Overheard

On the plane from Denver to STL yesterday, I overheard the following four sentences in rapid succession.

"Make sure you tell them it's not my fault we missed the plane."

"They know we're late for everything."

"I know a lot of those are my fault."

"I just don't want the reputation of someone who's always late."

At the moment, I'm reading Steven James' book "Story" which is about the mystery that is faith in Christ and how much more deeply we need to look at it, and one of his chapters is about "Christ admirers" vs. "Christ-followers." He points out that Christ admirers say great things about Jesus, and claim faith in Him, but don't change their lives when He challenges them to. Christ-followers, on the other hand, back up their reputed faith with the responses to Christ's work and teaching that show they really are walking with the Lord.

The fact that I was reading the book and hearing the conversation at the same time struck me as highly ironic.

The Perfect New-Volunteer test

Yesterday was a busy day, and it's on days like that when the most random ideas strike me as excellent--

So there I was, sitting in Starbucks, and I had the idea for a very reliable volunteer interview scenario. Find a Starbucks near a middle school (within walking distance) and arrange to interview your new volunteer there on a Friday afternoon; in fact, plan to meet 20 minutes after the first wave of kids walks in, so you'll be standing in line with 30 or so teenagers who all want to talk about the amazing things that happened in school today.

You'll weed out all the adults who really don't have a clue about youth ministry, such as this mom who walked in with her younger daughter and nearly walked right back out again (the daughter found some friends before mom could steer her out the door), saying, "Not only is there a long line, but they're noisy!"

Reusing (clothes, anyway) catching on

A while ago I read an article about how while recycling had gotten trendy over the past few years, no one's ever paid much attention to the "reduce" and "reuse" parts of the original triangle.

I'm a proud Goodwill shopper and talk about donating clothes and buying used with my kids fairly often, as a form of stewardship, and some of the folks (guys especially) I talk to are really uncomfortable with it. Since every designer store in the world, it seems, has a location in St. Louis, this story caught my eye today:

"Back to school shoppers stock up at resale stores"

"While parents are increasingly shopping resale, another trend is on the horizon: Teenage shoppers, who once never would have set foot in such stores, also are on the rise."Being green is cool, and we are in the recycling business," Maurice said. "Definitely the attitude (among teens) has changed. Also the kids are happier because they are getting more."