Help-- need a hard-to-recognize Biblical character

Hey, I'm headed for a reunion next month with my group of youth ministers who trained together, and part of the event is a trivia night/costume contest.

So I need some suggestions for a character from the Bible who would be hard to recognize but would also have a great backstory. Any thoughts?

Before all your Super Bowl parties, a warning...

From today's New York Times, this story: "Dip Once or Dip Twice"

“The way I would put it is, before you have some dip at a party, look around and ask yourself, would I be willing to kiss everyone here? Because you don’t know who might be double dipping, and those who do are sharing their saliva with you.”

Check out the story for the actual results, and then post a guard by your dips at the church party!

Kids say...

Walking into the building today, I heard this from one of the kids on the playground, talking to a friend:

"Kids hate organized games-- it's true!"

Guess what I'm planning this weekend? Yup, the games list for the middle school retreat. That kid's not invited anymore...

Quote of the day from the HS retreat

(On the ropes course) P: "I like my way better. It hurts more and makes me feel more manly!"

Up for an illustration

Take this news story, via Reuters, and use it to illustrate how people will grab at any solution, short of bringing it to God, to solve our problems.

Here's a quote:

NICOSIA (Reuters) - Having marital problems? Have you tried putting egg in your underpants?
A woman in Cyprus is on trial for sorcery after pledging to shake off a curse apparently plaguing a man's relationship with his wife and mother-in-law. [...] "She cracked the egg into my underpants," the 37-year-old man told a district court in the capital Nicosia.

Shameless Plugging for Something Cool

I opened this book and the page I looked at was my "favorite" (when I'm talking to kids, and in a bad mood) Bible story: the one where the bears ate the children.

Get this book: "Rejected Sunday School Lessons"-- it's 20 or so perfect examples of how not to do Bible study, and would be useful for training new adult volunteers or Sunday School teachers.

It's also hilarious. With a capital Arious!

(Unfortunate information: The book isn't listed on the YS website or Amazon, yet, so keep looking-- or sign up for the NYWC in Atlanta!)

So I called this kid...

I had a list of phone calls to make in between our goal-setting meetings today, and called one of my not-so-involved kids to invite her back to our Wednesday night Bible study.

Me: Hi, I just wanted to find out if you were going to be here on Wednesday for Bible study.
NIK: Probably not.
Me: Oh, sad! How come?
NIK: (huge silence)
Me: Any particular reasons?
NIK: (starts crumpling a bag of chips near the phone) I think you're breaking up...

I definitely had something crumpled at me to get rid of me on the phone today.

Ten things that would make field hockey better

I thoroughly enjoyed the game this morning. My kids are solid players and they put up a good fight, but ultimately lost 2-0.

I also had some time to think, while I was watching, of a list of suggestions for the powers that be who decide how field hockey is played, that would improve the game. As a disclaimer, I mentioned a few of them to one of my students who plays, and she immediately said, "Oh, that would make the game much more fun!"

1. Water hazards and sand traps. Since field hockey is what regular hockey would look like if it was played on a golf course, let's include the traditional golf obstacles.
2. Tackling. So many times the other team stole the ball; if my student had been able to knock the other player down and run away with the ball, that problem could have been solved.
3. Hills on the field. Bear with me on this one. A level playing field means everyone can see all the other players all the time; how much fun is that, really? Let's get some high ground that a team can hide behind and ambush the other team when they run by. We are talking, after all, about a game that used to be played with the heads of one's enemies.
4. The "You Hassle, You Hustle" rule. (In fact, let's get this in all sports.) Under this rule, if a parent shouts out advice to the team, the referees insert that parent into the game to show everyone how it's done right. Guarantee the stands stay quieter after the freshman girls' team schools some middle-aged dad who shouts, "You gotta catch up with them!"
5. Let the players actually stand up while they play; no more of this bent-over running thing- that cannot be good for the spine.
6. An official airline.
7. Crossover games-- like the series crossover novels that featured both Nancy Drew AND the Hardy Boys; let's play the field hockey team vs. the tennis team, or something like that. Maybe the bowling team.

8. There might be only seven things-- any other suggestions?

All of life explained by index cards

I saw this blog mentioned on the NYTimes website a while back and forgot to go look at the actual blog until today-- it's called "Indexed" and the author does charts that show odd relationships between things, drawn on index cards. Most of them are very funny: check it out!

