Merge

I have something important to share with you.

This fall I wrote 7 blog posts about how we gather which continued off the blog with a lot of folks who host conferences for church leaders or for students. These have been personally encouraging conversations for me as people begin to explore a framework in which transformation happens for people in communities.

This summer (June 27-July 2)Mark Novelli and Kelly Dolan (Imago Media) and Michael Novelli (Echo the Story) are hosting an experience called MERGE. It maybe the most unique, teen empowering, discipleship experience I've heard of for high school kids.

They are combining both the story of God (specifically a 16 story arc from scripture) and a way of gathering that cultivates transformation of communities.

It isn't a camp where you hand off your kids to strangers, the framework allows for you to bear the responsibility of leadership of your group, but also allows for the teams to own their own faith and the responsibility for it.

The MERGE team plays host and facilitator.

The experience will work because the folks like you will be there and the MERGE are great guides.

Michael, Mark and Kelly are on my short list for people I think are/will truly change the church. They are pioneers of ministry and thinking.

So go check out the MERGE site. Take your kids to MERGE. Then email me and thank me for sending you their direction.

Nipple Cracker (2005)

This is an essay I asked my wife if I a could publicly post few years ago.
It's a very intimate conversation about breastfeeding, but more importantly, about the amazing devotion my wife has to our kids. 2005 was a time in which I started writing about things outside of the church. This is still a work in progress and is more David Sedaris than youth pastor. I've often thought about compiling some of these into a book one day. We'll see. It's purely an exploration of writing for me.
Enjoy.

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Zach wants to give me a "nipple cracker". I know this because the words, "Dad, would you like a nipple cracker?" just came from his 8 year old mouth.

Mental pictures flood my mind. None of them pretty. Images of Ritz and Saltines crackers specially shaped like nipples fly through my mind. Then I think of my wife.

While Pam was nursing our daughter Mikayla, they both got "Thrush". That’s what the Dr. said, “Thrush.” I don’t know where a person gets this ailment or who got it first, but the infection that sounds like an elephant running through a long tunnel of palm leaves has invaded my family.

The symptoms of “Thrush” are, and bear with me here, large cracks across a woman’s nipples.
Imagine a nipple with the equivalent of the Grand Canyon running at a 45 degree angle through a fully erect nipple. Please, don't imagine my wife's nipple, just a generic nipple will do. And though I’ve never personally been to the Grand Canyon, I hear it takes your breath away. Which is what “Thrush” on my wife’s nipple did to me. That and make me exclaim, “Oh my God!” wincing back like a little girl, my hand covering my face.

So when my Zach inquired about my interest in a nipple cracker my first thought was, “uh.. no.”

They tell me “thrush” is a yeast infection. When a woman is breast feeding and the baby develops a yeast infection in her mouth, the mother is infected in the breast, and it has a pretty dramatic effect on the nipple. Both of Pam’s breasts were infected, but the infection had a certain fondness for her right breast.

Of course it doesn't help that my daughter was still learning to nurse and often confused my wife with a chew-toy, thus, helping with the canyon effect. Lift and separate maybe often be a desirable and sexy look for a woman, but not within a nipple.

Imagine a duck facing you, head tilted to the side, its’ bill open wide open.

Yep. That’s pretty much it.

Let me tell you about my wife. She loves her kids. She believes in breastfeeding and the health of her baby. So when she was diagnosed with THRUSH it was only something to work through. Did I mention that THRUSH is painful?

"My nipple feels like it's on fire!" My wife would complain.

"So, it burns around your nipple?" I would ask.

Her face screamed wrong answer.
She calmly spoke words I’ll never forget, words that echo in my male mind as if it were a nipple canyon.

“My nipple feels like it's on FIRE! And when Mikayla nurses it feels like there is glass on the inside of my boob!”

Then Pam looks me at me, chin forward and moves her jaw in a chewing motion.

“She bites you?!” That’s me cringing in the corner, with my ears covered.

Pam is relentless. “And it feels like there is broken glass on the inside!”

“Broken glass? Are you kidding me?” I can’t go there. “Is it like a burning ring of fire?”

