National Youth Workers - Day 2

High light - Learn To Lead Building Your Leadership Capacity by Rev. Dr. John McAuley

He talked about the common realities that leaders face. They are complexity, confusion and chaos. He talked about some guiding principles for us to lead in the midst of these common realities. Like any good workshop speaker he boiled it down to three things. We must build credibility, capacity and clarity.

Low point - Getting stuck in an elevator with 15 other youth workers and 3 innocent bystanders. When they say maximum capacity 19 people that is not a dare but a warning. The sign should have said 18 people OK, 19 people will get you stuck in an a hot stinky elevator for 20 minutes.

Well it is time to get off to the next session. I will catch you tomorrow.

National Youth Workers Day 1

My lovely wife woke me up at 5:10 am, with a kiss and the wonderful aroma of a full breakfast with hot coffee. She leaned over me and siad, "my darling husband, you have a full day traveling to Vancouver and participating in important meetings with eternal significance. I want to send you off with a wonderful breakfast worthy of you." At 5:15 I woke up.
Actually the biggest part of my day was spent at a Missions Canada Men's Meeting. We talked about different ways that men's ministries are taking place in our churches across the nation. One of the ways is men's ministry focused on Special Interest Groups. These groups consist of Christian men reaching out to non-Christian men through shared interests and passion. Two books that deal with this topic are, Dog Training, Fly Fishing and Sharing Christ in the 21st Century by Ted Haggard, I know insert joke here, and Organic Community by Joseph R Myers.

Best Leader Ever

I just finished reading Lead Like Jesus by Ken Blanchard and Phil Hodges. The subtitle of the book describes what it is all about. “LESSONS from the Greatest Leadership Role Model of ALL TIME” This is a great book to pick up.

On page 207 they quote Henry Blackaby from his book Spiritual Leadership, here is the quote, “Godly leadership is not about being more committed it is about being more submitted.” This one challenged me. Success as a leader in God’s kingdom comes not from just working hard and being smart but from hearing and obeying God’s will. I guess anyone can do that, God doesn’t need or want my special skills, he wants to obey.

To me that’s a humbling thought.

Once upon a time, there was a season when neither Sask. nor Winnipeg made a post-season play off game. It seemed so unusual that the teams figured there should be some sort of competition anyway. So they got together and decided on a week-long ice-fishing competition.

On the first day, the Bombers caught 100 fish and Riders caught none. On the second day, Bombers had caught 200 fish and Riders still had zero. The Sask coach, suspecting cheating, dressed one of his players in blue and gold and sent him to the Bombers camp to act as a spy. At the end of the day, the player came back to the report.

"Are they cheating?" asked the coach. "They sure are," the player said. "They're cutting holes in the ice!"

Please feel free to add your best clean Saskatchewan joke!

Are you kidding me?

I have to shake my head after reading the following quotes from Barna's article.

From George Barna’s article - Christian Parents Are Not Comfortable With Media But Buy Them for Their Kids Anyway
"Millions of Christian parents want to appear to be relevant in their children’s eyes, and to provide gifts that fit within the mainstream of postmodern society," Barna noted. "The problem is that many of the entertainment products that meet those criteria conflict with the moral precepts of the Christian faith. Parents have to make a choice as to what is more important: pleasing their kids’ taste and sensibilities, or satisfying God’s standards as defined in the Bible. When the decision made is to keep their children happy, the Christian parent is often left with a pit in their stomach.
"The process of selecting appropriate Christmas presents for children is a microcosm of the spiritual tension millions of Christian adults wrestle with," the California-based researcher explained. "Many Christian parents are striving to serve two conflicting masters: society and God. They refuse to believe that they cannot satisfy both. Sadly, this Christmas season will produce enormous stress for numerous Christian parents who don’t want to disappoint either God or their children, but whose ultimate choices will disappoint both God and themselves, while providing gifts that are not be in the best interests of their children. For Christians, the Christmas season should be a time of celebration and appreciation of the life of Jesus Christ. Instead, that joy is being minimized by the pressure and confusion introduced by our focus on material consumption and fulfillment."

To read the rest of the article go to http://www.barna.org

Hey check out this article!

re-thinking (true) discipleship
The term Discipleship” is used today without much vigor and has seemingly lost its biblical meaning, seriousness, and true sense of calling in most contexts. In ...