Goodbye Youth Minister

Last week the youth minister at my church left. He had served our church for 2.5 years, and everyone loved him.

He has gone to another church in another state. We know it’s not because he was unhappy at our church. On the contrary, he could barely believe God was calling him to move when things were going so well in our ministry. But family issues and other things were taking him away from us.

The kids only had two weeks notice. I help with the youth ministry, so I got to see it all happen. It was very difficult for him to share the news of his departure with the students. He read the words he had prepared, and as he did so, he cried. Several of the students cried, too, but as the announcement was being made, I could feel the group as a whole gathering its strength.

It is no fun when someone who has been a big part of your life moves away. The teens at my church have been encouraged to grieve and talk about their feelings. We need to be truthful about our disappointment. But we also need to know that the suffering will not last. We will be okay. We will keep on going, keep having fun, and keep learning about Jesus. God has not left us. And thank goodness our group serves God and not the youth minister. We have plenty of parents and volunteers who love the teens and can teach and plan activities. We will keep doing our thing, and we eagerly anticipate the next person who will come in as our youth minster.

Have you ever lost your youth minister? It’s a hard thing, but it seems to happen to a lot of people. If you’ve experienced it before, or if you’re going through it now, I encourage you to go ahead and let your heart be sad. Don’t bottle it up. Talk about it with your friends at church and with an adult who helps in the youth department. You could even talk to your pastor. And then allow God’s peace to come over you. Remember that the Lord is always near and that He has planned good things for you.

“The LORD is near all who call out to Him, all who call out to Him with integrity. He fulfills the desires of those who fear Him; He hears their cry for help and saves them.” Psalm 145:18-19

The new ec: devotions

I talked with you a little last week about the reasons why we felt ec had to undergo a complete overhaul. And if you've even peeked inside the October issue, you've probably noticed that while a lot of the stuff you love about ec is still there, there's also a bunch of new things. And one of the most striking differences is going to be the devotions.

If you're a long-time ec reader and fan of the devotional aspect of the magazine, the new ec devotions might set you back a little. But in a good way. Over the past few years, the ec team has talked a lot about the best way to do devotions in ec. Taking them out of the magazine was never really on the table, since devotions are an important, vital part of ec and one of the magazine's founding principles 13 years ago. And while completely ditching devos wasn't an option, pretty much everything else was. Meaning the way the devos were written, how many we included for each month, what we wanted devotions to do in your life.

So we started asking ourselves a lot of questions. Was our current devo writing style really the best? What did we want you to take away from ec devotions, both on a daily level and over the long haul? Did our current style meet your needs?

So we dreamed of new ways to write devotions. We talked to each other. A lot. I took several days away from the office and sat in coffee houses and my desk at home, plotting out my ideas and writing sample devotions. We shopped those around to writers and teens at various focus group meetings and refined, reworked, and refocused. The end result is what you see in the October issue.

The first big difference you'll notice is that the devotions are all grouped by weeks rather than dates. Depending on the month, there will be four or five weeks of devotions in each issue. Each week contains 6 devos (one for the weekend and one each for Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, and Friday).

An intro page will open each week and explain the over-arching theme for the week—the theme all of the devotions will be dealing with in some way. You'll start the week with the weekend devotions, which follow the familiar "story" devo style you're used to if you've read ec's devotions for awhile. The M-F devos follow a new format designed to teach you how to dig into Scripture and study it for yourself. The last paragraph of each day is designed to help you understand the one big truth we want you to take home for the week. We've also included a "journal" page at the end of each week, which is designed to help you see what it means to put the truths you've studied into practice this week—how to make God's truth "known" to the world. You'll also find suggestions on how to go deeper in Scripture about those topics and guides to help you read through the Bible in a year.

Our goal with this new style of devotions is to help you learn to read Scripture and really study it. We want you to see that God's Word does have something to say about your life today. We want you to know it, read it, love it. We want you to search Scripture and understand more about the God you serve. The new style of devos is our way of helping you along that journey.

So dig into God's Word. It has the power to change lives.

FRIDAY SNIPPETS AND SOUNDBITES

• A 25-year-old guy from Maine with three children decided to raise some money for his family by auctioning off the back of his neck. He offered his neck as a permanent advertising spot. The highest bidder could tattoo him with an image of the company’s logo. Globat.com, a Web hosting company, put in the winning bid for $5,000. Find a link at this Web site to watch a movie of the guy getting his tattoo.

