Thank you for sharing about how Jesus, by His grace, has changed your life. Jesus welcomes sinners, and like Paul, I feel like I am chief and most undeserving of such mercy. It is easy to overlook that this mercy which is displayed in God’s sending His own Son into the world to die in the place for sinners is also a reminder of the justice that should be ours for the punishment of our sins. Praise God that by faith we can have forgiveness through God judging sin in the cross, mercy through Jesus satisfying God’s wrath and holiness, and peace through Jesus’ blood which covers all our sins.

Timmy

We are all “under construction,” aren’t we?! I suppose that, in our journey of sanctification, we all have some stories to tell. I appreciate you sharing your experience and for the encouragement.

Bill,

You are spot on with the youth ministry stuff! When I used to teach students, I taught 45-60 minute expository messages and made my manuscript available to students after the service for students to take home for further study and application (to be used with their devotional times). When I first did that, I printed out 8-10 manuscripts, and to my surprise, all of them were gone. I doubled it the next week, and not a single one was left. This is a reminder that when you feed students God’s Word, they will develop a hunger and thirst for it. When kids come to church and find nothing different offered than a sanitized movie theater, we do not need to wonder why that, when the movie ends (leave school), they don’t hang around (church drop outs).

The funny thing is, when I was cleaning out our guest bedroom/new baby room, I came across those lists stashed under the bed. Of course, those lists need to be updated! I will see about getting those up in the near future.

I think it’d be a great idea to post your lists of “Top 50 Books to Read” as well as the “Authors to Avoid”.

It might help those that are in need of a resource like that.

JG

I eagerly anticipate the impact that you and others like you (Dockery, Vincent, Sherid, Van Neste, etc.) will make when you are unleashed on the SBC. However, you’ll have to articulate the vision of “youth ministry” to the parents up front and get their support, because the kids won’t like it.

A sad tale: A friend was helping lead college SS and wanted to lead a class in a study of a book of the Bible. The leader said, “Oh, these students aren’t mature enough for a solid Bible study. We need to study this book.” The book: a John Eldridge piece of mind-numbing rambling. My question: How do you get mature if you don’t study the Bible?

Only in the last 5-7 years have I come to realize that there is an entire world of great riches to be found (Edwards, Piper, Dagg, etc.).

However, I keep those books from my early Christian experience on display in my office bookshelf for all to see a window into my sanctification. Don’t be ashamed of the journey….Rejoice in it!

I think we talked about this sometime earlier, didn’t we?! I think a major issue in the churches is the idea that if our kids go to youth camp or children’s church, then we are par for the course. The problem is that the bar has been lowered to a level that we have undermined the minds of our children and fed their appetites with banal buffets from the world. Shouldn’t the church be the place where our children are challenged the most? If as much energy and passion is spent on knowing God as winning the next video game, then we would see a remarkable thing in our generation. Theology must be integrated in the family and in the church beyond a program and one week out of the year. One does not wonder why we loose our young people so quickly to the world. Could it be that they have borrowed convictions and superficial moorings?

It is my hope that a passion for the truth and a passion for knowing God will rise from the ranks of the redeemed through the Spirit’s awakening our minds and renewing our hearts.