and succeed) on this treadmill.

What would you need or want most?  What would benefit you?  Where would you find God in a different, meaningful way?

What if your church made God into one more demand on your time?  Come on Sunday.  Worship. Learn this.  Serve there.  Sit down and memorize, there will be a test.  Would that God be meaningful to you?  Likely he'd be the equivalent of your latest math assignment.

Here's what we tell the kids.  Come.  The door is always open.  When you have free time--on your schedule and not just ours--text and you're welcome to come over.  Sit down.  Relax.  Grab a pop...you know there's always some there for you.  Now, what do you want to do?  Play a board game?  D&D?  Computer game? Just shoot the breeze?  Watch a movie?  It's all good.  Oh, and bring your friends too.

In the course of this the kids get a chance to relax.  As they relax they open up, chat about their days and lives.  There's an adult there, relatively expectation-free, just to interact with them and enjoy them.  They're accepted.  They're loved.  They're home.

In this process, they learn more about what it means to be in relationship with each other, with me, and ultimately with God.  We don't sit them down in a classroom and teach them things about God (except in Confirmation and Sunday School, where that's exactly what we do).  Instead we show them God in the welcome invitation, in the gathering of friends, in the safe environment, in the unconditional love, in sticking with them through troubles and celebrating their successes.

We don't teach them about God in a classroom with a chalkboard because they won't spend most of their lives in a classroom in front of a chalkboard.  We teach them where God is in the things they do every day.  In this they learn that being holy and living well doesn't mean giving up everything that you love, it means finding ways to do the things that you love in godly fashion.  Godliness is woven in the fabric of their actions:  learning to play together, talk together, laugh and cry and fight and fear and explore together.

This method of evangelism takes longer than traditional methods.  What a classroom-person tries to teach in 45 minutes takes me years of patience, listening, walking with these kids.  But coming out the other side I believe we have more to show for it...not a God who lives in a building apart from their lives but a God who's with them every day just like that pastor was.

I get calls several times a year from folks who have now gone on to college and beyond, asking for advice or confessing troubles or needing help.  The lesson isn't over when class ends and neither is the connection.  It continues for a lifetime.

I'm firmly convinced that this is the best, if not the only, way to reach out to and nurture youth in today's environment.  The fact that most of them love every minute of it, seek it out and invite their friends, bears that out.  When we really get rolling I simply can't keep up with it all.  At certain times during the year I'll have four separate semi-formal get-togethers with kids during a week and then one or two spontaneous ones.  It's hectic, it's exhausting, it's a blast, and it's so worth it because it makes a difference.

There's seldom a single moment where you can point and say, "Aha!  I see what they're doing there!"  Mostly it just looks like doing normal stuff...which is the whole point.  But string along that normal stuff long enough and meaningful relationships grow.  A leaf just looks like a leaf, but step back and you'll see the whole garden growing around it.

That's how we do youth ministry here.  That's why it works.  Recently we've been given yet another opportunity, another influx of young friends knocking at our doors asking if we have time for them.  We need to say yes...for their sake, for the sake of our church, and most of all for the sake of God who invited them to knock (whether they know it or not).  This vision is that "YES!"

Next:  The "Whys" Part 2:  Why this vision?  Why the parsonage plays a crucial role in this ministry, how it's worked so far, and why things are changing.

--Pastor Dave (pastordave@geneseelutheranparish.org)

Is Anybody Listening?

Listen to the Christmas 2012 Children's Choir.

Lessons from Our First Youth Event

Our new (formal) Youth Event season kicked off Monday night with a well-attended viewing of the movie "The Hunger Games" which just came out on DVD.  Based on the book of the same name, it tells the story of two teenagers whose government and society force them to participate in a brutal spectacle pitting them against other teenagers from around the land.  All of the young folks, two from each "district" of the country, must fight in an expansive, scenic arena until only one emerges alive and victorious to be feted with riches beyond imagination.  This event is shown on TV for the amusement (and rooting interest) of all.  Our two heroes are forced to put on a show, faking a romantic storyline with each other, pretending they're thrilled with the chance to participate, demonstrating that they're not only willing to do away with their opponents, but that they're good at it.  If they don't play along they'll get no "sponsors" and not get the crucial aid they'll need to survive the ordeal.  At the same time they struggle with their own integrity:  the desire to be good versus the need to stay alive, the difficulty in keeping one's own identity when battling against a corrupt culture.

Like the books, this movie brought up multiple discussion points.  For purposes of this sitting, we focused heavily on two:

1.  Today's young generation lives in a world where if it doesn't happen on video, it's not real.  Between TV, YouTube, Facebook, phone cameras, webcams...every important moment is ripe for recording and broadcast.  There's a temptation, then, to swallow everything one sees on video as real.  The movie showed how unreal most of these situations are.  Our characters were forced to pretend the entire time they were on camera.  They were primped, trained, threatened, bribed...everything was directed towards showing the story the culture wanted told rather than the real feelings of these two people.  How similar is that to 99% of the things we see on TV today, especially "reality" TV?  In most ways if it happens on video it's not real.  Many of these people putting themselves out there for public consumption are doing just what all the youth in the arena had to do:  making up a pretend person to show to the world in order to put food on the table, stay alive, or gain fame.  That's not reality.  Or if it is reality, we're all in trouble.

