5 Things I Would Rescue

Back in the earliest days of my ministry we used to occasionally build youth group meetings around exercises found in the great book by Dr. Sidney Simon, Values Clarification. The scenarios provided were designed to help us understand what things, which people and what skills and personality traits were important in our lives. We would then hold our thoughts under the microscope of the teachings of Jesus and see how we were doing when it came to getting our priorities straight.

One of the more popular exercises (and one that is often used by people who have never heard of the book) is this: Your home is on fire, and you have time to save only 5 things. Assume that people and pets are already out. What would you go back and retrieve? We used to revisit that scenario on a regular basis, seeking to discover what really mattered to us.

This was brought back to my mind recently when my friend Lisa Jewett told me of a dream she had in which she ran back into a burning home to rescue her son Scott's prized hockey jersey collection. We laughed about it, but it once again begged the question in my own mind. What would I save?  So today I'm making a list of 5 things I would seek to save if my house was burning. Marilyn, Will and Conner are safe. What am I going back for?

1. Computer Tower - The hard drive to our desktop computer contains many important documents and pretty much every picture we have taken since the dawn of the digital age. It has the manuscript to my book, Will's screenplays and many other valued items. I should probably have all of this stuff on a Cloud somewhere, but since I don't even know how to find a Cloud I better grab the Tower. 
2. Wedding Certificate - Marilyn and I were married in 1986 in a Baptist church, but part of the ceremony was also from the Quaker tradition. Among them was the reading and signing of a Wedding Certificate, the official marriage license of the Society of Friends. The calligraphy was done by Jennifer Bills, one of my former youth, and it was signed by everyone who attended the ceremony. It's irreplicable and irreplaceable.
3. My Guitar & My Songs - Will plays my guitar far more often than I do these days, but that beat up old acoustic Washburn has been a part of me for a very long time now. I couldn't leave it behind. And with it comes a faded old orange folder containing over a 100 songs I have written over the years, going as far back as high school. There is no other record of the vast majority of those chords and lyrics so it needs to be saved, because I have no idea how much longer I will be able to remember all the words.. Plus, on the folder in a rather historic sticker. It has the U.S. Olympic Committee logo and it reads, "Win in '80!" Some of you will remember that in 1980 we boycotted the Olympics...so we did not win! It's a relic of days gone by for sure!
4. Photo Box - In our garage there is a large container of pictures from the many pre-digital years of my life. Family photos, ancient youth ministry pics and remembrances of great moments from the past fill this box- and it's going with me!
5. Only A Fool - In 1997 I attended a National Youth Workers Convention in Philadelphia and was presented with a wall-hanging honoring me for having spent 20 years in student ministry. On it are the handwritten words to the great Geoff Moore song, Only A Fool, which is a reminder that when God calls us quite often the rest of the world doesn't understand. It is the one token of my many years in ministry that I would desperately want to save.

To complete the exercise I need to ask myself the following question: What did I learn about my values and priorities from this? For me, the answer is simple. It is clear that while I seek to live for today and that I have hope for the future, the things that I treasure most are a part of my past. Our personal histories cannot be repeated or recreated; they exist only as memories. The older I get the more I treasure those memories and love to be surrounded by reminders of the people, places and events that have shaped my life. Everything I would go into the fire for is just such a reminder. We shouldn't live in the past, but we also should never lose it. The stories represented by my 5 items will live on in part because of the presence of those items in my life.

I would encourage you to play this little game as well. What is it that you treasure, and what do those things tell you about yourself? Think of it as a Hump Day Challenge! Be well, my friends.

Because of Jesus,

Throwback Thursday: Marathons & Sardines

The last five days featured what I believe to be the 5 best consecutive days of blogging ever to appear on this site. But they were also (for the most part) very serious in nature. So for this Throwback Thursday we need a palate cleanser. We need a

Scripture tells us "Raise up a child in the way he should go, and when he is old he will not turn from it." It is so true that the things we learn early on in any endeavour do tend to stay with us. I found this to be true in youth ministry as well. Today I want to talk about a couple of things I learned early on that stayed with me until my days of student ministry were over.

New Garden Friends Meeting, like almost every other youth group we knew about in the 70's, had "lock-ins." You know the event- kids come to the church, stay up late, sneak around and find places to be alone, get cranky and finally fall asleep. I have very few memories of this as a youth, but as a youth leader they were things to be feared! I didn't mind the lack of sleep- I hated playing guard dog trying to keep kids in areas of the church they were actually allowed to be in! So as I gained some experience, the event began to morph into what we called a Marathon. The difference was subtle but very important. There would be no sleep. We would plan events for the entire night, including energetic games at the earliest hours of the morning. Where "lock-ins" had been torture for me, I LOVED Marathons! I was challenged to be at my most creative, and the excitement level for the students went through the roof. As I progressed through the years, the Marathon morphed into Rec Around the Clock (a name I stole from the great Tom Klaus) and the stakes went way up! Now not only did we stay up all night, we were OUT of the church for the vast majority of the night! We went bowling at 2 am; ice skating at 5 am; played laser tag at 4 am; saw movies, played putt-putt, went to laser light shows and always finished with a breakfast. Rec Around the Clock became the single biggest event of the summer by the time I hit Kissimmee, including a guest appearance by Lost And Found. I never tired of these events, and the memories are many.

