by
Chet
27. July 2010 18:53
I'm putting together a little guide for our church youth group tomorrow night. Neither myself nor my other Wednesday night cohort in crime, Dewey, can be there, so one of the college-age guys is going to lead the group. I thought I'd jot down the flow here, since I can easily link directly to the videos and write out the discussion questions as well.
GETTING STARTED
Today we're going to watch a couple video clips from a movie called To Save a Life. This movie is the story of a young man named Jake Taylor. He's the school champion of basketball and beer pong, has a beautiful girlfriend, and everybody loves him. Life couldn't get better, right? An old friend from Jake's childhood comes back into his life, and shortly thereafter, commits suicide. Jake begins to think. "What did i miss? What could I have done different? It's all my fault!" A youth minister meets Jake, and leads him to Jesus. Things don't magically turn nice and neat, however, and Jake begins to really wrestle w...
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by
Chet
1. July 2010 09:04
I have a little thing with hugs. With physical contact period. I long for it, yet am uncomfortable around it.Friday, after a very wearing day, I finally had a few minutes alone before bed. I sat down on the kitchen floor, put my head in my hands, and finally just relaxed and let it all out for a couple minutes. I remember saying something like, "I would just love to be hugged, God. Freely, just given a real hug."Sunday morning after church it started. A pair of boys from the youth group, Ethan literally RAN up to me and have me a huge hug. Right after that, another. Later on, a full fledged hug from Tabi.On monday, two girls came out to ride horses. Again, the hugs came as a pair, Tabi and Stevi. I was starting to get the message. These were direct from God, and just what I needed.Then today, after lunch with a group of friends, 3 more. 2 from kids I may not see again for awhile but are now emblazoned on my heart, Stephen and Amber. And another from Tabi. And I felt finally free of s...
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by
Chet
25. June 2010 17:36
Tonight I am leading a youth activity at my church called Bigger or Better. It's a team-based game where you get into groups of 4-5 people, and head out into the surrounding neighborhoods in an attempt to trade your starting item for something bigger or better. This is one of my favorite games from my own youth days, and those in the group who have done it themselves have great stories to tell of it as well. The basic idea is you take what you have, go to a house, tell them what you're doing, and see if they'll make you a good trade. One guy made this pretty famous with his trades from a red paper clip to a house in 14 trades. I doubt we'll come back with something that big tomorrow... but who knows. If I remember right, the last time we did it, one team came home with a working refrigerator and a drivable car. Not bad for a couple hours work.
Today I am also being made known of some big changes in my life. I've thought this day would come sometime, but it wasn't until today that it...
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by
Chet
16. May 2010 07:04
True Friendship"It is one of the blessings of old friends that you can afford to be stupid with them."- Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803 – 1882)"A friend loves at all times, And a brother is born for adversity." - Solomon - Proverbs 17:17
"One loyal friend is worth ten thousand relatives."- Euripides, Greek playwright
"Never injure a friend, even in jest."- Cicero, Roman Philosopher 106BC – 43BC
"A true friend stabs you in the front."- Oscar Wilde"Walking with a friend in the dark is better than walking alone in the light."- Helen Keller
"Be slow in choosing your friends; slower in changing."-Benjamin Franklin"In the end, we will remember not the words of our enemies, but the silence of our friends."- Martin Luther King Jr."Two are better than one; because they have a good reward for their labour. For if they fall, the one will lift up his fellow: but woe to him that is alone when he falleth; for he hath not another to help him up.”-Solomon – Ecclesiastes 4:9-10&ld...
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by
Chet
10. May 2010 13:26
Here is a copy of a speech that I helped a 16 year old at my church develop. It was both fun and rewarding to help her with this and watch it and her develop over time. But it was even more interesting to see how her life suddenly got crazy busy while she was working on a speech about busyness and how we can be prepared for it and handle it. Not avoid it. Be ready for it. Because there are times, and perhaps even entire seasons, of life, where it’s both unavoidable and important to do what we are doing.
She sent me another quote a week or so after the fact from Abe Lincoln: “Give me six hours to chop down a tree and I will spend the first four sharpening the axe.”
Good job, Tabi. I'm very proud of you.
Am I too busy to serve the Lord?By Tabi Layton
Some years ago a young man looking for work approached a foreman of a logging crew and asked him for a job. “It depends,” replied the foreman. “Let’s see you take this one down.”
