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| purpose driven youth ministry conference: Purpose Driven Youth Ministry Doug Fields, 2009-12-15 If you long to reach kids and see their lives changed by God, this comprehensive guide shows you how. Purpose Driven® Youth Ministry will do for youth ministry what Rick Warren's Gold Medallion award-winning, The Purpose Driven® Church is doing for pastoral ministry. It's an indispensable guide to creating and maintaining youth ministry for the long run. It will help you create a solid spiritual team that builds the foundations of the Christian faith into the hearts and lives of young people. Forged around the fundamental purposes of evangelism, discipleship, fellowship, ministry, and worship, Purpose Driven® Youth Ministry uses the experiences of Saddleback Church to illustrate what a healthy Youth ministry can be. Nine transferable principles help you - Connect with the power of God for passionate, committed leadership - Define the purpose of your ministry and communicate it effectively - Identify your potential audience - Create programs that reach your audience and fulfill God's purposes - Implement processes that move students to maturity - Enhance your ministry with clearly defined values - Team up with parents to involve the whole family - Find volunteers and develop them into participating leaders - Persevere through tough times and thrive in an ever-changing environment. Balancing both theory and practice, Purpose Driven® Youth Ministry can be applied to any church setting, regardless of size, denomination, facilities, resources, and existing leadership. Purpose-Driven Youth Ministry will help you develop a ministry that equips students rather than a ministry that coordinates events. Doug Fields says, My goal for this book is to coach you through a plan to build a healthy youth ministry that isn't dependent on one great youth leader and won't be destroyed when the youth worker leaves the church. It's not a book on how to grow your youth ministry with six easy steps; it's about identifying, establishing, and building health into your church's youth ministry. |
| purpose driven youth ministry conference: Connection Doug Fields, 2004 |
| purpose driven youth ministry conference: Purpose Driven Youth Ministry Doug Fields, 2000-04-01 The Purpose Driven(r) Youth Ministry Training Kit is here to help you and your leadership team (both adults and student leaders) build a purpose-driven ministry. Designed to prompt group interaction with you as facilitator this kit contains five sessions for your team. If you're starting a youth ministry, look here for firm foundations. If you want to take your existing youth ministry to the next level, turn here for insights and applications that can take your team a quantum leap forward. This clear and easy-to-follow facilitator's guide walks you through each session so you can escort your team into discussion, discovery, and ministry-transforming decisions. Get ready to cover more ground, reap more rewards, and have more fun building a truly purpose-driven youth ministry than you ever dreamed! Build a vigorous, purpose driven youth ministry with these key concepts: Tap into the power of God - the foundation for any effective ministry. Chart the course of your ministry - clearly with a carefully conceived statement of purpose. Identify your target audience - know your students' various spiritual levels and needs. Develop purpose-driven programs that reflect the biblical goals of evangelism, worship, fellowship, discipleship, and ministry. Build a healthy leadership team whose members love each other as they love students. |
| purpose driven youth ministry conference: Sustainable Youth Ministry Mark DeVries, 2010-01-28 One of the big problems in youth ministry is the constant turnover of youth ministers. Mark DeVries addresses the problem with a systematic answer: churches need to take corporate responsibility for establishing a vision and structure for effective ministry, rather than leaving it all up to the youth minister. Especially helpful for senior pastors and church leaders. |
| purpose driven youth ministry conference: Faith Driven Entrepreneur Henry Kaestner, J. D. Greear, Chip Ingram, 2021 I'm excited about Faith Driven Entrepreneur. Anyone who is following the example of their creator God can find echoes of their work in this book. --Lecrae Entrepreneurship can be a lonely journey. But it doesn't need to be. God has a purpose and a plan for all those entrepreneurial dreams and creative gifts he gave you. The work you do today--the company you've built, the employees you work with, the customers you serve, the shareholders you report to, all of it--serves as an active part of what God wants to accomplish on earth. You are not alone in this journey. Join other faith-driven entrepreneurs as, together, we identify the values, habits, and traits that empower us to successfully build businesses, serve our communities, and faithfully pursue a loving relationship with God; read stories that exemplify how those values, habits, and traits unfold in everyday life; and discover the potential God wants to unleash through our work. Each book purchase includes access to the eight-session Faith Driven Entrepreneur video series, a discussion guide to encourage conversation among peers, and an invitation to join a Faith Driven Entrepreneur Group to meet other like-minded entrepreneurs. |