The different ministries I served over the years had many differences, but they all had one thing in common. They all played Sardines. For some, it was a game we played on rare occasions. For others. it was an obsession (the youth at Springfield Friends Meeting and Wesley Memorial UMC were especially talented)! For the uninitiated, Sardines is a hide-and-seek game. Two people go hide, and they everyone looks for them in pairs. When you find them, you hide with them, thus packing yourselves in like...wait for it...SARDINES! We learned this game from DB3 (David Brown the third) when I was 14 or so, and it was made all the more interesting by his stories of how it had been originally called "The Make-Out Game." As with all DB3 stories, you never knew if that was true, but it sure sounded good! After all, you played with a partner, in the dark, and tried to find hiding places where you would be alone for a long time (DB3 once told us about he and a girl hiding in a front loading washing machine at his boarding school- not sure I believed that one either!). Regardless of the make-out factor, it was a great game for scaring people in dark, spooky churches, and was getting more comfortable around the people you were with. You stick 30 youth under a desk, and you have togetherness!

Jim Rayburn, the founder of Young Life, once said "It is a sin to bore a student with the Gospel." One of the ways we tried to open the hearts and minds of our youth over the years was to find ways to make church fun. Did we sometimes go too far and plan events that were a bit too wild? Oh yes- on a regular basis! But I do believe by making church a place kids WANTED to be we were able to reach students with the Gospel who otherwise would have never heard it. Over the years we learned that parents would sometimes punish their children by grounding them from youth group. While I always found that a bit odd, if we could make it so special that it was punishment not to be there we were doing something right. And if that "something right" helped bring even one student to a relationship with Jesus the Christ, then I would do it all over again. Even the 2 am shopping cart demolition derby in the K-Mart parking lot...

If anyone has actually ever tried hiding in a washing machine, please let me know.

Because of Jesus,

Flashback Friday: Get to Know Me!

Me, 1981. No gray hair- yet!

I thought that since I continue to pick up new readers who may not know me very well that perhaps it was time for a Flashback Friday look at some info on the world's most trivial subject- ME!  Some of you will know some of this and some of you will know none of this, but hopefully none of you will know all of this! Confused? Good! And just for fun we'll make it like an old youth group game, 4 Truths and a Lie. Except there are way more than 4 truths. If you think you know which of these very unremarkable facts is not true, leave a comment with your guess. Or you can just choose to make fun of all of them. The winner, as always, gets a can of SPAM! Here we go...

• I was born in Asheboro, NC while Eisenhower was president. Technically speaking I am in my 7th decade. Ouch...
• When I was 4 years old I went on The Old Rebel Show, a local children's show in Greensboro, NC, and won a wild west quick draw contest. The show was never seen because it was due to air November 22, 1963, and was preempted by coverage of the JFK assassination.

• I once wore all pink- including pink tights- for my role as Prince Dauntless in the Western Guilford High School (Greensboro) production of Once Upon A Mattress.
•  I have been to California, Washington and Oregon, but I have never put even one toe in the Pacific Ocean. 
• My freshman year in college I helped start a fake fraternity called Omega Zeta- or OZ. We  joked that we didn't have a president, we had a wizard. 
• In high school there was a group 0f 7 girls who referred to me as Snow White. I can't make this stuff up...
• The first concert I attended was a Jimmy Buffett show with Steve Semmler and our dates in an ice skating rink around 1974. The guy sitting behind us threw up on our dates, so we missed half the show. Hooray beer!
• In 1979 I drove across the country with my friends Alan Brown & Carl Semmler in a Honda Civic wagon named Clyde. We made the entire month long trip with a tent strapped to the roof of the car.
• I saw Michael Jordan, James Worthy and Dominique Wilkins play basketball in person- all while they were still in high school!
• As a matter of fact I DID have a collection of John Denver albums on 8-track tape...
• I won tickets from a radio station to see Monty Python's Holy Grail in a sneak preview, two weeks before it actually hit theaters.  I took a date.  We didn't get it.  I now pretty much have it memorized.  Best.  Movie.  Ever.
• At my first meeting as a paid youth leader, at Centre Friends Meeting, I was still 18.  There was at least one student there who was older than me.

• During my 6 summers (1978-83) of working on the summer staff at Quaker Lake Camp (and for a few years afterwards) I had a group of female campers who called me Pops.  Pictured are Sharron Tutterow, Mollie Edwards, me, Debbie Tully, Kristin Hayworth,  Laura Wheeler, Jane Tesh & Jane Terrell.  Even at age 20 I was already a father figure- or at least old!  :)
• At one point I owned over 20 Beach Boys albums.  Those were the big CDs with the hole in the middle...
• I have a Goofy tattoo on my left ankle. I got it at Disney on a dare from my long-time Summer Intern, Jerry Hanbery. He got a Donald...
• I was in Atlanta at the Braves game the night Hank Aaron hit his 700th home run.
• Marilyn and I were married on August 30, 1986 in Elkin, NC. William Joshua was born July 16, 1995. Conner the Dog was born March 15, 2003. That's my family!
• I once attended a Washington Senators baseball game. Yes, SENATORS!
• Alan Brown and I wrote the song There's A Blue Pick-Up Truck Where My Heart Used To Be after he drove behind a really slow truck while trying to get to my house in the early '80s. I later performed it at a National Youth Workers Convention and Tony Campolo stood up in his chair and waved a candle (click here for story).
• My youth ministry career included working with the Quakers, the United Methodists, the United Church of Christ and Young Life. 
• I was in New York so often in the 1990's that at least 6 bellhops at the Milford Plaza Hotel knew me by name.
• While at FUMC-Kissimmee in 1997 I put together a big concert featuring Geoff Moore & the Distance that lost nearly $8000. Unfortunately, this is NOT the lie. See that story here.
• I attended a performance of The Lion King on Broadway and sat next to Batman.
• I have seen Les Miserables 11 times on Broadway- twice from the front row!
• Places I have lived: Greensboro, High Point, Asheboro (all NC);  Worcester, MA;  Clarendon Hills (Chicago area) IL;  Kissimmee, FL; Tampa, FL; & Waycross, GA.
• And finally...I led a seminar at the 2004 NYWC in Atlanta called Pagan Eye For the Christian Guy. CDs are available. Well, CD. I think I still have one...

