One of the guys at the conference put this video together.

The final day at the conference flew by and before I knew it I was rocking out on the last night of the conference with the band Kutless. Overall the whole trip was a great, energizing experience and I’m planning on going back to it again next year. The challenge now is to take all the stuff buzzing around in my head and process it.

I got back in town yesterday at 3:30 AM. Because of weather conditions at O’Hare I sat on my United flight for 3 hours waiting to take off. Thankfully we did and I didn’t have to stay in Chicago for the night. I sat next to a former Olympic skier named Jean-Marc Rozon from Canada on the flight home. He was coming to Spokane to do an aerial demonstration.

Anyways, the winter seems to be slowly winding down up here and I’ve got to start setting up for Fuel tonight. Peace…

Someone has gone and made a Garden State type movie about my homeland of Humboldt County. You can check out the trailer here.

Last night was a great kick-off to this weekend and today was a long, quick day. The conference is 3 days long and absolutely jammed with events to be a part of. Besides the seminars and general sessions there are optional lunch, dinner, and in between times to meet with various leaders. Basically from 9 AM until 10 PM I had just enough time to grab a meal.

The Duke Energy Center, where the conference is being held, is a massive place. So massive that there are actually 2 other events going on right now. One of them is a very sweet car show, displaying ever major car companies newest models. The other event would be probably right below a clown convention in my list of scariest events to stumble on. This afternoon I took an alternate route through the center and found that there was a Cat Show going on. As quickly as possible I made my way through a foyer of cat ladies that looked just like…cat ladies.

Tomorrow will be the last full day here in Cincy then a half day to close things out on Monday.

The National Youth Workers Conference kicked off today and I’m at it.
I just beat the storm into Cincinnati yesterday, spent some time with my good friends Dan and Wendy Spurling last night and except for a hotel reservation hiccup, am enjoying my time here thus far (I love throwing in some olde English every once in a blog post). So far the most valuable thing I’ve learned on this trip is to double check your hotel reservations. Apparently I only booked my room for one night and since the hotel is maxed out for the conference I had to switch hotels this morning. It turned out to be a blessing in disguise as I found an internet coupon for the Hyatt across the street, which is much nicer, for less.

The conference doesn’t really start until tonight but the place is buzzing with energy and youth pastors of all shapes and sizes. I participated in a couple of pre-conference events this afternoon and will be heading to the opening session shortly which features Tony Dungy, head coach of the Indianapolis Colts, and musician Sara Groves.

The last few days have been spent with the first visitors from my side of the family since we moved here. We had the first back to back sunny days since winter began so we were able to get out a bit and show them around. My beautiful wifey who just flew off to Seattle this morning with Jude, beat me to the blog posting. So you can check out a few pics she put up on our family blog.

The next week plus is going to be a change of pace.
Some of my family will be flying in tomorrow (North from Cali) to hang with us for a few days on their way to the Moscow Jazz Festival. Then Jess and Jude will be heading West to Seattle to spend time with here family over there. And finally, I’ll be heading East to the National Youth Ministry Conference in Ohio.

Go to google and type: “find Chuck Norris” then click on ‘I’m Feeling Lucky’

How much do you know about your faith? That is, if you even have one.

It’s a good question to ask yourself, especially if you’ve grown up in a particular belief. I went through an intense questioning of my faith for a couple of years and in the end found it to be the only one that truly resonated with me and answered my questions about life. Does that mean I have no more questions? Of course not. I’ve found that if I don’t ask myself tough questions and continually examine what I believe then the word faith might as well be substituted for culture or social club. If I were presented with hard facts that directly contradicted what I know to be true I would totally evaluate my Christian beliefs.

With that said, I read an interesting article recently (you can read a re-post of it here) about how DNA evidence has directly contradicted a major tenet of the Mormon faith. I’m not anti-Mormon in any way but since we’ve moved to Eastern Washington I’ve noticed their presence quite a bit more and so this article was more intriguing. As I’ve read about their beliefs (and their hundreds of doctrinal changes) over the years I can’t help but wonder how - as a ‘faith’- it’s done so well. Just like a lot of Christians don’t really know some of their core beliefs I’ve found that most Mormons know very little. I guess in a lot of religious circles ignorance really is bliss.

I realized after that last post that I haven’t done such a good job updating folks on what’s been going on since we moved here to the Northwestern most state of the USA. So here are the latest details of Life at/in Liberty (Lake).

Family
Since we’ve moved here the biggest changes with family have - of course - been with our little dude, Jude. In the 3 months since we’ve been here he’s started walking, which quickly turned into running. He’s also said his first sentence, “It’s good.” The kiddo’s personality is coming out more and more and Momma and Papa are finding out that it’s a very strong-willed one.
Jess and I have really enjoyed the winter here - snow and all - and are making new friends, Jess probably faster than me. The typical adjustment period with relationships has been in effect but it’s going well thus far.

Ministry/Work
This area of life has been a giant challenge. No matter how comfortable you are in what you’re gifted/called/experienced in doing, when you change jobs there is a quick learning curve. Taking on two major roles (Worship and Youth) has been stretching but so far it’s going well. The worship team is coming along nicely and we’ve got a good group of people with very positive attitudes and accepting to change. There is a lot of work/teaching to be done with the congregation as a whole on what ‘worship’ really is (i.e. not just singing songs).

The youth ministry is charging forward with some momentum. After not having a Youth Pastor for a bit the ministry had dwindled down to a dozen or so students. A few months in we’ve got around 40-50 that come on Wednesday night and a solid core of 14 students that are on the “Ministry Team”, which is a group that Jess and I are working closely with and will be giving responsibilities to in the coming weeks and months. Instead of calling it a ‘Youth Group’ we came up with a name that would fit our identity more - Fuel. I threw together a blog and myspace for Fuel which I’ll be tweaking over the next few months. I’m excited about the potential that Fuel has to be a positive force in the lives of youth in this community and God is already answering some of my prayers!

Personal
After a busy summer leading into a life-changing move I haven’t been writing much lately but have gotten back on track with my reading. Most of the books I’m reading right now could possibly be considered research for some of the things I’m thinking about writing about, but we’ll have to see.
Because our apartment is so close to the church I’ve had a lot more time with Jess and Jude during the day, usually being able to go home for lunch. It’s been great especially since 2 days a week I don’t get home until after Jude is asleep.

We’ll that’s the quick update. Tomorrow is Sunday so I’ve got a busy morning in store…off to bed.