MFUGE 2009: MOVE

PowerSource just returned from our large summer trip. We go to a missions oriented camp called MFUGE. It's a camp run by LifeWay and this particular site was in Charleston, South Carolina. We stayed on the campus of Charleston Southern in suites (2 dorm rooms strung together by a connected bathroom). But, I'm getting ahead of myself.

On Monday morning June 22nd my wife, Kristin, and I arose around 4:45am in order to get to the bus and be loaded and help with packing and such by 5:30am. The students arrived between then and 6:00am and we loaded up the bus and van and headed out onto the road. I'm not one for long car rides or trips as my stomach gives me a hard time about it so I took 2 Dramamine and knocked out pretty early into the drive. We stopped once for a bathroom break and snack and then again for lunch but other than about an hour and a half at the end of the ride I slept pretty much the entire way there which was really nice. I needed the rest for what would become a very long, hard, and enjoyable week at MFUGE.

Upon arrival at Charleston Southern we went through the ins and outs of checking our students and leaders into their rooms and familiarized ourselves with a very open and beautiful campus. With spacious lawns and a reflection pool it provides a place for great meditation times and great fun with tennis & basketball courts and a pool. These amenities are not why we have gathered in sunny, and hot, South Carolina. We, along with many other church youth groups, have gathered to serve. We paid good money and drove from hundreds of miles away to love people with the love and message of Jesus.

Our students and leaders were broken up into serve tracks, similar to our Surv Teams, based on their 1st 2nd and 3rd choices. The tracks included: Creative, Games & Rec, PCY (painting construction and yard work), Social, and Children. Each of these tracks provides the students with a rough idea of how they will be serving. The PCY track works on mowing lawns construction sites and functions much like a Habitat for Humanity team. The Games & Rec, and Children teams work mainly with young children. They go to daycare centers or drop off points and plan out a day of fun for these young ones, all the while looking for opportunities to share with them the life changing gospel of Jesus. The Creative team works with children as well as homes for the elderly and they plan a program consisting of music and drama that points toward Christ. Social is basically a grab bag of all the other teams. They could be stoking food pantries, playing with children, visiting the sick and elderly, or doing some PCY.

Almost all of our students got the track they were hoping for. I was a van driver for the Social track in which I was put in. I really enjoyed my track group. None of my students from PowerSource were in my group so I got the opportunity to meet and learn a lot of new faces and make new friends. At first I was a bit nervous at the spiritual temperature of the students in my track. (I wrote about this in an earlier post you can read here.) However our track leader, a young woman by the name of Kara Barefoot, and I have a history. We group up together as friends in the same youth group at Raleigh Road Baptist Church. It was really cool to be able to serve with her and talk with her about the paths God has taken her on over the course of the past few months. It's a great thing to see God moving in the lives of my friends.

During the week, my track group worked with children at a downtown center (more on my time there in this blog post), helped spruce up a homeless shelter (in which I had a fight with some vines hanging from a tree and the vines won), and helped to harvest some squash at a farm that donates it's food to the homeless. All in all it was a great time of ministry and fellowship with other believers.

During the night time and morning worship sessions we experienced a very passionate hearts from our camp speaker Brian Jennings and our worship leaders The Rescued (nice name). Brian's actually an alumni of PowerSource middle school ministry and used to attend Thomas Road during his youth. He was very excited to see our youth there and was able to communicate to our students very well. He understand the struggles of being in a large church connected to a Christian school and the apathy that can sometimes cause in students.

Now I will say.... the group we took to MFUGE are mostly our core students. By that I mean they are student who dig deeper that we tell them to and ask the hard questions about what it means to follow Jesus in this great big Wild Goose Chase we're on to know Him and experience Him more fully. Not only do they ask questions they dive in head over feet. They live it.

There was true evidence of that this week. Collectively our students lead about 20 children and adults to begin a relationship with Jesus Christ while we were at MFUGE. It's a really exciting thing. Even more exciting to know that the MFUGE staff will be working with those individuals all summer to help disciple them and bring them along in their walk with Christ.

I loved sitting in our Church Group Devotion times every night after our worship sessions. God taught me a lot simply by listening about the stories of courage and bravery chronicling our students sharing the message and love of Christ and seeing lives changed. I got the opportunity to teach one of these sessions and I think I may have been more moved than some of the students. I was at the brink of tears thanking God for what He was doing in the lives of my students and those they connected with that week. (More on that night in this blog post. )

Overall God did some amazing things while we were in MFUGE. I'm thankful for opportunities like that. To love God by loving those He loves (all people). After the lives changed and time spent meeting other Christ-followers from around the nation we said our goodbyes and began to make our way back to good old Lynchburg, Virginia.

