Phew!  The past few weeks have been pretty rough.  For about four weeks now, I’ve been dealing with a major headache like I’ve never experienced before.  The first time I noticed it getting really bad was coming back from the CAUS Youth Convention with our students.  I was riding back on the bus and my head hurt so bad that I could barely move.

I went to a sinus specialist first, because I’ve had breathing problems all of my life and… well… we just thought it was time.  They found out that my septum is crooked but that my sinus, adenoids, and tonsils looked all right.  He suggested that my septum is probably causing most of my sinus issues; either that or allergies, which he also tested me for (still waiting on the results).  They put me on a nasal irrigation routine that really helped me breath much better, but did nothing to help with the headaches.  In fact, they ended up getting worse.  At the recommendation of the doc, I quit the routine until my next visit with him this Tuesday. Here’s the x-ray of of my nasal cavities; the black areas are the air passageways…

Next, I went to the Community Health Center because the head pains were getting pretty unbearable.  The walk-in doctor asked me a bunch of questions, told me that he wanted me to get a cat scan to check for “further possibilities”, and put me on a prescription pain medicine until they can get something figured out.  The pain meds have taken care of the worst of the pain and made our two recent trips (to Atlanta for the NYWC and to Pierre/Gettysburg for Thanksgiving) much more pleasant. The only other bad thing… I broke out in a crazy rash, that still hasn’t totally disappeared, the day before we left for Atlanta… (groan)

It took my insurance company a while to approve the cat scan, but I’m finally going in tomorrow at 11:20 AM.  I would SO MUCH appreciate your prayers.  I’m hoping to find some answers and relief soon.

My top three tweeted words, according to TweetCloud, are “thanx”, “youth”, and “time”.  Interesting about “time”…  I’ll have to watch for that and see how it pops up.  How about you?

It’s the youth-led services weekend at my church here in Rapid City, SD. Our theme this year is “Don’t Let the Devil Get You Down”.

The great thing about doing student ministry at Destiny is that students are already plugged in and stepping out in ministry positions every week. Our pastors champion the idea of inter-generational worship. This is just a chance for our congregation-at-large to celebrate and encourage the gifts that are already present and at work in our local body.

For us, this year’s services looks like this…

• Sing a Few Songs – with our music/worship time being led by students on instruments and vocals
  
• Scripture – students are great at reciting scripture from memory… we like to mix it into our singing time
• Comedic Musical – we’re taking our cue from Improv Everywhere and we’re gonna spoof their recent viral hit, “Grocery Store Musical”, by changing a few words around and singing “Let’s squish our kids together!”
• Sketch / Drama - we’ve got some really talented drama students and we love to use scripts from The Skit Guys to let them do their thing; we’ll be using this one this weekend.
• Human Video - we’re actually gonna “spray paint” one of our students on stage (white T-shirt, sprayed black) to the tune of Tonex’s song, “Bl3nd”. (NOTE: we’re gonna use black hair spray for safety — and smell — reasons)
• Video Highlights – students love to see themselves on video and the congregation loves to see students passionately pursuing God; our group just got back from an awesome youth convention with a perfect highlights video in tow — BONUS!
• Story - students have stories that they can’t wait to share about how God has changed or influenced them from this past weekend; this is the perfect opportunity for them to share and encourage others in the same moment!

This is something that has become an annual highlight for many at Destiny. The students love it because they get to have a platform to share their gifts to a larger audience. The congregation loves it because the student’s enthusiasm is contagious. I love it because I get to watch students touching people’s live in profound ways.

What about you? Are you doing student-led services where you’re at? Tell us about it!

If you missed the original “Student-led Services” post, you can read it here.

This post was originally posted at YouthSpecialties.com; follow the discussion there or start a new one here.

Our cat, Sunshine, is a unique little guy… he’s four-years-old.  Just watch…

[video enclosure]

Back to teaching teens to worship…

Let’s take our lenses off and refocus on what worship really is again.

My pastor shared the following verse this morning about our roles as worshipers…

Romans 12:1 NLV – And so, dear brothers and sisters, I plead with you to give your bodies to God because of all he has done for you. Let them be a living and holy sacrifice—the kind he will find acceptable. This is truly the way to worship him.

In essence, our worship… true worship, is offering our LIVES to God — every part of it.

Recently, as part of our effort to move students towards a broader and more biblical definition of worship in their lives, I shared a message titled “Worship: Why it Matters”. Some of you may recognize that title as I, admittedly, stole all my points from Louie Giglio, the founder of Passion City Church and the 268 Generation. (Listen to Mr. Giglio preach part 1 and part 2 of this message in it’s entirety here.)

I was listening to the Passion Message Podcast when I first heard it, and I knew that I wanted to share this with our students. Our teenagers need to hear that worship matters because…

GOD IS WORTHY – There is a worship chorus going on right now that is bigger and even more brilliant than the U2 tour. We can join in the anthem and be a part of worshiping the God who is, was, and will ALWAYS be worthy of our praise! I hope that our ministries make much of God, and that we never tire of making His name famous in our student communities.

YOU ARE A WORSHIPER – Yes, everybody is worshiping SOMETHING or SOMEONE. May we never get to the end of our lives and find that we were worshiping something much less than God.

THERE IS A WAR OVER YOUR WORSHIP – Satan’s an adversary and will do anything he can to chip away at God’s worth in our lives. That’s why people are bowing down to false gods all over the earth. They’ve been lied to and they’ve believed the lie. Don’t fall into that trap!

WE BECOME WHAT WE WORSHIP – Have you ever seen a teenage boy completely change personalities because of a new girl in his life? How about a young music fan changing his whole wardrobe for his favorite band or performing artist? We need to watch what we worship because it’s a terrible thing to worship the wrong thing and then BECOME like what we have worshiped instead of being transformed into God’s likeness.

IT’S FUEL FOR THE SOUL – Okay, maybe this one’s about us (grin)… Worship matters because it keeps our spiritual selves alive. King David actually talked to his soul, saying, “Why so downcast?” (Psalm 43:5). When we worship with our lives, even through our darkest struggles, God honors that and pours life and direction into our spirit-man.

Thank you, Mr. Giglio, for the good reminder about what true worship is all about.

If you missed the original “It’s Not About Us” post, you can read it here.

This post was originally posted at YouthSpecialties.com; follow the discussion there or start a new one here.