Upon returning back to Grace Point and EPIC Student Ministries, I had the opportunity to share with our EPIC students and parents just a small sampling of what God was/is teaching me.  Included below are my notes along with a link to where you can listen to a recording of my talk.

One last thing:  Thanks Grace Pointers for allowing me this sabbatical!!!!

Town Hall Meeting (05062012)

Big Idea:  God is looking for authentic people, not perfect people

Text:  Matthew 23.25-28

• Sabbatical Thank You
  • Went into the sabbatical with a heavy focus on what God wants to do in EPIC, but the word that was constantly being spoken to me was the word, AUTHENTIC.
  • Started off with a week-long youth ministry conference in Louisville, KY with 3,000 other youth pastors.
  • Attended a day-long seminar at the beginning of the conference called Pause:  An experience to gain clarity for your life and work which was taught by Dan Webster, CEO of Authentic Leadership, Inc. and former Pastor of Student Ministries at Willow Creek Community Church outside of Chicago.
  • Dan is now a Life Coach out of Holland, MI.
  • Through this Pause seminar, there were four things I realized I needed to do concerning myself as a person and as a leader:
    • Listen to God (authenticity happens when I pause long enough to see how I am interacting with God).
    • Listen to the last year (authenticity happens when I pause long enough to reflect on the journey I have taken).
    • Listen to my leadership development (authenticity happens when I line up my leadership with the gifts and talents God has given me).
    • Listen to the challenges I must face (authenticity happens when I am bold enough to deal with obstacles in my life, may it be, mental, spiritual, emotional, or physical).
• As a result of this Pause seminar I struck a relationship with Dan that led to him mentoring me through my sabbatical and helping me discover who I really am.

• What does it mean to be Authentic?
  • Get Whiteboard to list synonyms of the words Authentic and Inauthentic.
  • After discussing the lists READ Matthew 23.25-28
  • Read Matthew 5.20
  • Pharisees– the scribes and the Pharisees were in fact, the most obedient and committed religious folks in first-century Jewish culture. In addition, the Pharisees were theologically correct in almost everything they believed and taught.  The problem is they hid behind the Law.
  • They were more concerned about what others thought of them and how they portrayed themselves as spiritual giants that they didn’t see the flaws in their life and in essence lost their authenticity.
  • They were holy.  They devoutly followed God, prayed to Him regularly, often “heard from God” about how things should be, BUT they led by guilt.
  • But that isn’t the kind of disciples God is looking for.
  • Read Matthew 9.9-12:  As Jesus was walking along, he saw a man named Matthew sitting at his tax collector’s booth. “Follow me and be my disciple,” Jesus said to him. So Matthew got up and followed him.  Later, Matthew invited Jesus and his disciples to his home as dinner guests, along with many tax collectors and other disreputable sinners. ¹¹ But when the Pharisees saw this, they asked his disciples, “Why does your teacher eat with such scum?^[d]”  When Jesus heard this, he said, “Healthy people don’t need a doctor—sick people do.”
  • The disciples God is looking for are the broken, authentic, and transparent, not the Pharisee.

• How does this apply to EPIC?
  • I am a Pharisee!
  • The problem:  Read Luke 6.40.
  • Counseling—Perceived Perfectionism—“You think you have to impress everyone with your talent or accomplishments to get them to like and accept you. You believe that your friends and colleagues won’t respect you if they discover that you’re flawed or vulnerable.” Burns, David D.
  • As a result EPIC has become more about spiritual appearance than raw, real authenticity.
  • As Erwin McManus puts it in his book, An Unstoppable Force, we are creating a museum of saints instead of a hospital for sinners.
  • A walk thru a Wax Museum.  Not the real person.
  • The church was not intended to be a place where we put on masks to hide our true identity but was designed to be a place where it is safe to remove the masks and be authentic self.

• How do we fix it?
  • Start with the leaders, both adult and student leaders.
  • This whole next year of leader training will focus on the theme of Authenticity.
  • Going through the workbook, The Real Deal, by Dan Webster.
  • We are going to start this summer with a Student Leader class that will meet on Saturday nights during the service and will be open to any student 6-12^th grades that are interested in plugging into an area of service in the church including EPIC.
  • Teaching series will focus on Authenticity:
    • Ethos—our identity, our culture, our character
    • Masks—A look at the different masks that we wear and how to remove them.
    • [You]nique—Discovering why you are here and what you have to offer the world.
    • I am EPIC—A look at EPIC characters in the Bible and how we can be EPIC as well.
    • Culture Shock—Being authentic in a non-authentic world.
    • iWorship—What does authentic worship look like.
    • AttiTUDE—Developing Godly attitudes instead of self-seeking attitudes.
    • Truth is—Five promises from God when life is difficult.
    • Discipline—Moving from desire to experience.
    • Doubt—What causes me to doubt and how can I overcome it.
• Catechism/Confirmation Class on Saturday Nights starting around the beginning of the school year.

