I always wondered where they got all those ashes on Ash Wednesday. A couple of years ago, someone finally told me that they burn the palm branches from the previous year’s Palm Sunday service.

Maybe I’m not the sharpest knife in the drawer, but I didn’t know that. The palm branches from the previous year’s Palm Sunday service are burned, made into ashes and smeared on the foreheads of those needing to remember “from dust you have come and to dust you will return.”

A pastor friend of mine posted a YouTube video of his church burning the palm branches.

I guess now the question is, “Where do all those Midwesterners get palm tree branches?”

I pray that this Ash Wednesday is deep and meaningful start to your Lenten experience.

Grace and peace

Most people know about Fat Tuesday or Mardi Gras, but what you may not know is that historically there has been a purpose behind this party, despite the lack of purpose that this day seems to currently possess.

The purpose of this day is to indulge a bit in all the things you are planning on giving up. Eat some extra candy, drink all the coffee you can, watch all the TV your mind can handle and most importantly, party with your friends! (I might add, in a way that doesn’t break any commandments! We are Christians, after all!)

IT’S FAT TUESDAY!

Until a couple of years ago, I had never heard of Shrove Tuesday or its traditions. While I lived in Nashville, however, I was fortunate to be in a community group with a great family from across the pond, and they introduced me to Shrove Tuesday and some of these crazy traditions.

The deal is that traditionally all the families would bring their flour, sweets and other goodies that might not keep over Lent and eat it all! During Lent, they wanted to refrain from foods they enjoyed and that gave them the most pleasure as a way to embrace the season of Lent. It’s my understanding that because the typical things they brought to purge themselves of—butter, flour, sugar, etc.—were mostly the goods to make pancakes, that’s what they made … and that’s what they played!

As you can see in the video above, we practiced some pancake games ourselves. It was such an amazing time of fun and fellowship. I miss my Nashville community group and will be looking to have some fun tonight in Texas!

Here’s is what i ate for lunch… Let the Pancake festivas begin!

I would encourage you to start a tradition with your community. Flip some cakes, have a party, do something fun because Lent is coming.

So yea, INDULGE!

What are you giving up this year?

Eat up, drink up, make it count!

Grace and peace

Erik

Here’s what the back of the book says;

This isn’t just another devotional book. This is a guide to a 40-day journey to resurrection.

Maybe you don’t even know what Lent is. Maybe you’re thinking it’s that stuff you pick out of the depths of your pants pockets. Maybe when you hear Lent, you think it’s something only Catholics do.

Even if you’re not familiar with Lent or have a negative association with it, I think we would all agree that Easter is essential to the life of the Church. It’s the time of year when we are intentional about retelling and rehearing the story of Jesus’ death and resurrection.

And because Christ invites His followers to not just hear about resurrection but to participate in it, we have historically taken the 40 days leading up to Easter to prepare our hearts and minds to enter into the story of Christ.

This little book is a guide, a help, a companion on that 40-day journey of prayer and Christian practice known as Lent. On this journey, we will practice the disciplines of addition, subtraction and introspection so that we may more fully participate in the life, death and resurrection of Jesus Christ.

We call this journey Lent.

And we take this journey because we all need a resurrection.

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I would love to offer this little devotional book to you as you as you make your way to Easter Sunday.

If you order the book by this Friday at noon i can guarantee it’s arrival by Wednesday the 22nd, which is when this Lenten journey will start for most of us.

At my church we are using this book to guide our middle school and senior high students on a Lenten journey. There are a handful of other churches that are using this resource to help their students as well.

There are themes for every week of the journey which we will all be using as preaching topics during this next 7 weeks. And if you interested, some of us are going to join a conversation to help each other as we craft messages and services for our students during this time. That conversation will mostly happen via email and i would love to include in that as well.

You can get the book here and checkout the Web Guide (an online resource to supplement the book) here.

My prayer is that this resource would help you and your ministry as you make your way through the desert of Lent to the brilliance of resurrection!

Would love to have you on this journey with us!

Grace and peace
erik

And here is the book cover if you want to see / read it all!
(thanks to Aaron VanStrien for his skills, which he donated to this project!)

