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I don't know about you, but I love the Holidays. The time from the end of November to January 1 seem to have a sense of excitement and joy to them. It's also a great time to reflect on God's blessings and faithfulness.  With that in mind, I want to point out a few things that the Holidays and Holy Communion have in common.  1. We Look Back With Thanksgiving  The Holiday season (In the United States) officially kicks off with a Holiday we call, "Thanksgiving." Thanksgiving is a time when we come together and reflect on the goodness and faithfulness of God. We gather with family, share a meal, and remember that God has blessed us in extraordinary ways.  Holy Communion begins by looking back with thanksgiving. Like the Holiday, we gather together with others and reflect on the goodness and faithfulness of God. We look back, thankful for Jesus' sacrifice that has given us new life.  Holy Communion should always begin by looking back with a tha...

Imagine with me that your family just adopted a golden retriever puppy. In preparation for his arrival, you purchase one of those invisible electric fences. After all, you want your dog to stay within the safe confines of your yard.  You install the fence, bring fido home, and put the electric fence collar on him. He goes out into your yard and upon hitting the boundary, gets shocked. He does this a few times but soon learns where the fence is and where he is allowed to go. As evening falls, you bring fido in for the night and you begin to think to yourself - "that fence is really in the wrong place. It needs to be closer to the house." So you go outside and move the fence ten feet closer to your house.  Fido goes out the next morning, expecting the boundaries to be where they were yesterday, only to find that the fence has been moved.  Imagine this fence gets moved on fido every evening. Each morning he wakes up to discover the fence in a n...

As Christian parents, we desire to pass our faith onto our children, but honestly, sometimes we just aren't sure how to make it happen. Our motives are right, but our methods are far from effective. Over the next few days, I want to talk about 3 things parents should stop doing. These are things I've observed over the years. They are habits that we often unknowingly pick up hoping that they'll help us, but they can actually hurt us. Our last post talked about how we should stop being super spiritual and be Jesus to our kids by loving them and spending time with them. Today I want to talk about something I see many of us get hung up on. 2. Stop Trying to be your child's best friend. Look, I know you think your life is "Gilmore Girls" and you're Lorelai and your kid is Rory, but the truth is, life isn't a TV show. What works on Netflix or CW isn't going to work in your home. Your child doesn't need you to be their best bud, they nee...

As Christian parents, we desire to pass our faith onto our children, but honestly, sometimes we just aren't sure how to make it happen. Our motives are right, but our methods are far from effective. Over the next few days, I want to talk about 3 things parents should stop doing. These are things I've observed over the years. They are habits that we often unknowingly pick up hoping that they'll help us, but they can actually hurt us. 1. Stop being super spiritual  Look, I get that you really, really, really want your teenager to love Jesus. Any good, godly parent wants that, but cramming it down their throat by running around the house constantly talking about deep spiritual truths or turning every moment into some spiritual lesson is not going to work. In fact, I would imagine it might have the opposite of your intended effect. Some of the best advice I ever received in life was this -  Sometimes the most spiritual thing you can do is unspiritual.  ...

Tonight I had the privilege of discussing the topic of social media with a room full of High School Students. At the end our session, we split them into pairs and asked them to come up with 5 social media rules for Christians. We then went through each list, sorted out the similar ones, dumped the goofy ones, and worked it down to, what we think, are 5 things you should think about before posting to social media. Here's what we came up with: 1. Think about Jesus - What would Jesus think about what you're about to post? 2. Think about others - Put yourself in the other person's shoes. What will they think about what you have to say? Will what you say or post hurt them or mislead them? 3. Think about the future - How will you feel about that post 10min from now? 10 days from now? 10 months from now? 10 years from now? Would you be okay if your future children or grandchildren came across your post? 4. Think about the why - What's your motivation for po...

Sometimes in ministry, we can become so busy that we forget what it is we actually do. This can be especially true when it comes to student ministry. There's always another activity to plan, service to prepare for, sermon to preach, student to be counseled, fire to be put out, or issue to deal with. All this motion and activity can, at times, be overwhelming and in the midst of it all we can loose our focus. What can we do to help us keep our focus? 1. Remember why we do what we do. 2. Remember what we actually do. 3. Remember how we do what we actually do. So, why did you get into student ministry? Because you love students? Because you like feeling young and hip? Because of the pay? Because you enjoy your job? As good as some of those are (although most of them are pretty bad), they are not enough. You do what you do because God has called you. Period. If he didn't call you to this, go find something else to do. Please. Spare yourself, your family, your...