Recording Link:  http://www.gracepoint.cc/index.cfm?i=8595&mid=18&g=41599

Here goes:

• Anna’s mom, Karen ‘Chucks’, passed away Friday, August 13th.  It is harder than we thought.
• The memorial service is Sunday, August 22nd in Columbiana, OH.  It is a private service.
• I have the privilege of overseeing the ceremony.  I am both honored and nervous.
• Very proud my younger brother is a doctor who walked us through a very difficult week.
• Very honored to have another brother and a sister who prayed us through the week.
• The kids start school next week–YAY!!!
• Praying Isaac’s year goes better than last year.
• Have to be out of house by August 31st.
• Currently have no clue as to where we may be moving.
• Excited that Grace Point has hired our first worship pastor, Aaron Zink.
• Feel incredibly blessed to serve on the staff I do and to serve the church family of GPCC.
• I miss all of my EPIC students and leaders, REALLY REALLY BAD!!!.
• EPIC, by far, has the best volunteer leadership team on the PLANET!!!!!!  NO JOKE!!!!!
• Currently reading the book, Radical by David Platt–Phenomenal!!!
• I hate seeing my wife cry!
• I hate seeing my kids cry!
• I am madly in love with my wife!!
• I am more madly in love with Jesus!!!

I feel like I need a personal download and here is why:

• Anna has been gone for 5 days and I am going CRAZY!!  Don’t know if I can make it another 9 days.  I have only heard from her twice and need to hear her voice again soon.
• Excited to get Isaac back from camp tomorrow.  Heard he had a great time but want to hear it from him.
• Noah and Emma have been awesome.  It has been great to have Eva Hyder’s help watching them.  She took them to the Clipper’s game on Tuesday and to the pool today.
• Have been patching and painting alot!!!!!!
• Hopefully getting cabinets in the kitchen on Saturday.
• Need to get tile down as soon as possible so we can get back to living normally.
• Would love to have everything done by next Friday so we can surprise Anna on Saturday.
• Got the air-conditioning fixed in her van.  She will be excited.
• Man, I miss her!!!!!!!!
• Have two and half weeks until we leave for our Mission Trip to Cleveland.
• Have way too much to do and not enough time to get it all done for the trip.  Just found out we are doing a week’s worth of VBS!
• I am excited about Father’s Day but bummed that Anna won’t be here!
• I love her and miss her A LOT!!!

Well that is all for now.  Thanks for letting me vent!

1.  My goal for this year is to live 1John 2.6, “Whoever claims to live in him must walk as Jesus did.”  I want to walk just as Jesus walked.

2.  I am transferring degrees from Master of Arts in Counseling Psychology to a Master of Arts in Management and Leadership.  Just sense that the counseling path is the path God has for me right now.

3.  I have read two fiction/non-spiritual books in the past month (that is a record for me, since I prefer non-fiction spiritually related books).  I read, The End Is Now, by Rob Stennett.  Though it is a spiritually focused book it is fiction book.  The other book I just finished up is, Tiger Force, by Michael Sallah and Mitch Weiss.  The book is the account of a renegade group of U.S. soldiers in the Vietnam War.  This book was way out of my normal reading habits but Anna got it for me and I really enjoyed reading it.  I read it all in about 3 nights.  It taught me a lot about human nature especially in moments of extreme crisis and conflict.

4.  I am currently reading, In Common:  Catalyst Groupzine.  It is a compilation of authors discussing the importance of community among Christians. 

5.  EPIC is going well.  I really like our FUSE Nights in which parents are encouraged to attend.  Our current programming breakdown is:

1. First week of the month—FUSE Night (Dinner with families and then parents have separate discussion while students do their regular programming).
2. 2nd and 3rd week of the month—regular EPIC format
3. 4th week of the month—rotate between an outreach activity and service projects.

6.  I am excited that the Colts are in the Super Bowl!!!!

7.  I am focused heavily on The CHILL which is our High School winter retreat.  You can read about it here.

8.  My personal spiritual development has been taking me through the book of Acts.  Though I haven’t been as consistent as I should, I have been impacted about the leadership of the Holy Spirit in the early church.  The result of His empowering of Christ-followers was incredible boldness and compassion which led to incredible growth and ministry opportunities.

9.  The fam is doing well.  Isaac and Noah continually do well at school.  Isaac has been quite the Jesus-witness at school (we are waiting te get calls from the school and/or parents).  Emma is Emma—really enough said!  She is getting sweeter by the day.  I live for our nightly snuggle moments.

10.  Anna and I have been working out.  Though it has been painful,  I have really enjoyed the experience.  I have lost about 10 pounds in the past 15 days.  My favorite snack is Steamed Sugar Snap Peas—and no I am not kidding!

So what is your Top Ten so far this year?

1)  Married to Anna for 11 years.
2)  Have known her for 15 years.
3)  I met her in Canada at camp
4)  She is my best friend–for REAL
5)  I am a proud father of three amazing children
6)  The oldest of three bothers.
7)  I love to blog (www.myepicjourney.com)
8)  I LOVE to read but only non-fiction
9)  I want to be a professional fisherman when I grow up.
10)  I am not sure I will ever grow up
11)  I am currently working on a Master’s in Professional Counseling
12)  I am Pastor of Student Ministries at Grace Point Community Church
13)  I have been Youth Pastor for 11 years in 4 different churches
14)  Our Student Ministry is called EPIC
15)  I LOVE my students!!
16)  I LOVE my leadership team MORE!!!!
17)  I love Ohio but not the Buckeyes
18)  I love the Indianapolis Colts–A LOT!!
19)  I grew up in Nashville, Indiana
20)  I have an amazing sister we adopted when I was 24!! She was 25!!!
21)  I love to hunt–animals!
22)  I don’t like to fly
23)  I am not a big fan of traveling altogether
24)  I weighed 165 lbs. when I entered college.  I no longer weigh that!
25)  I pooped my pants–in public–at a funeral.  I was 24 years old!