This is me!

Today, I'm thankful that God has positioned me for such a time as this. This is a quote from the book "To Transform a City" by Swanson and Williams.
" . . . you know who you are - a select group of people with an overenlarged heart and the capacity to embrace a vision for ministry larger than a single church. You think about the kingdom. You think about the broken. You think about who needs to be at the table. Though often misunderstood and underappreciated (and always underfunded), you have the call of God on your life. We want to encourage you: Don't give up! Cities are the future of the church, and God has positioned you where you are for such a time as this."
Waiting for my time!
Praying for the transformation of Pearland!

See You at the Pole - Pearland

I wanted to post an update on See you at the Pole.

I attempted to put together a support committee for See you at the Pole.  We struggled to meet and we struggled to have a shared vision.  Towards the end of this process, I was a little lost. I was torn between believing that I was trying to force something that God wasn't in and believing that the enemy was so terribly opposed to believers coming together, that he was thwarting our every move.

The numbers are down a little from last year, but I do believe that God is using us.

PHS - 112 students/8 adults

JH West - 14 students/1 adult (no picture)

 

JH East - 200 total

 

Berry Miller JH - 20 students

JH South - about 100 (no picture)

I have no numbers or information on Dawson or Pace or any middle school.

There are outstanding stories. And Pictures. I put everything I could on Facebook, my page, the syatp page, the PHS CITY page and KSBJ.

And I guess, I decided that God was using us to create awareness about See you at the Pole - of it's importance and how God uses it on a campus.

 

And our committee has a plan.  One person is going to contact the School superintendent.  One is going to contact a teacher sponsor for next year.  An other's children are so fired up for See You at the Pole, they have become leaders in their own right!  And another, felt the need to contact the student pastor opposition and let him know how wonderful her school's See you at the Pole was!

 

God is moving.  In us.  In schools.  In Students.  Thank Him.

This morning, DeZavala Middle School

What an interesting morning!  I was to talk about How to grow spiritually over the summer at a middle school (5th & 6th graders) club in Pasadena.

Before I go any further, I need to squash all your misconceptions about on campus Christian Clubs - that they are a "holy huddle", that it is all the Christian kids in one room and they all are solid church kids.  Bah humbug!  I find that the on campus Clubs attract any where from 30% to 90% non church kids.  The presentations need to be about 90% on accepting Christ, how to grow and understanding your faith and finding a church.

So, as of yesterday, I had a fairly traditional presentation about bible reading, attending church and prayer as traditional methods of spiritual growth.  I had a summer bible reading plan so that they could read thru the New Testament over the summer. 

It was safe.  It was easy.  Matter of fact.  God starts hitting me with questions:  Name one time that you experienced spiritual growth while reading the Bible or praying.  Or thru the act of attending church.  That one is closer, because if you knew who I had to put up with while attending church, you would know I had to grow. 

I can't think of a single Bible reading that cause growth in me.  Or a single prayer, except when I got to the point of:  Thy will be done and truly, that was a struggle of wills and preception. 

What cause growth in you? the spirit quietly asks me.  Now, I am terrified.  Do I really have to talk about struggles and pain that bring growth to 5th and 6th graders? 

How about the act of service?  How about loving the unloveable?  Doesn't that bring growth?  How about being attacked by the church?  Back stabbing?  That sure brought a world of growth.  What about living in need?  Painful, but I have had to learn to trust God for what I need.

I'm driving and crying, going to this club, thinking about what has brought precious spiritual growth in my own life and how do I tell 5th graders about that?  How the bible, prayer and church attendance provides the framework for growth thru suffering, love and service?

The good news and the bad news.  The good news:  God used a simple lesson on Spiritual growth to turn everything I believed about spiritual grow upside down.  The Bad news:  Not a single student showed up this morning.  The good news:  I was able to freely minister to the sponsors and they both seem to need it.

Growth.  Who knew what I would learn this morning?

Power Bands at Berry Miller - The day of!

It is finally the day of the power bands at Berry Miller JH.  I am nervous, but hopeful and excited.  I am there early. 

I was emailing as late as yesterday morning because I didn’t have the 10 adult leaders I needed.  Today, I don’t know what to expect, but I know that at this point, it is about trusting God.  I’ve done everything I can do.

I end up with 8 adult leaders and 5 youth pastors.  One youth pastor had to cancel yesterday afternoon, so another had brought one of his volunteers to fill in.

I have Kurt, Caleb, Paul, Ronnie and Chuck as the youth pastors.

I have John, Julie, Benjamin, Lee, Alyx, Michael and 2 guys from Life church – I can’t remember their names.  They were all wonderful.  The teacher sponsor takes a group, which makes for 9 groups.

I am in the bleachers, breaking up the rowdy group as planned.  The sponsor opens with prayer, as usual.  I have sent about 20 of the rowdies to 4 different groups.  The sponsor announces that we are doing things differently, that the students need to join a group on the floor and if they don’t want to, they need to stay in the bleachers.

Where did that come from?  Oh, well.  Adjust. 

Paul quickly asked me what those kids were going to do.  I assure him, it wasn’t part of the plan.  He and Tamara get them together and Paul does a lesson for those kids.

Meanwhile, we recruit the choir teacher to do Paul’s part – the white bead.

I float from group to group, making sure that they have what they need, listening, advising, helping, checking, being available.  The students I notice are all very attentive, very engaged, in listening and making the power bands.  The students who chose to remain in the bleachers are giving Paul their full attention.  The choir teacher, quickly recruited to do Paul’s part – the white bead – is doing an excellent job.  The Black bead youth pastor is on group 7, the Red bead youth pastor is on group 5 – there are 9 groups in all.