| purpose driven youth ministry conference: Your First Two Years in Youth Ministry Doug Fields, 2009-05-26 Since forever altering the course of the youth ministry world with his best-selling, groundbreaking book, Purpose-Driven® Youth Ministry, Doug Fields’ mind—but especially his heart—has been focused on the many unique needs of new youth workers.Doug translated his passion, insight, and vision for his beloved “rookies” into what you’re now reading, Your Fist Two Years in Youth Ministry—hands-down the most comprehensive companion to not only surviving, but also thriving, during the most crucial phase of youth ministry. Employing his renowned wisdom and humor—as if you and Doug were chatting over a long, relaxing meal—the author disarmingly relates stories and principles from his own successes and failures over 20-plus years in youth ministry. In the end, he offers treasure troves of practical advice, all in the hope that new youth workers can travel a smoother path and achieve real longevity in a church culture that all too often chews them and spits them out.Doug covers all-important issues such as:· Dealing with discouragement· Establishing a solid spiritual foundation· Building effective relationships with students· Resolving conflict· Ministering to parents and families· Trailblazing change· Working with volunteers· Defining a realistic job description· And many others!In addition, a chorus of insightful sidebar voices joins your conversation with Doug, among them ministry veterans Jim Burns, Steve Gerali, Mike Yaconelli, Helen Musick, Chap Clark, Marv Penner, Rick Warren, Jana L. Sundene, Bo Boshers, Duffy Robbins, Tony Campolo, and Richard Ross, all who’ve composed extensive, topical essays for each of the dozen chapters.Your First Two Years of Youth Ministry is a must-have tool for new youth workers, volunteers, seminary professors and students, senior pastors, elders, church boards—even veteran youth workers who’ve been ministering in unstructured environments and are now asking, “What did I miss? What can I still learn?”The first two years of youth ministry are never easy. But never fear. Doug fervently assures us: “Hang on. Hope’s coming!” |
| purpose driven youth ministry conference: Global Youth Ministry Terry Linhart, David A. Livermore, 2011 In the first textbook of its kind, Global Youth Ministry brings together some of the foremost voices in international youth leadership to focus on the theological, theoretical, sociocultural, and historical issues that shape ministry to youth in contexts around the world. |
| purpose driven youth ministry conference: Rebuilding Youth Ministry Christopher Wesley, 2015-03-06 Christopher Wesley is on the front lines of youth ministry. He’s been in the parish trenches, refocusing an unpopular youth program and making it one where teens feel connected, stay involved, and grow in faith. In Rebuilding Youth Ministry, Wesley offers ten indispensable strategies to help you make your youth programs just as successful. Wesley coaches fellow Catholic ministry leaders on how to overcome common hurdles of ministering to young people. Wesley shares how he faced feelings of complacency, underestimated youth, and entertained rather than ministered in his own parish. Wesley built a distinctive program based on small group faith formation and sustained it with the assistance of more than sixty volunteer adult mentors. Wesley lays out ten strategies that helped grow participation in his high school program from nine teens to ninety and the middle school program from forty teens to eighty-five, including: Making your youth program about more than pizza; Pursuing authentic relationships between small groups and mentors; Shaping a dynamic youth ministry team; and Creating a space that’s welcoming to teens. |
| purpose driven youth ministry conference: The Purpose Driven Life Rick Warren, 2012-10-23 Discover and fulfill your God-given purpose by joining the more than thirty-five million others who have embarked on a spiritual journey that started with this #1 New York Times bestselling book by Pastor Rick Warren. Before you were born, God knew what your life had in store for you. His hope for you is to discover the life he created just for you--both here on earth, and forever in eternity. Let Rick Warren guide you as you learn to live out your true purpose. The Purpose Driven Life is more than a book; it's a road map for your spiritual journey. Combining thoughtful verses from Scripture with timely stories and perspectives from Warren's own life, The Purpose Driven Life will help you discover the answer to one of life's most important questions: What on earth am I here for? Throughout The Purpose Driven Life, Warren will teach you to spend time getting to know yourself and your creator in order to live your life to the fullest. Unlocking your true purpose will also reduce your stress, simplify your decisions, increase your satisfaction, and, most importantly, prepare you for eternity. Designed to be read over the course of forty-two days, The Purpose Driven Life will help you see the big picture, giving you a fresh perspective on the way that the pieces of your life fit together. Every chapter of The Purpose Driven Life provides a daily meditation and practical steps to help you uncover and live out your purpose, starting with exploring three essential questions: The Question of Existence: Why am I alive? The Question of Significance: Does my life matter? The Question of Purpose: What on earth am I here for? Each copy of The Purpose Driven Life also includes thoughtful discussion questions, audio Bible studies that go along with every chapter, and access to a supportive online community, giving you the opportunity to dive even deeper into each life-changing lesson. |