• Is it hard for you to imagine leaving your pet behind when you go to college one day? Well, if you pick the right school, you don’t have to say goodbye to Lassie. There are at least a dozen colleges that offer pet-friendly dorm rooms. Eckerd College in St. Petersburg, Fla., has more than 40 pets in 3 residence halls. Stephens College in Columbia, Mo., started allowing pets 4 years ago and now has more than 60 rooms in 2 residence halls that are home to cats, dogs, hamsters, rabbits, and guinea pigs. Read more about it here.

• Have you ever seen a wallaby before? To their surprise, some people in Western England have spotted one running wild. It’s not a wild wallaby, though; it escaped from the zoo! The animal, which looks like a small kangaroo, is normally spotted in Australia or New Zealand. Motorists have been warned to watch out for the two-foot-tall bouncy guy. Check out the whole story here. 
  

Times they are a-changing

When we said new, we weren’t joking. When we said redesign, we meant it. Or, as we like to say around the ec offices, this ain’t your daddy’s ec.

And if you’ve gotten a peek at the new, improved ec, you know exactly what I’m talking about. The redesigned ec magazine has probably already found its way to your churches and shown up in your mailboxes. And if you’ve looked at it at all, you’ve probably noticed it’s not quite. . . . the same. And that’s a good thing. (Or at least we think so!)

That said, I’d like to spend some time talking to you about the changes you’re going to see. And I want to do more than just tell you that we made changes. I also want to tell you why.

Understand this: we didn’t go into this redesign and just make changes because we thought it might be fun to switch things up. We made changes because over the past year or so, we’ve been taking a good hard look at ec and evaluating the magazine. Does it say what we want it to? Does it achieve what our readers want it to? Is our way the best way to handle devos, stories, and issues teens are facing.

The truth: the resounding answer to that question was no. After conversations with teens all over the place—about devotions, stories, music, and magazines in general—we came the conclusion that our way probably wasn’t the best way. Our magazine wasn’t the magazine you needed it to be.

So change had to come.

And that’s what you’ll see with the new, improved ec magazine. We’re very aware that we don’t have all the answers, but we also know that we know the One who does. We fully recognize that we’re older than you and your high school experience isn’t the same as ours and we’re not afraid to say that you have it tough. We want to walk through all of this with you—disappointments, college decisions, dating, acne, music, depression, school, and dealing with your families. WE don’t know everything, but we want to walk through it all with you and point you to a God who never leaves you, forgets you, or falls asleep.

We hope you recognize that in the redesigned ec. The changes we’ve made don’t just include paper size and colors, but an attitude and voice. You know more than we give you credit for, and we want you to see what it means to really live for Christ in this crazy world. We want to encourage you, to walk beside you, to tell you what we’ve learned along the way. We want to keep you from the mistakes we’ve made and spur you on to a new level in your relationship with Christ.

So check back over the next week or so. We’ll be detailing the specific changes and talking about the reasoning behind those changes. First up (on Monday): devotions.

A word from the trusty intern, Chansin

With a 20-inch flat screen Macintosh, two desks, and a plastic tree, this office will be mine for the next three months, and I’m very happy to be the intern for ec magazine this semester.

Being a senior in college, this is the fifth internship I’ve had at various companies, but it’s the first time I’ve had my own office. I could barely believe it when they showed it to me. I get my own phone, stapler, and cushioned desk chair that spins. Who could ask for more?

Mandy, Emily, Jen … these are the girls who put ec together each month, and I couldn’t have asked for more fun people to work with. Not only have they been incredibly nice to me, but I can tell they really care about their readers (you!) and about putting together a magazine that will help you know Christ better.

There’s a girl named Ashley who works in the office, too, and she gave me a grand tour of the Lifeway building last week. This place is huge! There’s a whole section just for conferences because stuff is always going on here, and they even have their own cafeteria for all the employees. Ashley showed me their library, too, which contains a copy of just about everything Lifeway has ever published plus more. Ashley told me the history of Lifeway (which started as the “Baptist Sunday School Board” in 1891!) in her sweet Tennessee accent.

I’m a Texas girl myself. I went to high school in Granbury, Texas, and moved to Nashville for college. I’m a senior now at Belmont University and can’t believe my college life is almost over. It feels like it was yesterday when I was doing middle school drama and then playing tennis for the high school team.

