Meet me In St. Louis?

I'll be in St. Louis this weekend. I'll have some times to get together if anyone wants to connect.

email me: mark@theRiddleGroup.com

and let's see if we can set something up.

Random Riddle Update:

There is officially Halloween Candy in my house. Pop Rocks, Nerds, twix, and a rainbow of flavor.... Must resist.....

writing, writing and more writing

I'm keeping my head down and writing.
Light posting is possible for the next day or so.

Things I need to finish today

The updated slides for my seminar in St. Louis.
A meeting.
A milestone for both my books... for Zondervan - (that would be a total of two things)
Finish the update of The Riddle Group webpage (the Youth Ministry Consulting Firm I own)
polish a section of my pastor book for the Milestone listed above for Zondervan
download the new iTunes song I got for getting coffee at Starbucks on Wednesday.

and I need to finish a burrito from Chipotle... it opens today.

Also it's my day to drop off and pick of the kids. So my working hours today are 9:45am to 2:15pm.

I'm off! Have a great day.

UPDATE:
Meet with Matt and Joe in Owasso. First time with these guys. Great folks. It would be fun to work with them and the church they are from.

I picked up Chipotle today and brought my wife lunch. It was sooo good. I had the Barbaco. mmm. Saw my friend, the Great Wade Hodges there. He was 100 people in front of me in line.

Dropped kids off.

Worked on my AMSI (Zondervan thingy for the Youth Pastor Survival Guide.. but didn't finish!! ahhh!

I'm off again!

Out of Print

My friend John Frye has written another book. This time it's fiction.

The book is titled, "Out of Print"
Here's what's it's about (from the website)

“A world with no Bible.”

Luci Dykstra sat on the edge of the bed fearfully pondering these words from the television news report. . . Professor Harold Johnson and his class of students watched the Greek words from John’s Gospel disappear from the chalk board. . . . The Vatican’s Council on Biblical Studies scrambled to create a message for the Pope to deliver to a frightened world: Why is the Word of God vanishing?

Out of Print: A Novel ignites the imagination as a mystery in which the Bible as we know it is no longer available. Fearful people, confused scholars, surprised reporters and a watching world struggle to make sense of the cataclysmic event.

• Where is God when the Bible goes “out of print”?
• What if the global church had no Bible?
• What if Jews, Catholics, Orthodox and Protestants united to keep “the Story of God” alive on the planet?

In this provocative story the wonder and purpose of the Bible captures our hearts."

I'm looking forward to getting a copy of this book and reading it. John is a gifted story teller and a great scholar. In a world that often worships the Bible more than God, it's an intriguing concept for a book.
He even got Scot McKnight to write the Afterword even though Scot doesn't read fiction.

Go here to the site.

Go here to buy it. You can only buy it on this site.

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Still Writing

It feels like I've been writing these books for a while. It's been a few months. Last month was a pretty intense burst of writing for me. I'm getting closer. I'm starting to get excited about the book for Senior Pastors on youth ministry. The more I write the more I feel it might have potential to make a difference in local church ministry. I have several hopes for this book, but mainly I'm hoping that the relationship between Senior Pastor and Youth Pastor will be strengthened and that the environment of the local church will be a better off.

Right now, this is only hope. We'll see what happens.

Until then, I'll go and write some more.

I want to try this.

I want to try this....

or maybe not... those guys are crazy...
but it is soooo cool.

Watch the video.

Link

Back from San Diego

San Diego was a great experience.

Friday's Seminar with Marko was good, not great, but good. We got solid feedback and the evaluations were pretty high, so maybe I'm being hard on myself. I'm pleased with most of our content, but not in how we treat it. IT will be better in St. Louis next week. I'm excited to present an improved version.

I got to hang out with some great people throughout the weekend, which is always a highlight for me. It's good for me to be with other great leaders because it sharpens me.