2.  One of the enduring themes of the books and the movie is that even though our main characters find a way to keep/salvage some integrity, fighting back against the system to change it, they, personally, are never the same again after having witnessed the horror and violence that their culture has set up for them.  In some ways it takes them years to recover.  In other ways they never do.  Our young people today have the capability of witnessing almost anything with the click of a mouse button.  The best of human achievement is open to their Googling, but the worst is too.  No generation before them has had access to the kind of information and imagery that they have, for good and bad.  Our parents and society kept away harmful images and information during our formative years.  You had to actually go out and get/buy a magazine or movie to see shocking things.  These were usually protected, kept away from minors.  Not so today.  All of it comes right into your house.

This means that our young folks have a special responsibility to guard what they see.  They need a discipline beyond that which our upbringing required.  They need the ability to say, "No...I do not wish to see this, at least not right now."  No matter how much our culture dangles in front of them, they need to understand that society is more interested in selling them something than protecting them from anything.  They need the same kind of integrity our main characters had, to not go along blindly into things beyond their capacity to control.  Once seen, an image can't be unseen.  It'll follow you the rest of your life.  Those of us who are older have built up some resistance.  The cement of our brains has hardened to an extent.  Much of the harm of all but the most grotesque images bounces off.  But when you're young that cement is still wet.  The wrong image at the wrong time can leave an imprint that hardens into permanence, just like the hand print on the sidewalk.  It's OK to say no to some experiences for now, to stay out of the arena until you're sure you want to enter and you're sure you can handle it.  Just because something exists doesn't mean it's right for you.

We'll have more youth events in the coming months.  Hope to see all of you young-type folks there!

--Pastor Dave (pastordave@geneseelutheranparish.org)

Youth Announcement

Attention Youth and those who know them:

Our fall season will kick off with an end-of-summer movie on Monday Night at 8:30 p.m. at the parsonage.  We'll have a little discussion after the movie, so plan on being out until 11:00 or so.  If anybody needs a ride home, we can provide that.

The movie will be Hunger Games.  It's rated PG-13 so parents with youth around that age, be advised.  I have not seen the movie yet but I have read the books.  Part of their message is about the destructive effect of violence on young people...something we talk little about in our society.  That will become a part of our discussion.  I believe it will be a valuable one.  Nevertheless the movie contains a PG-13 level of violence, so be advised.

See you at the parsonage at 8:30 on Monday night!

--Pastor Dave (pastordave@geneseelutheranparish.org)

Advice to Youth

One of the questions I get asked often is, "What do you DO with the youth?"  It's tricky to answer because at any given moment our activities look like, "playing games" or "watching a movie" or even "not much".  But all those moments are preparation, not only training them to relish the blessing of normal things and conduct those things in Godly ways, but building relationships that allow me to be a resource in the more serious moments.

That's the subject of this post.  I've asked a couple (now mostly former) youth for permission to share some of the questions they've asked over the years and my responses.   Naturally we'll keep details general to preserve anonymity.  Also note that we're paraphrasing questions and answers here.  These things usually happen in snippets of conversation here and there.  Seldom will one of our youth sit down and spout a complex question in one sitting.  Even more seldom do I have opportunities to give fully-formed answers like this.  The presentation here will be compressed and thus slightly fictional.  The heart of the questions and the answers are the same, though.  They just sound better here than they did in real life.

Question 1:  I have a friend who bugs me to no end at school.  How much should I forgive?

That's easy.  As much as humanly possible.  And when you've exhausted that, pray for some of God's strength to forgive even more.  Usually you'll find that if you're trying your hardest to forgive, fewer things bother you.  You're not looking for trouble or offense therefore trouble finds you more seldom and you don't get as offended about little things like you do when you're holding a grudge.

Forgiveness doesn't mean letting yourself get hurt, though, nor letting other people get hurt.  If your friend is really causing pain to you or other people it's fine to say, "I forgive you but I can't be a part of this.  You're really hurting me and I don't want to do this anymore."  Most people will be taken aback by that kind of honesty.  Often they don't realize how much they're hurting others.  Sometimes they're just projecting hurt they feel inside onto other people without even knowing it.  (Like a girl who thinks she's overweight making herself feel better by calling somebody else "fat".)  When you bring the hurt out into the open, usually people are startled and then immediately apologize.  Often that's an end to the bad behavior as well.

If that doesn't work or if you're not comfortable talking to someone that way, you might talk to a counselor or teacher at school who knows both of you and the situation.  Or, you know, talk to mom and dad about it if you can.  They've probably been through something similar.

Question 2:  I'm dating a guy and it's pretty new but it's great.  The thing is, I feel pressured to go a little farther than I'm willing to go.  The few people I've talked to about this have mixed opinions. How do I deal?