| purpose driven youth ministry conference: Gospel-Centered Youth Ministry Cameron Cole, 2016 Youth ministry is an essential part of most evangelical churches. And yet, there is a surprising lack of resources written specifically for youth workers focused on viewing all aspects of youth ministry through a gospel-focused lens. Featuring contributions from a host of experienced youth workers from a wide variety of churches, this how-to manual offers guidance related to every facet of youth ministry, from planning short-term mission trips to working with parents. Theologically rooted yet eminently practical, this handbook will equip youth leaders to effectively shepherd the young people under their care--training them to live faithfully in their homes, churches, and schools. |
| purpose driven youth ministry conference: Youth Ministry That Transforms Merton P. Strommen, Karen Jones, Dave Rahn, 2011-05-03 A first-of-its-kind study of Protestant youth ministers reveals the hopes, frustrations, and effectiveness of today’s youth workers.Of the 7,000 youth workers assembled in 1996 under Atlanta’s Georgia Dome, a sample of 2,130 full-time youth ministers from dozens of Protestant denominations and parachurch organizations answered a battery of exhaustive, deliberate questions covering:What they liked best about youth ministryWhat particularly pleased them in their work with youthWhat they found most encouraging or discouragingTheir biggest obstacle to an effective youth ministryTheir biggest concern in youth ministryTheir answers revealed a dedicated group of professionals, concerned a out the students in their ministries, but troubled with a variety of perplexing issues. And their answers form the backbone of Youth Ministry That Transforms, a comprehensive analysis of this groundbreaking study (funded by the Lilly Endowment) focusing on the hopes, frustrations, and effectiveness of today’s youth workers.Spearheaded by Merton Strommen--one of America’s most exemplary and influential thinkers and authors in youth and family ministry--the research-writing team is joined by Karen E. Jones and Dave Rahn of Huntington (Indiana) College’s Link Institute for Faithful and Effective Youth Ministry, and acknowledged leader in the task of undergirding youth ministry with a research base. These three deliver thorough analysis and sound interpretation regarding the state of youth ministry at the dawn of the 21st century.Youth Ministry That Transforms belongs on the desks and in the classrooms of all who are concerned with this developing profession, including denominational and parachurch leadership, professors, youth ministry students, and thoughtful youth workers themselves. It is also an insightful resource for any who want to understand youth ministers and their profession: senior pastors, executive pastors, and other individuals and committees charged with hiring and supervising youth workers. |
| purpose driven youth ministry conference: Youth Ministry Malan Nel, 2018 |
| purpose driven youth ministry conference: Youth Ministry from the Inside Out Mike Higgs, 2003-06-06 Mike Higgs, a youth worker with over two decades of experience, expresses the great need for youth workers to stop focusing on performance and focus instead on following God in his work so that ministry will become less noise and more substance. |
| purpose driven youth ministry conference: When God Shows Up Mark H. Senter, Mark Senter, 2010-03 A veteran youth ministry expert provides a substantial history of American Protestant youth ministry, helping readers understand trends and changes. |
| purpose driven youth ministry conference: InterGenerate Holly Catterton Allen, 2018-07-10 Leaders in Christian communities are all asking the same question: How can we bring the generations back together? InterGenerate addresses important questions of why we should bring the generations back together, but even more significantly, how we can bring generations back together. In this edited collection, ministers, church leaders, and Christian educators will find valuable, new generational theory perspectives, fresh biblical and theological insights, and practical outcomes backed by current research. InterGenerate offers important guidance on topics including •intergenerational spiritual disciplines, •transitioning from multigenerational to intergenerational, •new research that focuses directly on intergenerational ministry and offers practical outcomes to implement, and •benefits of intergenerational ministry for the most marginalized generations. An exciting and distinctive aspect of InterGenerate is the vast diversity of voice —men and women ranging in age from millennials to baby boomers, representing multiple countries and over a dozen denominations—all seeking ways to become more intentionally intergenerational in their outlook and practice. |