...
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by
Chet
4. May 2010 07:28
Does the journey from boyhoood to manhood need to be recognized? Or will it just happen? Do we, as fathers, brothers, mentors, and sons ourselves, need to usher boys into the life of a man?
That's the question that Raising a Modern Day Knight seeks to answer, both in concept and in deed. I'm almost done with the book, actually, but the chapter I read this morning titled "Commemorating a Transcendent Cause" really connected with me. The previous several chapters had outlined several ideas for ceremoneously bringing young men into the world of men. The point wasn't that you have to grab them on their 18th birthday or their college graduation - the point was, they need to be grabbed. Whether it's a lonely walk through the woods that is interupted by significant men in the boy's life, or a steak dinner with a father and his comrades sharing their own journeys, boys need to be welcomed into this world. It will not happen accidently. It will not happen on it's own, unless you really, real...
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by
Chet
13. April 2010 12:26
Erin picked up my substitute teacher's permit from the local school today when she took Colton down there to meet with his speech teacher. I am officially "permitted" now. Woo Hoo. Why is it that I have both butterflies and a sense of nervous anticipation? Oh yeah... I know why.
The superindant's secretary wrote me saying she'd let the elementary and high schools know I was available to sub. I asked her to just send it to the high school. This isn't some extra-income thing for me... If I asked the me I knew 4 years ago if I'd be doing this, I would have laughed MYSELF out of the door, or at least had no idea how God would bring me here. But here is where I am, and I'm living in it, and going to enjoy it. Erin told me she had a few "good lucks" to pass along to me from the office, and I think they think it's kind of funny that I want to do this. Oh well. I do.
I was surfing the net a while ago looking for some stuff on subbing, to see what I ...
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by
Chet
6. January 2010 11:07
Tonight I'm leading the youth group at our church in an hour I'm calling Lessons Learned from a Microwave. This past Sunday, we had a group of them out for the afternoon to perform a variety of "science" experiments using a Microwave to cook different objects. If I remember correctly, we nuked a banana, 4 hot dogs, marshmellows, an orange, a CD, two frozen eggs, a fruit snack, semi-frozen grapes, a cell phone, and a large ball of aluminum foil. While some of these objects behaved "as expected" or did not show much in terms of exciting results, others surprised us. Overall, it was a great afternoon, and in the process no one got hurt, we didn't need the fire extinguisher, and I believe a variety of lessons, or at least life truths, can be taken from the experience. I'm going to share our videos, along with some of those things they've made me think of, with the teens tonight. I'm also curious what they will come up with as applications of the knowledge we have gained. These are the type...
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by
Chet
3. December 2009 12:50
I had the dream of anyone who's ever taught a group of teenagers happen to me last night. One of the girls, a 16 year old (or maybe she's 15, I can't remember now, but I'll guestimate on the high side to give her a moral boost when she reads this) came up to me afterwards to tell me why she and another girl had not been there for youth group that night, because they were helping out with Team Kid, which is some sort of somethingorother where they were teaching younger kids about Holiness, at least on that particular night. So she asks me, "Do you know what that word means? Holy?"
"Well sure, I say... it means 'set apart.'" I don't know if she was expecting a bigger answer or not, but that's my understanding of the basic meaning of the word, and it was right on what they'd apparently been teaching, so we're on the same wavelength. "So," I ask her... "are you holy?"
..Gears start turning... "Well, yeah, I guess so... you know, when I ask forgiveness... but only God's really holy.... ...
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by
Chet
14. October 2009 09:41
Finding Your Place in the Bigger Story
A lesson for youth on freedom and significance
Tonight (10/14/2009) I'm leading our youth group,and want to start talking about "The Bigger Story." This is actually much more than just what could be accomplished in a single night, much less even in an hour a week, once a week, for any period of time, so tonight I just want to start cracking the door open... seeing where they are, what their expectations and hopes are to what the future holds, and how they came to that "conslusion." Are we aiming to be what the world has planned for us, what we feel we can accomplish, or what God has specifically designed us to be? That's not all that hard to answer on a surface level, but down deep, who am I really LIVING as if I'm going to be when I "get big?"
ICE BREAKER - What do you want to be?
Give each person in the group two card to write on. On the first card, have them write their name, and answer the question "What do you want to be when yo...
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