So there you have it. Lots of random facts, a few embarrassing pictures, and one lie. It's more than you wanted to know I'm sure, but now you have at least some idea of why I am the way I am!  Hope you enjoyed it and will take a guess at my one untruth. Good luck to all, and have a wonderful weekend!

Because of Jesus,

Never Have I Ever...

Did you ever play the game I Have Never...? We used to play it quite often in some of my youth groups. There are probably some of you who read that last sentence and are feeling a bit of moral outrage, because for many people Never Have I Ever (the other name it is known by) is a drinking game- quite unsuitable for middle and high school students! The concept of the game is simple. Each player receives an equal number of shots beers M&Ms, and then every person gets a turn. You go around the group and everyone says something that they have never done, and each person who HAS done that particular thing must do a shot....or in our case eat some candy. For example, if someone says "I have never gotten a tattoo" then everyone present with a tattoo must eat one M&M. The last person with candy remaining wins. It's a fun game, although playing with teenagers required some specific guidelines so as not to create too much embarrassment. You were not allowed to say anything of a sexual or illegal nature when we played, or to say things that you knew applied to only one person in the group. But it was a great way to learn new things about the people in the group.

Today I thought it would be fun to combine I Have Never with another great youth group game, 4 Truths and a Lie. I will list a number of things that I have never done, and you can play along and see how you would fare if you had to do a shot every time I say something you have done. And just to spice it up, one of the things I list will be a lie- something I HAVE done. So play along, let me know how you did and your guess for the one lie. And if you do actual shots, please send me the video! Here we go...

• I have never been to San Francisco
• I have never watched Dancing With the Stars
• I have never had coffee from Starbucks
• I have never hunted any living thing with a gun. Just SPAM
• I have never watched Dance Moms
• I have never eaten duck
• I have never owned an Apple phone, computer or pad
• I have never milked a cow
• I have never been to Spain. But I kinda like the music...
• I have never jet skied
• I have never watched Grey's Anatomy
• I have never owned an electric guitar
• I have never been to Idaho
• I have never watched Survivor
• I have never drank a Red Bull
• I have never seen U2 live in concert
• And yes...I have never gotten a tattoo!

There's my list. Leave your own I Have Never in the comments, guess the lie,  and let's have some fun! Happy Friday, everyone!

My Game Hall of Fame

Cocktail at Myrtle Beach in 2004

This past Saturday I got a call from my friend Joanne Gastler with an unusual request. Her daughter Jennifer (Wesley Memorial UMC) was trying to remember all of the rules to the epic card game, Cocktail, a staple of many trips in my later years of ministry. I have to admit I surprised myself by being able to recall the complicated procedures. In truth, there were so many classic youth group games that it is hard to remember them all! Over the years my students played hundreds of different games as a youth group, from the sophisticated to the stupid. I always assumed most student ministries were like that; I could be wrong. I think our games always had a lot of variety and creativity, and I know that some of them are quite memorable to the kids who played them. If you happen to be a former youth of mine who is reading, I'd love to hear which ones you remember. I bet someone from every group I was ever a part of remembers the Egyptian Mummy Race. Let's take a stroll through my Game Hall of Fame:

• The grand poobah of all my games was Sardines. I learned it as a kid from my youth leader, DB3, and then passed it along to every group I ever worked with until Waycross, where we had no decent place to play without disturbing people. This was hide and seek in pairs, and it was a riot. The kids at Springfield were really good at it.  
• Does anyone remember the whole New Games craze of the 1970s? I was an officially trained and licensed New Games trainer and referee. Smaug's Jewels or British Bulldog, anyone? "Play hard, play fair....nobody hurt!"
• At TNT we often played versions of TV game shows. We played Remote Control, a game of TV trivia based on the MTV show. We did our own versions of the Dating Game and the Newlywed Game. The Newlywed Game was especially fun because we would partner students who barely knew each other and make them guess at the answers to the questions. It was often hilarious. We also used board games such as Taboo, Win, Lose or Draw and Outburst to create games we could play with a large group.
• We had a great game we played on the pool tables at Springfield and Kissimmee called PIG. It involved rolling a pool ball and sprinting around the table, and it was awesome. We played a similar game on a ping-pong table called Round Robin. Other active indoor games for the groups included classics like Fruit Basket Upset, Shuffle Your Buns, Broom Hockey, The Technicolor Stomp and Do You Love Your Neighbor? All of these required lots of movement and lots of noise, so they were very popular!  And I haven't even mentioned the cults of Four Square players that sprung up at Springfield, in Kissimmee and in Tampa...
• I can't think of a ski trip and not think about Pass the Pigs. Great time killer!
• Our visit with Amy Simmons Stanley and her family in Orlando recently reminded me of her favorite game at Springfield Friends Meeting, Musical Guys! This was an aggressive version of musical chairs, using guys on all fours as seats instead of the traditional chairs. It often involved a bit of wrestling before losers were declared. And Amy retired undefeated...
• There were two different winking games we played. One was Killer, a nice passive card game that involved catching a winking murderer.  The other was Wink 'Em, one of the most violent games ever created. Ask if you want details!  :)
• We played Brain Games, too. These were always fun, but there was always someone who just never figured them out, so they often took a VERY long time to play.  "It can be Snoopy, but it can't be a dog..." And who could ever forget Who Has the Hat?
• We played dozens of different Name Games designed to help students learn each other's names. These games, at every stop along the way, were pretty much universally despised...
• We had some outdoor games that were favorites as well. Go Tag was a classic that used tons of energy and created mass confusion. It also allowed lots of opportunities for creative cheating, one of my favorite things about youth group games! Wild Softball was another favorite, featuring a softball bat, a kickball and running the bases backwards or playing without a third base. We also tried Wet'N'Wild Softball, where you were hosed down between third base and home plate. We occasionally played football and basketball like normal people...but not soccer. Never soccer. I do have standards.  :)