| purpose driven youth ministry conference: Youth Pastor Dr. Houston Heflin, 2010-09-01 A youth pastor—whether paid or unpaid, full-time or part-time, right out of college or right out of retirement—has a big job to do. Actually, anyone who accepts God's call to help young people grow as disciples of Christ has several big jobs to do. The youth minister must be a teacher who can communicate the essentials of the faith; a friend who can listen to and be present with young people; a prophet who challenges teens to live lives of justice and righteousness; and an administrator who can manage the day-to-day logistics of youth ministry. Youth Pastor: The Theology and Practice of Youth Ministry provides a biblical and theological grounding for the many jobs a youth minister does, explains what each of these jobs entails, and helps youth pastors identify where their gifts lie and where they still need to grow. Whether you are a first-time youth minister or a seasoned youth ministry veteran, Youth Pastor gives you valuable tools for evaluating your ministry and vocation. It also serves as an excellent text for undergraduate courses in youth ministry. Table of Contents: Introduction Chapter 1 Becoming All Things in Ministry Chapter 2 Discipling Teacher Chapter 3 Evangelistic Missionary Chapter 4 Pastoral Shepherd Chapter 5 Organized Administrator Chapter 6 Bold Prophet Chapter 7 Compassionate Priest Chapter 8 Spiritual Friend Chapter 9 Equipping Recruiter Chapter 10 Visionary Leader Chapter 11 Faithful Teammate Chapter 12 Discover Your Ministry Style Epilogue: Character and Competence in Ministry Appendix: Youth Ministry Role Inventory |
| purpose driven youth ministry conference: Out of the Box and Loving It! Todd Shaw, 2006-04 |
| purpose driven youth ministry conference: Thriving Youth Groups Jeanne Mayo, 2004 Youth ministry expert Jeanne Mayo grew her youth group from 30 kids to over 1000. Here Mayo shares practical principles for growing ministry through a friendship culture. |
| purpose driven youth ministry conference: Deep Ministry in a Shallow World Chap Clark, Kara Eckmann Powell, 2006 Whether you're struggling to make anything work in your youth ministry or finding that most things are clicking along, this book will help you develop a practical theology---to ask what is happening, what should be happening, and how you can make it happen. Each chapter is followed by discussion questions to help you process in a group or on your own. |
| purpose driven youth ministry conference: Gospel Discipleship Congregation Guide Michelle J. Morris, 2020-03-31 Each congregation has a unique mission field. Several tools for developing disciples and for engaging in discipleship are available to churches; however, the resources assume that the churches using them are similar to the church that created them. With Gospel Discipleship, individuals and churches learn how to engage in self-reflection, which then defines a path that fits their context. The discipleship path for each individual disciple is assessed and determined through the Gospel Discipleship Participant Guide while this Gospel Discipleship Congregation Guide guides the implemntation of the program and assesses the discipleship path for the congregation as a whole. Therefore, the program leader(s) needs the congregation guide while individual particpants need their own participant guide. With Gospel Discipleship, churches can identify a pathway for discipleship applied from one of the four Gospel storytellers: Matthew, Mark, Luke and John. Each had a distinct approach to discipleship which can be applied to a given church's identity, vision, and mission. As disciples are encouraged by the church to step beyond the door and engage the needs of people, they can be sent forth confidently with an awareness of personal, unique gifts, and insights into the actual mission field where they participate with God in changing the world. |
| purpose driven youth ministry conference: Waking to God's Dream Bishop Dick Wills, 2010-10-01 The demands of congregational ministry are many, the rewards sometimes seem few, and burnout becomes a real possibility. Small wonder, then, that churches become stuck in a state of arrested spiritual development. When the pastor is functioning in a survival or maintenance mode, the church's vitality is often the first casualty. Yet Wills's own experience demonstrates that churches can turn around; the wind of the Spirit can be felt anew. This happens when the congregation is infected by the vision of what God is doing in their midst--a vision which the leaders, particularly the pastor, must bring before them. In Waking to God's Dream, Richard Wills shares the spiritual disciplines and insights which he believes account for the transformation of the congregation he serves from a large church in decline to one that is growing and reaching out to its community in a variety of creative ministries. Detailing the steps and initiatives that led to this turnaround, Wills demonstrates how personal commitment on the part of the congregation's leaders and ministers have been the key to the work they have accomplished. |
