Happy Birthday, Marilyn!

Today is my wife's birthday, and like most days in her life, it will be all about other people. (The picture on the right is old now, but it's of us at Disney, our favorite place in the world.)  She's at work right now; I hope some of the good folks there will take her to lunch.  Later today she will be serving as a band booster for Will's marching band at Sickles High; I hope we can work in a birthday dinner somewhere along the way.  But that's Marilyn- always going the extra mile for other people, and especially for family.

She has survived some ridiculous things in our 23 years together.  Before Will was born in 1995, she took most of  her vacation time to go on youth trips and spend hours on the road with teenagers.  The first few years after Will was born, she had to take care of him by herself quite often as I was still on the road with those teens.  She put up with late night phone calls, unexpected visits and spending way too much of the family budget on our ministry.  She even put up with being married to an idiot, and she never lost faith in me or in God.  I don't know if people marvel at her steadfast devotion to Jesus and her family, but they should! 

So today, I wish a happy birthday to the best wife and best friend an idiot ever had!  A long time ago, when we were dating, I gave her a stuffed bear named Boo, and we began calling each other Boo as our "pet names".  This was the very early 1980's, mind you, so we were Boo before Boo was cool!  Happy birthday, Boo...I can never give you everything you deserve, but I will always love you.  Now we just have to survive this one last teenager...

Because of Jesus,

Dallas, 1982

My regular readers may have already noticed that 1982 was a very pivotal year in my life and in my ministry.  Somewhere along the road of this most interesting year, David Stone (see Influences: J. David Stone) suggested to me that I attend the Youth Specialties National Youth Workers Convention (NYWC).  I knew of Youth Specialties (YS) from their series of Ideas books and a few other youth ministry resources, which were really just starting to be published at the time.  I had never heard of the NYWC, and neither had anyone else I knew, but David made it sound like a place that I needed to be, and he was leading some of the workshops.  So I made plans to go by myself to Dallas in November of 1982.  I was 23 and venturing out on my own, and I had my doubts.  It turned out to be a  very good decision plus I came home with awesome belt buckle seen above.  Thanks Wayne Rice!

The NYWC in 1982 was not the same beast it is today.  Dallas was the only location, and there were only around 800 of us there, compared to the thousands they draw to multiple locations today.  It was held in a hotel ballroom with very limited sound equipment and no big screens or projectors.  And it was wilder- MUCH wilder!  Those were the days when YS was a stand alone company, not part of the Zondervan conglomerate, and they were much bigger risk takers.  I was clueless as to what to expect, but the opening general session told me all I needed to know.  Mike Yaconelli and Wayne Rice,the two head-honchos of YS, did a welcome and orientation, during which they roasted many of the denominations represented at the convention.  The barbs went something like this:

• How many Southern Baptists does it take to change a light bulb?  Just one- and it doesn't even matter if the light bulb needs changing!
• Pentecostals, the hotel pool is NOT available for mass baptisms!
• Episcopalians should note that hotel bar closes at midnight...
• There will be an all-night meeting of the Committee of Methodists in room 806 to determine if that committee needs to meet again tomorrow!
• Sorry, Lutherans, but the revolving restaurant at the top of the hotel is NOT available for a potluck supper on Saturday night...

They then did a "roll call" of denominations, and I was surprised to find out that there were a few other Quakers in attendance, all from Iowa, including my future friend Tom Klaus.  There were not, however, enough of us to qualify for an insult from the stage!