• Over the last few years of my ministry, at Wesley Memorial UMC in Tampa and in Waycross, we had a lot of fun with a device called The 4-Way Grinder. It was basically a tug of war between 4 individuals with inner-tubes wrapped around their waists, all pulling in different directions (see picture at right). Only minor injuries were recorded...

Why so many (and such weird) games? For fun. For exercise. To build group unity and give the students a shared history to talk about. All of those reasons and more add up to the main reason- being strange and unpredictable helps put butts in the seats so we can talk about Jesus. It's pretty simple, really. And it helps convey the message that following Jesus is NOT dull, boring or predictable. It's a wild ride... and one with a GREAT finish!

Because of Jesus,

Throwback Thursday: Psychological Sit-Ups!

A Typical Night at TNT

We always tried to keep the fun in youth ministry, using silliness to fight the 3 mortal enemies of working with teenagers- tameness, sameness and lameness! Every now and then when you're trying to be crazy you lose control of a situation. In my case, it was usually my own fault. But sometimes circumstances just surprise you. Here is one such story!

One of the reasons our TNT program at Springfield Friends Meeting became so popular among students was our willingness to be goofy and daring with our programming. It helped that we had goofy and daring students on our ministry,too! We often did stunts that ended with someone getting wet or receiving a pie in the face. Our favorite way of delivering the whipped cream pie was a stunt I learned in my Young Life days called Psychological Sit-Ups. It worked like this: I would announce that I had acquired a Spock-like power of pinching a nerve in a person's neck and rendering them paralyzed. It required an elaborate set-up for me to accomplish this, and I would ask for a volunteer (actually chosen in advance and in on the stunt) to help me demonstrate. I would blindfold them, cover them in towels and sheets, and lay them on a table. I would apply the pinch as the crowd began chanting "you can't sit up....you can't sit up...you can't sit up..."  The chant would grow louder and louder until I would scream SIT UP! The person on the table would be unable to move- because they were in on the stunt. After two such performances, it was easy to find a third volunteer who didn't know the trick and was eager to prove me a fraud. We would go through the whole show a third time, only this time, the over zealous victim would sit straight up- into a waiting pie held by another student. It was a classic stunt that I used for many years. And it almost always worked.

And sometimes the pies got me...

One night at TNT we were had a number of new people (which of course is the only way it worked- once you saw it, you had to be pretty stupid to fall for it...) and so we broke out the pie. Things were going along just fine, and the victim was a Trinity High School girl whose name escapes me (Lynn Prevette, maybe?). As we got into the stunt, the pie appeared as usual, and was handed to another girl, Pam Collins. Pam was friend of our Amy Simmons and, we thought, of the victim. What I didn't know was that on that very Monday they had gotten into an argument over a boy, and tensions were still running high. So when the victim sat up, the pie was not just waiting for her- the pie was SMASHED into her face with great force! I thought for sure it broke her nose. There were gasps from the gathered crowd as I moved in to try and ease her pain and clean her up to make sure she wasn't injured. It was one of those thousands of youth ministry moments that is funny now...not so much then.

After that, only students I knew well got to hold the pie. And we moved on to another pie delivery stunt- Speed Kissing.  But that's for another day!

Because of Jesus,

Flashback Friday: The Technicolor Stomp

Among the things that confused and baffled me about the students I was working with at the Union Church of Hinsdale in 2000-2001 was that they really didn't like games or stunts.  The only games they ever wanted to play were basketball and Capture the Flag- both fine games, but hardly the kinds of games I wanted to play exclusively.  I led them in a few of my tried and true favorite games, and they just didn't get the art of playing.  As for stunts (little skits or games designed to "punk" someone at the end) they just seemed confused as to why anyone would do such things.  Even Psychological Sit-Ups failed to amuse them.  It was all very frustrating for me, because I always loved a great game!  So I want to share with you a few things that worked most everywhere else I served, and see which ones my former youth remember, and which ones still sound good today.