That’s one of the reasons I’m excited about working for ec. It was only a few years ago that I was in your shoes! I remember that middle school and high school can be tough … but it can also be so much fun – especially if you have a loving church and personal relationship with Jesus. He’s the only reason I was able to get through it all!

I hope to spend this semester learning what’s involved in publishing a magazine. I also plan on learning more about God … and then passing along some of that through articles and blog entries to you guys. Have a great day, and plan on hearing from me again soon!

--Chansin

Anticipation

I don’t deal well when I have to wait. I’m not a fan of long lines at the grocery store, red lights, or slow computers. I’m working on it, though. I may not be a fan of waiting, but I am a fan of anticipation. You know that feeling that builds in the weeks before a big trip? Or that feeling you get when Christmas is just around the corner and you can’t wait to open your presents, especially if you don’t know what some of them are? I love those feelings! I don’t mind being kept in suspense when I’m excited about the event to come.

Have you read today’s devotion yet? (If not, go ahead and do it. I’ll wait until you come back.) I read it and wondered how many of us wait with anticipation for Christ’s return. Kenny Chesney has a song out now called “Everybody wants to go to heaven, but nobody wants to go now.” I heard it on the radio a few days ago as I was flipping through the stations and stopped to listen to the words. It hit me that a lot of people feel that way. And honestly, I used to too. A few years ago, I secretly hoped that Jesus wouldn’t come back until I was older and had done all the living I wanted to do. Do you feel that way?

But once I started looking around at the world we live in—the war-torn, impoverished, natural-disaster riddled, economically troubled, violent planet we inhabit, I realized that our earth is wearing out. But it’s not just our fault. This earth wasn’t meant to last forever in its present state.

Even earth’s good parts—the beauty of the Rocky Mountains, the near paradise of the tropical isles—are just pointing to how great this planet will be when Christ returns and redeems it. (You know that “all things new” idea in the Bible? [See Rev. 21:5.] That applies here. God will transform all of creation.) And our relationships with others—which can be so difficult to understand, unfulfilling at times, and painful to end—point to just how fallen we are. I crave a perfect place where I can be in perfect relationship forever with one who loves me. Do you know why? That’s what we were created for. And do you know where that exists? Heaven.

So yeah, my life is great here on earth, but I’d be happy to leave it all right now if God called me home. I look around me at all the turmoil in our world, and I actually long for Jesus to come back. I know the earth has good things to offer (and I enjoy them!), but I realize that they are only glimpses of what heaven contains. And heaven is worth anticipating.

What about you?
What about life on earth makes you want to go to heaven?
What makes you want to stay here?
Are you ready for Jesus to come back? What if He came back this afternoon?
What do you need to do to make yourself less attached to the things of this world?

FRIDAY SNIPPETS AND SOUNDBITES

• When you’re in middle school, it seems like all the girls are taller than the boys. I know I was! At least our proportions are not as out-of-the-ordinary as Chinese man He Pingping and Russian woman Svetlana Pankratova. He is the shortest man in the world (2 feet 5.37 inches tall!) and Pankratova has the longest legs of any woman in the world (more than 4 feet long – she’s a total of 6 feet 4 inches tall). Check out the pictures taken of them to advertise the release of the 2009 edition of Guinness World Records. 

• An elderly Muslim man from Nigeria has more wives than years of life. He is 84 and has 86 wives … and 170 children. Men of the Islamic faith are usually restricted to no more than 4 wives, but Mohammed Bello Abubakar has somehow gotten around that so far. He has a reputation for being a healer and says the women come to him. None of them work, and he won’t reveal how he gets the money to feed and clothe everyone. Read more of this disturbing story here.

• Public bathrooms are the worst, but we all need to use them sometimes. One man in Michigan found a particularly disgusting public bathroom – and cleaned it. He then billed the city $156.94 for the work he did. He’s not going to get reimbursed, but city officials did honor his work with the Golden Plunger Award. This story is cited here.
  

Music Minute: Extra-Speedy Deadline Edition

Wow, can you believe September is half over already? I can't - I feel kind of like Rip Van Winkle. We are finishing up a mad, mad rush to get the January issue of ec on press, so I'll have to be quick. But I did want to point out a couple (meaning, just two!) things you ought to check out in Christian music this week.

What's new: New stuff from Bebo Norman, Rush of Fools, Group 1 Crew and Nevertheless.

