This week was youth camp. There were some unbelievable obstacles. The camp facilities we used were not exclusive nor Christian. In fact I learned that it has been used for many thing in the past. Back in the 50s it was a Jewish camp. Of course I have no issues with this, but it began changing hands and was used as a Wiccan camp, nudist camp, and general drunken idiot party camp over the years.

Beyond the deep spiritual issues there were many other problems, likely due to the spiritual issues. The camp had gone into disrepair in the past few years and had just been started back up. The cabins and camp kitchen didn’t have water hooked up in April, but we were promised ti would all be ready. We checked back several times and made changes per their promises of “these cabins won’t be ready but these will.”

The week before we found out the kitchen would not be accessible and we would have to make adjustments based on what was available. When we got there, none of the cabins had water. They had a single working shower we could access and porta-potties around the camp. We were promised the showers would be hooked up in the cabins the next day. By noon nothing had happened and we asked the camp manager. He contacted the owner and there was a show down with maintenance, who had not been notified of any of this and the manager, who was good at making promises without following through. The maintenance guys exploded with a fit of yelling cussing, and punching the manager in the face. Sadly, the only students that saw it were mine. Not sad that the other students missed it, but rather that mine had to see it.

They kicked that guy out and brought in a team that rigged up some more showers for us but the incident really put the leadership on edge. We had a meeting to try and decide if we should cancel the camp for the safety of our students. We generally felt that we would be watchful but continue. I had learned about the spiritual background of the camp the previous night so I pushed to increase prayer, specifically spiritual warfare. I stayed at the campfire with one of the other directors that night until very late praying. Tuesday morning we started involving our junior leaders in the prayer and didn’t have any more problems like that.

Some highlights from camp included nearly 70 students from 3 churches, 4 salvations, a dozen or so re-dedications, and a new student leader for my group.

We had a lot of fun, minimal injuries, and most importantly some incredible experiences with God. I don’t know exactly how to describe my position in the camp. I planned the minute to win it games each evening before chapel and I worked closely with our junior leaders, providing spiritual guidance and support. I was a cabin counselor, but our plan was to put the major duties of the counselors in the hands of the junior leaders. They lead the quiet time each day and were largely responsible for their teams throughout the week. The adult leaders organized and backed them up.

The most difficult thing for me was stepping back and letting them do the real “in the trenches” ministry. There would be a powerful altar time and I want to go handle the prayer with the students, but instead I trusted what I, and the other leaders, were hearing from God and stepped back to pray for the student leaders as they prayed with other students.

2 of the 4 students who were saved prayed with student leaders. Almost all of the re-dedications were with the student leaders. The most powerful times were when a group of leaders would be praying with a group of students and I didn’t interfere.

At the end of the week I was amazed to have one of my students asking about being a leader. She has been a Christian for about 6 months and I’ve seen her potential for about 4 months now. I don’t ask students to step into this position but I do watch for them to demonstrate certain attitudes and start encouraging them in those attitudes until they ask to step up. I really wanted this young lady to become part of the leadership team, but I thought it would be a couple more months before she would step up. Honestly I couldn’t be happier though.

I have so much more I want to say about camp, but right now I just need to recover. I had to get this initial recap out there though.

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So I’m a Christian, now what?

That is what our series has been for the past several weeks. We have talked about baptism, communion, worship, prayer, reading the Bible, the Holy Spirit, and witnessing. Last week was about witnessing and the students were fired up and excited. I’m serious. They were shouting and wanting to get out and do it.

This week I brought them into the main service and quickly went through the past several weeks for everyone so the “adults” would be caught up. Then I asked the students to get into small groups with the adults. Roughly 2 students and 2 adults. Then I had the students and adults share what God has been doing for them. I challenged them to share something that they were really excited about and work towards sharing their story (testimony). I also had the adults share with the students.

Many of the students were really nervous about it, but after they were all very positive. I haven’t received much feedback from the adults, but at least half the students told me tonight they want to do this every month. They talked about how much it helped to share with the adults and for the adults to actually listen and interact. They also told me they loved hearing the adults share with them.

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I’m finishing up a series with my students, “I’m a Christian, now what?” Basically I’m talking to them about what we can be doing as Christians and what the first steps are.

I’m sharing with them some stories of Biblical heroes that did amazing things, and how we can start doing those things, but then sharing with theme some very real, practical first steps. We have talked about baptism, worship, prayer, and reading the Word over the past few weeks. Tonight we talked about the power of the Holy Spirit in our lives.

I talked about how before Jesus, God’s Spirit was with a very limited group of people, but after Jesus went to heaven He sent the Spirit to all God’s people. I illustrated some of the people in the Old Testament, and then I talked about Peter, who was full of fear and doubt and … well himself. Then the change that came over him when the Spirit came upon him in power.