Well, I have a very definite reaction to this.  There are things I'd like to say.  But ultimately this is going to be your decision.  Nobody can live your life for you.  Part of growing into maturity is being able to make responsible decisions about this kind of thing.  Besides, I think you already know what I'd like to say.  The problem isn't knowing, it's figuring out how to make sense of it all.  I do have a couple things that might help.

The first is the Immutable Law of the Tattoo.  You ever seen two celebrities get each others' names tattooed on them?  Once the ink goes on it's guaranteed that they'll be split up in six months.  Have you ever wondered why?  It's because they're playing a weird game behind those tattoos.

The two celebs will say they're getting ink punched into their pores because they're sure their love will last forever.  That's actually the opposite of what's going on.  If they were really sure the love would last forever they wouldn't need the tattoos.  They'd have a quiet confidence in their hearts, shown in their every action.

The truth is, they're really not sure!  Because they're afraid it might not last forever they get in a rush to get permanent marks on their bodies to show each other that yes, it really really really will last.  The tattoos aren't a mark of love, they're a mark of fear and insecurity.  But no matter how much ink they cover it with, that fear and insecurity always comes out in the end.  Instead of dealing with their issues, they got big ink splotches so they could pretend their insecurity didn't exist.  Thus the break-up.

The moment they got the tats is probably the moment when they were most afraid and needed to be assured (or pretend) that it really would last.  Ironically their sign of "forever" becomes the sure sign that it won't last forever.

The same principle holds when teenage relationships get intensely physical.  There's always a sense of pressure, of the need to prove something, of doing this so we know the relationship will last.  Thus "pressured to go a little farther than I'm willing".  People say they're doing it because they know they're in love and will always be, but if they really knew that then there wouldn't be such a rush.  If forever really is on the menu, there's no problem with taking things a little slow.  When you get in a hurry to take Steps X, Y, and Z when both age and your time together suggest you're not even to Step C yet, it's a sure sign that the physical part of your relationship is becoming your tattoo.  You're really not sure it'll last, you're really not wanting to admit that, so you do this Big Thing to convince yourselves that it will last Forever.

This doesn't work any better with a physical relationship than it does with ink...worse, in fact.  Sex is supposed to be an expression of deep and intimate love.  When it becomes a response to fear, a method to try and "prove" love is there, it often goes badly...as does the relationship.  You never end up getting your proof.  The fear never goes away.  In fact the fear gets more intense because now your relationship is even more heavy while at the same time being on rockier ground.  Ick!  Eeek!  Bleh.

That's why in situations like this, the decision to charge ahead is almost always the decision to end the relationship (eventually).  I'm not sure that's what you're aiming at.

Here's another simple principle:  You should have as much fun as possible while growing up without risking anything that's going to take that fun away or stop your progress.

You don't need me to retell all of the potential consequences of physical relationships that you learned from health class and your parents.  You're in a rapid period of growth and discovery now.  It might be worth remembering that your plans and desires for your own life can change in an instant.  You're not sure what you're going to be like (or want) two years from now, or even two weeks from now.  Neither will your boyfriend.  It's never smart to risk permanent consequences in a temporary, ever-changing environment.  Everything will go so much better when you know you're able to handle any consequence and when you're sure the person you love can handle it too...not only handle it, but be happy with it even.

Question 3:  I worked all summer long and for the first time ever I have money!  The thing is, I've been thinking about buying a computer.  It's a major expense.  It would halfway be for schoolwork but I'm not going to lie.  I want to soup it up and have a cool gaming/internet rig as well.  I can afford it now!  The dad half of my parental coalition is OK with this but the mom half is stalling.  I get what she's saying but this is what I've been thinking about most of the summer.  I earned it, right?

(sigh)  I hate it when you're both right.

Part of the solemn duty of parents is creating appropriate feedback loops.  They've been doing this to you since you were quite small.  When you do good things, good things happen.  This encourages you to keep doing them.  When you do bad things, bad things happen as a deterrent, discouraging you from keeping up that behavior.

You've done a good thing by working this summer...one assumes your first serious paying job.  Ideally the feedback loop on this should read positive.  Yes!  Spend your money on something you love!  That reward will encourage you to be diligent, to work more, to earn other rewards down the line.  The risk of saying, "No, you may not do this" is that you'll not see the worth in, or benefit of, working.  So I don't want to encourage that approach.

On the other hand, any parent will rightfully have concerns about a guy's first major expense.  Parents have been through all this themselves.  They know that wants can change rapidly.  They don't want to run into a scenario where you blow your wad of cash on an instant expense and then regret it a couple months later.  It would bother them to see you disappointed.  Also part of their valuable feedback loop is teaching you about saving and using money conscientiously.  A fairly-major expense in the context of other expenses seems fine.  A super-major expense costing everything--or near everything--you've earned rings alarm bells for them.  They remember what it's like not to have any money at all.  They want to teach you about the value of wise financing.  In their heads they're imagining you as a 45-year-old turning to your wife and kids and saying, "I sold the house and you can't eat today but look at my shiny new Maserati!"  That's called a parental fail. They imagine their poor, starving grandchildren, tears streaming down their faces, saying, "Grandma didn't raise you right, you selfish money-spender!"  For all they know this Big Purchase may become your gateway to a lifetime of ill-considered consumption.

