The Morning After…SYATP

The flags are flying alone today.  The left-over doughnuts are stale or donated.  And students are wondering ‘what just happened here’?

What just happened, youth workers, is a chance for you to seize the day – yesterday, specifically – and capitalize on your little pole-prayers.

Don’t let yesterday be a one-time, drive-by prayer event.  (Especially if you had a heavy hand in organizing or executing it!)  Sending a subtle message to your students that prayer is a random, one-time event that requires a T-shirt, a slap bracelet, and all-you-can-eat Krispy Kremes is NOT the intention of SYATP or youth ministries anywhere…

Rather, the opportunity exists to help students see prayer as a daily, hourly, continual event that SPARKS a movement, doesn’t complete one.

1.  Remind your students TODAY, via text, tweet, post, smoke-signal – use whatcha got – to pray.

2.  Give your students a specific moment to pray each day.  Have them set a reminder on their phone.  Publicize it judiciously in your student area.

3.  Encourage your students to become involved in weekly campus meetings at their school.  Besides the weekly dose of doughnuts, they’ll also get encouragement, accountability, and spiritual challenge on a regular basis.  It also communicates that events like SYATP can be a life-style launch, which is what all youth pastors hope for.  It may also spark a passion and vision for their campus…which should always be a not-so-subtle hope & by-product of SYATP.

4.  YOU pray.  Walk the campus.  List out the schools in an area over your desk or on your screen saver.  Get a list of educators in your area.  YOU pray.  SYATP is not intended as your prayer closet – find yours and get in it!

Whatever you do….do not let SYATP feel like the morning after a regrettable event.  ‘Man – that was stupid and it didn’t really make any difference in my life over the long haul….definitely NOT doing that again….’

Best Thing I Heard at SYMC 2013: Day 3

1.  Water what’s strong.

Don’t waste time trying to nurse what’s dead – invest in what’s strong and allow it to overtake the weak areas.  LOVE IT!

2.  Sometimes the messenger IS the message.

Definitely sometimes the messenger enhances a message that might have otherwise been missed.

3.  I killed people in the Bible for lying to me.

Yep – God don’t mess around…so help me always be honest with you, Jesus.

4.  I don’t get carpet.

It’s a floor covering made of fiber, Matt.

5.  We shouldn’t be driven there.  We shouldn’t someday make it there.  We should start there.  (on our knees before Jesus.)

Bring me back to that place in my life, Lord, where prayer was the first thing – not the last.

6.  I am with you – even in the aftermath.

Thank God – I might even say ‘especially’ in the aftermath.

7.  God does say he care for the flowers – and they live in dirt.

God’s provision doesn’t always look the way we think it should.

8.  It’s time to focus less on the why and more on the who.

Amen!

9.  I’m flippin’ Phil Bell.

It sounds so cool with a British accent.

10.  Dad, can you help me with my NHS forms?

I’d rather do ministry with that kid (and his brothers) than any other kid on this planet!