The Egyptian Mummy Race-  We would divide into several teams, and each team would attempt to wrap one team member in a roll of toilet tissue from head to toe.  Best mummy wins!  You can see great mummies from Springfield Friends Meeting and FUMC-Kissimmee on this page.
Sardines-  The king of all youth group games, in my humble opinion.  Hide and seek played with a partner, where on pair hides and everyone else looks for them, then hides WITH them after finding them.  A classic game best played in huge, old church buildings. Outside of youth ministry circles, this is also known as the Make Out Game.  Not that such things EVER happened in my youth groups...  
The Honey Bee Club-  An "initiation" stunt that convinced students they were being welcomed into a special club, this elaborate bit conned the victim twice.  The first time they had water spit in their face, and then were promised a chance at revenge by initiating the next person.  Unfortunately for them, the next "victim" was in on the gag, and so they got it again.  It may sound a little mean, but it was a beloved stunt at many stops along my journey.  And who can forget listening to the entire crowd buzz likes bees the entire time.  Bzzzzzzzz...
Do You Love Your Neighbor?-  A musical chairs type game, this was played with great ferocity by all of my groups- but one.  The odd-person out would stand in the middle of a circle of chairs and then approach a seated peer.  They would then ask the question, "Do you love your neighbor?"  If the seated player answered yes, the people on either side of them had to change seats while the odd-person also fought for one.  If the player answer no, they would then continue on to say "But I do love people who..."  They would then complete the sentence with things like attend a certain school, are wearing socks, haven't brushed their teeth today or what ever they choose.  Then everyone with that characteristic has to change seats.  It is a wild game that also helped kids get to know a little about each other.
Speed Kissing-  A race of teams in straight lines, facing forward, the turning as rapidly as possible and passing kisses on the cheek to the back on the line.  After a few practice runs, they race against another team or a bogus "world record."  And when the next to the last person in line turns for the finish, they are greeted with a pie in the face.  Another often requested stunt.

The Technicolor Stomp- You divide into teams.  Each team gets an equal number of balloons to inflate, with every team having their own color.  After they are all blown up, the balloons are all placed in the center of the room, and you yell, "GO!"  The idea is to use your feet to pop the balloons of the other team so that your color will be the only ones left.  Thus the name.  The game is wild, loud, easy to cheat at and a ton of fun for everyone!  Yet somehow the students in Hinsdale found it beneath them.

I'll stop there, but I have to tell you, games and stunts were an important part of making our youth groups meetings "You Gotta' Be There!" events in the communities we served.  Other games like Hook-Up Tag, Fruit Basket Upset and Four On a Couch were huge parts of various ministries.  I am so thankful that I grew up knowing, and hopefully was able to impart of the students I served, that following Jesus is fun.  Thanks for letting me look back.  Now I'm gonna' go play some SMITH...

Because of Jesus,

Get To Know Me- The Sequel!

Back in February of 2011 I wrote a post called Get To Know Me to help you, my beloved readers, understand a little more about the weirdness that is me.  Today I bring you the sequel, with even more fun facts abut my life.  Again, in traditional youth ministry fashion, we will do this as a game.  Hidden in the following list of facts is one false statement.  Post your guess as to which one is the lie in the comment section and I will draw a winner from among the correct answers.  What will you win? How about the latest Newsboys CD, God Is Not Dead!  Pretty cool, huh?  So here we go...

*  I was once part of a Womanless Beauty Pageant at Springfield Friends Meeting, entering as the fabulous Carlita.  I finished dead last. I was one UGLY woman!  All pictures have been destroyed.
*  I have written or co-written close to 200 songs. Some of the silly ones are quite famous in certain circles.  Some of the more serious ones I have sung in a few places (like Quaker Lake Camp) for small audiences.  Some of the best ones have only been heard by one person.

Conner Dog

*  My first dog (and only dog until Conner came along many years later) was named Tippy, because he had a tip for a tail.  Tippy was a "Heinz 57"- a mutt, who only had one eye due to an accident he had when he was 6 weeks old.  He died with his head in my lap on our way to visit my grandparents.  To this day whenever something goes missing or I forget to do something, I blame it on Tippy.
*  I cannot read music.
*  My mother was one of 5 sisters, yet I have only 3 cousins on that side of the family.
* Eating lima beans will make me barf. My second grade teacher, Mrs. Ware, did not believe me.  She does now.

The Caribbean Beach Resort

*  I have stayed at 10 different Walt Disney World resort hotels.
*  I once performed an hour long concert in the Pioneer Family Restaurant in Archdale, NC, under the stage name Bubba.
*  At various points in time I coached youth football, youth basketball and Little League baseball.  Just to be clear, at no point in time did I ever coach youth soccer.
*  I have seen both Neil Diamond and Barry Manilow live in concert. 
*  Among my 2290+ Twitter followers are at least 10 former youth group members.
*  In high school, as part of a Yearbook assembly (I was editor), I once danced to Rock Around The Clock in front of the entire student body.

Myabi Kyoto's, Myrtle Beach

*  In 28 years of student ministry, not once were we ever asked not to come back to someplace we were staying or dining.
* I was once on stage with the band Third Day.
*  I once sold steak knives door-to-door in North Carolina.
*  My first girlfriend was Susan Kochel- in 5th grade. She dumped me on a field trip to Old Salem.
*  I once took a group from FUMC-Kissimmee to Atlanta for a Braves game and it was delayed for a few hours. But not by rain. Because the stadium caught on fire.
*  In 1988 I was featured in a brochure for YouthQuake, a national Quaker youth conference. Everyone agreed that my picture looked like a young Hitler.
*  My youth ministry career spanned 8 different churches in 4 states; one camp, one para-church organization, and one denominational position.

Long time ago...

* My wife, whom I have known for 30 years, has never seen me in person when I did not have a moustache.
*  And finally, the first new car I ever bought for myself was a 1984 Renault Encore. It was wrecked by an unnamed youth who drove it less than 2 miles one Sunday afternoon.

So there you have it.  Lots of random facts, a few pictures, and one lie.  It's more than you wanted to know I'm sure, but now you have a little more idea of why I am the way I am!  Hope you enjoyed it and will take a guess at my one untruth.  See you tomorrow with the correct answer...and the winner!

