Leaving High School - things you need

Top 10 Things
Students Need to Know Before They Leave High School

1. They are valued.
2. They are loved.
3. They are passionately in love with Jesus.
4. They are the Church.
5. They are to love others.
6. They are to be Prayer Warriors.
7. Practice the Spiritual Disciplines.
8. They know some of the Word. (Not all of it, because it is a
journey of faith and ongoing)
9. They are life long learners on a faith Journey.
10. They have mentors and are mentoring others.

The Overthrow of Youth Ministry

Greg Stier has a MustRead
entry about youth ministry and what we must do.

For me it is:

1. Value in Relationships.
2. Making our youth ministry better but "programmed"
3. Address the tough issues.
4. Rethinking, pushing, and mentoring.
5. Praying more.

Observations of Visiting Church #100

So one of the fastest growing churches in the Nation is about 30 minutes from me, So I decided to visit on Saturday nite. (Probably going to be a ritual of mine to visit at least once a month local churches that have Saturday nite services and give my observations)

This past Saturday I went to C3
as they call it or Cleveland Community Church (Really a Baptist Church in disguise)

Here are my observations (Both positive and negative)

1. The Greeters were good from parking, information center.

2. Child care and security were excellent. Trying to get my 3 kids involved and afterwards they enjoyed it.

3. The services music was ok. (One of the songs I didn't know and I thought it strange the Senior Pastor's wife introduced the service)

4. They were kicking off their "Get in the Game series" and getting focused for a new ground breaking.

5. Average age seemed to be near their pastor 40s but they trying to act like in their 20s (I thought that was strange)?

6. They must of just found out about blogging - all the info on Check on Matt Fry's New blog ....http://www.mattfry.com/

7. The sermon was ok. Good speaker - short, concise. I think though he misunderstood "duty" from his perspective the Christian's "duty" focus was more on religiosity rather than heart and attitude. Personally I think duty, honor, and heart are balanced together and that the Sadduccees and that had their duties and focus off.

8. The giving gifts to visitors at the info center was cool. (I got a new coffee mug)

9. Clothing - I don't think he needed to point out "hey, we're cool I'm wearing a jersey and my converse to church" idea .. so what? (Somehow ..Begin RANT ... does it matter if I'm casual or not, when I come to church? Why point it out? Almost seems we're focusing on the external rather than the internal? And almost being like those that wear suits and ties ... a We're better than you idea ...we're casual, and we love it. Personally, don't try to be hip if you are not, just try to be yourself and who God created you to be.... no matter what you wear. (And Hopefully you do wear something though ... the whole Christian nudity idea gets old sometimes and is really weird))

10. Follow-up - I left my number, email, etc. And well they say within the first 24-48hrs a note or something saying Glad you came. Well guess what I got? NOTHING. (Somehow my friends at http://www.purposedrivensoftware.com might be able to help them out there)

Overall I give the Church a B+ With room to improve.