The next few days were among the most exciting, draining and educational of my life.  The workshops were amazing, with people like Yac, David Stone, Dennis Benson, Tony Campolo and Jim Burns opening my eyes to what student ministry could truly be.  Tony led a workshop called Issues that Divide the Church, and focused on the sacraments, abortion and homosexuality.  As you can see, we have made SOOOOO much progress over the last 27 years!  Jim Burns 2-part Advanced Youth Ministry seminar became the basis of almost everything I did for the next 10 years. (I finally got to thank Jim in Pittsburgh in  2005!) In those days, the general session speakers YS chose were there to challenge you to think.  No matter your theology or your politics, there was a main speaker who would really tick you off!  The whole thing was like drinking from a fire hose- totally overwhelming!  And then there was The Wittenburg Door banquet.  The Wittenburg Door was a magazine published by YS that featured satirical humor, generally making fun of the excesses of the church.  It's now just The Door and YS let it go years ago, but at the time it was quite a thorn in the side of the mainstream church.  For their banquet in 1982, the speaker was Dick Gregory, the radical, outspoken African-American comedian who was not known for his religious views or church language.  He held nothing back as he spoke about our responsibility as Christ-followers to feed the world and take care of the broken and cast out.  It was amazing, and I was among those who gave him a standing ovation.  Many had walked out far before the end.  My eyes were opened in a whole new way for about the 34th time that weekend!

It was also at this event that I met James Ward for the first time.  James was a featured musician at the convention, who came out looking like James Taylor- a skinny white guy in a white shirt and loose tie.  He say down at his piano and began to play, and JT disappeared and Stevie Wonder popped out!  He was incredible, and our paths would cross a number of times over the years.  His long out-of-print album Good Advice remains one of my very favorite contemporary christian recordings, even if it is on a cassette tape!  I also met and got to play guitar with Yohann Anderson (just YO to his friends!), the founder of Songs & Creations.  The Songs & Creations song book was the standard for youth group singing from the 1970's until the praise and worship movement of the 90's, and YO was the man behind gathering so many great songs in one place.  He led all the group singing at the NYWC until praise bands were discovered...

It would be 5 years before I returned to the NYWC (an event I would eventually attend 15 times, and speak at once) but the lasting impact of that first time would be difficult to overstate.  The lessons I learned and the connections I made would last the length of my ministry and beyond.  You will read many more NYWC stories as time goes by; you will hear some of these names again as well.  I returned to New Garden more fired up than any $100 a month part-time youth leader ought to be, ready to make the student ministry there all it could be.  How could I not be excited, with the words of the greatest speaker I have ever heard, Tony Campolo, still ringing in my ears:  "You are thinking the world is too big, and one person can't change it.  Well you CAN change it!  YOU can make a difference!"  I was certainly going to try...

Because of Jesus,

The White Team

My Dad began coaching little league football in the early 1970's with the Guilford College Steelers in Greensboro, NC.  The Steelers were a "county" team who played in the powerful Greensboro city league, and in the early years they were doormats.  Dad transformed them into consistent winners at the 8-10 year old level, and I always enjoyed helping him.  As their success increased so did the number of kids coming out to play.  There was a limit (35, I think) of how many players a team could carry.  And to make sure all of those players got to play the city instituted a great program.  Regular games were on weeknights, and all of your players were eligible for those.  Then on Saturday mornings there was another game- but your top 15 players could not participate!  So Saturday morning was the game for the back-ups.  On a powerhouse team like the Steelers, that Saturday morning team was very good.

One particular season (the year escapes me) we had over 50 kids come out to play for the Steelers.  Dad would not cut anyone, and he wanted everyone to play, so he came to me with an idea.  Would I be willing to coach a third team- one that didn't even dress on weeknights, but that played as a second Steeler team on Saturday mornings?  This would be a team full of kids who had not played organized football before; full of the smallest kids and the slowest kids and even some who didn't know their left from their right.  In short, it was going to be a bad team.  But it seemed like a challenge to me (not being a very bright young man!) so I said yes.  Not wanting to call it the "C Team" or the third string, we settled on The White Team, because they would wear the white jerseys abandoned by the "real" Steelers a few years earlier.