Segment from the September Kickoff: "What do they Know?"

Top 10 Reasons to do Service Projects with the youth group

10. Because Jesus said, "Go surf!" Oh, wait... that's "serve."
9. That warm and fuzzy feeling you get afterward is perfectly legal.
8. You'll meet people who go to all the other high schools in St. Louis.
7. You could get your picture on next year's top 10 list.
6. Because the world needs more sandwiches.
5. Girls think it's hot when you volunteer.
4. Because ripped and dirty clothes are fashionable right now.
3. My friend's friend's cousin told me that if you skip your homework to do a service project, your teacher has to give you an "A."
2. No matter what the project is, we'll accomplish more than the Cardinals.
1. Isaac will finally remember your name, and stop calling you "Brenda."

A comment on how to prepare

I was listening to the latest Car Talk podcast (love those guys!) and heard them reference an ad campaign for an investment company that used the line, "The only place where 'success' comes before 'preparation' is in the dictionary."

Anyone have a way we can use this as an illustration? I have the feeling it's a good one.

Loving the fuzzy logic

This past week in our Wednesday small group night, we asked our students to talk about how a new person should feel at his/her first small group night. G, one of the most enthusiastic kids, had this answer:

"They should feel worried... really worried! Because then, when they realize how awesome it is, they'll REALLY want to come back!"

A chuch typo

We're putting together an updated songbook for our children's chapel service, and I walked into our clergy assistant's office today to find a sheet on her desk with one of my all-time favorite camp songs on it.

"I love this song!" I said, not noticing that she was pulling all those pages out.
"Read the whole thing," she told me.

The first verse was good: "I will call upon the Lord/who is worthy to be praised/ So shall I be/ saved from my enemies."

But the chorus had a kicker to it: "The Lord liveth!/ and blessed be the Lord/ and may the God of our salvation be exhausted!"

(It should read, "be exalted," by the way.)

A little moment that kept me laughing through Communion

I preached yesterday, in the "big church," at all three services. Today, I'm really tired from all that, but still laughing because of my students. I'd been given the idea to include some material in my sermon about the students at our church, since I have a perspective on them that the other preachers generally don't use. And so during the main service, I talked directly to the youth group in the congregation.

The youth group was busy while I was preaching. They were busy putting a whoopee cushion under my chair, and then re-inflating it a couple of times when I'd managed to sit on it while there was too much noise (hymns, etc) for it to be embarrassing.

Maybe they didn't get all of the challenge I set out for them in the sermon, but they're comfortable enough to hang around while I teach about God, which is a great start!

A message from God...

...courtesy of the P.K.s

Bible will not be declared an "indecent publication"

From Reuters, this story:

HONG KONG (Reuters) - "Hong Kong's media regulator has rejected calls to reclassify the Bible as an indecent publication following more than 2,000 complaints about its sexual and violent content, including rape and incest...

Publications classified as indecent in Hong Kong can only be bought by people aged over 18 and must be sealed in a wrapper with a statutory warning notice."

Skittles: Steal the Rainbow

From MSNBC, this story:

"A man caught removing tires from a truck
has been charged with stealing the tractor-
trailer containing $250,000 worth of Skittles,
police said."

The most odd part of this story is that the Skittles in the stolen trailer were worth $250,000. The tires and rims he was trying to remove and sell were worth $500. I suspect there's a metaphor there, useful for youth Gospel messages.

There's a light at the end of this tunnel

...and someday our students will get there, and do things like this: (AP, via NYTimes.com

"Twenty years later, Wiese hauled [her] diary out of storage and read it to a bar full of strangers just for laughs.
''Cringe readings,'' these exercises are called, and they are growing in popularity around the country.
Groups in New York and elsewhere convene to relive what most would rather forget: the depths of their teenage angst. Participants get up on stage with their ragged, old diaries and are instructed to read only material embarrassing enough to make them cringe.
It turns out that embarrassing is also funny. When Wiese appeared at the reading, held monthly at a Brooklyn bar, the room was packed beyond capacity. The 33-year-old fundraiser may have been cringing, but her audience was cheering."

What does this say about my small group?

One of my students brought a friend to small group night this week and shared the following conversation:

"So [my friend] said, 'At my youth group, we watch Rob Bell videos.' And I said, 'yeah, at my church we watch Will It Blend'!"