She’s steady. “Fire and glass buddy. Broken glass.”

I suddenly feel compelled to do something for her. “Um… Would you like a glass of water?”


Nipple cracker? More like nipple crater.

Pam shows me the Royal Gorge right there again before she attempts to “latch” our daughter on.

The doctor says we have to treat Pam and Mikayla at the same time for this “Thrush”. The treatment involves oral medication for Mikayla and lotion for Pam.

Before I was married the ideas of boobs and lotion took on a completely different meaning for me. If you had told me there would come a time, 11 years into our marriage, when I’d be talking about my wife putting lotion on her breast, I’d have thought something completely different was going on. I assure you it did not include a nipple torn asunder.

Life as parents is an adventure and it’s harder than you think it’s going to be. You view parenting differently from an immaculate vacuum of inexperience as a young person. It’s an innocent and naïve perspective, void of mammory trauma or bloody suckling. I had always known parenting would be hard, but not nipple cracker hard.

Single guys reading the last sentence only see the words, nipple and hard. Their world does not and can not involve cracked nipples. The closest thing they come to this kind of thing is wearing a loosely fitting life-vest at the lake and getting that kind of nipple chaffing after a long day on a wake-board. Dude, trust me, my wife was totally wishing for a little chaffing. Wake-board nipple rash tickles. My wife thinks you are a pansy surfer dude. (Ok. So I made that line up.)

I won’t get into the calluses. Nor will I get into the long healing process necessary for a lotioned up nipple cracked, bleeding and being sucked 8 times a day by an infant we have nick-named “chompers”.

I tried to avoid making eye contact with the nipple for a while. I just couldn’t look. A man can only take so much broken nipple views in his life before a tear takes place in the space-time continuum and the male fascination with mammory glands comes untethered, this connection men have with breasts can not be tampered with. This connection that confuses so many women, this love of the booby.

The doctor told Pam she could stop breast feeding. That the pain would get better and it would keep Mikayla from passing it to her over and over again. But Pam who knows the benefits of breastfeeding said no. Some women would walk over burning coals or broken glass for their kids. Pam actually did, on her breasts, because she continued to breastfeed our daughter.

Now you all know a bit of married life as well. But that’s for another essay.

Zachery is waiting for an answer. “Dad!” He pokes me in the chest as I sit next to him.
“Do you want a nipple cracker?” I snap out of my dazed nipply daydream.

“What’s a nipple cracker son?”

Wild eyes look back at me. “It’s when you grab someone’s nipple, pinch and twist.”

Laughter.

“Oh. I see. Where did you learn about a nipple cracker son?”

“School.”

“No. I don’t want a nipple cracker and Zach I don’t want you to ever give one to your brother!”

“Come on dad! Please?!”

“Go ask your mom if she wants one.”

Scrolls we need to hide (2004)

I wrote this after visiting the dead sea scrolls when they visited Grand Rapids, Michigan. Rereading this I love the idea of writing that will be forgotten then re-remembered. I'm asking myself this today.

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Saw a few of the scrolls on Sunday. Very cool.
Written by the Essenes, the 900 scroll they discovered in a dozen or so caves outside of Ancient Qumran.
Looking at a 2000 year old writing is a bit confusing. Part of you thinks... It's just writings on paper (or animal skin)
Then another part says. A piece of paper in a clay jar in a cave shouldn't last 2000 years. The faintest whisper of a breeze or the slightest repeatative movement would destroy a scroll in a century or two. these lasted 2000 years.
These pre-christian, folks lifestyles make Pharasees look like Frat boys. Cultish activities including fence laws that would convince the most conservative baptist pastor he was destined for Hell. But they are my brothers. Men who cared about scripture and God's desire for their lives. Men who, when Romans had destroyed Jericho 10 miles away, ran to hide their most prized possessions. Their scrolls. They were good hiders. The researchers got to a point where they could identify the handwriting of the various scribes and that they had become "old friends".
You and I stand on tall shoulders... we get caught up in the here and now and throw around terms like ancient-future alot.
Mostly meaning we need to do things like we used to. Icons, and desert father stuff. But we are all about having an IMPACT right now. but maybe.. just maybe.. part of being ancient future is about creating things that will be forgotten. Things that make a difference over time. Being insignificant today... but shoulder for others to stand on. Maybe we are called to hide some scrolls for our brothers 2000 years from now. I wonder what those scrolls look like.