The other thing to keep in mind (from a parental point of view) is the asterisk following the "It's MY money, I earned it" argument.  The assertion is true but it doesn't encompass the whole picture.  You earned that money but your cost of living over the summer is actually much higher.  If you had to use your new-found money to provide shelter, food, and transportation for yourself you'd be living in a soybean field and eating raw Ramen as we speak.  You didn't have to do those things because your parents picked up the tab.  Having provided roughly five times what you earned just keeping you dry and fed, they feel rightly that they should get a little say in how your earnings are spent.

So, again...you're both right.  What to do?

I don't know how I'd react if you were my child but from this distance it seems like this should be part of the learning process for you.  Talk this out with your folks, hear their concerns again, see if you can't find some mutual assurance.  But in the end even blowing your cash on a computer and then finding you didn't like it in two months--among the worst possible outcomes--wouldn't be the end of the world.  In fact that would teach you as much as anything your parents could say.  And that's even if it doesn't work out.  If it does work out, well, you'll need to upgrade that thing at some point.  Plus you need software for it.  Back to work, son!  That's a good outcome too.

Then again, I'm not your mom.  Her definition of "good" may differ.

If I were you, I'd probably go to my mom and say, "You were right.  I don't want a computer.  Instead I'm going to spend that money on an old jalopy and go cruising for chicks.  Would you crochet me some nice, soft covers for the back seat?"  At which point your mom will say, "Hmmm...are you getting the 500 gigabyte hard drive or going with a full terabyte?"

Don't tell her I said that though.

--Pastor Dave (pastordave@geneseelutheranparish.org)

The Lives of Others

I got a chance to watch an interesting movie last night.  It was called "The Lives of Others". It's a German film with English subtitles.  It dealt with a member of the East German Secret Police during the Cold War.  Our officer was assigned to 'round the clock surveillance on a playwright who seemed loyal to the Communist Party but aroused suspicious.  Through the use of "bugs" the police could hear every word he said in his East Berlin apartment.  Since high-ranking party officials were out to get him for various reasons, his future didn't look bright.

The theme of the story was how listening to true art and true goodness through those wiretaps changed the life of the secret police enforcer.  The movie was quite well-written and well-acted.  I enjoyed it.

The part that struck me for our purposes is how different the plot and pace of the film turned out to be from the usual Hollywood stuff we see.  This was a film about spying, oppression by the state, using your talent to stand up for what's right, and defending your friends.  The first part of the movie probably wasn't much different than it would have been had it been produced in America.  But with all of those heroics leaking through the characters, the Berlin Wall providing a tangible and near-unbreakable barrier between the East Germans and freedom, and a secret police force involved, had this story been filmed in the U.S. it would have climaxed with a thrilling escape, gunfire, tunneling under the Wall while bad guys dogged your heels.  American film producers would have felt the story needed more punch at the end, more overt tension, more reasons to spend a special effects budget.

"The Lives of Others" contained none of that.  Its ending was both good and tense, but the story stayed solidly framed on the characters and the relationships between them, not on some huge manufactured thrill-moment.

Isn't life like that though?  Seldom do our greatest joys come in whiz-bang events.  They happen through the patient unrolling of threads between us as we're knit together.  We spend far too much time looking for happiness or excitement in events and circumstances.  We tend to underrate the happiness and excitement that comes through discovering each other.

Our youth ministry follows this pattern.  If you came to a single event you'd probably think it was nice, but not out of the ordinary.  But over time a hundred ordinary moments weave us together into something extraordinary.  I sometimes tell the kids, "It's not what you do that makes life fun, but who you do it with."  Waxing the kitchen floor with people you enjoy is a great afternoon.  Going to Disneyland with people you hate is a pain.

We can also learn a lesson about worship here.  Some people base their opinion of church on what kind of services that church conducts on a Sunday morning.  If they like the music and the liturgy it's a good church.  If not it's lousy.  Heaven forbid anyone should change anything once it's set!

Any kind of worship can be better or worse, really.  The style of worship doesn't matter as much as the people participating in it.  People with less faith and less room in their heart for their neighbors must insist upon one kind of worship--the kind they like--or their church experience is ruined.  People with more faith and room in their heart for their neighbors can find goodness in just about any kind of liturgy or song.  The latter group knows that it's not about the notes on the page, it's about the people that they're together with and the God in whose name they gather.

Like our German film-making friends did here, we need to spend more time concentrating on people and relationships and maybe a little less time basing our lives, our judgment, and our contentment on events or circumstances.  The beauty in people is more subtle but also much more profound and enduring once discovered.

I'm not sure I would have remembered this movie had they gone for the typical ending.  They kept me focused on the people instead of the action and now it'll stick with me much longer.

--Pastor Dave (pastordave@geneseelutheranparish.org)

High School Movies and God

Every other Sunday this spring we've been holding a movie/discussion night for high school students.  Attendance has been pretty good!  We start by eating a meal, mostly cooked by our high schoolers (good stuff!).  We converse while eating and then sit down to watch a movie together, reflecting on it afterwards.