| purpose driven youth ministry conference: Renewing the Vision , 1997 This volume provides all who minister to young people with an effective blueprint for building a truly meaningful ministry |
| purpose driven youth ministry conference: Giving Up Gimmicks Brian H. Cosby, 2012 Gives youth pastors, youth leaders, and parents a guide on how to lead a gospel-rich youth ministry that makes the means of graceWord, prayer, sacraments, service, and communitycentral to the ministry. |
| purpose driven youth ministry conference: Experiential Youth Ministry Handbook John Losey, 2004 This book provides more than eighty activities youth workers can use to help students connect. |
| purpose driven youth ministry conference: Youth Ministry Nuts & Bolts Duffy Robbins, 1991 Helps the busy youth worker organize and understand his or her ministry between meetings: preparation, prayer, personal commitment, building relationships with parents, goal-setting and time-management, evaluating, budgeting, recruiting, and training volunteers. |
| purpose driven youth ministry conference: Wired: For a Life of Worship Leader's Guide Louie Giglio, Stuart Hall, 2011-07-13 What They're Wired For Athlete or musician, quiet or “the life of the party”—every student you encounter is unique. No two are the same, but all have something in common: each is wired for worship. Not just any worship, but for that of their Creator! Designed for high school and collegiate settings, the Wired Leader’s Guide assists leaders in challenging students to know God’s purpose for their lives and guide them in fulfilling it. Mirroring the student version of Wired, the Leader’s Guide contains additional teaching resources and ideas for group interaction, as well as the same thirty-day worship journey to explore the depth of God’s character as a path to know Him more intimately. |
| purpose driven youth ministry conference: Getting it Right General Conference of Seventh-Day Adventists, Youth Dept Staff, General Conference of Seventh-Day Adventists. Youth Department, 2005 |
| purpose driven youth ministry conference: The Purpose Driven Church Rick Warren, Richard Warren, 1995 This is a five-point strategy for attracting and spiritually maturing the unchurched, from the pastor of Saddleback Church. |
| purpose driven youth ministry conference: Christus Vivit Pope Francis, 2019-04-04 To young Christians of the world, Pope Francis has a message for you: Christ is alive, and he wants you to be alive! In his fourth apostolic exhortation, Christus Vivit, Pope Francis encapsulates the work of the 2018 synod of bishops on Young People, The Faith, and Vocational Discernment. Pope Francis has always had a special relationship with young people, and in his fatherly love for you he shows that: You can relate to young people in Scripture who made a difference You identify with the Christ who is always young You face difficult issues in the world today You yearn for the truth of the Gospel You are capable of amazing things when you respond to the Gospel You learn and grow with help from the faithful of all generations You need bold and creative youth ministry You can discover who God made you to be You are urged to pray for discernment Christus Vivit is written for and to young people, but Pope Francis also wrote it for the entire Church, because, as he says, reflecting on our young people inspires us all. May the Holy Spirit urge you on as you run this race. The Church needs your momentum, your intuitions, your faith. We need them! And when you arrive where we have not yet reached, have the patience to wait for us. |
| purpose driven youth ministry conference: Speaking to Teenagers Duffy Robbins, Doug Fields, 2007 To equip youth workers (paid and/or volunteer), Sunday school teachers, and pastors to be more effective communicators of the gospel in the context of youth ministry. |
| purpose driven youth ministry conference: Beyond the Congregation Christopher P. Scheitle, 2010-09-09 Christianity in the United States has long been organized around congregations and denominations. However, a different type of organization operating outside of these traditional structures is claiming an increasingly important place in the religious market. The growth of Christian nonprofits, popularly called parachurch organizations, has been recognized by churchgoers and social scientists alike as an important development that is transforming the composition and dynamics of American Christianity. The size, resources, and activities of this population have made it the public face of American Christianity and altered the relationship between individuals, churches and denominations. Beyond the Congregation utilizes data on almost 2,000 of the largest and most influential Christian nonprofits in the United States to answer some of the key questions raised by these organizations. What explains the growth of Christian nonprofits? What activities are they pursuing? How are they funded and how do they use those funds? Beyond the Congregation provides a much needed examination of these issues that is accessible and informative for scholars, nonprofit executives, religious leaders and the general public. |