Then I talked about out own lives and how we can live this life of power too. I also talked about how it can be so much more. Paul talks in 1 Corinthians 13 about the greater gifts of the Spirit. “These three remain, Faith, Hope, and Love, but the greatest of these is Love.” This doesn’t mean that God’s Spirit doesn’t empower us to do miracles, but it does mean that the greatest miracle that the Spirit gives us the power to do is the ability to love our enemies, the ones who hurt us and keep on hurting us.

Then we had a time at the altar that was beyond amazing. I honestly don’t have words to describe what God did.

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I am not dead, I tweet occasionally, but finding time to write more than 140 characters lately has been a stretch.

It’s been about two weeks since ATF and I still haven’t done a follow-up post, so I guess that is what this will be about. Just to summarize, ATF was great. Now driving in Baltimore was evil, but worth it.

Speaking of “worth it.” They must have a bug on my computer that lets them in on my sermon notes. Over the course of the weekend they pretty much summarized everything I said for the last several months. The first night has a powerful drama that illustrated this idea. I wanted to embed one of the videos used during this drama, but I can’t work out how, so you’ll just have to click over to watch it.

Worth it

I know this really touched my students’ lives.

The theme was love, and they talked about how God pursues us, and courts us, and desires for us to be fully and completely His. It challenged my teens, but it also challenged me.

The only dark cloud was my wife got injured. I’ve done several trips and events and the first hospital visit was for my wife. It was a kind of freaking thing, the bathroom stall door came off the hinge and hit her in the head just before lunch on Saturday. She got a concussion from it, but is otherwise ok.

All things considered it was a wonderful weekend and I’m really excited about what God is continuing to do.

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I am a broken person. It might look like I have it together on the outside, but on the inside I’m totally broken.

The thing is, I have a lot of people looking to me for the answers. It is tempting to try and put on a facade, to make it seem like I’m great. It would be nice if I had the answers, it would be nice if I could keep the juggling act going so that everyone would think I had the answers.

I don’t have it all together. I don’t have the answers. I don’t even know all the questions. I can’t keep juggling things because eventually everything comes crashing down.

Do you want to know the crazy part? Broken people don’t want perfect people to help them. The want real people and the only perfect people are far from real.

I’ve been crazy busy so I haven’t had time to share everything that is going on. I am going to be sharing a lot about some things. I have been hearing the hearts of several of my students lately and they are hurting, but God is really working in their lives too. I want to get permission to share some of their stories. Not the whole thing, and certainly not enough to identify them, but enough to show the pain and also the glory of God’s grace.

I am amazed at the power of His love to really change hearts. He is good and His love is overwhelming.

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I am a person that internalizes everything. I’m always thinking, analyzing things. I pick up on a lot of things and build huge stories around them. Often this serves me well, but it also makes my full of doubt. I am constantly aware of others. I am picking up on their moods and how they look at me, talk around me, and act around me. I think these things through for a long time after the fact. Days later I am likely to be thinking through conversations and trying to figure out if what I said could have been done better or if I misunderstood things.

This often leads to a lot of self deprecation on my part. I beat myself up over everything. I feel like way too much is my fault.

I know I’m not the only person that feels this way. That is why we are going through a series on happiness, and more importantly depression. Tonight we talked about appearances and how we can begin to obsess over our appearance. How the words of others become a part of us, and how the patterns of this world beat us down.

We also talked about how God desires to transform s by renewing our mind. He wants to break that pattern and make something new within us. He wants us to know that we are valuable. Not because of how we look, what we have, who we know, or any other thing that we do. We are valuable because He has said we are.

The Creator over everything, King of Kings, Lord of Lords, God of all eternity has said you are valuable. He has said that nothing in all the created universe can separate you from His love. He has paid the infinite price for you.

Today know that you are valuable and share with someone that they are valuable.

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Last week I wrote about the prevalence of depression in the students I work with and know of and how I want to try something different to help them. I am asking advice as I go forward because I know that the answers are bigger than I can imagine. I received this email and have obtained permission to publish it hear anonymously. I have stripped a couple of pieces out to keep anonymity, and I think later this week I will share some personal experiences I have with depression. This is the story of a real person, and I believe something that should guide me and others like me who seek to make a difference.

First, I would like to say that I think an attempt at facilitating awareness of depression and its many causes is a wonderful idea and despite what I may say to the contrary I think any step you take is a step in the right direction.