So far the movies we've watched have been:

• Smoke Signals, the story of two young Native Americans from Coeur d'Alene and their struggle to cope with the death of their parents.
• Forrest Gump, about the way a learning disabled man changes the world through his forthrightness and perseverance.
• Dead Poet's Society, about a group of teenage boys in a boarding school struggling to find their way in life and to cope with difficult circumstances.
• Life Is Beautiful, about an Italian Jewish man during World War II who gives up everything to save his son in a concentration camp.

One of the decisions we had to make early on in the process was whether to focus upon "God movies" that presented faith in an explicit context or whether to try and find God working in stories that weren't directly about him.  We will watch some of the former down the line, but we're concentrating primarily on the latter.  When we started going over the overtly Christian movies we found that some were out to prove a point rather than tell a story, interfering not only with enjoyment but our ability to learn.  Others just weren't great examples of movie-making.  On the other hand we easily came up with a dozen movies which could teach us about God, faith, and coping with life as long as we teased out a little discussion.  These were great films with a faithful message whether they intended to speak about God directly or not.

It's funny how faith works like that.  How many of you have ever been moved by someone coming up to you and saying, "Accept Jesus right now!!!"?  (Moved to do something besides run, that is.)  Sometimes the kind of talk that appears to be about faith is actually about the ego, motives, or choices of the person doing the speaking more than about God.  Hitting people over the head with the Lord seldom does anything but make them go, "Ouch!"  But if you're patient and show the beauty, tenderness, love, and passion of faith at work in your daily life, people will see and respond.  Some of the most godly talks I've ever had have come with people who didn't even realize at the moment that they were talking about God.  Drawing the connections between that daily walk and faith is often the last step in the process, closing the circle, rather than the first.

Keep this in mind next time you want to talk to someone about faith.  What are you leading with?  How will they know you're trustworthy and true?  If the relationship's not right then faith won't follow even if you talk about God until you're blue in the face, just like if the movie's not right then people won't see God in it even if he's mentioned in every second line of the script.

--Pastor Dave (pastordave@geneseelutheranparish.org)

Kids and Loneliness

I was reading some old magazines the other day when I ran across a column in a now-defunct publication by a gentlemen named Ken Levine.  He's quite the guru in the computer software world now, living out his dream one presumes.  But it wasn't always that way.  Click through to read excerpts from his column from 2004 and why his words still matter.

A Simple Gift

Someone gave me a simple and wonderful gift this week I'd like to share with you.

Last Sunday was a busy one for me.  Bible Study started my day, then worship.  After worship came music rehearsal.  I got to come home to change and then it was games with the boys until three o'clock.  At three some of the girls came and we set up the movie equipment and cooked dinner in the church kitchen to serve to the high school group at 4:00.  From 4:00 to 7:00 we watched and discussed the movie, then it was time to clean up.  We tidied up the fellowship hall, put away all the plates and such, wrapped up the extra food, then everybody went home.  Well, everybody except me.  I stood staring at a stovetop with food spots on it (not food still, just some grease spots) and a soaking refrigerator drip tray that needed washing out.

By that time it was after 7:00.  I had already missed my daughter's bedtime.  I had not seen my son all day except for a good morning kiss.  He was sick so we didn't even get to share the peace in church.  I looked at the stove and the tray and thought, "20 minutes".  I knew I should clean them.  I knew if I didn't I was likely to hear about it.  Even though I had just spent all day at church, more than half of it with the youth, had put in hour after hour helping them do this stuff, I knew I would hear about the 20 minutes I didn't spend scrubbing off the top of the stove or washing out the drip tray.  I'd lay 70-30 odds that both of them would be called "filthy" along with the whole kitchen, even though it was mostly clean.  You know how that goes.

Some will say, "Why didn't you just get the kids to help you?"  But they did!  Some came early to cook.  The whole group stayed after to rearrange the fellowship hall, put away the movie equipment, clean up the obvious things in the kitchen. Not a one left.  They asked what they could do to help and then they did all that stuff happily.  But they have lives too...families and homework and other things they had given up to spend 3-4 hours with us at church.  I didn't feel right asking one of them to stay even longer doing these last two chores...really one-person jobs anyway.

So I stood there, the last one in the building, and looked at that stove with some spots on it, that drip tray soaking in the sink.  I looked at the cupboard with the cleaner.  And I made a decision.  I went home.  I went home to see my son.  I went home because I was tired after more than a full day at church.  I went home because I had already put in plenty of work and I thought it would be OK to put this last bit off for a day or two.  I went home because I felt that even though cleaning the last bit would be right (and save the whole day of work I'd put in and the wonderful youth events from being summarized as, "You left the kitchen dirty!") going home really felt more right and more important at that moment.

Mondays are always busy for me so I didn't get back to finish up.  Tuesday I got a call and had to be away.  That's the day I had planned to clean.  I knew I'd have time to do it Wednesday morning after Women's Bible Study.  I was running a risk though.  People would see the spots and the pan in the sink.  But that's what I could do.