| purpose driven youth ministry conference: The Jesus Gap Jen Bradbury, Andrew Root, 2014-10-15 Is Jesus God?Did Jesus sin?Can you be a Christian and not believe in Jesus?The way Christian youth answer these and other questions about the basics of their faith might surprise you. Their answers, drawn from a national research study, are found in The Jesus Gap. It explores not only the depths of what Christian youth believe about Jesus, but also how that belief translates into a life of faith.Combining focused research with years of diverse youth ministry experience, Jen Bradbury is at once insightful, passionate, and practical in her approach to making Jesus the heart of youth ministry. This book offers inspiration and hope that the truth of who Jesus is still has the power to transform the lives of our youth.Because at the end of the day, if youth don't leave our youth ministries knowing the true Jesus, then we're pretty much missing the point! |
| purpose driven youth ministry conference: A New Kind of Leader Reggie Joiner, 2017-01-20 You probably have a short list of people who impacted you during your childhood and teenage years. When those individuals intersected with your world, they became a new kind of leader for you. They were not new in the sense that they had never led anything before or they were radically different from other leaders. They were new because … their influence gave you a new direction. their belief in you gave you a new sense of worth. they showed up at a new phase of your life, and their faith helped you solidify your faith in a new and authentic way. If someone showed up for you, then the question is, “How will you show up for someone else?” A New Kind of Leader, by Reggie Joiner, explores seven beliefs and practical applications that will cause you to reimagine how you influence the next generation. Because when you hold the door open for a kid, you hold the door open for the future. |
| purpose driven youth ministry conference: Reinventing Youth Ministry (Again) Wayne Rice, 2010-09-11 Reflecting on four-decade-long a career marked by wild social turbulence and remarkably creative and innovative ministry--including game-changing initiatives such as Youth Specialties and the Wittenburg Door--Wayne Rice turns his eye toward those who are to come. What does the future of youth require of the future of youth ministry? For three-dimensional people at the greatest cusp of change in their lives, set against a backdrop of a constantly changing world, it requires youth, parents, congregations and youth workers alike to undergird the activities of their ministry with a commitment to reality--to remember that the gospel is always, ultimately, a matter of a flesh-and-blood God pouring his life into his flesh-and-blood children. |
| purpose driven youth ministry conference: Raising the Bar Alvin L. Reid, 2002 Two-thirds of today's teens are interested in having a meaningful relationship with God, yet less than one-third of them are active in a local church. These statistics indicate that it is time to change how the church does youth ministry, and this compelling book provides an impassioned plea for the church to set higher standards for ministry to teens and their families. |
| purpose driven youth ministry conference: The Relationship Principles of Jesus Tom Holladay, 2008 The book walks you day by day, step by step, through how to live out six fundamental truths taught by Jesus. |
| purpose driven youth ministry conference: Taking Theology to Youth Ministry Andrew Root, 2012-08-21 Even if you know you’re called to youth ministry and are passionate about the students in your group, you’ve probably had a few of those moments when you’ve wondered why you’re doing certain things in your ministry, or wondered why you’re even doing youth ministry in the first place. If you’ve ever stopped to ask, “What’s the point of youth ministry?” ... In Taking Theology to Youth Ministry, Andrew Root invites you along on a journey with Nadia—a fictional youth worker who is trying to understand the “why” behind her ministry. Her narrative, along with Root’s insights, help you uncover the action of God as it pertains to your own youth ministry, and encourage you to discover how you can participate in that action. As you join this theological journey, you’ll find yourself exploring how theology can and should influence the way you do youth ministry. |
| purpose driven youth ministry conference: Youth Ministry Management Tools 2.0 Mike A. Work, Ginny Olson, 2014 Youth Ministry Management Tools 2.0 by Mike Work and Ginny Olson is an up-to-date revision of a popular, best-selling resource manual that helps youth workers with the administrative side of leading a youth ministry. |
| purpose driven youth ministry conference: The Perfect Program and Other Fairy Tales David Chow, 2005 Seasoned youth pastor David Chow has some engaging anecdotes and tested advice to remind youth pastors that God influences their work even when it's not perfect. |