I'm especially thankful for several relationships with folks who lead various ministries and are able to help me think beyond my typical thinking. As I've said before on this blog, I have something inside me that is very uncomfortable about self-promotion. Or better said, promoting the Riddle Group feels like self promotion. I don't know why this is, but it's something to spend some time praying about. I love what I do and would be happy to work for free and often do. But I've realized this motivation actually hurts my family. Obviously right? I'm not getting rich doing consulting, but I'm driven to expand the kingdom and support pastors minister is healthy, sustainable ways.

Regardless, people keep saying the same thing to me. "What you have to offer has real value and people have got to find out about it."

Anyway, while I was in San Diego I was able to see some friends from the "Something" group/house church who have relocated to SD from Michigan. John Raymond joined us and we ate dinner at Miguel's (amazing mexican food) on Cornado Island.

Then John and I walked down to the ocean. I put my feet in and called Pam while I was standing in the water.

It felt great.

I had forgotten the power and roar of the ocean.

humbling. amazing. awe inspiring.

I could live near the ocean. no doubt.

My flight left yesterday as San Diego was ablaze.
I'm praying for all my friends who live there.

Middle School handing out Birth Control

Wow.

"PORTLAND, Maine - Pupils at a city middle school will be able to get birth control pills and patches at their student health center after the local school board approved the proposal Wednesday evening.

The plan, offered by city health officials, makes King Middle School the first middle school in Maine to make a full range of contraception available to students in grades 6 through 8, according to the state Department of Health and Human Services."

Link

The Loss of a Friend

Terry put it best on his blog. I don't have words for this right now, so until then, I'll let Terry's speak for me.

Rest eternal grant them, O Lord

"In the midst of life we are in death;
from whom can we seek help?"

We hear these words in the Burial Office, reminding us of our dependence on God's mercy and need for His strength in the midst of our busy lives. Today we wake to the tragic news of the loss of my friend, and local Vicar of Holy Cross, Fr. Bill Wiseman.
He was taking a friend, to visit her parents in Houston, along with her three children for fall break at school. A typical, ordinary thing to do, yet in the midst of that death.

This is a deeply sad time, please remember the Wiseman family, and the Lunn family in your prayers, and pray for the repose of the souls of:

Dr. Rhonda Lunn, 51.
Kathryn Lunn, 16.
Michael Lunn, 14.
Adrienne Lunn, 14.

The Rev. Bill Wiseman Jr., 63.

O God of grace and glory, we remember before You this day the Lunns and Bill Wiseman. We thank you for giving them to us, their family and friends, to know and to love as a companion on our earthly pilgrimage. In Your boundless compassion, console us who mourn. Give us faith to see in death the gate of eternal life, so that in quiet confidence we may continue our course on earth, until, by Your call, we are reunited with those who have gone before; through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.

Amazing

Intro to Ikon - Not your typical church's welcome

Ladies and Gentlemen, thank you for joining us this evening at our intimate, humble gathering. Take a seat, make yourselves comfortable and prepare yourselves. Tonight we would like to share a secret with you, a sacred secret that must be kept strictly between us.To be honest it is a secret which cannot be told, for it cannot be understood or even experienced, but only birthed within us and lived through us. Nonetheless this evening is a futile but necessary attempt to place this sacred secret into some kind of language, for language is the only messenger we know, fallen angel though it may be.

My first encounter with this secret occurred a number of years ago while I was walking home, late one evening. As I weaved my way through the half-dead trees that inhabited a piece of wasteland connecting my origin to my destination I heard an inner voice calling my name. I stood still and listened intently to what I took to be nothing less than the solemn, silent voice of God. As I stood there, rooted to the ground, God spoke to me, repeating four simple words, “I do not exist”

“I do not exist”? What could this possibly mean?

One thing for sure was that this was not a simple atheism, for it was God who was claiming God’s non-existence. In that wasteland I was confronted with something different, I was confronted with the erasure of God by none other than God. I was confronted with the idea that, while God may not be something, that did not imply that God was nothing.

Up until then I had considered God to be just one more thing in the world, albeit the greatest. But after this event I wondered whether this was an inappropriate way of approaching God. Perhaps God ought not to be thought of as an object in the world but rather as that which transforms my interaction with all objects in the world.