What we like: Chattanooga boys Nevertheless released In the Making, which is chock full of mellow rock tunes, sparkly piano and soaring vocals. Fans of Coldplay should check it out. We like 'It's True.'



• Group 1 Crew's mix of hip-hop, funk, and soul is so, so catchy, y'all! Check out their new album Ordinary Dreamers - you won't be disappointed. 'Keys to the Kingdom' had me walking around all day singing it!



What we're looking forward to: Making this deadline. :o)

What we don't like: Stinky gym bags, pop quizzes, and those cold, cold metal bleachers at football games.

(PS: If you have an iPod or use iTunes for your music, update to iTunes 8 and be sure to check out the Genius feature. It suggests custom playlists made from your own music (just pick a song), and will reintroduce you to tunes you forgot all about!)

Friday Snippets and Soundbites

• Has your pet ever gone missing? Nine years ago a Ginger cat in England disappeared from its home. Amazingly, “Dixie” was recently found only a half mile from its owners. They thought their cat was hit and killed by a car, but now they are overjoyed to be reunited. Read the full story here.

• The dentist and your mom tell you to brush your teeth every morning and night for good hygiene, but now there’s another reason to keep brushing. Poor dental hygiene increases your risk of heart attack and stroke. Being young and healthy, a heart attack might be the last thing on your mind, but heart disease is the No. 1 killer in the world. Want to know how brushing your teeth makes a difference? Learn about it here.

• A couple of Polish designers built a house in Germany . . . upside down. The regular-sized house will never be home to a family, but visitors are enjoying the strange exhibit, complete with chairs, tables, and carpet stuck to the ceiling. Check out the picture slideshow.

• The Jonas Brothers wear purity rings to represent their commitment to abstinence. This past Sunday the host of the MTV Video Music Awards, Russel Brand, made fun of them for that commitment. Brand suggested the guys shouldn’t keep their virginity for marriage but take advantage of their youth and status and become sexually active. It goes to show that many in our culture don’t understand God’s design for marriage and sex. In response, “American Idol” winner Jordin Sparks, who also wears a purity ring, stood up for them onstage. See the Jonas Brothers' response:

Unfamiliar Territory

Have you ever found yourself in a situation in which you were asked to do something that forced you completely outside of your comfort zone? One time, I was at a karaoke birthday party at a friend’s house when I was pulled out of the crowd, given a microphone, and cajoled into singing a duet with my boyfriend. I do not sing, so this was particularly humiliating for me. But other people couldn’t get enough of hearing themselves on the microphone that night. I just wasn’t one of them.

But that’s kind of the gist of this whole post (and the articles on page 34 and 52 in this month’s issue). We’re all completely different. God made us that way so that we’re not all fighting for the microphone but we’re not all happy to be spectators either. What things do you love to do that your parents/friends don’t seem to understand? What activities do they enjoy that make you completely uncomfortable?

I’d never have thought that my ability to make a way-too-detailed plan would serve me well, but it’s an ability that kind of freaks out my less-organized friends. When a problem comes up, I’ve usually already thought of alternate options because I anticipated the problem. People are surprised that I even had a contingency plan when it comes through in the clutch. I chalk it up to my spiritual gift of Administration, which comes in pretty handy both at work and in planning to lead my sophomore girls small group at church. While this “gift” may frighten some of the more creatively-minded free spirits in the world, if we were all messy or all neat, this world would be pretty mundane, don’t you think?

So I ask you, what are you good at? Do you know your spiritual gifts? Have you started looking for places to serve that make the best use of your unique combination of gifts and abilities? God doesn’t expect just people your parents’ age to take care of the church. But maybe keeping the nursery like your mom, feeding the homeless like your friend, or greeting newcomers like your dad doesn’t interest you. What can you do?

Here are a few suggestions:
Do you like to cook? Offer to bring some homemade snacks to youth group to save your youth minister some money that would normally be spent on food.
Do you like to play sports? Volunteer to play on the church softball/basketball/soccer team.
Are you patient? Ask how you can serve in the nursery or elementary Sunday School classes.
Do you love to act? Ask your pastor about serving (or starting!) a drama ministry in your church.
Do you make good grades because you really understand what you’re learning? Offer to tutor friends or younger students for free.