Sardines & Marathons

As we approach the third birthday of this blog, here's another vintage post from my first week of blogging back in 2009...

Scripture tells us "Raise up a child in the way he should go, and when he is old he will not turn from it." It is so true that the things we learn early on in any endeavour tend to stay with us. I found this to be true in youth ministry as well. Today I want to talk about a couple of things I learned early on that stayed with me until my days of student ministry were over.

New Garden Friends Meeting, like almost every other youth group we knew about in the 70's, had lock-ins. You know the event- kids come to the church, stay up late, sneak around and find places to be alone, get cranky and finally fall asleep. I have very few memories of this as a youth, but as a youth leader they were things to be feared! I didn't mind the lack of sleep- I hated playing guard dog trying to keep kids in areas of the church they were actually allowed to be in! So as I gained some experience, I began to change the event into a Marathon. The difference was subtle but very important. There would be no sleep. We would plan events for the entire night, including energetic games at the earliest hours of the morning. Where "lock-ins" had been torture for me, I LOVED Marathons! I was challenged me to be at my most creative, and the excitement level for the students went through the roof. As I progressed through the years, the Marathon morphed into Rec Around the Clock (a name I stole from the great Tom Klaus) and the stakes went way up! Now not only did we stay up all night, we were OUT of the church for the vast majority of the night! We went bowling at 2 am; ice skating at 5 am; played laser tag at 4 am; saw movies, played putt-putt, went to laser light shows and always finished with a breakfast. Rec Around the Clock became the single biggest event of the summer by the time I hit Kissimmee, including a guest appearance by Lost And Found. I never tired of these events, and the memories are many.

The different ministries I served over the years had many differences, but they all had one thing in common. They all played Sardines. For some, it was a game we played on rare occasions. For others. it was an obsession (the youth of Springfield Friends Meeting were particularly skilled in the game)! For the uninitiated, Sardines is a hide-and-seek game. Two people go hide, and they everyone looks for them in pairs. When you find them, you hide with them, thus packing yourselves in like...wait for it...SARDINES! We learned this game from DB3 (David Brown the third) when I was 14 or so, and it was made all the more interesting by his stories of how it had been originally called "The Make-Out Game." As with all DB3 stories, you never knew if that was true, but it sure sounded good! After all, you played with a partner, in the dark, and tried to find hiding places where you would be alone for a long time (DB3 once told us about he and a girl hiding in a front loading washing machine at his boarding school- not sure I believed that one either!). Regardless of the make-out factor, it was a great game for scarring people in dark, spooky churches, and was getting more comfortable around the people you were with. You stick 30 youth under a desk, and you have togetherness!

Jim Rayburn, the founder of Young Life, once said, "It is a sin to bore a student with the Gospel." One of the ways I tried to open the hearts and minds of our youth over the years was to find ways to make church fun. Did I sometimes go too far and plan events that were a bit too wild? Oh yes- on a regular basis! But I do believe by making church a place kids WANTED to be, we were able to reach students with the Gospel who otherwise would have never heard it. Parents used to punish their children by grounding them from youth group. While I always found that a bit odd, if we could make it so special that it was punishment not to be there, we were doing something right. And if that "something right" helped bring one student to a relationship with Jesus, then I would do it all over again...

If anyone ever tries hiding in a washing machine, please let me know.

Because of Jesus,

The Game Hall of Fame

I had the the pleasure of meeting my Twitter friend Dave Pettengill and his wife Lindsey for breakfast Tuesday morning.  Dave is a youth pastor, and as we chatted and got to know each other we told a lot of stories about youth ministry, and many of them revolved round the games our groups played.  Over the years my students played hundreds of different games at youth group, from the sophisticated to the stupid.  I always assumed most student ministries were like that; I could be wrong.  I think our games always had a lot of variety and creativity, and I know that some of them are quite memorable to the kids who played them. If you happen to be a former youth of mine who is reading, I'd love to hear which ones you remember. I bet someone from every group I was ever a part of remembers the Egyptian Mummy Race (see pic at right).  Let's take a stroll through the game Hall of Fame:

• The grand poobah of all my games was Sardines.  I learned it as a kid from my youth leader, DB3, and then passed it along to every group I ever worked with until Waycross, where we had no decent place to play without disturbing people.  This was hide and seek in pairs, and it was a riot.  The kids at Springfield were really good at it.  
• Does anyone remember the whole New Games craze of the 1970s?  I was an officially trained and licensed New Games trainer and referee.  Smaug's Jewels or British Bulldog, anyone?  "Play hard, play fair....nobody hurt!"
• At TNT we often played versions of TV games shows.  We played Remote Control, a game of TV trivia based on the MTV show.  We did our own versions of the Dating Game and the Newlywed Game.  The Newlywed Game was especially fun because we would partner students who barely knew each other and make them guess at the answers to the questions. It was often hilarious.  We also used board games such as Taboo, Win, Lose or Draw and Outburst to create games we could play with a large group.
• We had a great game we played on the pool tables at Springfield and Kissimmee called PIG.  It involved rolling a pool ball and sprinting around the table, and it was awesome.  We played a similar game on a ping-pong table called Round Robin.  Other active indoor games for the groups included classics like Fruit Basket Upset, Shuffle Your Buns (a musical chairs variation), Broom Hockey. The Technicolor Stomp and Do You Love Your Neighbor?  All of these required lots of movement and lots of noise, so they were very popular!  And I haven't even mentioned the cults of Four Square players that sprung up at Springfield, in Kissimmee and in Tampa...
• I can't think of a ski trip and not think about Pass the Pigs.  Great time killer!
• There were two different winking games we played.  One was Killer, a nice passive card game that involved catching a winking murderer.  The other was Wink 'Em, one of the most violent games ever created.  Ask if you want details!  :)
• We played Brain Games, too.  These were always fun, but there was always someone who just never figured them out, so they often took a VERY long time to play.  "It can be Snoopy, but it can't be a dog..."  And who could ever forget Who Has the Hat?
• We played dozens of different Name Games designed to help students learn each other's names.  These games, at every stop along the way, were pretty much universally despised...
• We had some outdoor games that were favorites as well.  Go Tag was a classic that used tons of energy and created mass confusion.  It also allowed lots of opportunities for creative cheating (Best creative cheaters ever?  Todd Willis & Jocelyn Sessions in Kissimmee), one of my favorite things about youth group games!  Wild Softball was another favorite, featuring a softball bat, a kickball and running the bases backwards or playing without a third base.  We also tried Wet'N'Wild Softball, where you were hosed down between third base and home plate.  We occasionally played football and basketball like normal people...but not soccer.  Never soccer.  I do have standards.  :)

