More Than Dodgeball | Youth Ministry Blog by Josh Griffin

Josh GriffinMore Posts HSM Parent Letter Summer Experiment

One of our amazing summer interns, a journalism major at Pepperdine, is helping launch a 3-month experiment in HSM. In our 5-year plan for our ministry, I have us slated to go after parents with focused efforts in 2011, so this is exciting to say the least. We’re going to do a series of summer newsletters for parents – lot of info on what’s going on, what’s ahead and arm them with ideas and discussion starters for their students.

I know it is critically important to equip parents to disciple their kids, and for too long student ministry has aimed to take on that primary responsibility. We’re using The Parent Link (they’ve got a 30-day trial going on right now) as our basis for the newsletters, and highly customizing it to our own needs.

It goes out the door tomorrow – PDF to an email list and a few printed copies at the info area, too!

JG

4 View Comments July 2, 2009

Josh GriffinMore Posts HSM Weekend in Review: Volume 54

Weekend Teaching Series: GROW

Sermon in a Sentence: As we grow up physically, emotionally, and socially, we also need to grow spiritually and put ourselves in a position to allow God to transform our lives.
Weekend Scale of Difficulty: 3 out of 10
Service Length: 72 minutes

Understandable Message: Jason Petty, our pastor of discipleship, mixed things up a bit and challenged students with a message devoted to showing the importance of growing spiritually. Because all healthy things grow, the goal of our spiritual growth is to look more like Jesus. However, growing spiritually is difficult without a teachable heart, which God will give us if we are willing. We have to put ourselves in that position to see God. Petty gave students deep truths to think over and made sure there were a ton of resources available to for students to grab after the service.

Volunteer/Student Involvement: Students ran cameras, lights and sound. Volunteers also greeted and did setup/cleanup.

Element of Fun/Positive Environment: We aired a video Jake recorded on how to approach HSM, including how to walk, how to take a bulletin and pen, and how to interact with the greeters. Fun! Also, we had a “Bible Ninja” video where students gave an infomercial for Bible Institute and expressed how much they wanted to understand the Bible, but could never seem to do it. Exciting and hopefully thought provoking!

Music Playlist: Surrender, This Is My Desire, Center

Favorite Moment: During his message, Jason made sure to not play the guilt card on students as to why they need to grow with Christ. He shared a story that continually made him spiritually guilty on how Jesus was waiting in a coffee shop and crying because we forget to spend time with him. Instead, Jason compared meeting with Jesus as the excitement and passion of how we interact with the guy or girl we “really like” and how our pursuit of that person drives us to want to communicate and get to know that person better and deeper.

(This report was written by the amazing summer-intern Kyle Cleveland, I was gone this weekend to do a wedding)

Add Comment July 1, 2009

Josh GriffinMore Posts Killball Cup 2009 Highlight Countdown Video

My sophomore guys team didn’t take the title this year … just 2 of the 3 tournaments building up to the main event. Next time!

JG

4 View Comments July 1, 2009

Josh GriffinMore Posts New Look for MoreThanDodgeball.com

mtdb_new

Here it is – the new look for More Than Dodgeball!

We’ve still got about 65 little tweaks left to make on the template before it is technically finished – we did enough testing to at least roll it out tonight. As we kick off version 3 of the now 3-year old site, I thought it might be fitting to go back to the significance of the name.

So what does the name “More Than Dodgeball” mean?

More Than Dodgeball is simply a way of expressing our heart’s desire to see youth ministry as more than entertainment, glorified babysitting or church “lite.” More Than Dodgeball reminds me daily of my calling to serve God by serving students — reached with the Gospel of Jesus Christ, connected in a small group with a caring adult, growing in their faith on their own and serving God in the church and with their lives.

Please know I love dodgeball, we even played a version of it a few weeks ago in our youth ministry – but I see it as a symbol of student ministry past where purposeless activity and busyness stood as a false measure of success. Student ministry should be judged about changed lives and hearts being drawn closer to Jesus Christ, which is what we want to be all about.

