Tuesday, April 17, 2012

and we're BACK!!!


WOW!!! What a crazy year! It’s been literally a year since I have blogged and I don't even know why except for the fact that life kicked it up a gear. So what have you missed? One thing (that was huge for us) is that we started a student leadership program instead of relying on adult help. The reason why, is adults have the tendency to help when it’s convenient for them and it still feels good. As soon as life becomes stressful or the teens don’t react the way they want, they are gone with nothing but a puff of smoke where they were once standing. We realized that this was becoming a hurtful practice when my wife and I took August off of ministry (first time ever). On a daily basis, they would call, Facebook or stop by our house to see if we were going to come back. They would ask, "you’re not leaving us, right?” Our hearts broke! That’s when we decided, the most dependable people were the teens themselves. We told them that who ever was interested in joining, to come and meet with us once a week outside of church (so we could see their commitment level). We quickly whittled down the volunteers to a small group of junior and seniors with a couple college kids. All of a sudden it clicked! We finally received the help we need and gave them some self-investment in the ministry. Our out reaches this year has been the biggest and most powerful in the 5 years of doing this.

Earlier in the year, I had a vision from God, which he told me I have a "spirit of Caleb". I finally understand it now. Caleb was trying to move in to the Promise Land with his peers but they were not willing to make the move. It wasn't until he was older; he was able to take the land with the next generation. I’m finally starting to understand that now! We could make the moves we wanted with our peers. They were not willing to make the move but when we looked to the next generation, they were excited about it.

This has been a scary but exciting year and I can't wait to see how the remainder of the year goes. I will be sure to try and update this more (even though I don’t think anyone are reading this).