Weekend Recap

1.  My weekend started off with some unexpected and not very enjoyable excitement.  Friday afternoon I was in a pretty bad car wreck.  My car basically got tore up from the back and the front and my neck is pretty sore, however I'm very thankful that Jamie and Jace were not in the car and I didn't have any major injuries considering it could have been a lot worse.  Thank You Lord.

2.  Friday night we hung out with friends and watched "How To Train a Dragon."  This weekend we also watched "Inception" and "Charlie St. Cloud."  Out of all 3 movies "Inception" was my favorite and "Charlie St. Cloud" was a definite disappointment.

3.  Saturday my neck was pretty sore so I did a lot of chillin around the house, organizing mail, hanging with Jamie and Jace and did a lot of reading.

4.  We also hit up Barnes and Noble and I purchased 3 books: Crazy Love, Death By Meeting and The Blessed Life.  I'm really looking forward to reading all 3 of these books!  I'm going to read Death By Meeting first because I really want to be on point and efficient with meetings I lead.

5.  Our family has been missing out on Barnes and Noble, Jace loved it and we will visit it more often, especially during these colder months!

6.  Sunday at People's Church was great as usual.  Pastor Herbert preached a great message titled I Quit Cheating On My Wife, check it out at www.peopleschurch.tv.  Jr. High also went really well, we had some new students and in every experience a student gave their life to Christ!

7.  Sunday night we indulged in a pizzookie (a cookie in a pizza pan dish with ice cream on top) from BJ's Restaurant, if you haven't had one go get one this week!!!  The only down side is I gotta hit up the gym to burn off those extra calories.

8.  I finished two books this weekend, whoohoo!  I finished In A Pit With A Lion On A Snowy Day by Mark Batterson and Green by my youth pastor friend Rodney Wardwell.  I enjoyed both books!

Weekend Recap

1.  Sunday we had 3 great Jr. High experiences!  Our attendance was good and we had 14 students give their lives to Christ.

2.  In my message I shared with my students the 4 greatest moments in my life, here they are:  1st is when I gave my life to Christ, 2nd is when I married Jamie, 3rd is when Jace was born and will be tied when Cali is born, 4th is when the Colts won the Super Bowl...JK, it's in my top 10 but my 4th is when I've seen or heard about people close to me giving their lives to Christ.  There is no greater reward then seeing people give their lives to Jesus!

3.  This weekend I finished a two week fast, it was both refreshing spiritually as well as physically.  I definitely felt closer to God, got clear direction about Epic and my life and lost about 15 pounds.

4.  My first post-fast meal was Orange Chicken from the Cheesecake Factory, we celebrated Jamie's birthday there Sunday night since it fell on a Wed during the fast.

5.  I was hoping the Super Bowl would feature the Jets vs the Packers, only the Packers made it and I will be cheering for them to win it all!

6.  I'm almost done reading Mark Batterson's book "In A Pit With A Lion On A Snowy Day."  This book has really challenged me spiritually to take risks, move forward through uncertainty and have a greater trust in God.

7.  Saturday night we had community group, I love doing life with other believers, especially those in our community group.

8.  Friday I watched the movie, "To Save A Life", I highly recommend it!  It was a very realistic and thought provoking ministry in regards to what teenagers are facing when it comes to peer pressure and God.

9.  My Buckeyes are tearing it up on the hardwood, we may have come up short on the grid iron but we are looking real good for a National BBall Championship!  The Thunder are also tearing it up!

My Resolutions

Not that anyone would care but here are some of my New Year's Resolutions:


1.  Sleep in my bed.  No I'm not in the dog house, lol, last year I got in the bad habit of falling asleep to the TV on the coach.  Sometimes my mind races so veggin out in the tv put me to sleep but no more!
2.  Lift weights consistently.  I haven't lifted weights in years so this year I'm getting back into the hitting the weights.

3.  I'm going to attempt to eat no red meat except once a month.  I'm just being real, if I'm near a Five Guys, Fogo De Chao, Texas De Brazil or Nic's I'm going to eat some red meat :).

4.  I'm not going to drink any pop this year except for when we take visiting guests to Pops, again trying to keep it real :).

5.  Read one book a month.  Last year I did some reading but I want to do more this year.  

6.  I'm not going to watch tv while Jace is awake unless it's a major sports event (playoffs, march madness stuff like that).

7.  I'm going to do my devotions in the morning.  I'm not much of a morning person so a lot of times I will pray and read my bible at night but I'm going to change it up this year.

8.  Get my weight to under 200 pounds.  Brian Rush/Vernon Deas are my inspiration!

I'm 3 weeks into the new year and right now I'm on track with all my resolutions.  If you read this blog you have my permission to ask me how I'm doing on any one of these resolutions!

What is 220?

220 is a new 4 month discipleship program we have for our high school students at Epic.  The students who are approved to be in 220 program will be doing the following:

- Weekly Scripture Memorization.
- Read through the New Testament.
- Serve at Epic every week.
- Participate in 2 service projects.
- Attend special teachings led by myself and Jason Patterson.
- And more!

This program is designed to help students go to the next level in their relationship with God.  I'm super excited to see the growth, life change and impact these students are going to have on their world!

Students can get 220 applications in the high school room, the deadline for turning in applications is Wednesday, Jan. 26th.

Happy Birthday Jamie!

Today is my beautiful wife's birthday.  In honor of her special day here are some things I appreciate about Jamie:

1.  She's an amazing wife.  Jamie is very supportive, loving, caring and I'm extremely blessed to be married to her.  She is my better half and I'm a better person because of her.  I thank God for bringing her into my life.

2.  She's a great mother.  I love watching Jamie interact with Jace and her excitement for Cali who is on the way.  Jace knows and love's his mommy very much and she truly is outstanding with him.  Her love, care and commitment to our children is a huge blessing.

3.  She's an awesome worship leader.  This year it's been amazing to watch Jamie grow as a leader.  She is humble, teachable, a hard worker and does a great job with the worship team.  She also can sang!  Yes sang!  Sang means much better then sing and has an anointing!  :)

4.  She can cook!!!!  My house is like the food network and I love it!

5.  She passionately loves Jesus.  Everyday I see Jesus in Jamie.  She has a passion to serve and please God.  This is one of her most attractive traits in my eyes.

6.  Speaking of attractive, Jamie is smokin hot!  Mmm!  She gets me all hot and bothered :) lol, tmi right!

Happy Birthday Babe, I love you.

Youth Ministry Lessons I Learned in 2010 Pt. 3

I finally figured out how small groups worked best for my youth ministry! We've failed many times but had success this year.

We currently do our small groups on Wed night as part of our experience & here is why:

1. All of our students attend on Wed night so this change took us from 20% of our students in small groups to 100%!

2. Our sharpest leaders attend on Wed night so I don't have to stress about finding leaders, host homes & another night of the week to do small groups, it really simplified things for us!

3. Our students can discuss the message while it's fresh on their mind!

4. All of our students are now connecting with each other & our leaders at a high level!

5. It saves everyone gas money! Not a real reason but a benefit.

I love the way we are doing small groups & wished we started earlier! This also allowed us to do a Battle of Community Groups which was very successful for us too!

If your wondering what our experience looks like the biggest change we made was I started preaching 15-20 minute sermons to give our small groups 25-30 minutes to meet at the end of our experience.

FYI: We split up our groups by gender, school & grade.