The White Team practiced separately from the other players, and slowly a team began to come together.  Eddie Pope became our quarterback because he could remember the plays.  Kevin Morris, who came out to late to make the other roster, was our ringer- he was talented and very fast. And our guys practiced very hard- but we also had lots of fun.  We would run trick plays every day just to break things up.  When the starting defense needed to hit some people, I would play quarterback for a make-shift offense, and they could hit me all they wanted to.  The team progressed, and played well in our first game- but lost 7-6.  No could believe we had been that close, but still, everyone feared for us- game two would be against Lewis Center.

Lewis Center was the power program in Greensboro city football.  They annually played for the city championship at a least one age level, and they had been doing this for years.  The general assumption was that their Saturday morning team could make the playoffs in the regular league!  And The White Team was about to take them on.  My Dad was worried that we would be beaten so badly that it would humiliate the kids.  I secretly worried the same thing.  But we showed up anyway- and the game was amazing.  They drove the ball down the field, and we stopped them inside the 10.  This pattern repeated itself all game long.  We never came close to scoring, but we kept fighting.  The game ended in a scoreless tie, which, of course, was a major victory for us.  My Dad often said over the years, as he was winning city championships with the Steelers, that The White Team performance that Saturday morning was the greatest game he ever saw a Steeler team play.  And I wouldn't argue...

My experiences with that team were full of great lessons that I carried with me into my years in student ministry.  I learned the value of mixing working hard with playing hard.  I learned that building bonds between myself and the students I worked with could lead to results that seemed miraculous.  But the big lesson was this- a team (or a group) can be so much greater than the sum of its' parts.  Over the years my groups didn't always have the most "popular" students, or the most jocks, or the most "beautiful" people.  But we usually had amazing youth groups full of people who loved each other and who were seeking Jesus.  And just like with The White Team, some of the individuals drew on their experiences to become stars later on.  Many of those students are still out there playing, raising families, seeking God and "shining their lights" for others.  I thank God for them everyday.

I am  seriously considering trying to get the team back together and challenge my Tampa Bay Bucs...I think we could take 'em!

Because of Jesus,

Back Home

"Back home, I spend my summers; Back home, I spend myself...

In my late teens and early 20's Quaker Lake was not just a place I worked in the summer; it was a place of sanctuary for me and my friends.  When life was stressful and we needed to "get away" we would call Neal and ask if we could come down and spend a night or two.  When the forecasters called for a big snow, we would drive the 25 miles to QLC hoping to get snowed in there.  There were times when I would drive down and just walk around by myself, exploring the woods and visiting the Campfire Circle.  In many ways, Quaker Lake was home.

So when all of the politics and turmoil (see yesterday's posting) that was North Carolina Yearly Meeting of Friends in 1982 came to Quaker Lake the week after Christmas for the annual Winter Camp, I was nervous.  And I was not alone.  There was great debate at New Garden Friends Meeting as to whether or not we should even take our youth.  But we did.  And while the program and speakers were very different than what we were used to, it was not awful- until the last night.  The speakers/musicians they brought in spent an hour telling us all we would burn in hell if we didn't respond to their invitation to give our hearts to Jesus.  Many of us came from backgrounds that taught us that following Jesus was a life long spiritual journey, not a pressured, spur of the moment decision.  We were not even given any time to sit in silence and pray about our choice.  So we didn't raise our hands.  And the leaders became angry.  They again reminded us that if we didn't act at that moment, hell awaited.  I was distraught; the 14-17 year old students from a similar background were horrified.  I wrote a song late that night that tells the story; few have ever heard it, but I share it with you now. The opening tag is at the top of this posting, the rest is below.  It's called Back Home.

As evening fell one winter night, I sensed that something was not right

with the people and the place that I had come to know so well

I looked for faces that I knew as shadows crept across the room

I looked up and it seemed as if no one I knew was there

and I bowed my head in prayer

The question they shared in the end asked if Jesus was my friend

but the answer didn't matter, 'cause I would not raise my hand

I felt that eyes were now on me, and what I feared had come to be

Outcasts in the place we loved, in the place we called our home

and we felt so all alone

Chorus:  But we know, yes we know, that our friends aren't far away

And we know, yes we know, that no matter what these people say

the LORD will find His way...

