Here’s a great video from our friends at the Fuller Youth Institute describing the split between generations that characterizes many (most?) churches in America. I love the controlling metaphor of sitting at the dinner table – reminds me of Jesus’ description of the Kingdom feast in Matthew 22. For more compelling statements on integrating generations within the church and the role that youth ministries can play, visit Sticky Faith.

Here’s an excerpt:

The concert hall at the Sydney Opera House holds 2,700 people. This blog was viewed about 13,000 times in 2011. If it were a concert at Sydney Opera House, it would take about 5 sold-out performances for that many people to see it.

In 2011, there were 39 new posts, growing the total archive of this blog to 96 posts. There were 213 pictures uploaded, taking up a total of 40mb. That’s about 4 pictures per week.

The busiest day of the year was July 15th with 1,246 views.

The Most Viewed Posts were:

1. Three Lessons Youth Workers Can Learn from The Social Network
2. Senior Weekend – Generational Integration in the Church
3. Why We Do Missions – Worship is Service
4. Woodleaf Summer Camp
5. Costa Rica Missions Trip

The top referring sites in 2011 were:

• networkedblogs.com
• facebook.com
• mppc.org
• mail.yahoo.com
• mppchs.com

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Thanks for reading!!

Click here to see the complete report.

Floor of examination room 8 at Sage Veterinary Hospital, home for 3 weeks.

To put a twist on a classic Robert Plant lyric, I’ve been out of the game for a while. I’ve hopelessly neglected my blog this past fall. I halfway expected it to be gone, somehow lost to the dungeons where all disregarded blogs wind up. But it’s still here and one of my resolutions for the new year is to be more consistent, even when writing is the last thing on my mind. For most of the fall, sitting down and putting a few thoughts together simply seemed to much. The fall started out well enough but turned out to be one of the most trying seasons of my family’s life. In order:

1. My dog developed a severe reaction and infection to something (undetermined) that triggered an auto-immune disease. Fourteen days in the Veterinary ICU, 5 blood transfusions, surgeries, steroids, antibiotics, amputated tail, and a ridiculous amount of treatment and she’s alive and recovering.
2. My son had a few febrile seizures one night after we came home from visiting the dog in the ICU. Rushed him to the ER, overnight and next day at Packard Children’s Hospital, EEG, blood work, and he’s recovering well.
3. My wife and I developed a nasty bronchitis that kept us up most of the night for 10 days. We weren’t sleeping much anyway with my son’s and dog’s issues.

More than anything, we learned to rely on God when we had nothing left. We’re grateful to have our family healthy together at the start of this new year.

At work, our ministry hired a new staff person to oversee Small Groups and Leadership Development. Jacque Becwar was the High School Pastor at Rock Harbor Church in Costa Mesa for 4 years and now joins us at MPPC. Total stud whose made an immediate impact. Blessed to have him on board. If the image above encapsulates my life experience this fall, the pic below will be the enduring image for me from our Fall 2011 Student Ministries staff:

So, all in all, grateful for this past fall, trials and all, and looking forward to a great 2012…and hopefully some more blogging.

Thanks for reading.

Children of St. Paul’s Church, New Zealand

Christmas 2.0

Christmas in 50 Words

Facebook Christmas

Linus shares Christmas

The Christmas Story, music by Michael W. Smith

Hanging out

Jacque takes the leap

Woodleaf speaker Dave Wilson setting up the week:

Club skit (leader hiding under the table)

End of the same club skit (fake head at the end this time)

Singing It’s Amazing at club

Woodleaf speaker Dave Wilson setting up the week:

Club skit (leader hiding under the table)

End of the same club skit (fake head at the end this time)

Singing It’s Amazing at club