And the Word became Flesh....

Tonight was a blast, I think we had more energy than we've had yet (which is great) with the same amount of kids (so still room to grow!!!). We had just over 20 kids this week come to Young Life and it was a bunch of fun. We did a mixer where we each have a celebrity name on our backs and try to figure out who we are by asking others questions, we sang songs, we yelled songs, and we learned about Jesus a bit. Tonight I shared about how much Jesus was willing to give up just to learn to speak our language, just to present himself in a way we could understand. I showed a video from youtube about mustaches (don't worry, it made sense in context) and stated that the incarnation (which literally means, "in meat" or "in flesh") was God's growing a mustache to be a part of mustache culture. I posed the question, "If God was willing to do this for you, isn't it only fair for you to just check God out?" All and all I think the night was great! There was so much energy however, that it was very difficult to lead music without a sound system. If you know anyone who would be willing to join us in this ministry with a $400 gift we could get a full sound system. Thanks so much for your support. Brad (in the video) said tonight was the highlight of his day. Your prayers and financial support made that happen! -Mat

Young Life #2

Tonight's Young Life was wonderful! It was a bit smaller than last week, but it was a long weekend so it was to be expected. We had high energy the whole time for sure! I shared about Jesus in John 2:1-10 which is the Wedding at Cana and turning water into wine. I challenged our common perceptions of how we think of God and Jesus and said that I really think that Jesus is the life of every party. We talked about turning water into wine and how when Jesus shows up the party only gets better (even if someone else had put out their best wine first) and asked all the kids there to think about whether or not what I was saying was possible, and did it matter to them if it was. We were just around 20 kids this week. I'm confident next week will be better! On a side note, We could definitely use a sound system, especially if we get any bigger, it's hard to lead louder/faster songs without one. The one I'm looking at is on sale (probably indefinitely, thank you recession) for $399, if you, or anyone you know is interested in helping us purchase that people shoot me an email!! -Mat

Young Life, The Journey Begins!

I just wanted to write a quick blurb about Young Life tonight! I think the video speaks for itself but here's a bit more:
We started off the night at the wonderful home of Teri and Rick Schaefer, who were so kind to make our leaders dinner!!! (If you're in the Salem area and are interested in doing something like this feel free to let me know!) From there we went to Charley and Nancy Marshall's home where we held our first club. Boy let me tell ya, I was NERVOUS, not having done club at Sprague before I didn't know if we would get big numbers or not. I was hoping for 30-35 young people tonight. And we ended up having just under 30!! It was such a good night! We sang some great songs, had a wonderful mixer, a talk (I shared a talk about our story, I tried to make the case that we all have an idea of who we are and we tell people accordingly, but I pushed to say, "what if there is a bigger story we could be a part of?" and "what is Jesus has something to do with that story?" I included the story of the bleeding women in Mark 5:24-34. I said that she was a women who wouldn't accept the story those of her world told her (that she was unclean and incurable) and instead reached for the story God wants to invite us into. I asked us all to think about if we are open to the idea that we might have a better story than the one we already know. I think kids really enjoyed themselves! We went to Dairy Queen after and everyone joined us! It was such a good night. Thank you all for praying! I'm sorry if this video isn't perfectly edited and I'm sorry if my spelling or grammar isn't perfect. I just really wanted to get this up as soon as possible to let you all in on all the great things God is doing in South Salem! -Mat