What if I was being taught that every time I affirm God I simultaneously affirm something less than God? What if this God I affirm is always a delusion formed from the materials of my imagination and desires? What if one of the steps toward God rests upon a rejection of God? And thus what if God ought to be thought of, not as that which I affirm but rather as the event which causes me to make the affirmation in the first place?

And so I began to wonder if it was possible to think of God otherwise than being and nothing… to think of God as speaking, as happening, as an event, as life but not as an object. To approach the God beyond, behind and before God.

If this is the case then God ought not to be thought of as the patch of Meaning which covers over the wound of our unknowing… God is the wound itself, the wound which inspires the industries that make the patch. If this is the case then God is not to be located in the fabric of our beliefs but rather as the holes within the fabric. We must cloth ourselves in our creeds for they shelter us but these creedal garments, if we are to truly honour them, must eternally be allowed to unravel and be reformed, for they testify to God, not by the reification of their words, but by their kinetic, fluid life.

If this is the case then fidelity to our Creeds and our God will involve betraying them.

We have often thought that the cross we carry is one upon which we must be crucified, that this is the highest call of Christianity… but what if we are asked to go further. What if the cross we carry, like that carried by Simon of Cyrene, is not for ourselves but rather for that which we love more than ourselves. What if the highest call of Christianity involves crucifying our God precisely for the sake of our God?

All that is left for me to do is hand over to the management and say… Welcome to ikon

(Written and preformed by Peter Rollins)

Unfolding Oragami

I am trying to learn origami by going backwards. I have stolen a paper crane from the shoebox of junk in the corner and am unfolding it slowly, stopping with each reversing stage to commit the shape and passing landmarks to memory. I quickly discover that it doesn't work. When I reach the beginning of all this unravelling I am forced to accept that, despite its map of lines and creases, what lies before me on the table is just a piece of paper and I am powerless to turn it back into a bird.

(Written and performed by Kellie Turtle)

Link

Not so Usual Church with amazing poetry

I don't read a lot of poetry. none really. i don't know what's wrong with me.
but i found some that i connect with on the Icon ( a church in belfast) website.

I'll post some soon. maybe the other people who don't like poetry will like it.

Writing a lot

I spent a lot of September writing the books. I got a lot done. The youth pastor book is 85% done conservatively, and the senior pastor book is 45% done. I want to have them both completed by november 1. I'm not sure that's going to happen. But I'm shooting for it.

Just a quick reminder that in January 2009 you can pick both copies up at a bookstore near you.

San Diego

Anyone going to San Diego?

If you are going to be there, say hi to me!

Also don't forget to stop by the "Expectations that Killed the Youth Pastor" seminar on Friday afternoon! I'm excited to co-lead with Marko this year.

Who'll be in SD??

This is just plain cool.

I wasn't there. but this sounds really cool.
My friend Bobby over and life church and his team developed an interactive element to worship for the catalyst conference.

The cool factor for this is about a 10.

Link

Here's Bobby's description of what they did:

"Here is a quick post to describe who/what we used and explain a little bit about the technology involved, and also get ideas/feedback from all of you.

1. What is SMS?

SMS or “Short Message Service” (wiki) allows you to send short (160 character) messages to and from mobile phones. SMS is often referred to as “texting”.

2. What did you do with texting at Catalyst (for those of you who were not there)?

• Thursday morning we introduced YouVersion.com and asked that people text Bible verses (ex. Hebrews 13:17) about leadership to a 5 digit number (it’s called a “shortcode”). We then displayed in real-time the full verses that were submitted on the screens in the arena.
• Thursday afternoon we had people text (a,b,c or d) to the shortcode to vote on which song was their favorite “reverb” song. We displayed the results and the band played that song.
• Friday morning we asked people to text words that they felt described Craig’s session. It could be a word that described how it made them feel, or a words that were “take away” words from the session. We then displayed a tag cloud of the words people submitted at the end of the session.
• Late Friday morning we asked people to text their names or email addresses if they were committing to pursue radical integrity and grace. It was in association with the Deadly Viper book that was launched at the conference."