How do you think of a good message or series messages for students?

I probably do a mix of all the above. Some methods are better than others but none is right or wrong, in my opinion.

The current series we are doing, Never Too Early was a mix. I really wanted to dive into some scripture with my students and 1 Timothy kept coming to mind. My initial thought was to walk verse by verse through it. But then i started reading through the Old Testament as a new years resolutions and some of those stories really began to pop. So instead of just looking at Timothy as a young leaders i thought, let’s look at the life of a handful of young people in the bible who God used to accomplish his purposes. Almost immediately after this was the route i decided to go i ran across this video at church, PERFECT!

That’s was how this one came together and so far so good. 
We focused the first message on the disciples in general and how most of them were probably teenagers and the very core of Jesus’ movement to change the world.
The second week we took a look at David. He’s a no brainer. The older brothers overlooked because, as the scripture says, “humans look at the outward appearance (things like age and experience) but God looks at the heart.” And then we talked about David taking off the armor given him to face the giant because he realized the only way he would win the battle was by faith in his God, not by trying to be someone else and living in someone else’s armor or shadow.

Next week we will look at Timothy and focuses on the verse “Do not let anyone look down on you because you are young but set an example…” This will be followed by Samuel and then a wrap up message to the series.

Doing this gig has it’s challenges. One of them is coming up stellar content that really connects with students… EVERY WEEK! The advantage i had in my previous gig was that i spend a couple months crafting messages and was then able to deliver them multiple times over a few months. And if a message was REALLY good i could keep in the rotation for up to a year. 

Things are a bit different now but i’m excited about how it’s stretching me and i look forward to working with other youth pastors like myself to collaborate in providing high quality biblical content to students and their families.

If you up for some collaboration let me know!

Grace and peace
erik

I read student ministry blogs here and there. I want to do that more; there are so many great ideas and encouraging people out there.
What student ministry blogs should I be reading?

And i’m looking forward to sharing some of the things we are doing here in the student ministry at Christ Church Plano.

Christ Church is a really great place! It’s also a really interesting mix of a liturgical church, rooted in tradition, history and beauty, and an evangelical bible church kinda feel with a high value on scripture and a personal relationship with Jesus. Most of the things you typically think of from a liturgical church and a bible church both find themselves being gracefully lived out right here in one place. Geographically we are in the suburbs of Dallas, Texas, a place called Plano that has its own kind of charm and plenty of suburban challenges.

I’m pretty new around here, just into my 3rd month, but I think this mix of things is going to make for some great but unique ministry in the student ministry world. I still know a lot of folks who are doing event-based attractional ministry, i know folks who are doing strong small group ministry, and i know folks who are trying to do missional youth ministry. I even know some folks who are doing a mix of all the above. The journey i’m on is to figure out how to do youth ministry in a liturgically sensible, biblically formative, socially conscious, and above all disciple-making kind of way.
Maybe there are some folks out there trying to do similar kinds of things. WHO ARE YOU? We need to talk!

Basically i’m excited to talk about student ministry, middle school ministry, failures, successes, and all the crazy stories in between. Student ministry is a wild ride but i’m excited to be a part of this community of people in a new kind of way. I’m excited to dive deeper into the conversation.

Grace and peace
erik

TUESDAY JANUARY 24TH
Psalm 45 | Gen. 15:1-11,17-21 | Psalm 47, 48 | Heb. 9:1-14 | John 5:1-18

WEDNESDAY JANUARY 25TH
Psalm 119:49-72 | Gen. 16:1-14 | Psalm 49, [53] | Heb. 9:15-28 | John 5:19-29

THURSDAY JANUARY 26TH
Psalm 50 | Gen. 16:15-17:14 | Psalm 59, 60 or 119 | Heb. 10:1-10 | John 5:30-47

FRIDAY JANUARY 27TH
Psalm 40, 54 | Gen. 17:15-27 | Psalm 51 | Heb. 10:11-25 | John 6:1-15

SATURDAY JANUARY 28TH
Psalm 55 | Gen. 18:1-16 | Psalm 138, 139 | Heb. 10:26-39 | John 6:16-27

SUNDAY: JANUARY 29TH
Psalm 111 | Deuteronomy 18:15-20 | 1 Corinthians 8:1-13 | Mark 1:21-28

Don’t forget to sign up for my news letter, twitter feed, and be my friend on facebook.