I sat still in deep despair of all that they were saying there

trying to get my courage up and say "that's just not true"

As I reached out for the Light, I knew could guide me through this night

it seems I finally understood what it really means to pray

for the LORD to show the way

CHORUS

A dim fire gave me just the light to see if what I feared was right

to see if all was really lost, and we had to leave our home...

But instead we reached out on that day and without a sound began to pray

and with that bond of unity we would not be denied

you see the LORD was by our side!     -C. Jones  (1982)

That moment- when the crowd was breaking up and many of the youth gathered around me, could have been a time to complain or give up.  But in that moment, God moved in us, and I knew just what we needed.  As we held hands and prayed silently, our emotion was every bit as intense as the evangelical fervor of the speakers.  Our leaders could see that, and they left us alone to pray.  There were only 6 0r 7 times over the years when I felt like Jesus just stepped in and took over, joining groups in a tangible way.  This was the first of those times- He was in the circle, holding our hands- and spiritually, I was never the same again. The struggles over theology and style would continue, and New Garden sent a strongly worded letter to NCYM asking for more balance in programming.  But for those of us who had been in that circle, we knew we had encountered the living Christ amidst the struggle, and it would not seem so scary anymore.  Once again, Quaker Lake had become a sanctuary to me...and it was still home.

Because of Jesus,

The Sit-In

The early 1980's were a strange time to be a 21 year-old, socially concerned seeker/christian trying to find his way in the world.  In November 1980, Ronald Reagan was elected and my roommates and I strongly considered moving to Canada (just so you know, this was not simply politics for me; I was a registered republican at the time and I voted for John Anderson, a republican who ran as an independent.  It was just that Reagan scared us to death!).  In December 1980 John Lennon was shot and an icon of the peace and justice movement was dead.  By 1982 Reagan had declared it was "morning in America" (which was true if you happened to be white and have money) and the country was in an extreme conservative swing.  Worse, at least for me, was that the church was becoming completely immersed in politics.  Jerry Falwell and the Moral Majority and Ralph Reed and the Christian Coalition had been a great help to the Reagan campaign, and now they were using their power to urge congress to pass more "christian" legislation.  On the national stage Christianity became less about what Jesus taught and more about conservative politics.  And if you dared disagree with them, you were quickly declared both unchristian and un american, which they saw as the same thing.  For example, the Moral Majority worked tirelessly against the re-election of Sen. Mark Hatfield of Oregon, despite the fact that he was one of the most outspoken evangelical Christians in the Senate.  His flaw?  He was for disarmament and a World Peace Tax Fund.  To paraphrase the great Tom Leher,  it takes a certain amount of guts to get up and speak out on behalf of peace and justice and brotherhood and all the other things those people are against!  Strange days indeed...

In the midst of these changing times, Quakers in North Carolina were changing too.  For years, the Young Friends (7th-12th grade students) of NC Yearly Meeting had been primarily controlled by students who went to Quaker Lake for summer camp, many of whom also attended New Garden Friends Meeting. (For those of you who are regular readers, you will know that those are the two ministries I worked for at the time, so I was double trouble!)This began to shift in the early '80's as the leadership at the top of the Yearly Meeting began to change.  When the position of Youth and Christian Education Director for NCYM came open, the search committee went outside of NCYM, passing over several local candidates and hiring David Tebbs from Ohio.  Over the next few years David and I disagreed on many things, but I always had the ultimate respect for him as a leader and as a Christ-follower, and we eventually became good friends.  At about the same time, Jerry Cannady was installed as the new head of the Young Friends Activities Committee, which controlled the planning for all NCYM youth events except Quaker Lake summer camp.  Jerry was a large, angry pastor who had no interest in youth- he was put in place to put us (the Quaker Lake and New Garden crowds) in our place. He did not have our respect on any level, and he made it clear he didn't like us at all.   A showdown was inevitable.