And suddenly, the unexpected happens.  The bell rings.  The show is not over, but it is over. 

I am mortified, but I start breaking up groups and sending students to class.  Groups tell me:  Please, we are almost done, let us finish, but I send them to class. 

I check with all the adult leaders.  They tell me:  I had the best student leader ever, which makes me feel like I have given each and every adult leader the best student ever.  It is okay that we didn’t have a youth pastor present, I shared the gospel with each bead and every student in my group heard and understood the gospel.  The youth pastors were just re-enforcement. 

It wasn’t how I planned it, but I left thinking:  God is good, the Gospel went out and His ways are always higher and  better than our ways.

Thanks for your prayers.

Power Bands at Berry Miller JH - Part 2

To get this job done, there is quite a bit of prep.  I can do math and figure out how much of everything I need, but I must admit, assembling it all is something else.

I decide to be prepared I will need supplies for 400 power bands.  This means 400 15 inch lengths of leather cord, 400 black beads, 400 red beads, 400 white beads, 400 green beads and 400 gold/yellow beads.

All the supplies need to sorted and packaged.  This was a much bigger job than I would have thought.  I decide I will cut and bundle 100 leather cords a day on Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday.  It takes me over an hour to get about 140 cords done on Monday.  Allie (my daughter) helped me a lot on Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday.  She counted most of the beads and put them in pill bottles.  40 beads to a bottle, 6 colors of beads, 10 groups – 60 bottles of beads. 

Then the next step is 40 leather cords (bundled in groups of 10) and 6 bottles of beads put in a bag.

It may not sound like much, but it took hours to get this all done.

Power Bands at Berry Miller JH (part 1)

I have agreed to do power bands at the club at Berry Miller JH.  At this point, there should be at least one question:  What is a power band?

A power band (also called a salvation bracelet or a “rainbow faith” bracelet) is a cord with colored beads on it.  Each bead represents something in the salvation message.  I like to use Black –Sin, Red – Christ’s Death/Blood, White – Cleanse/pure, Green – Grow, and Yellow – Heaven/Streets of Gold. 

It’s a simple project – kind of a craft and a salvation message all rolled into one.

However, the club at Berry Miller has a consistent attendance of about 300 +/-.  I have done this before, but with about 100 students at a time, not 300.

So, I come up with a plan.  I ask for advice and suggestions.  I decide to break up the group into smaller groups of 30 and put an adult leader and a student leader with each group.  It will take 10 groups and 10 adult leaders.  Not only that, I decide that I will have 5 pastor/youth pastors come in and each give a 1 minute presentation on a bead color.  They will give that presentation 10 times – once to each small group.

I will have to recruit 10 adults and 5 pastor/youth pastors.

There is a group of rowdy students.  They sit the same place every week.  I decide that group should be broken up. 

What do you think?  Will it work?

The On Campus Christian Club at West AND What I was made for . . .

This morning, I was at the club at Pearland JH West. It is just a wonderful club. Let me tell you about it.

There is a leadership team that is made up of 4 8^th grade girls: April, Abby, SaraBeth and Milan. They are wonderful, each dedicated and gifted in their own way. April seems to be the behind the scene, take charge, back bone leader type. Abby is the teacher, talker, leader type. SaraBeth is the praying, dedicated, behind the scene, driven by her passion for God. I don't have a read on Milan yet. She was ill this morning and quiet the last time I was there.

April is who greeted me when I came to the first club, introducing herself, explaining what they were doing. SaraBeth prayed at the flag pole for See you at the Pole – alone in 2010. I believe that SaraBeth might be the driving force behind this club, however, she is painfully shy, yet she overcame that to recruit others to help her start a club. And now, she is a leader. She prayed this morning – did a great job. Abby is the only teacher/speaker I have heard so far, however, I understand that she and Milan switch off.

This is what I have done the 3 times I have been at West. I have clapped and cheered and told them what a great job they were doing. I have linked them to the other clubs, by telling them about the CITY shirts and by telling them about the other clubs. This morning, I brought them food: Donated 2 bite brownies with sprinkles and a glop of yellow frosting. They were thrilled!

Another thing. I told them I would normally put 2 brownies on a napkin and April and SaraBeth took over and started doing it. It's a simple skill and I'm sure it doesn't sound like much, but April and SaraBeth, eagerly embraced it and started doing it and took it over. Teachable.

After the club, I picked up trash. I am thrilled to pick up trash for these clubs, because it makes sure the club stays in good standing with the school. Close things down, so that all the student leaders can get to class on time.

They were thrilled to hear about the shirts. Thrilled to have brownies. I was thrilled to be there. This morning, I was the only adult in the auditorium. There were 96 students today. Last time, there were 2 adults, me and another youth pastor. Adult help is an easy way to support these clubs and so important. The safety ratio for a club of this type is 1 adult to every 30 students. It is important that the church step up and do this. It is a preventative measure: It prevents the problems the students could get into. It prevents the problems the school could have with the unsupervised students – alone in the auditorium. It prevents the school having to come up with the personnel to supervise the students, which would also be supervising the club, which can lead to other issues. And it becomes the church supporting the church, the adults supporting students. I love that.

And here is what I was made for. At some point, I became a welcome addition to their leadership team. Welcome to help, welcome to contribute. Not the leader or the master, but a fellow team player. And I love that. I love coming along students and helping them fulfill their vision of a having a great club at their school. I hope you are hearing me: I don't want to be in charge: I don't really think that is appropriate, but I do like being a team player and I don't have any trouble being an equal on a student leadership team.

That's what I was made for.