| purpose driven youth ministry conference: Dogged Out For Love Shirley Wright, 2006-03-29 Love is something everybody needs and doesn’t know what it really means without knowing the love of God. For in Him only is there real love. And we can’t even begin to understand or fathom what love really means without Him. We look for it in all the wrong places. But we will never find it there. It’s not in mankind; it’s not in anything in this world the way we perceive it. Until we realize that it only comes from God, we will only find hurt and pain and misery. Believe me, I know, there are lots of Christians still looking for love in the wrong places. It’s sad to say. And we are being destroyed and don’t understand why. So, we think God has let us down and we blame Him for our depression, hurt, and pain. We wonder why the Lord doesn’t help us. But what we don’t realize is that God is helping us, even though we don’t know it. You see, the devil is fooling us. He is taking our focus off Jesus and putting it on people and things, so we can’t be all that God has for us to be. The failure is not in God, it’s in us. You may say, “I gave him or her all the love I had and he or she betrayed me. How could they do me like that?” But what we fail to realize is that God is our first love and we must receive His love and give Him our love first. John 10:10 says, “The thief comes to kill, steal and destroy.” And that is what he has been doing. But you don’t have to let him get away with it. Jesus came that we might have life and more abundantly. Otherwise, Jesus is life in every area of our lives if we let him. We need to ask Him to lead and guide us in all things. Proverbs 3:5-6 says, “trust in the Lord with all thine heart, lean not unto thine own understanding, in all they ways acknowledge Him and He shall direct thy path.” So the failure is not in God, it’s in us for not seeking God’s help. Believe me, I know; been there, done that. I gave all I had to give to the wrong men, yes, men. I say men because I kept trying to please them so they would love me. But it didn’t work. They betrayed me, jumped on me, and stepped on me like a floor mat that said “Welcome.” I know how it feels to be dogged out for love, or so-called love. It sucks! As we receive God’s love, then and only then will we know what love is really about. It’s not a fancy or fairy tale. God’s love is divine. He is not looking at your faults; He is looking at your needs. Man’s love, so-called love, that is, is cold, taking, and not wanting to give. They lie, they cheat, they take away our pride and self-esteem, they pull us down, and then they have the nerve to tell us it’s our fault that they treat us the way they do. The devil is a liar. The devil wants us to believe that we have to take all kinds of abuse; that is just the way it is. But the devil is a liar. We don’t need that kind of man, because you see, he’s not a real man anyway. He’s just something wearing a pair of pants. Remember, we can make it just us and God. God will bring us through. But we must learn to trust Him. I have been through hell and high waters. I’ve been a floor mat, a punching bag. I’ve been stressed out; I have even tried to take my life a few times when I was younger. But I thank God that He said, “You shall live and not die.” Satan was trying to take me out to stop me. Now I know what it is to be dogged out and kicked to the curb. I know how it feels to be turned inside out, not knowing if you are coming or going, not knowing what to do next. For some so-called love. As far as I am concerned, they can keep it. I don’t need it and neither do you. Why take less when we can have the best? God did not make woman to be a man’s floor mat. He made us to be his helpmate. But we can’t help someone if they don’t want to take it. |
PURPOSE Definition & Meaning - Merriam-Webster
The meaning of PURPOSE is something set up as an object or end to be attained : intention. How to use purpose in a sentence. …
PURPOSE | English meaning - Cambridge Dictionary
PURPOSE definition: 1. why you do something or why something exists: 2. If you do something on purpose, you do it…. Learn …
Purpose Definition | What Is Purpose - Greater Good
May 6, 2025 · To psychologists, purpose is an abiding intention to achieve a long-term goal that is both personally meaningful and …
Purpose - Wikipedia
Purpose is an abiding intention to achieve a long-term goal that is both personally meaningful and makes a positive mark on …
Purpose - Definition, Meaning & Synonyms | Vocabulary.com
When you do something with purpose, you do it with determination. When your activities have a purpose, you have an aim or …
PURPOSE Definition & Meaning - Merriam-Webster
The meaning of PURPOSE is something set up as an object or end to be attained : intention. How to use purpose in a sentence. Synonym Discussion of Purpose.
PURPOSE | English meaning - Cambridge Dictionary
PURPOSE definition: 1. why you do something or why something exists: 2. If you do something on purpose, you do it…. Learn more.
Purpose Definition | What Is Purpose - Greater Good
May 6, 2025 · To psychologists, purpose is an abiding intention to achieve a long-term goal that is both personally meaningful and makes a positive mark on the world. The goals that foster a …
Purpose - Wikipedia
Purpose is an abiding intention to achieve a long-term goal that is both personally meaningful and makes a positive mark on the world. It is part of the topic of intentionality and goal-seeking …
Purpose - Definition, Meaning & Synonyms | Vocabulary.com
When you do something with purpose, you do it with determination. When your activities have a purpose, you have an aim or intention in mind. This noun also has a third meaning: "function, role, …