Bible Study went fine.  After we finished I went into the kitchen to begin my work, glad at least for the company of ladies to chat with as I scrubbed and they washed out coffee cups.  I went over and looked at the stove and guess what?  It was clean.  I turned to the drip tray in the far sink and it was clean too.  Nobody had said a word to me.  Nobody had complained.  Nobody had come up to me after multiple hours of work I'd put in serving the church and its kids (and missing my own family) saying the equivalent of, "You didn't do enough!"  They just helped out.

Now, I don't know what was going on inside the cleaning person's head as they scrubbed the stovetop.  They may have been grousing and cursing me to high heaven.  But if they did, they didn't say it so I'm going to pretend it was every bit as gracious of an act as it seems.  The wonderful result for me was getting a gift...not just the gift of not having to do 20 minutes of work but the gift of feeling like someone helped out, that someone cared.  Somehow the burden of putting in 8 hours and 20 minutes of work was incredibly easy when I just had to put in the 8 hours and somebody else picked up the 20 minutes.  They didn't have to.  But they did.  It made me feel loved and cared for having those helping hands.

I don't know whose they were, but thank you.  Thank you for your incredible gift.  Thank you for easing my mind about 20 minutes spent with Derek on Sunday night instead of 20 minutes trying to avoid complaints about stovetops and drip trays.  I appreciate your quiet helpfulness.  My family appreciates it.  The youth appreciate it.  The work you put in wasn't a little, it was a LOT.  It meant a lot to me.

--Pastor Dave (pastordave@geneseelutheranparish.org)

More Love: Working With Youth and Children

When talking yesterday about love being the basis of Godly authority, it struck me that this is also the core of having authority with (and occasionally over) children and youth when working with them in a church setting.  Everybody who works with young folks says, "I love kids!"  Does that verb take an active or passive role, though?  Is "love" just a sentimentality towards children in general...loving kids the way we love azure drapes or a fine red wine?  Is "I love kids!" mostly about our internal feelings?  Or does "love" take the form of outward action:  time spent, energy devoted, stories listened to, hugs given, games played, roads walked, mistakes endured, accomplishments praised?

Most children and youth have pretty good barometers.  They know when your work is all about yourself.  They know when your work is all about them too.  They know the difference between loving them as decorations and loving them in truth.  Generally they have little time for the former but crave the latter.

Working with and understanding God's younger children isn't rocket science.  You just have to love them in the real sense.  Your service to them shows the truth about you and your God.

Your service to them also communicates that they're worth that service, that you believe your time and energy are well-spent with them.  That's a powerful testimony.  For the most part I've found that if you invest your best in young folks they will absorb that and reflect it back.  If you expect to see something in them worth investing in you will find it.  They'll show it to you themselves.  If you walk in suspecting or not trusting in their worth then they'll hide anything of worth from you.  In a way, it's the ultimate act of faith.  You can't force a relationship.  You can't predict how the relationship will go.  Often you don't even know what the kids will say or do next.  You just believe something good is there and express that belief through word and action.  99 times out of 100 it will turn out to be true.  Both you and the kids will be better off for having found it.

It's important to remember this because I've worked with plenty of folks, both in my churches and advising other youth groups, who tried to start their relationship with children and youth somewhere outside of love or trust.  I can't tell you how many times I've heard things like:

• "We can't let them bring their friends because we'll have too many kids.  This event is only for people of this church."
• "Just make the youth clean up the lot.  They need something to do anyway."
• "You have to watch them and keep them in line.  Otherwise they'll take everything you brought right away."
• "We need to get these kids fund-raising for their activities.  They can't just have a free ride around here."

It's almost like people plan in order to keep anything bad from happening instead of going in looking for good to happen.  Ironically, when you approach in fear of the bad that's exactly what you get in this kind of ministry.  Only by trusting in the good--saying, "Let the kids come and let's do something amazing with them that'll be great for all of us"--do you experience the good in the ministry and in them.  Every once in a while one of them will knock you for a loop and you have to spend some time processing through awkward or bad things.  But those moments pale both in comparison and number to the good times and amazing experiences that grow from the love shared between you in God's name.

--Pastor Dave (pastordave@geneseelutheranparish.org)

Children Tell The Christmas Story

I have a theory about why we love the little children to tell our Christmas story through a pageant: They are ADORABLE!

I can't take my eyes off them!  

So at least I will be paying attention when the greatest story ever is told.  

Besides, children are innocent,

they are sweet,

they are impish,

they are fun!

They have beautiful voices  

and they have pure love in their eyes. 

 

I can't think of a more fitting kind of person  

to tell this very important tale of the coming of our Lord.

So, Go Tell It On the Mountain!

Hark, the Herald Angel Sings!On this Silent Night

 A Savior is Born-

 and a child told me about it!

I am so grateful to be part of this church. I am grateful to Dana and Jennifer for all the work they put into this play.  I am grateful for the parents and grandparents of children who make it possible for me to see their kids every Sunday. Thank you, everyone, for the honor of listening to your children!

