This morning, my oldest daughter, Sari, who is 9 years-old, was digging through our journals. She wasn’t meaning to do anything conniving, but it was a little unsettling when she walked into our bedroom this morning reading an old journal of mine from my college days! I didn’t even know where she got it from! […]
Over a year ago, the high school youth group that I lead was interacting with a developmental spiritual growth template. The stages are: Spiritually Dead Spiritual Infant Spiritual Child Spiritual Young Adult Spiritual Parent I ended up teaching this developmental paradigm at our church on a Sunday morning in a sermon called: Are You Hungry?. […]
About a year ago, USA Today ran an article entitled: Has the sun set on Sunday school? After taking some time to report on the inception and original purpose of Sunday schools, the author cites a couple of reasons why Sunday school is on the decline: 1. Families are too busy. Parents and kids, as […]
King Saul The Israelites had the meanest bunch of enemies they had ever seen: the Philistines. They came from the sea around 1100 BC. The Israelites were scared of the Philistines (fear). All they had to do was trust God (faith) and follow his instructions (Torah), and the LORD would take care of Israel’s enemies. […]
Review A long time ago God created man and woman. We fell, we sinned, we ignored God and went our own way. With the stain of sin on us we had to leave God and live on our own (we all earned death). But, God has a rescue plan (to save us from the punishment […]
I just sent this letter to the parents of our Followers students regarding what happened with the story we interacted with this past Monday. Followers is an after-school program that Hayward Wesleyan Church does every other Monday after school with grades K-5. You can read more about Followers here. Dear parents of Followers students, This […]
Review of Judges: source YouTube Cycle of Apostasy Israelites would abandon God and worship idols. God would send them an oppressor to punish his people. The Israelites would cry out the the LORD for help. God would raise up a Judge to rescue his people. The Judge would drive out the oppressor and rescue God’s […]
Review of Genesis thru Joshua God made people to be close to him (Genesis 1-2). But our bad choices has broken God’s creation and brought death into the world (Genesis 3). God wants to rescue us from sin and death (Genesis 3:15). God picks a group of people to be part of his rescue plan […]
I received this email from a children’s pastor a few weeks ago and I’d been thinking about how to respond. Here is the email: Hi Jeremy, I was reading your post at Kidzmatter on Have You Ever Thought About a Discipleship Plan for Your Family? That is a very good question you ask and it’s true… […]
The longer I work with children and then watch them grow up into teenagers and young adults, I believe this to be true about boys: They need to be able to wrestle with their dads. Everyday. They need to be able to test their strength against their dads strength. They need to learn the rules of […]
source “Almost Christian,” Kenda Creasy Dean, p. 38
Kenda Creasy Dean, in her book, “Almost Christian,” details what most of American religion seems to be centered around: Moralistic Therapeutic Deism. On page 43, Dean uses this quote from C. S. Lewis which seems to indicate that no faith or radical faith are more tenable than moderate faith. Fascinating thoughts on the current religious culture’s slide […]
source “Almost Christian,” Kenda Creasy Dean, p. 33
From my journal dated: June 1, 2014 Last Wednesday night, after small group, Alex Pena wanted to talk with me. He asked what I was thinking about Youth group next year… so I told him some of my current thoughts on how we’re thinking about restructuring how we’re running things. He seemed to be genuinely […]
From my journal dated: May 20, 2014 This morning was rushed. The girls slept till 7:50a. School starts at 8a. Sari woke up frustrated that she’d be late to school, but also didn’t want to rush (kinda of a catch 22 when you wake up late!). I gave Sari a choice to be 30 minutes […]
I just deleted the Facebook app off of my phone. I’m just disgusted with it. Now, I’m not a Facebook hater in the least. I have had an account on the popular social media site since 2008 and I will continue to use it. It is an extremely useful and wide-reaching tool. I use it […]
A reflection from my journal dated: May 20, 2014 We are chronically late to school. I could share a number of reasons why, but it still doesn’t excuse our constant tardiness. As I reflect, one of the most challenging things is being a long-tenured pastor to students (ages 0-18) in a small town. The plethora […]
source “Almost Christian,” Kenda Creasy Dean, p. 1
This year (2015-2016) in Followers, we are storying our way through the book of 1 Samuel. It’s a little experimental (you can read about that here). 1 Samuel 3:1 – 4:1 “The boy Samuel ministered before the LORD at Shiloh under Eli. In those days the word of the LORD was rare…” The LORD calls to Samuel […]
This year (2015-2016) in Followers, we are storying our way through the book of 1 Samuel. It’s a little experimental (you can read about that here). 1 Samuel 1:21 – 2:36 Hannah weans Samuel and presents him to the LORD at Shiloh. Samuel continues to grow in the LORD in the house of Eli (priest at […]