Get creative! God wants to use you, so don’t waste the gifts and abilities He’s given you.
First Timothy 4:12 says that young people should set the example for others to follow. But don’t think that you have to minister in the exact same way as everyone else. You might be surprised where you’ll meet God when you start to serve Him in unfamiliar territory.

Friday Snippets & Soundbites

• What if the newest game show to hit the air in Japan was "Are You Smarter than an Elephant"? OK, it's not going to happen, but one study reveals that elephants aren't too bad at arithmetic. Considering the pachyderms don't have any fingers or toes to count on, their mad math skills are pretty impressive. Read more about it here.

• One tough kitty's owner unknowingly took it for a ride—underneath the car! The cat, "Bella," managed to hang on to the spare tire beneath his owner's car for the duration of a 70-mile trip in Arizona. Aside from being "hysterical, shaky, and tired" (hey, wouldn't YOU be if you'd had to endure an hour of hanging onto a spare tire at highway speeds to stay alive?), the cat was fine. But his owner had to cancel a business meeting to drive Bella back home. For the full story, click here.

• A waitress got the tip of a lifetime when the couple she was waiting on left her $1000 gratuity. The Illinois resident was able to recommend some gluten-free seafood dishes to the diners, and they decided to show her their gratefulness with the generous tip. The couple's identity remains a mystery, but the waitress does know one thing—where their money is going. She is planning to send her 12-year-old daughter to Washington D.C. on a scholastic field trip next month. Get the whole story here.

• Scientists now say that daydreaming might actually be good for you! Here's an example. Back in 1974, a 3M engineer named Arthur Fry was sitting in church, daydreaming. That Sunday, Fry should have been paying attention to the sermon, but instead he was thinking, 'What I really need is a little bookmark that will stick to the paper but will not tear the paper when I remove it' because the little scraps of paper he used to mark pages in his hymnal had a habit of falling out when he opened the book. His daydreaming led to the invention of the Post-it^® note. We're not saying you should daydream in church, but allowing yourself to get bored and wander a little mentally can spark lots of creativity. Try going a few minutes this week without automatically picking up the TV remote or your Wii™ controller. And read more about daydreaming here.

Music Minute

I don't know about y'all but I'm exhausted. Summer is almost over. We had the Olympics, the Democratic National Convention, Hurricane Gustav, part of the Republican National Convention...and suddenly August is over and everybody is back to school. And I need some new music, so let's check out what's going on this week!

What's new: Remedy Drive's new album Daylight Is Coming came out August 26. New releases are also out from DecembeRadio, Chris Tomlin, GRITS, This Beautiful Republic, underOATH, and Jimmy Needham.



What we like: It's no secret the ec staff are fans of indie rock cool-boys Remedy Drive. Daylight Is Coming somehow manages to be both rockin' and mellow at the same time. There's plenty to like on their latest (including "Daylight," the song Mandy mentioned earlier). Check out "What Happens at the End." Snappy drums and a great hook will give you some motivation to get through the day.



(Note: MySpace pages for the next two bands crashed, so I am linking you to their websites instead. You can still preview their tunes; that's one of my conditions for reviewing a band here.)

You gotta love a band that describes itself as "Rock / Rock / Rock." Florida metal band underOATH is definitely not typical Christian music, but so what? We like it! And if big, loud metal is your thing (I confess to owning a few Metallica albums back in the day), you'll like what these boys offer up on Lost in the Sound of Separation. Check out "Desperate Times, Desperate Measures."



And finally, This Beautiful Republic released Even Heroes Need a Parachute. You'll find lots of power-pop goodness on this album - not to mention a super-cool album cover. If you kind of imagine crossing Jars of Clay with My Chemical Romance, you're getting close to their sound. We like "Fears and Failures."



What we're looking forward to: Rush of Fools delivers Wonder of the World on September 16. And GRITS releases Reiterate September 30.

What we don't like: Stinky gym bags, assigned seats, and why doesn't newspaper ever tear in a straight line? (Actually, I can answer that one. Because of the structure of the paper, the fibers lie in one direction. Tear it that way, and you'll get a reasonably straight line. Tear it the other way, across the fibers. and it will look like your six-year old brother did it.)

For you, Sarah!

We recently got an e-mail from Sarah asking about a video we posted on the blog back in July. Sarah wanted to show her sister, but didn't know where to look for it. (We're working on some ideas to make navigating the blog easier. Please be patient.) That said, the video in question was “Daylight” by the band Remedy Drive.
Here's the link.