More. Than. Dodgeball.

JG

3 View Comments July 1, 2009

Josh GriffinMore Posts Book Review: Thank God It’s Monday

Enjoyed my first audiobook on my walks last week – I’ve still been enjoying the silence, but thought it might be fun to listen to something for a change. Thank God It’s Monday is about strategies to unlock the potential in your team and make for a remarkable workplace. Good stories, good principles, lots of passion – all focused on how your workplace helps or hinders productivity. Good stuff – and although it is different “hearing” someone speak – but you get so much more personality as well as good content. B-

Add Comment July 1, 2009

Josh GriffinMore Posts The Old Republic Trailer

Oh man, how have I missed this? Looks incredible.

JG

3 View Comments July 1, 2009

Josh GriffinMore Posts Youth Worker Sacrifices Himself to Save Another

Chris sent me this link to a news story about a youth pastor who gave up his life saving a kid who was drowning. Here’s a clip of the powerful story, our hearts go out to the family for sure.

According to the Itasca County Sheriff’s Department, they received a 911 call at about 5:30 p.m. Sunday.

Paul Shorma and Kayla Domagall were amongst the crowd of 30 on the beach outside Zorbaz restaurant on the shore of Pokegama Lake when the call for help arrived.

According to witnesses, a group of young people were on a house boat on the lake, en route to a sandbar to swim. That’s when witnesses say the weather turned and the waves on the lake grew to about 3-foot swells.

One youth was struggle with the waves when Junker and Hermiston went out to help him with a life jacket. The youth was able to make it to safety but both men didn’t make it back.

The community where this happened consists of about 8,000 people so you can imagine the HUGE impact on the town. He grew up in Grand Rapids, Now was the youth pastor at the Baptist Church and his dad is the Senior pastor at the Christian and Missionary Alliance Church in the same town. More information and to make a donation to his trust click here.

JG

senior pastor

1 View Comments July 1, 2009

Josh GriffinMore Posts 5 Ways Parents Can Help Your Next Mission Trip

We’re sending teams to Africa and the Dominican Republic this week – I found this little section in one of the training notebooks I thought might be useful to you. 5 ways parents can help their student with the mission trip:

1. Please take time to pray with your student before they go. Pray for their safe travel, for good health, that God would use them to change lives, and that He would grow them more into His likeness on this trip.

2. Please double check their packing. DON’T let them overpack. An iPod and camera are OK, but they don’t need to bring all their electronic gadgets with them to Africa. NO LATOPS or other bulky/expensive electronics. And, it’s Africa…not a fashion runway…so don’t let them pack a ton of clothes. Also, help them think through the carry-on bag. As a team, we need to be prepared to have luggage not show up at the airport. It happens all the time, so pack a carry-on accordingly.

3. Be prepared to not hear from your child everyday! I know some of you have talked about international call plans on your child’s cell phone. If you do this, you still need to be prepared to not talk to your child everyday. They will not be allowed to use their cell phone unless we are at the hotel. With the time differences, it is very difficult to plan talking times. We will have two cell phones, and every student will have the chance to call home when it is convenient for the team and in case of emergency, so you will hear from them. Also, we will encourage your students to email home, and we’ve set up a blog for you to check in on the team where we will post pics and videos.

4. Please be on time to pick up your student from LAX. They are going to be very tired, and very excited to see you. If you need help making pick up arrangements, please don’t hesitate to email or call Danny. We can certainly help arrange that if you are working and cannot make it. No worries! Just let us know ahead of time so we’re not waiting at the airport after 30 hours on a plane … haha.

5. Be prepared to be patient with your student when they return home. It takes a few days to recover from traveling internationally. Jetlag and culture shock are real. Your students will be experiencing life-changing sights, smells, sounds, and stories. Be ready to let them process that safely with you at home. Ask them question. Pray with them. Cry with them. Look at pictures together. Listen. It’s our expectation that they will come home a little different from this experience. Anticipate that and be ready to help them talk about it.

JG