Copy Driven Churches (2004)

What I remember about this post is the snarky title. But re-reading today I'm taken back by my comments on experts. I don't think I really knew what I was saying, but today I really appreciate what I said then. I think I was on to something then. Whatever it was 6 years ago that inspired me to write that has really been developed since then. There's a reason I Peter Block's writing so much. I guess it took me 6 years to prepare for reading books like "Community".

It seems I really think it's cute to mix and match the church names at the time.
I like that I'm an equal opportunity critic.

Today what unnerves me about all of these articles is my willingness to write and speak about such things. To this day I wrestle with the arrogance associated with writing this kind of thing. Yet, I still write and continue to do so. hmmm...

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WillowCreek. Saddleback. It’s all a lot like Islam. Thousands of pastors pray toward South Barrington and Mission Viejo several times a day. And at least once in their lives they must make a pilgrimage to the sacred mecca.

How many Purpose Driven pastors are there out there?

Almost as many “seeker-driven services” I’ll bet. It’s amazing how many people have accepted Rick Warren / Doug Fields / Bill Hybels into their hearts. They may have more disciples than Jesus, at least in America, where leading a church can be broken into 5 easy categories starting with “M” or “C”.

I went to a Saddleback Service 5 years ago. I heard Rick speak. It was good stuff. What I didn’t like was the other 4 times I’ve heard the sermon at various churches around the country. (No kidding.. 4 times) You know what? Saddleback seems to be a great church. It’s the little clones that are annoying. I will say this. Rick, Doug, Bill and the like are brilliant God-fearing guys. They try some fun stuff. God love ‘em! But to every other pastor in the World. You are not these guys. You are you. Don’t short-change your ministry for a formula. Don’t short-change your people by trying to be someone else. Your people need you to show them God. You are uniquely S.H.A.P.E.D. to reach the Community, Crowd, Congregation, (another ring representing a group smaller than congregation), and Core in your local church.

Oh. And to all the hip, cool and post-modern pastors out there who are cheering “yeah!” When inviting people to be “an apprentice of Jesus” in your “church for emerging generations” re-read the above paragraph. Only insert Len Sweet and Brian McLaren in for Bill Hybles and Rick Warren. We are as guilty of talking philosophy of “emerging ministries” without really ministering to people as anyone. (Perhaps more guilty) Some of my favorite churches in the US are churches you have not heard of, or will never hear of. Why? Because they are just doing ministry to post-moderns. Imagine that!? There is a church in Arlington TX and Moore OK that are meeting real needs in real ways. There are no super stars there. The ministries are not flashy, but they are messy. And you know what. They are one of the few churches I can say with all honesty are reaching people who are not believers in large numbers.

Hey! I’m not saying everything has to be original to you. But how about SOMETHING different! I understand that there are new words coming to express the “new paradigms” that arise. I understand needing a common language. But let’s be thinking people as we talk. It’s not bad to use other people’s stuff. (Especially since you pay for it.) But let’s think outside the box! Let’s let God use these leaders to groom us for our ministry to people. That’s what a great mentor does.

Being true to your context is not easy. In fact, it may be the most difficult thing you ever do. Deep thinking and lots of listening. Frankly, our culture is so mobile and pastors so transient that the hard work of a pastor understanding context, almost has to be neglected and replaced by formula’s to function. But is that the way it should be? Perhaps we should look less to experts for understanding our context and more to our community. Perhaps we should look into staying closer to home then moving every 2 years. Perhaps there are other models yet to be explored. Why have we not done this local exploration? No experts have told us how. But you are the expert!

Here’s an idea. (Look out) Almost DAILY I’m having conversations with pastors about how they no longer fit into the average church or the above average church. These people feel as though they are ministers without a place to serve. They are lost.