The showdown came at Yearly Meeting (a once a year, statewide gathering of Quakers), August 1982 at Guilford College.  For several years, part of the program had been the showing of the Quaker Lake slide show from the the recently completed summer camping season.  The campers who also attended this event looked forward to it, and others came in just for the slide show presentation.  On this particular occasion, the slide show was the last event of the day on the next to the last day of the sessions.  For those who attended camp, the slide show was often a very emotional event, and this year was no exception.  At the conclusion, before anyone connected with QLC could say anything, Jerry Cannady jumped to his feet and announced that it was time for everyone to go back to the dorms, and that there was to be total silence as we did so.  We were stunned.  No time to visit and chat about what we had just experienced.  No time to go back through the slides and take them in more slowly, without the soundtrack.  Jay Osborne, the Presiding Clerk (that's Quaker for chairman or president) of the Young Friends spoke up and asked if those who wanted to could watch it again.  He was told NO in a most unpleasant way.  As people began to get up and leave in silence, Jay and I did not move.  Neither did many others.  Jerry began yelling at us and using some distinctively un-Quaker language, demanding that we get out and go to our dorms.  And still we sat there.  A long, ugly discussion ensued that let us know in no uncertain terms that things were changing.  Those of us who found our expressions of faith more in the peace and equality and searching for Truth were now being dictated to by those who saw everything in black and white; and we had just been declared part of the darkness.

I don't really remember how it all ended that night; I don't think we saw anymore slides.  My own theology and beliefs, so young at the time, have certainly changed since then. 
But what I really remember is my good friend Jay Osborne, age 17 or so, (yes, the same Jay who dropped my guitar off the roof of the QLC lodge!) staying seated to "stand up" for his beliefs and his friends.  I was proud to sit with him and all the others. To this day, I feel bonded to Jay by that moment, and it is something I will never forget.   We knew challenges lay ahead for us, and we were right.  Winter Camp was coming to Quaker Lake in December, and we were afraid of what was going to happen at that place we all loved so much.  The storm clouds were gathering- and I was about to have one of the great spiritual experiences of my life.  But that's tomorrow's story...

Because of Jesus,

Create In Me

It's another Sunday, another day to praise God and be amazed by the grace He gives us through Jesus Christ.  But yet...I wonder.  Now that I am no longer in professional ministry, what is God's plan for me.  Am I still of use to Him despite my status as a "notorious sinner?"  What is my "place in this world?"  Some days I doubt, and sometimes I despair.  But mostly, I remember the words of the psalmist in Psalm 51 when he prays "create in me a clean heart, oh God, and renew a right spirit within me."  Lois Cheney captures my doubt about my worthiness to serve the Savior in her classic (but sadly, out of print) 1969 devotional book God Is No Fool.  One of my favorite passages, read on Youth Sundays by dozens of students over the years, reminds me that I walk the same path as so many others who doubted they had anything to offer God.  Listen to her words:

Moses said, "Oh come on now!  Be sensible!  I'm a terrible speaker.  They'd never listen to me."  And God said, "Oh for crying out loud!  OK, I'll use your brother to help with the speaking."  And Moses led God's people out of disintegration.

Jonah said, "Oh come on now!  Be sensible!  Not me!  I'm not the type."  And after a rather unexpected vacation in a fish, just thinking things over, he talked to God's people and led them God's way- even though he wasn't happy about it.

And Zacharias said, "Oh come on now! Be sensible!  Not me!  My wife and I are too old to have any kids."  And God said, "Oh shut up!"  And he did shut up- for nine months.  And John was born, and the way for the Christ opened up.

And I heard a child say

"I can't serve God, I'm too young."

And I heard a boy say

"I can't serve God, I'm not good enough."