• Over the last few years of my ministry, at Wesley Memorial UMC in Tampa and in Waycross, we had a lot of fun with a device call The 4-Way Grinder.  It was basically a tug of war between 4 individuals with inner-tubes wrapped around their waists, all pulling in different directions (see picture at right).  Only minor injuries were recorded...

Why so many (and such weird) games?  For fun.  For exercise.  To build group unity and give the students a shared history to talk about.  All of those reasons and more add up to the main reason- being strange and unpredictable helps put butts in the seats so we can talk about Jesus.  It's pretty simple, really.  And it helps convey the message that following Jesus is NOT dull, boring or predictable.  It's a wild ride... and one with a GREAT finish!

Because of Jesus,

Summer 101: The Great Race

Summer is almost here- the best and most important time of the year for youth ministry!  Here's another idea for anyone still looking to fill holes in your summer student ministry calendar! For even more suggestions, click the Summer Ministries tab at the top of this blog. 

If you are looking for a summer event that will draw a crowd and put a quick end to those old "church is boring" rumors, then The Great Race is for you!  It's simple to put together and loads of fun.  It works for any size group.  And it's time tested.  We did them when I was in high school- you know, before electricity!  :)  It's a great entry point event for new students and friends of your current youth.  It just screams COME AND SEE US!!!

Here's how it works.  You put together a relay race featuring 10 to 12 events, and divide your youth into at least 2 teams.  The larger your ministry, the more teams.  Each team then decides on a team member to complete each leg of the race.  Pretty standard stuff, right?

Here's what make it interesting- diversity.  You can have a couple of events that require athletic ability, such as a distance run or a free-throw shoot.  But then, you just need to go crazy.  Use the old "eat crackers and whistle" routine.  Maybe break out the classic Chubby Bunny.  Have someone sing one of your favorite youth group songs from memory while being blasted with a water hose.  Use brain-teasers and math problems.  Have someone chug a Coke and belch.  Have someone improv a dance to a song you know your youth really can't stand.  Ask youth group trivia questions.  Get one of your adult volunteers who can do a "stone face" and have one of the tasks be to make them laugh.  Be as creative as possible- and as inclusive.  Try to have events everyone can be comfortable doing.

And then have a big finish.  Make each team gather at the finish line and accomplish some things together as a team.  I usually gave each team a bucket of water, a tiny paper cup and a 2-liter bottle and made them fill the bottle by passing the cup back (always touching EVERY team member) to the bottle.  I always had them make up a team cheer (with movements); and the finale was for each team to build a pyramid using all team members.  Great moments, great memories and great photo opps!

So there you have it.  Many of you are far more creative than I, so add your own twists and have a Great Race this summer.  Here's my guarantee- have this event once and your students will make certain it becomes an annual event! 

Because of Jesus,

Summer 101: Digital Scavenger Hunt

Summer is coming fast!  I continue my Summer 101 series today in the hopes of inspiring youth pastors everywhere to make the most of the very best ministry season of the year- SUMMER!

The Scavenger Hunt has been a part of youth group activities since Grog the Caveman first had the group from T-Rex Baptist Church go out to look for fire and wheels- but it is still a winner.  It has taken many forms over the years, but my favorite has always involved some sort of pictures.  In my earliest years we did Polaroid Scavenger Hunts; we then moved on to Video Hunts and finally to the more modern Digital age.  These are not only a riot for youth and adults to be a part of, they also provide you with great promo pics for the present and excellent blackmail pics to use years later!  There are 1000 ways to do this event, but here's what worked for me.. 


*  You'll need to make an educated guess at how many students will show up, and have more than enough vehicles with adult drivers to safely transport them all.  The more teams the merrier!  You can either let students divide themselves up and pick a driver, or (and I love this one) let the drivers "draft" their teams.  That adds a "mixer" element to the event.  Students can make great connections that will last while riding around in a car working as a team.  And, needless to say (and yet I am saying it!) every car needs a camera that will allow you to download the photos easily at the completion of the event.

*  Make a list of pictures they need to take in the allotted time (usually 2 hours).  Make sure you have more things on the list than they can possibly do in the time period.  Some items should require specific locations; others should ask for pictures of specific actions.

*  Give each picture opportunity a point value.  The more "unusual" the photo, the higher the point value.  For instance, a picture of the group in front of another church's sign might be worth 50 points.  A picture of the group carrying a total stranger across a street might be worth 500. This system helps insure you will get more of the best pictures, and also reminds the teams that this is NOT a race.  It's about points.  