They are among the first of a growing wave of pastors who will no longer settle for less that total reckless attempts at faithfulness to God and his Bride. Many of these pastors work with youth and have been mentored by guys like Mike Yaconelli, who are challenging pastors not to settle for a comfortable job and a paycheck. They truth is all the advice they are getting is freeing them and simultaneously making them feel lost. They verbalize their hesitancy to plant a church. (At least as the currently understand it). What they don’t know is that they are the beginning of the revolution. (Here comes the idea) To administratively gifted people: Set up a way for people to raise support to minister to city’s experimenting with new ministry ideas and planting dozens of home-style churches in their cities. If I were wanting to work with YoungLife, Campus Life or aborigine’s down under I could raise support easily. Why can’t we be missionaries to Tulsa, Dallas, DC, Seattle, San Diego…etc. ? A loose organizational network needs to rise up to help legitimize micro-ministry as we re-define church. Who will it be? You? A friend?

Or maybe we are destined to be clones.

"Just Not in Charge..." (2004)

From 2002-2004 there was a lot of conversation about "the death of youth ministry". I think the term can originally be attributed to Holly Rankin Zaher, around the same time, but there were several of us who'd been asking questions about the future of youth ministry and how it needed to change.

I gathered a group of people at the convention that I respect. DeVries wasn't at the convention, but he lives in Nashville and happened to be in town and showed up as a favor to me (I think I still owe him!) and a wonderful conversation occurred. I wrote this article shortly after the conversation.

Re-reading this post I'm reminded of a few things: 1.) I asked my friend and former assistant youth pastor (and later YS staff member) Alex Roller what he thought of the article (he was in his early to mid 20's at the time) and he told me he threw the magazine across the room when he was reading it. :-) I love that kind of honest feed back.

Eventually something similar to this found it's way into a chapter of my first book (Inside the Mind of Youth Pastors).

It's also interesting to me that Chap Clark's influence is very evident on some of my material here. the U of Chicago stat is straight from him and his thinking.

So here's the article from 2004. Enjoy.

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"Just Not in Charge..."
by Mark Riddle

Youth Worker Journal July/August 2004
This May at the Emergent Convention in Nashville I led a conversation discussing the current state of youth ministry and its future. I invited Mark DeVries, Holly Rankin Zaher, Jonny Baker, and Tony Jones to give their thoughts. Almost 50 people sat in on the 10 p.m. conversation and contributed their thoughts and ideas. What follows are the main themes discussed in that setting: Twenty-three-year-olds shouldn’t lead youth ministries. Can God use a 23-year-old to minister to students? Yes, and God does. Should this person be in charge? No.

Let me confess that I started getting paid for youth ministry when I was 19. It’s always been a point of pride with me. My first job was within a highly dysfunctional mainline church. 90% of the people attending were born or married into membership, and there were lots of big fish in this little pond. People were gripping for power like Sergio Garcia gripping his driver on the 18th hole at Augusta. There was enough calculation for control and paranoia regarding agendas that John Ford Nash, Jr.’s beautiful mind would’ve fit right in. I worked for a great pastor named Paul. I stayed close to Paul, and he protected me. We spoke every week about every conversation I was having with students. When Diane’s mom called Paul to complain about the fact that I wouldn’t put a Garth Brooks poster on the youth room wall, Paul knew it was coming and he handled it. He had my back. I was young and not yet a man. There’s one unrelenting fact about my first two years of ministry. I wouldn’t have survived had it not been for my pastor Paul. I can’t tell you that I’d even be in ministry today if not for the constant and consistent encouragement, processing, and strength of Paul.

Youth ministry is changing, and I’m not talking about small changes. Examples of small changes are changing the night of the week you meet on; moving from large-group Bible study to small groups; and moving from lecture-style teaching to helping kids create experiences. These are all fine changes I’ve made through the years (and they felt huge at the time), but the changes coming in youth ministry make them all appear truly tiny in comparison.

Almost every week I hear of another youth pastor declaring the need to kill life-stage ministries in our churches. (I don’t have time or space to dive into this, but our systematic separation of teens from the rest of the church is creating enormous problems involving perspective and warped theology in our teens as they grow.) This change is coming. It’s a fact, and its implications for ministry with teens and families are legion. Negotiating the currents of this change is immensely challenging and not for the light-hearted.