And I hear a woman say

"I can't serve God I'm not skilled enough."

And I heard a man say

"I can't serve God I'm not pure enough."

I wonder if God ever gets any new problems...

The great songwriter Mary Rice Hopkins wrote "Create in me a clean heart, oh God, that I might serve You."  My prayer on this day of worship echos her words.  May God open our eyes and our hearts to what He has in store for each of us.

Because of Jesus,

The Next Big Thing

Early on in my ministry I began to understand that the missing link in most youth ministries at the time was communication.  Letting students and parents know what was going on, what was coming up, and what they needed to do about it was a new concept in the fly by the seat of your pants world of youth work.  Sometime in the year after David Stone turned me on to the concept of Wholistic Youth Ministry (that is ministry to the whole person- body, soul, mind and spirit) I began to actually plan months in advance for YFYF programs.  As part of that planning, I began doing a monthly newsletter that we mailed to the home of every youth on our roster- active or not.  The first objective of this newsletter was to inform.  My theory was that it would inform much better if it was actually something the students wanted to read, so I set out to make it creative and exciting.  Missionaries use the quote "empty bellies have no ears" to explain how hard it is to share the Gospel with a starving person until you feed them.  No matter how great a youth ministry you build, it is worthless if no one shows up.  So we needed to excite them! I used names of active youth in the articles; I hid inside jokes and contests in the body of the letter; and I tried to give catchy, creative names to everything I could.  For instance, one Sunday a month we would go to a local fast food restaurant instead of just having snacks.  We just said we were going to Burger Doodle, and that name stuck no matter where we went.  We also tried to keep sameness, tameness and lameness (with apologies to Jesse Jackson) out of our ministry.  We hoped the kids were never quite sure what would happen each Sunday afternoon.  I soon discovered it was working.  We were almost hip!  Do you know how hard it is for Quakers to be hip?  Students who rarely showed up for YFYF were talking to me about the newsletter.

The second objective was to get them excited about things that were still to come, things that we wanted them to look forward to.  I began to think of this as the ministry of The Next Big Thing.  Did we have a trip coming up in a few months?  Were we going to see Ghandi or having a Marathon soon?  Did we have a Polaroid Panic planned or a guest speaker coming?  Anything I could think of that we could plug as a way to keep students anticipating was featured in the newsletter.  This, in turn, forced us as leaders to plan in advance.  It all seems so basic now, but at the time youth ministry was just coming of age and this was pretty radical stuff!  And it worked...

Over the years the methods of communication changed.  There would be summer booklets, telephone hotlines (like 847-XLAX in Kissimmee) and websites.  But they all served the same purpose- to keep parents and students up to date, and to hype The Next Big Thing.  I was always looking for ways to inject my sense of humor into these things, and in the early New Garden Friends Meeting years I did it by ending each newsletter with "and remember..."  I looked back through some of those letters, (Yes, I still have them- I know, I am pathetic!) and here are some of the actual things I wrote for those students to remember:

• An apple a day keeps the doctor away...but an onion takes care of everybody!
• It is better to give than to receive...unless,of course, you are Darek Newby!
• He who lives in a glass house...should dress in the bathroom!
• A bird in the hand...BITES!
• March 20-26 is International Youth Leaders Are Great People Week.  It is also International Pickle Week.  So in another YFYF first, we proudly bring you International Buy Your Youth Leader A Pickle Week!  We prefer dills!  And a happy April Fools Day to all of you!
• A day without sunshine is like...NIGHT! (Thanks, Steve Martin)

Those early days were exciting, and I will never forget what it was like to grow up right along side my students.  I owe that group so much.  They taught me so much about communicating with youth.  But I still had lots to learn.  It would be several more years before I figured out that if I made a newsletter the right size to fit on the back of a toilet, even more people would read it!  Until next time...

And remember:  This blog is like toilet paper.  You may not need it every day, but it's always here- and if it's not, you will really miss it!