Sermon Note Questions: Serving Others

This Sunday's sermon on Matthew 25: 31-46 brought out an interesting question from one of our Confirmation students:

We talk about serving people but some people are independent and don't want to be helped.  How do we serve them?

The best way to answer this question is with a question:  Who gets to decide what "serving" is?

When you say "some people are independent and don't want to be helped" you're implying that "serving" means doing something for someone else in a way that doesn't let them participate fully or take ownership of the work.  It's almost like saying, "You just sit yourself down there, helpless person, and let me do this for you."  Most people aren't going to want to be served like that!  And you're right, some people hear exactly that message when we offer to help.

That's why the most important part of serving your neighbor is knowing your neighbor.  Many people of faith make the mistake of making service all about completing tasks.  This is understandable because service almost always involves some task or other.  But service isn't really about tasks, it's about people!  When we make service about tasks we're like a Boy Scout trying to complete his merit badge and not letting anybody get in the way of his goal.  We're going to help that old lady across the street whether she wants to go or not because darn it, we need to serve her!!!  Pulling grandma across the crosswalk isn't really service unless you know her, know she wants to go, and know that she appreciates the hand, right? Otherwise it's just selfishness ("I have to serve and earn my reward!") disguised as service.

Service to our neighbor is just an extension of loving our neighbor.  Loving our neighbor means taking the time to get to know them and letting them define how we can serve them.  Sometimes that might mean doing something for them while they sit and watch.  But sometimes the best service we can give is to affirm that they are independent and strong, to encourage them and cheer them on as they do the things they want and need to do.  Saying, "Your lawn looks so nice today!" can be as big of a service as going and raking all of their leaves ourselves.  It just depends on the person and what they need.

To tell the difference all you need to remember is this:  defining service by tasks makes it all about you and what you have to give, defining service by people makes it about them and what they really need.  In the first case they have to shape their lives around you, to accommodate your need to serve and feel good about yourself.  In the second case you change your life and your service to reflect them.  Service defined by a task doesn't matter much after that task is completed.  Service defined by your deep relationship with a person can lift someone's spirit for a lifetime.

--Pastor Dave (pastordave@geneseelutheranparish.org)

Confirmation Student Questions: Hurt

Today we continue our look at questions submitted by our church's Confirmation students through their sermon notes.  This is the first of two questions we'll field on the sermon from last Sunday on blessings. (The Monday morning version can be found here.)

If God is with us and blessing us, why do we still feel hurt?

In the beginning of all things, back in the Garden of Eden, everything was perfect.  Nobody knew pain or suffering or loss of any kind.  Then Adam and Eve bit the fruit and brought sin into the world.  The Bible tells us that sin didn't just break them, it broke the whole world and their relationship with it.  Thorns came upon the ground, we experienced physical pain for the first time, people started blaming and accusing each other and hurting with words, death became a part of our reality.  The world wasn't the way it was meant to be anymore.  We made it that way through sin.

You don't have to look very far to see the world is still broken.  People at school often fight and say mean things about each other instead of getting along.  Some people in a community have plenty to eat, others have little or none.  Nobody knows who to vote for in the presidential elections because all of the candidates seem self-centered and out of touch.  Racism, war, famine, disease, natural disasters...these things afflict the world every day, causing people to suffer.

The hurt we feel is a response to this "brokenness".  I don't know if you've ever known anyone whose nerve endings have been deadened.  It happens sometimes either because of a birth condition or some kind of accident.  Not having any feeling in a part of your body creates an incredibly difficult challenge.  The biggest problem is that you can't feel pain.  If you have no feeling in your foot you could step on a nail and it'll just drive right through you without you knowing.  I've heard of people without feeling in a hand who actually burned it on the stove and only knew it when they started smelling their skin burning, long after the damage was done.

Imagine having that same thing in your spirit.  If you never hurt you'd be viewing things like racism, poverty, illness, suffering from natural disasters and you just...wouldn't...care.  Hurt is your indicator that something is going wrong, something you should pay attention to.  When somebody calls you a name or treats you badly the hurt you feel tells you that this isn't right...the same way stubbing your toe on something tells you that you weren't walking right.  Hurt reminds us that the world isn't perfect and that we need to change things for the better.  Hurt reminds us not to do wrong things to each other or to put up with wrong things being done to us.  Hurt isn't pleasant but it's necessary in this way.

Even the best things in life involve hurting.  Giving birth to a child involves a fair amount of physical pain.  No matter how much you love that child, they grow really quickly!  From a parent's perspective the baby whom you were just cradling in your arms runs off to college in just the blink of an eye.  Every time you look at your adorable three-year-old you realize that he won't be three forever--not even for long--and that all of these moments are temporary.  Your best moments involve that kind of sadness.  Realizing that nothing in this life lasts forever helps you treasure those moments though.  That pain reminds you to make the most of every moment you have.  Again, hurt fills an important role in our lives even though it's unpleasant.

The hurt that comes from this broken, temporary world also reminds us to look forward to God's ultimate gift:  a return to life the way it was meant to be.  We hurt now, but we won't hurt forever.  God has promised us that we will be with him and every tear will be wiped dry.  As it turns out, the good things in this life really are forever!  Only the pain really passes away.  But we have to hold on through a fair amount of that pain in order to see the promise come true.