Let me just say it: the 23-year-old has the heart to change his or her church (with God’s help), but seldom the skill—which often results in burnout or departure from that particular local church, only to experience the same pathology and frustration at the church down the street. Many youth pastors simply leave ministry all together. The road to modern-day youth ministry has been paved with the lives and souls of young youth pastors who fell on their journey and were trampled under the feet of the church and its lust for forward momentum.

It’s encouraging to see so many youth workers at the large conventions; but what about the thousands of unknown youth workers who were out-maneuvered by parents, church boards, and senior pastors, resulting in their hearts being emotionally and spiritually burned by the system? No one speaks for them; in fact, we don’t remember them. We are silent.

The University of Chicago declared that modern-day adulthood begins at 26, and I have yet to meet anyone over 30 years old who disagrees with that declaration. Yet we expect the 23-year-old late adolescent to lead a congregation in one of the church’s most emotionally charged areas. What chance does a young youth pastor have when he or she is working with a 55-year-old, passive-aggressive Vice President of Marketing at WalCo who has 30 years of experience and training in playing politics? We need more 23-year old people in ministry, just not in charge.

I realize this may not be a popular notion, but let me ask you a question: Does it show we value 23-year-old humans when we put them in leadership of youth ministries, or are we in an indirect way harming their souls and their future ministries?

Let us nurture, value, and protect our younger sisters and brothers in ministry as we give them an appropriate level of responsibility and attribute to them an appropriate understanding of life with God. Let them be well-guided interns or volunteers until they’re adults and found ready within the community. Let us all continue to thank God for these young people and for their faithfulness to the callings they’ve received. We mustn’t mislead them or take them for granted—for their voices and lives are desperately needed within the church. Let them lead-—in their season.

Untitled doc (2004)

In late 2004 it seemed to be a critical time for me. I had a lot going on personally at the church I was working within & was still rethinking some things regarding the church. I wrote the following piece and I don't think I ever posted it anywhere publicly (til now).

Re-reading this is like looking into a window in my life. I was a receiving a lot of criticism for asking questions at the time. Words like emergent, postmodern and such were buzzing and I was able to articulate my small judgmental (what I call narrowmindedness in the doc) and though I never published this (I don't think I did) it's interesting that it's written in such a way as I'm reaching out and connecting with a community out there in the world who'd been with me on the journey from my first rant up to that point.

Time does weird things to writers, or at least to me. There are times when I've looked back at things I've written years before and wondered to myself, did I really write that? A few times this has happened when I've been publicly quoted, but most often it happens when I'm reading something in my files. This is one of those things. It feels like it was written by someone else. To be honest it seems like something Andrew Jones (Tall Skinny Kiwi) would right at the time. So I read it like a detective. Did I write this? Who uses words like "radical empiricism"? William James was driven into me by my philosophy teacher at OBU. that feels like me. etc. You get the idea. It's a tad weird to say this, but I like a few of these lines so much, that I question whether I have the capacity to actually write this kind of thing.

Just a glimpse into my mind today as I read this again. Maybe I'm the only guy who puts words together that has felt this way.


This is something I wrote in 2004. thoughts?

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Confessions leaders and pastors, reimagining Church.
1. We'll confess that we are often cynical, whether it be from a past hurt or a Radical Empiricism.
2. We'll confess that we are often optimistic and hopeful. That it's our great love for God and Jesus as proclaimed in the scripture that propells us toward living the way we do, and believing about what we believe. Often this leads to Idealism.
3. We'll confess that in our desire for faithfulness and enthusiasm for new ways of living out the Kingdom of God, we are often guilty of the very same narrowmindedness that we say we have left.
4. We'll confess that we need humility in these matters. We need to hold great convictions and simultaneously live with, what my friend calls "a posture of I don't know".
5. We'll confess that we will likely do good, badly. That we will live rightly, wrongly.
6. We'll confess that we are optimistic about the mutual admiration of the various faces of the Church. This leads us to diving headlong into discussions on the Bible, the church and philosophy often with frustrating outcomes. Ironically, it is these outcomes that actually reinforce our cynical thinking about the Church, leading us toward narrowmindedness. (see #3)
7. We'll confess that we have nothing to prove, but we often live like we do.
8. We'll confess that it's hard to confess some of these things because we fear others will take them in a manner they are not meant and use them against us. (see #7)

Don't call me youth pastor (2004)

Below is something I wrote in early 2004. Though this comes off as toxic, it wasn't written to be so. It was an honest prayer and confession. One that I still think I can agree with. Maybe not literally, but the sentiment is real and helpful.