A little background on me, I am born and raised in Oklahoma to Christian parents who are still married after nearly 34 years. I married at the age of 20 and have since had 2 daughters. While my parents were raised in Christian households and met through church, my parents stopped taking me and my only sibling to church before I started grade school. I have, what I readily admit, is an unfair bias against youth ministry based on my own experiences. Perhaps you can profile me? I was the girl who was sort of friends with someone already relatively vocal and established in his/her youth group that would be a good “fit”. I was a straight A student who never got into any trouble but since we weren’t members of a local church many in the youth ministry assumed I did not know the story of Jesus Christ. I say good “fit” because I married someone who, while raised Catholic and went to Mass every Sunday, was actually DISCOURAGED from coming to a mutual friend’s youth group while I was encouraged. I would say this is because he was wearing a Marilyn Manson t-shirt or some such, but I do not actually know what they were thinking or why they chose me instead of him. I am telling you this so you can see where I come from when I get to my actual story I can honestly say (of course this is as an adult) that if I even suspected those youth ministers cared about their charges the way you do, I might have an unnatural bias FOR youth ministers.

I do not know when and where my depression started. After counseling and drug therapy, I do know it was not any specific event. This is important to establish, because for some people it is a specific event or series of events in their home life that causes periods of depression and suicidal tendencies. I think your ministry in facilitating an open dialogue with these adolescents about how they feel and how to manage is wonderful. If they are willing to talk and identify as depressed then they absolutely need an outreach. Wanting to talk is probably the first step. I want to emphasize that I was not this teenager. I never told ANYONE about my feelings or what I was thinking until I began dating my now husband. My parents are very supportive people, but mental illness is something every family tries to pretend doesn’t affect them. (obviously my opinion) I routinely attempted to divert the pain by causing other pain to myself. I never cut the skin very deep and sometimes not at all. When I would be driving I would try to think of ways to cause an accident without hurting anyone else. Some days, I even wanted to die. Even after I met my husband and told him everything, there were days when I wished I would die because this unknowable pain, this pain that was in my head that made no sense whatsoever, was so taxing and so burdensome I just wanted it to end even though he made me happy and I had a completely “happy” life. This is where the faith many assumed I didn’t have would always come in. I felt the conviction of the Holy Spirit and knew this wasn’t supposed to be how my life ended, unfortunately it was not until I was 20 that I sought the tools needed to harness this pain. My husband and I married in August of 2002. My life spiraled out of control. I would rage and cry and scream and have no idea why. I wouldn’t get out of bed at all some days. I hated college and had no idea what I was doing there but feared my parents reaction if I dropped out. I stopped going to classes completely even though I was passing all of them with flying colors. I gained even more weight than I had put on after high school and became even more depressed. One day, I don’t know which day, I told my husband, I give up I don’t know what to do. I was having panic attacks regularly and could no longer leave the house. One day when we were visiting my family I had yet another panic attack. They called the doctor who is a friend of my dad’s and he said for me to come in right away. I saw his PA at the time who was the first person who offered me hope. I told her I felt worthless, horrible and always felt there was a huge weight on my heart and my head and it was killing me. They gave me antidepressants and strongly recommended I seek counseling. I cannot tell my story without stressing this to the nth degree. ANYONE SUFFERING FROM A MENTAL ILLNESS MUST SEEK PROFESSIONAL COUNSELING! I went to a local christian counseling center with all the foreboding and bias you would assume someone in my position would. This person was literally the God send I was looking for and I hurt for people who do not find counselors like this, because I know they can be a dime a dozen sometimes. Although he was not a Psychologist he possessed a Masters in Divinity and was completely open and honest about what that meant and assured me he was not there to tell me “God will fix it honey, you just need more faith.” He gave me tools to combat the painful feelings and helped me realize that I have a bit of a perfection complex (not uncommon in people with clinical depression as I am sure you know). We had many sessions and he still to this day encourages me to take antidepressants which I admittedly do not do at this point. I discovered that while in my teens I suffered from depression, mine was made worse by the birth control methods I employed after getting married. I also, of course, suffered from horrible pregnancy depression and postpartum depression after the birth of my first daughter. Depression obviously is an ongoing crash course of suffering even for those like me. There are many days even now where I think, my kids and husband don’t need this, they don’t need me. Of course the most crippling thing of all as an adult with depression who has children is that my kids will one day feel this excruciating pain as well. I told my husband that I would not describe my depression as darkness like many do. To me it is a never ending maze with the sun shining brightly on you,(suggesting there is happiness all over) but when you take a wrong turn you get lost and listless and you don’t know how to go back and there is no end, because you do not know what you are searching for to be the end anyway and sometimes you don’t even know you made the wrong turn until you have made so many you don’t know where you are anymore. Of course life is not a maze, no one is boxed in like this, everyone has light and dark. I don’t have a happy ending, depression is something I will always struggle with, but I find I am happy to tell my story and tell anyone that thinks like I do, you are not alone, you are not worthless and you are loved by the only ‘person’ that matters, of course it helps to have someone you can see and touch love you back So I am writing this to you to say Thank You for telling me my feelings matter and I know that I am preaching to the choir here, but make sure this message gets sent even to the kids who don’t want to hear it. If you had told 17 year old me “hey, you matter, you mean something” I wouldn’t have heard a word of it. Encourage kids who are suffering from life induced so to speak depression to talk if this opens them up and helps the healing process,but my honest advice is tell every child that comes to your ministry that there is something they can do, and they matter, not just to God but to you. Even as an adult it is difficult to grasp God’s love when you are suffering, it helps to have someone say it to your face. Helplessness and worthlessness were a big part of my depression, that horrible pain seems to feed exclusively on those feelings. I think Helen had a great idea about making them matter by encouraging them to do things even little things, but not something to embarrass them or call them out in front of everyone, I was never seeking attention just worthiness. Remember that girl/guy you see at youth group who never has a lot to say, never gets too close, might need this message more than those who seek it. I would have been too intimidated to come forward. Just look at how I approached you about addressing this delicate subject? I have no idea if this is helpful at all or if my story is everyone’s story in your line of work, I just felt like it would be unfair to have you as you often do ask us complete strangers for guidance, insight or wisdom to not say anything when I personally have been so rocked by my depression diagnosis. I certainly am not an authority at any of this, and I lack a big indicator of severe clinical depression; suicidal tendencies. I have never actively tried to take my own life. I know family members and classmates who have done so, but none that I was close enough to to know their suffering, but I do think it’s important to know the many faces of clinical depression.