We made it about 15 miles.......... then our bus broke down.

We were in pretty heavy stop and go traffic and the brakes on the bus locked up and began to smoke excessively almost to the point of fire. Craziness. We assessed the damages and realized we would have to be towed in order to fix the problem. We shuttled students in the van to a Chic-Fil-A in Summerville, SC a few minutes down the road (I'm leading a worship evangelism conference there next weekend pray for me if you think about it.) It took us about an hour and a half to get all the students there. We then walked over to a shopping center with a PetsMart a Target and some other interesting stores. We passed the time waiting for the bus to arrive and arrive it did at about 9:00pm that evening. (We left camp at 10am). We loaded everyone up on the bus very tired and were ready to be on our way. Then another problem happened. The temperature gauge was reading close to a boiling point on the bus. We went back and examined it and had to call a repair man to come take a look. During this time a couple drove up next to our bus (which reads THOMAS ROAD BAPTIST CHURCH in the side in big letters) and asked us if we were from TRBC like "Liberty University TRBC) turns out they were both Alumni and let us know that if we needed a place to stay that we could sleep on the gym floor of their church, which had showers and AC. Considering how late it was and not knowing the extent of the problems we would be facing with the repair we stayed at the church.

We slept like rocks and a shower felt great after being in a sweating bus for a long time. Our students were great. Even though a few started feeling a little sick due to the heat, for the most part no one complained. It was awesome. The next morning TRBC had sent a new bus that drove through the night (THANKS SO MUCH Mr. Parra!!!!) to pick us up. We loaded up and headed home. With Rubik's Cubes in hand we made our trip home. I slept most of the way again but woke up and worked on some DLP Church History lessons that I ripped to my iPod.

I love long sweaty bus rides with break downs. I wouldn't trade them for anything because...

God moved in our hearts. God moved in the hearts of others.

Some will never be the same again because we made the trip.

I love this ministry.

I love it.

I wouldn't trade it for anything.

Winter Retreat: All I Have To Give - Sunday AM Devotions

“As humans, love is the most powerful emotion we feel. And when you feel it, you can't stay still. You have to move. You know why? Because love moves. When it's real, it evokes emotion. When you feel it, you will go to the extreme to show it. When Jesus was on earth, He basically boiled all of life down to a few simple statements about love. God loved. God moved. We should love and when we do, we should move. But move to do what?” – Clay Scroggins

We’ve spent a lot of time talking about what it means to love God and love people, about what it means to give all that we have to give. There’s a song by Tim Hughes called “God of Justice” that we’ve sung a couple of times together in PowerSource. The chorus goes like this:

Jesus, You have called us.
Freely we’ve received, now freely we will give.
We must go,
Live to feed the hungry,
Stand beside the broken,
We must go
Stepping forward,
Keep us from just singing,
Move us into action,
We must go

My favorite line in that chorus is, “stepping forward, keep us from just singing, move us into action…”. For you and I, this is where we need to be.

All weekend we have been singing about, reading about, hearing about, and talking about all we have to give. The problem is that if all we do is sing, read, listen, and talk about giving all we have to give, and we never do it, all we’ve done is waste a lot of breath, ink, and time. It’s similar to being a doctor and diagnosing a patient with a disease. What would it be like if all that doctor did was talk about how to cure the disease? Maybe he writes a book about it, maybe a couple people read this book and it starts a revolution. Maybe people even sing songs about how to cure this disease. They print stuff about it on their t-shirts and on their backpacks. They even begin talking about it in some schools. But neither the doctor, nor anyone else involved ever actually cures anyone of this disease. It would be a tragedy. It’s very much the same way with us. Jesus is the cure for the disease of sin we are all infected with. He came to be the remedy for those who are dying and lost. For us to not share that cure with others would be just as tragic. Before you read any further, pause for a good minute or two and let that sink in.

In a couple of hours, you’ll hop back on the bus and head home, no doubt pull out the last of the Red Bull stash and make your way back to life as you know it. Now it’s in your hands. The question before you is the same as it has been all weekend. Will you give all you have to give? Will you take the cure to those who so desperately need it?

The Message captures I Peter 4:7-11 as follows... 7-11Everything in the world is about to be wrapped up, so take nothing for granted. Stay wide-awake in prayer. Most of all, love each other as if your life depended on it. Love makes up for practically anything. Be quick to give a meal to the hungry, a bed to the homeless—cheerfully. Be generous with the different things God gave you, passing them around so all get in on it: if words, let it be God's words; if help, let it be God's hearty help. That way, God's bright presence will be evident in everything through Jesus, and he'll get all the credit as the One mighty in everything—encores to the end of time. Oh, yes!