Every time we get together in church to celebrate we also pray for people who are suffering.  We pray for God to be with them and that he would use us to help them...not to take away their pain but to let them know that they're not alone as they deal with it.  That's probably the most important message we can bring.  I'd never take away your pain.   That would make your life a real tragedy.  But you don't have to feel alone as you bear it.  Whether it's a passing pain like a fight with a friend or an enduring pain like abuse or having a loved one die, someone's here who cares about you and is willing to walk beside you and hold your hand through it.  That walking and hand-holding is a little reflection of the heavenly healing to come.  It's a gift we give to each other as people of faith until that day when God bestows his ultimate gift on all of us.

--Pastor Dave (pastordave@geneseelutheranparish.org)

News About Kids

A couple of events happened this week involving young folks in the community.

First, a group of students from the school, including several from our church and affiliated with our youth program, came and raked up leaves all around the church grounds.  They ended up with more bags than you could count!  Witness:

And then, on that same day, some folks gave the church a gift for the youth.  Now installed in a corner of our kitchen is our very own youth refrigerator for pop and assorted items.  Take a look!

A huge THANK YOU to everyone who contributed to this effort!  The kids will be delighted to have cold pop and I'm sure those using the kitchen will delight in their increased counter space as well!

Both of these events made church a nicer place.  It's neat to see that people care about our community in these ways.

--Pastor Dave (pastordave@geneseelutheranparish.org)

Ministry With Young Folks

I want to piggyback on something Rosanna wrote this weekend, expanding it into a larger discussion on youth and children's ministries.  Her piece was simple, describing the theologically teaching moments in carving pumpkins.  In one event and one essay she perfectly captured our strategy working with the younger folks of our congregation.

Since I started in youth ministry a couple decades ago I've been a proponent of conducting young people's ministries organically.  There's a time and place for sitting kids down and telling them all about God using chalkboards and worksheets and traditional teaching methods.  In our church this happens in confirmation and a little bit in Sunday School.  But if that's the only way you teach them about God, if that's the only experience they have of "God stuff", then you have the unintentional consequence of divorcing God from anything they do in the rest of their life.  You end up with young people who can recite correct technical doctrine in the classroom but who don't perceive God outside of it.  Entire generations have been raised to think there's "God stuff" and then there's "real life" and the two don't mix.  That, my friends, is an incorrect--OK, I'll say it--downright bad witness.

Organic ministry focuses more on finding God in the things the kids already do, how God is working in the lives they already have instead of how he's absent until they learn the chalkboard stuff.  We teach them about a God who is with them everywhere and always and not just during the hour they're learning at church.  The traditional message runs, "These things are holy, the things you do are not."  We try to teach them how to do the things they normally do in a holy fashion, not giving them holy moments but helping them see how to live holy lives.

From the outside this looks like doing a bunch of odd stuff in church:  carving pumpkins, playing games, sitting around and drinking pop and talking.  Some will say, "How is that different than what they normally do?"  It's not too much...and that's the point!  Little by little these kids are learning how to play games and be friends with each other in a holy way, how to see and invite God into their cultural rituals like pumpkin carving, how to share God in conversation and refreshments.  We're not happy with the kid who perfectly parrots our answers about the Trinity (which we do teach them) in class and then goes out into the world not caring about his neighbor.  We'll go a little light on the doctrine and show them what the doctrine means first:  sharing, caring, being together, getting over little bumps in our relationships and forgiving each other, celebrating this life God has given us, creating love and goodness in the world.  That way when they hear the doctrine they are able to embrace it because they've really been living it all along.

Organic ministry doesn't produce as many of the tangible moments by which we've traditionally gauged our results.  There aren't as many instances when we can say, "I taught the kids about  this theological concept today!"  In fact in a given moment one might say, "All I really did was carve a pumpkin or play a game.  What really happened there?"  But over the long haul giving up those single moments when we can be proud of ourselves as teachers in favor of multiple moments when we were integrating our lives and God's with the real, everyday lives of the kids really pays off.

In just a few years of doing ministry this way here I can point out case after case of young folks who have moved on coming back and touching base when they needed help, being concerned for the lives of their friends as much as their own, and bringing incredibly good things into the world.  And that's not going to end.  They probably didn't understand the significance of pumpkins and board games when they were 8 or 13, but when they're 35 or 40 they're going to look back and realize everything they got taught about God and life through this time together.  They're going to smile as they realize it didn't seem like teaching at all, that it was so deeply ingrained that it slid right into their hearts and stuck, and that God has blossomed like a flower in their lives as naturally as breathing.  We didn't give them a fish, we taught them how to fish, and that's going to affect everything they choose to do:  jobs, marriages, faith relationships, and hopefully raising the next generation of children.

Thank you to Rosanna and the rest of the Sunday School and youth ministry folks for putting it so perfectly and getting it so right.

--Pastor Dave (pastordave@geneseelutheranparish.org)