As I re-read this I'm taken by my burden for misleading teens, and families. I still feel this to an extent.

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My name Mark Riddle and I'm a Youth Pastor. I've built my life around being a lifer. One of those guys who said he would never be a Senior Pastor and dedicate my life to youth ministry. I excelled in my vocation. Leading groups of 20, 50, 150, 300 teens each week. I'm good at what I do. I've read a lot of books. Books on youth ministry, business and church life. I've been to all the cool conferences several times. You know the ones I'm talking about. The big "national" conferences where all the youth pastors gather and the small regional conferences too! I could give half the worships at these national conferences word for word I've been so many times. I even lead workshops at some. I'm fluent in what all the progressive churches are doing around the world in youth ministry. Ok... around my world..America. Chicago, Mission Viejo, Tipp City, Edina, Louisville, Tulsa, Eden Praire, Irvine, Dallas, Houston, Colombus, San Antonio, or Colorado Springs I knew churches there and what they were doing. Eventually I even gained friendships with some of the people employed by these churches. I use their names in conversations with other Youth Pastor's to help them look up to me. I know their programs and other like em... Purpose Driven (PDYM), Son Life, YoungLife, Youth For Christ, oneighty, Kingdom builders and Ground Zero. I know words like Post Modern. I know the litany of churches and people who profess to be post-modern. I've tried the postmodern youth minstry thing.
I've built programs. Boy have I built programs. Programs for Jr high students and programs for SR high. I've put programs with Purpose's, I've filtered programs through funnels and cones. I've built programs for students at various levels of commitment.. even seekers. I've done small group programs, Hyped-up David Letterman crazy programs written up in youth Group magazine programs, multi-level missions to the world programs , student leadership programs, youth worship services, enourmous outreach programs, concerts, retreats and Bible Studies. I've also built teams to build the more programs.
After over a decade of cramming for the Youth Pastor test in the sky and building youth ministry machines that will be perpetuated long after I'm gone, I have this very sick feeling. Something like Jack Nicholson in "About Schmit" I have discovered I have misspent a large portion of my life. I'm not called to be a lifer. I'm not called to be a Youth Pastor. You may ask how I discovered this fact? You may say that I've impacted the lives of hundred, if not thousands of students over the past 12 years. I would say to you. Yes I have impacted students.. but probably less for the good than the bad. I've taught them (unintentionally mind you) that the enourmous and diverse bride of Christ is a youth group. That life should be fun and that the church should cater to them. I've taught them that they don't need adults.. and any needs they have from adults should be brought to them by adults... I've enabled a generation of young people to leave the greater community of God to find a local church to meet their needs. I've taught them to be selfish spiritually. I've taught them that church is about fun and God. I've enable lazy parents when I've taken the primary spiritual nurture of their kids in my hands. Youth group is not real life. I was paid to minister to students on behalf of a congregation. What lesson am I teaching students about ministry, community and God when I leave for another job? I can't do this anymore. No. I will not do this any more. Teens need adults in their church, not volunteers. They need churches where communities naturally flow from relationships with various generations. Don't call me a youth pastor. I hate that term. I will not be a youth pastor to you or to anyone. I feel the weight and burden of misleading a generation of students. I feel the pain of creating, building and perpetuating a system that teaches a different Gospel. Am I being to hard on myself? I think not! The community is where God meets his people. The whole community. What kind of God does a group of teens isolated in their youth group see? What does he look like? Are you called to do this?
We must reimage what it means to be involved in the lives of students. We must reimage our role!
My name is mark. I used to be a youth pastor and I'm sorry I was. Will you forgive me?