The NLT translates v. 10...God has given each of you a gift from his great variety of spiritual gifts. Use them well to serve one another.

God’s call to give all you have is not an option or a suggestion. It is not a “if you feel like it” or “when you have time” kind of a thing. For a Christ follower, it is commanded. God has equipped each of us with everything we need to love others. He commands us, to use all of those things well. Why? “To serve one another.” Period.

But, before you go, I would encourage you to begin to prepare your hearts for the last stop of the retreat. In our session this morning, you will be challenged by the real life stories of people in your community, the least of these. You will be given opportunities to give all you have to give. Hopefully, these opportunities are a starting point, the beginning of a long journey of giving all you have to give that becomes a permanent part of your life. So may you as you learn to love God and love people, step forward, do more than just sing, and go.

Winter Retreat: All I Have To Give - Saturday AM Devotions

Once again we meet. There’s a song by the band Jack’s Mannequin that goes “So this is morning, it’s when I spend the most time thinking about what I’m giving up.” Now, I don’t support much of what that band has to say about anything… in fact I disagree with most of it. I think this lyric can get us started today.

It is morning. You may be tired because you stayed up most of the night pranking your room leaders (I surely hope not) or because you have left over Red Bull and for some horrendous reason decided to pull an all-nighter. So here’s what I’d like you to do. Before you read any more of this page I want you to stand up and stretch a bit. Run in place for a couple seconds or try to touch the ceiling of your room or something to wake yourself up. Go ahead. (Insert Jeopardy music here)

Alright, now that everyone is done stretching out, spend a few minutes in prayer. Ask God to help you to understand the things He wants you to learn today. Look back at those notes you wrote down last night about giving all you have to give to God. Spend some time talking with God about those things and asking how you live them out. Maybe even today you could do one of those things. Spend some time in prayer now.

Ok, now we’re ready. Open your Bible, or share with someone, and turn back to the same passage we were in last night in Matthew 22:35-40. We want to look at verse 39. The verse talks about loving your neighbor as you love yourself. This is the “Love People.” part of the phrase in the top corner of your pages. Jesus doesn’t just give us the command to love God with all we are, He gives us a second command to love your neighbor as you love yourself.

So who is my neighbor? Are we talking Mr. Rogers, “Could you be my? Would you be my?” kind of stuff or is this the guy that lives next door to me or what? The word neighbor in the passage is actually referring to everyone. Other translations read “to love others as your love yourself.” In other words, “love people”.

This, once again, is easier to read than it is to live out. Loving people can be hard. Period. This means Jesus wants us to love the unlovable, the people who get on our nerves, the people who we don’t get along with at school, those who pick on us, those who we pick on, the nerdy kids, the band and choir kids, the jocks, the preps, the goths and punks, the kid who sits alone in the lunch room day after day. We need to love them. Why? Because Jesus first loved us. Yesterday we learned how much Jesus loves us. He died for us on the cross. What else does He have to say about loving people?

Turn in your Bible, or follow along with your friend, to Matthew 25:34-40. (No it’s not a typo I know it sounds and looks like 22:35-40, but its different. Just go there.) Go ahead and read that passage.

Jesus is saying some pretty heavy stuff here. The scenario is this: Jesus is telling us to look around us, to look for those who are sick, tired, poor, or imprisoned. He’s telling us to look for these people because He wants us to love these people. Now we may be thinking, are you kidding me? You want me to find someone who is sick? Someone who is in prison? I know these types of people can make us uncomfortable. It’s not easy to go into a nursing home and see the residents tired, sick, and alone. But the truth is, if we don’t go and love them, who will? It’s easy to say, “Well, maybe some kid from another church will go.” It’s easy to pass that responsibility off to other people, but Jesus says something at the end of this passage in Matthew 25 that should change our perspective. Jesus says, “Whatever you do for the least of these, you do for Me”. When Jesus says the least of these, He is referring to all the people we have been talking about: the ones that are uncomfortable to be around. He’s telling us that how we treat these people is the same way we treat Him. In other words, by loving people, we are also loving God. This requires more of us than simply going to church on Sunday morning. This requires more of us than going to a retreat in Ghent, WV. This may even require more of us than going out for a couple of hours on a Saturday with a SURV team to meet the needs of some of these people. When Jesus says to love people, He doesn’t put a time limit on it. He doesn’t put a price tag on it. He doesn’t put conditions at all. Jesus’ only condition is for us to love people as we love ourselves. That’s a lot of love. It sounds to me like that means giving all I have to give. So the question that we have to ask ourselves is quite simply…are we? Are we giving all that we have to give? Are we going out of our way to love the unlovable? To love the least of these?