I think that covers all the bases!

Thanks for stopping by.

Grace and peace
erik

Here is a short video, be inspired!

Here are a couple links that are worth checking out…
http://www.TheKingCenter.org
Martin Luther King Jr. wikipedia page
Nobel Prize bio

and don’t foret to check out youtube, tons of great stuff.

One of my resolutions is to read the bible more this year!
I’m reading the whole thing in the first 90 days of the year and then at least one chapter ever day of this year.

My pastor, Fr. David Roseberry’s preached a sermon yesterday (check it out at Christ Church Plano) that was awesome and a great reminder and challenge for us to get into the Word of God this year!

Want to join me?!?!
You know you do!

I’m going to post on Facebook (and maybe on this blog) every monday, what is called The Daily Office. A collection of readings for everyday of the week that people all around the world read together.

Read all of the readings or just pick one of the readings for the day and take a few moments to get into God’s Word.

God will meet with you and speak to you!
Can’t wait to see what God does in our lives because we are getting into His life through reading His Word, the bible!!!

Here is The Daily Office for this week…
And if you have an iPhone or iPad there is a great app; iPhonelectionary.com that can give you these readings as well. Or just pick up the free YouVersion Bible app and start your own bible reading plan.

But here is The Daily Office for this week…

MONDAY JANUARY 16TH
Psalm 25 | Gen. 8:6-22 | Psalm 9, 15 | Heb. 4:14-5:6 | John 2:23-3:15

TUESDAY JANUARY 17TH
Psalm 26, 28 | Gen. 9:1-17 | Psalm 36, 39 | Heb. 5:7-14 | John 3:16-21

WEDNESDAY JANUARY 18TH
Psalm 38 | Gen. 9:18-29 | Psalm 119:25-48 | Heb. 6:1-12 | John 3:22-36

THURSDAY JANUARY 19TH
Psalm 37:1-18 | Gen. 11:1-9 | Psalm 37:19-42 | Heb. 6:13-20 | John 4:1-15

FRIDAY JANUARY 20TH
Psalm 31 | Gen. 11:27-12:8 | Psalm 35 | Heb. 7:1-17 | John 4:16-26

SATURDAY JANUARY 21ST
Psalm 30, 32 | Gen. 12:9-13:1 | Psalm 42, 43 | Heb. 7:18-28 | John 4:27-42

My 1st news resolution of 2012 is to read through the entire bible in the first 90 days. I’m doing pretty good but now i’m already at the point of “do i really want to do this?” YES! Yes i do… and i would encourage you with the same. DO IT! PUSH THROUGH!

I propose that our new years resolution, most of the time, reflect ways we hope to be better humans and better followers of Jesus. If this is true then lean into the Spirit and let God help you to become all you were created to be…

I post this and think about it every year about this time, it’s part of my years rhythm and ritual. So check this out and think about it today.

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From January 2011,

God has given me a fresh perspective on the new year. A perspective that has really challenged me and grown me. I preached a message last year about resolutions. The new perspective is that maybe resolutions are a list of things we are wanting freedom from. God’s people have a reputation for needing to be freed, for needing to be saved from our captivity. I think most of a resolution we make reflect the things or issues we want to be freed from.

When we want to stop smoking we are hoping to be freed from addiction. When we want to lose wait or get fit we are wanting to be freed from our laziness and our lack of discipline. When we are wanting to get out of debt we are trying to be freed from the chains of money, greed and possessions. I can’t think of a resolution that is made that doesn’t reflect a type of freedom being desired!

“It is for freedom that Christ has set us free.”
:: Galatians 5:1

Freedom is a pretty huge theme for the Christian. And the New Year is a perfect time to reflect on the ways Jesus wishes you to be freed, to live in his freedom, and to be the person he has created you to be.

Think on that!

Grace and peace
Erik