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We are continuing the series on “Am I Happy?” in youth and I was talking with one of my students after. She was telling me how in the schools they have groups for quitting smoking (which I’ve facilitated), drugs, alcohol, bullying and plenty of other things like that. What they don’t have is a group for students who are suffering from depression.

I know the schools offer services for this but I also know the counselors are overwhelmed and unable to help most of the students that need someone. As I was talking with this young lady I began to see the need for something that doesn’t exist in our community. I don’t know exactly how to make this happen but we will be having some kind of class or group or whatever in the next couple of weeks for depressed teens. I don’t want this to be some kind of group therapy though. We will need some sort of curriculum to teach them how to deal with stress, frustration, anger, and everything else that is related to depression.

I am just now starting to research this but I want to make it happen soon. Anyone have any ideas?

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I know it’s an old joke, but we had our first real fight at church tonight. It has come close more than once. A couple of weeks ago I had to break something up before it happened. Tonight I was brought in after the damage was done. One of my adult leaders was outside when it happened and got it broken up pretty quickly but it really ticked me off. I stayed calm with the boys, but I feel like it was the steely calm that I am prone to get which people who know me will identify as extreme anger.

I talked with both mothers and with the students involved and those that were around. I think it will be fine but the boys aren’t allowed back for two weeks. I hate doing that though because they both need what we were talking about.

We started a series called “Am I Happy?” It’s from Blueflshtv and is about where we go for happiness and such. There was a 15 minute clip that showed real people talking about how they dealt with the pursuit of happiness and what it did to their lives. This was interspersed with Sean McDowell talking about what was said and what God has to say on happiness.

I’m really excited about the series as a whole. We will conclude the series with a one out on cutting.

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I am not a huge fan of Gospel tracts. I don’t feel that they really work most of the time, but I don’t think that is exactly the fault of the concept.

I am talking through witnessing with my Young Adult’s class. I am giving them a series of challenges each week and then we are talking about how those challenges went. What was effective, what wasn’t, and why? I am more interested is teaching a lifestyle of living the Gospel. A life of prayer for the lost and action on that prayer.

This week the challenge revolves around Gospel tracts. Everyone was given 3 sets of two different tracts. They were challenged to leave one set in two different locations or complete a hand off to a total stranger with the tract in some way with no follow through. I feel that most people handle tracts like that. Every tract I’ve ever been given has been someone I’ve never met handing my some folded bit of paper as they walk away. This is exactly why I don’t like tracts.

They were also challenged to go through the remaining tracts with people. One set with two people they have a pretty good relationship with. Possibly family, friend, coworker … the kind of person you might talk to on a regular basis. The other set with two people that they don’t really know well. Could be a stranger or could be someone they have a very superficial relationship with.

I think in the right circumstance a tract can be used as a tool for witnessing. I don’t think it is the all to end all of witnessing but I am very interested the conversations on how this went for everyone.

Have you been given a tract? How did that go? Have you handed out tracts? What was your method. Have you ever been involved in a situation where a tract helped lead someone to Christ?

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