Let’s spend some time this morning thinking about what we can give up: our comfort zones, our selfishness, and our fear. End this time like we began, in prayer. Ask God to make you aware of the least of these in your life, the least of these all around you. Ask Him to give you the courage to love them.

Winter Retreat: All I Have To Give - Friday PM Devotions

So chances are you, yeah you, the one reading the page, are pretty tired in this moment. Or you’re pretty wired because you snuck Red Bulls in your bag and were chugging those suckers on the way over. Regardless, here we are in Ghent, West Virginia. You’re in your room by now, probably unpacked and sitting in or near your bunk and are staring at the book in your hands and maybe wondering what this “AllIHave2Give” stuff is all about. Give all of what? Give all of a banana split to pastor Micah’s face? Give all my strength in an Anaconda Squeeze like Nacho Libre? What is “AllIHave2Give” all about?

You’ll notice on just about every page in this book in one of the top corners it says “Love God. Love People. Matt 22:35-40”. Grab your Bible, if you don’t have one, share with a friend. If you have a Bible and see someone without one, offer to share. Open it up to those verses. Matthew is the first book in the New Testament. It’s the first of four books that we call “The Gospels”. “Gospel” means “good news”. The good news in these books is about God sending His Son, Jesus, to Earth to die for the sins of mankind. It’s all about God’s love for us. We’ll talk more about that a little later.

The setting for these verses in Matthew is this: Jesus was a Rabbi; this is similar to a pastor in our time. The Rabbi was a teacher of the Old Testament law. He took a few disciples, followers, under his wing and taught them everything He knew. One day, Jesus was teaching His disciples when some Pharisees, other religious guys who weren’t fans of Jesus’ teaching, showed up and tried to trick Him by getting Him to say one of the Old Testament laws was more important than another. Read those verses in Matthew. Go ahead I’ll wait…

Wow. I don’t know if you know anything about the Old Testament law, but what Jesus is saying here is huge. In the Old Testament there is a book called Leviticus. The entire book is pretty much a giant
list of laws that the Israelites were supposed to follow in order to make themselves pure and holy before God. Jesus is summing that entire book up with this: “Love the Lord your God with all your heart, all your soul, and all your mind,” and “Love your neighbor as yourself.” Jesus is saying that all of the Levitical law is supported by these two commands.

The thing is.... these commandments are harder to obey than they are to read. See, there is one little word in those verses that changes the dynamic, the seriousness, of these commands. The word is ‘all”.
Jesus didn’t ask for us to love God with some of our hearts. He didn’t ask us to love God with some of our soul or some of our strength. He asked for all of it. He commands us, not asks us, to love with ALL we have to give. God doesn’t just want us on Sunday mornings at Daybreak or Wednesday nights at Focus Groups. He wants us Sunday through Saturday, 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. He wants us to love Him with our lives.

Some of you may be thinking... are you kidding me? Dude, that’s a lot of time. 24/7 is more than I’m willing to give. God must be greedy to want so much of my time, after all who is He? What has He ever done for me to deserve that kind of love?

In the same gospel you’re in, Matthew, if you look at chapters 26-28 you will read the account of Jesus’ death and resurrection. I’m sure, even if you’ve never been on any trip or event with PowerSource, you have at least heard of Jesus. You may have heard He was a good teacher, or a good person, or you may have heard His name as an expletive when your friend stubbed his toe. The point is, you’ve heard of Him. The truth is, Jesus was a good teacher, and He was a good person. In fact, He was perfect. Do you know anyone who is perfect? I don’t. Sometimes we see people on TV that we think are perfect. Maybe you know someone who you think looks perfect, or who is the perfect athlete, or musician, etc. Let me tell you a secret…. those people… they aren’t perfect. (gasp)* I know, I know…calm down and hear me out…we all have flaws. We all do things wrong. We can look good on the outside and be ugly and dirty on the inside. We can be great at a certain skill, but really stink when it comes to treating people like people instead of objects.

The Bible calls these things that we do wrong sin, and it is that sin that keeps us from having a relationship with God. If you look on the last page of your handbook at The Romans Road you will see a series of verses from the Bible that talk about our sin. In Romans 5:8 we see that Jesus died for our sins. He died so we wouldn’t have to. He gave All He Had To Give. He loves you that much. That’s why He deserves all you have to give. He saved your life. You just have to accept Him. Read through the rest of the page with The Romans Road on it. Then spend some time praying and asking God to show you ways to give all you have to give to Him. Write them down in this booklet so you will remember them.