Tim Keel's Intuitive Leadership

I'm really digging Tim's book on leadership. I'm not done. But I like it so far.
It reads like a familiar voice.
It feels like someone is writing the words I've felt for sometime.
Some of the things he's writing I've put words to.
Some I haven't.

There are some chunks of the book that are rich. Think the quadruple cholocalate cake rich. Think intensity of flavor.

It's a book on leadership that a lot of folks won't read unfortunately. The reason they won't read it?

Because the first two chapters are simply Tim's Story. This breaks the mold of traditional leadership books. Hearing the author's story to some will feel as if the author is self-indulgent. they will be looking for principles. 21 irrefutable principles. or 7 habits or maybe a purple cow.

Leadership is always subjective. It's always contextual. principles are fine. but today's pastor's need to learn to listen to their lives and their context.

Tim doesn't come out with principles blazing.
He starts with his story. Then he talks about being a leader out of your story.

I'm going to keep reading.
Go buy it.

The future of Youth Ministry

Marko was asking about the future of youth ministry of on his blog.
Here's my response related to the talk he'll be giving. This is not a comprehensive explanation by the way, only extrememly brief thoughts.

1. I don’t like the word “driven” either.

2. The future of youth ministry will need to
embrace the particular and contextual. The days of the cookie cutter youth ministry are over.

2b. If this is true, then youth ministry will focus more on theological conversation then education for teens. (esp. mid and late adolescents)

2c. The pressure to compete with the youth ministry down the street and all their razzle dazzle with communities embracing, knowing, loving, and walking beside students in tanglible, often less flashy, often non-programatic ways.

3. The extended family of the church will take it’s responsibility to help parents raise teens more seriously and youth pastors will be leading them in ways to do this.

4. Over the past 10 years a shift has happened. A majority of parents now actually consider themselves to be the primary spiritual nurtures of their kids. (this might not be the shift) The shift is that youth pastors have caught up and more than ever before believe that to be true as well. However Functionally most youth ministries don’t do squat to actually support parents in these rolls. Often they contribute to the opposite.

The Future will hold youth pastors who stop brow beating parents with the “you are the primary spiritual nurtures of your kids” which most already know, and begin actually helping parent’s do it. This may happen in ways we have not discovered yet, additionally, via tools that lead parent/kid conversations, encouragment, parental mentors as well as well as youth mentors, a church support system.

5. Church leaders will continue to talk and learn about systems thinking and how youth ministry is effected/affected by the unique system in each church.

6. I think that hospitality will be an ever increasing gift for the church and youth ministry in the future. Genuine Hospitality might even approach our love for the gift of leadership in the US. Hospitality after all is relational, it’s missional (that is looking to the needs of others), it’s organic, it’s communal, it’s particular and contextual.

7. The Youth pastor’s role will change when youth pastors remember why they got into ministry in the first place. Not for programs to lead, but to pastor kids. These pastors will rediscover what a pastor is and does and this is how they will spend their time.

Um..

Driving by a church on a main street in Tulsa I saw a sign that said this.


NOW OFFERING
OUR SERVICES
IN ESPANOL

um...

oh never mind...

Mindi's Online Dating Tips

My friend Mindi has some dating tips listed on her website.

Link

Here's my favorite part:

"every so often, i get my nerve up and dive into the online dating pool. obviously, it hasn't been successful yet. but it has been a learning experience. here are a few things i've learned:

on photos:

1. glamour shots/commercial headshots shouldn't be used. anyone with sense knows those have been retouched. and in most cases, that look is not what you'll be seeing when you meet up at the coffee shop.
2. if it looks like there's any possibility, the pic could show up in a mug shots book or be on a post office wall, don't use it.
3. please make sure your photo is from this decade. that also goes for your hairstyle.
4. if you're going to have an animal in the pic with you, it should be cute and alive. no dead fish, no dead deer, no insects of enormous size. and no pics of your dog (cute) with a dead bird in its mouth (yech!)."