*  To provide a little intrigue I always made one of the highest value items getting a pic of ANOTHER one of the groups taking one of their pictures.  This provides some of the most dramatic moments of the event!

*  Involve the community.  Send teams to church member's homes, local restaurants and anyplace else where the activity will generate some buzz for your youth ministry. 

*  To keep things lively, offer real prizes to each member of the winning team.  This is NOT the time to give away your cans of SPAM or last year's leftover t-shirts.  And to keep things on schedule, give serious point penalties for every minute after the event's end time that a team returns to the church. 

*  Have an adult on stand by with a vehicle at the church in case anyone has car trouble or an emergency.  Make sure their cell number is printed on the official event list.

That should be enough to get you started on one of the most fun events you will ever do!  Just remember that the key to the entire thing is being wildly creative with your list of photo opps.  Do this once and do it right, and I give you my personal guarantee that the 2nd time you do it you'll need twice as many cars and drivers.  "If you take pictures of them, they will come..."  Now get crackin' on that Summer calendar!  Blessings to you all.

Because of Jesus,

"Ch-ch-ch-changes..."

I have mentioned here before that when I arrived at Tampa's Wesley Memorial UMC in October of 2001 there were some innate problems with the youth ministry.  I moved slowly the first year when it came to making drastic changes and severing ties with the past, but with the huge influx of new 6th graders in August, 2002 (see Monday's post), it was time to start swinging my axe!  Here are 4 of the traditions I found on my arrival that I decided to hack away at in order to take our ministry where I felt God was leading us to go...

A trust building game in The Overflow.

1. Meeting space.  We had no space of our own to meet in.  The Fellowship Hall was occupied by our children's ministry (more on that in a few) during the same time period on Sunday afternoons.  There were no classrooms large enough for us.  So for a number of years the student ministry had met in the church sanctuary.  From my first day on the job I was not happy about this set-up.  First of all, the space was too big.  Thirty youth in a room that sits 500 is just not a good match.  No matter how good a crowd turned out, it always felt tiny.  Also, I have always enjoyed wild and sometimes messy indoor games as part of my youth meetings.  I cannot stress enough how much trouble you can get in for throwing pies in the sanctuary.  And finally, it didn't feel like "our" turf.  There was nothing "youthy" about it.  All the pews faced forward, so group discussions were difficult.  It was a beautiful worship space for our church.  As a youth room it had serious problems.  There was, however, a large empty space in the back- The Overflow - that could be closed off from rest of the worship room.  And that became my target area...




Worship in The Overflow


2. Worship.  The tradition with the youth of WMUMC was that worship took place in the sanctuary, and it was the first thing they did at youth fellowship each week.  The music was led by a Praise Band consisting of a few students and some adults.  Joining us for this part of our time together were all of the kids and leaders from our children's ministry (they also joined us for snack time).  All of these things were problematic.  I wanted to be able to have worship to close our time together, or in the middle, or whenever.  The Praise Band was so loud and the room so large that you couldn't actually tell if anyone was singing or not.  Having the kids with us must have looked good on paper, but in reality it limited what we could do and it limited our flexibility.  I always (from Day 1 in 1978) wanted my students to arrive at youth asking the question, "What will happen today?"  The way we were set up at the time, the question was moot.  We had to do the same things at the same time every week.  Soooo....   I uninvited the children, with the trade-off that I would bring youth to do worship for their Promiseland Sunday School program every Sunday morning.  We moved to The Overflow, changed worship to the end of the program (most of the time!) and re-imagined the Praise Band with our newly arrived Contemporary Worship Leader, Jason Deese.  For the time being, I would go old school on them and lead music with just my acoustic guitar.  It was awesome- turned out this bunch could really sing!  Did anyone fight me on these changes?  Oh yes.  Did they work?  BIG TIME!!!




The infamous 4-Way Grinder in action.


3. Games.  As I have written about far too many times to count, I believe building relationships to be a huge part of student ministry.  So after moving from the sanctuary we began to play.  We continued the pre-youth outdoor football game that was very popular with the males (especially the adult male volunteers!) and added more wild, crazy, unusual group building games to the mix.  I must have had a dozen students say to me in those first few months something along the lines of, "WOW!  I never knew that youth group could be FUN!"  And then, just when they thought they had me figured out, I broke out the 4-Way Grinder.  Things were never sane after that...




"I'm goin' to Graceland..."


4. The Name.  The previous youth pastor had tagged the group with the name God's Property after the Kirk Franklin group of the same name.  While there was nothing wrong with the name, it just didn't pass my "WOW!" test.   Rather than change it or drop it right away, I just ignored it.  I never uttered those words in the first year.  They popped up on my office computer everyday (she had left under bad circumstances and taken some passwords with her...) but I just let it ride.  I built a website for our ministry at some point early on, and it was around that same time that I began asking for suggestions for a new name.  I received a number of suggestions, but after talking it over with our Youth Ministry Team and some of the student leaders I decided on Graceland.  I'll write more about that on Friday.

Change is always scary, but it is often the catalyst for growth and new adventure.  Such was the case with these changes, but they didn't come without a price.  There will always be people who oppose change.  But here is my student ministry leadership thought for today- If you are still doing everything the same way, with the same events and programs and the same names as your predecessor, then are you really necessary?  Very seldom can I say this about my life, but looking back at these changes I wouldn't do anything different.  We were ready for some "good times"...

Because of Jesus,