Youth Specialties Blog
Amazing Fire Trick
By Adam McLane on April 06 2010 | 7 Comments
There's about a 100% chance you're going to show this to your youth group. Actually, there's a 50% chance you're trying to find a candle and not even reading this at all.
There's an illustration here, too. Let me know how you use it.
By Adam McLane on April 06 2010 | 7 Comments
Missional Living for Regular People
By Adam McLane on April 06 2010 | 3 Comments
Living missionally. It’s a great idea, and a concept that is hot—but not always one we take time to live out.
So what does it mean to live missionally anyway?
By Adam McLane on April 06 2010 | 3 Comments
Connecting with Six Types of Kids
By Adam McLane on April 05 2010 | 1 Comments
This is a pretty cool explanation. You can buy Connect by Jonathan McKee, which explains a ton more here.
By Adam McLane on April 05 2010 | 1 Comments
April Article Series: Taking Care of Yourself
By Adam McLane on April 03 2010 | 0 Comments
This month we're kicking off a new feature at YouthSpecialties.com. Each month we're publishing a bunch of new articles on the website around a theme.
For April, we thought it was timely to remind youth workers to do a little self-care. By this time in the school year we've invested so much time and energy into the spiritual well-being of everyone else, we need to be reminded that taking care of ourselves is an important part of serving Christ.
So, over the next month, we have about 15 articles along that theme. Some of them are from our authors and speakers and others are from new youth ministry voices.
Let us know what you think about the articles. Leave a comment, share them with your team, post them on your Facebook wall. They are offered as a resource to you. Enjoy!
By Adam McLane on April 03 2010 | 0 Comments
Good Friday/Easter Excerpt & Video
By Andy Root on April 01 2010 | 0 Comments
Here is a Good Friday/Easter excerpt from The Promise of Despair and a video made by David Lose (author of Making Sense of Scripture) that illustrates my theological themes so well.
THE CHURCH IS NOT IN THE OPTIMISM BUSINESS, BUT LIVES FROM THE SECRET
Optimism says, “Something good will come out of this experience.” Hope says, “In the midst of this hell God will act.” In the midst of this present hell of death God’s future will bring the fullness of life. Optimism is positivity; hope is trust. The church is not in the business of optimism; that is not its function (though the powerful in society may want it to be so). Optimism is for Hallmark, not for a com- munity that worships a crucified God. When optimism is the church’s business then we allow it to screen us from seeing reality. The church is not in the business of optimism and positivity but of trust in a new reality that will be born within this broken one.
And it is a secret because it is an altogether different reality that we hope for. Optimism needs no secret, because it is looking for the silver lining in the present of this reality. Optimism speaks incessantly, fearing that if it stops framing this reality in a positive manner it will be annihilated by the nothingness all around us. But hope is a secret that calls for silence, contemplation, and deep reflection. Hope bubbles up from deep within our being that is so close to nothingness, making its way to our lips in fear and trembling. We find ourselves choking on the wonder of its possibility; we find that contemplating it forces us to speak lower; because we are hoping in an altogether different reality, in the dawn of God’s future, where death is not optimistically given face paints and cotton candy to hold, but is obliterated in the fullness of life in God’s Love. Hope is a secret because it is trust in a wholly new reality, not just this reality shined with the spit of optimistic positivity.
The cross is the overcoming of God with death; death has itself destroyed the Trinity. But the Trinity is the source of life, and death has done the audacious, it has sought to overcome life itself, to overcome with nonbeing the One who speaks being out of nothing for the sake of Love. So from this broken reality, from the death of the Trinity, God in Godself brings life and an altogether new—call it resurrected—reality. God in Godself has been resurrected. The Son is alive, the Father is given back his lost Son, and the Spirit is now thrust into the world, for from the Love of the Father and Son that has gone through death the Spirit looks to draw all death into the life of God so that death might be broken, and we and creation might be made new.
Easter is the proclamation in this world of death that the altogether new reality of God’s future has dawned.That God in Godself has been resurrected and overcomes death and now promises us that our deaths will die, that a new future beyond death is opened to us. It is a hope made possible by entering death, by entering and overcoming death with life—forevermore in Godself and soon to be for us too.
And this then is our ultimate hope, hope that comes through death. We hope as we trust that all our suffering, yearning, and brokenness has been taken by the Spirit and placed between the Love of the Father for the Son, a Love that is stronger than death by going through death. All those who despair can, in the power of the Spirit, take hope, for they are enveloped in the Love of Father and Son. Through their despair God is coming to them; in their despair God gives God’s very person so that an altogether new reality might dawn from the future.
By Andy Root on April 01 2010 | 0 Comments
Do You Need a Digital Sabbath?
By Adam McLane on April 01 2010 | 7 Comments
I am old enough to technically be called a digital immigrant, though I have been strongly Internet-connected since the mid-1990s. I cannot imagine being born into a world that has always had widely-available Internet, always had some form of instant messaging, and where the average consumer has a mobile phone, as all of the students in our ministries have been.
By Adam McLane on April 01 2010 | 7 Comments
Review: Relationships Unfiltered
By Adam McLane on April 01 2010 | 1 Comments
I have always said that relationships are a vital part of an effective youth ministry. Andrew Root, author of Relationships Unfiltered, would partially agree with me. After reading his thoughts, I may need to change my perspective.
Root, who is assistant professor of youth and family ministry at Luther Seminary, wrote Relationships Unfiltered after years of personal and ministry experience showed him that there was more to relationship than trying to influence the person to do what you want them to do. I still think relationships are vital in youth ministry, but how relationships are handled needs to change. But what does that change look like? You will have to read the book to find that answer, but here are a few clues.
By Adam McLane on April 01 2010 | 1 Comments
