Finishing -- Sunday, August 30th

Today we talked about the story of Terah and Abram. Terah was Abram's father. Terah lived in a place called Ur and started to move to Canaan (which we now call Israel). But about 1/2 way there he stopped and finished his life living in a town named Haran. His son was 75 and God came to him and told him to move to Canaan, like his father had originally intended. God promised to bless both him, his family, and the whole world through him. He then completed the journely that had started many years before, moving into Canaan. This story can be found in Genesis 11:27-12:9.

Many times we have been told by God to do something or not do something. Sometimes he even convicts us with His Holy Spirit. And many times we get very excited about doing that thing for God, but then we get 1/2 way done but get distracted. Maybe it is because we become tired, have too many things to change, it is too hard, or a something "better" comes up. All these things cause us to not finish waht we started. But God wants us to be a people that follow him, but not just half way, but completely follows him. Maybe there are things you have been called to do, today is the day to finish those things. Maybe you have made a promise to someone else, today is the day to complete what you promised.

I give this morning: A-
Favorite moment: Haley asking, "There are round circles?"

Videos from Wednesday, August 26th

Emma Says Hello

Is Non-Dairy Creamer Flammable?

Mythbusters #1 -- Wednesday, August 26th

Tonight we started our 5 week series called Mythbusters. Our first myth to bust was: I Don't Matter.

Psalm 139:13-16 tells us this:
"For you created my inmost being; you knit me together in my mother's womb. I praise you because I am fearfully and wonderfully made; your works are wonderful, I know that full well. My frame was not hidden from you when I was made in the secret place. When I was woven together in the depths of the earth, your eyes saw my unformed body. All the days ordained for me were written in your book before one of them came to be."

From these verse we learned five things.
1. God created you. God is perfect, which means he makes no errors, mistakes, or accidents. This means he created you arne that you are not a mistake, error, or accident. He wanted you here.
2. God made you wonderful. That doesn't mean without flaw. But it does mean that you were create in just the way he watned you to be. There are 10 to the 2000 different combinatinos between two people when they create a baby. You are 1 in literally billions upon billions. He uses flaws in us and loves us jsut he same. When God look sat you, it isn't with anger and disappointment on how you look or how you are, but instead he looks at you and loves you, he thinks you are wonderful.
3. God knew you before you were born. God had you in mind at creation, knowing you would one day come along. God had you in mind on the cross, knowing you would need salvation. God knew you while you were in the womb and loved you. You might have been a surprise or accident to your parents, but not to God.
4. God had a plan for your life even before conception. You might feel useless and like your life is pointless, but even before birth God had a plan for your life. Things for you to accomplish as you follow him. And it is a good plan and all you have to do is follow him!

The world could go on wihtout you, but it would be incomplete. God doesn't make mistakes and he wanted you here and has a plan for your life. It is a good plan.

I give tonight: B
Favorite moment: The awesome questions "Why are there poor people" "Doesn't God knowing everything cancel out free will", etc...

Summer Kick-On BBQ -- Monday, August 24th

Today was our summer kick-on bbq. We had a great time. Check out the pictures at: http://thetabyouth.spaces.live.com/

For the night we played a scavenger hunt with written clues and acted out stories from the book of Acts. I hope you had a good time.

Fighting God -- Sunday, August 23rd

This morning we continued our reading of the book of Genesis. We read from chapter 11, verses 1 through 9. In these verses we learn of the people after the flood trying to gather together and build a city and a tower in order to make a name for themselves. God ended up coming down and causing their languages to become confused, thus causing them to leave the project undone and making them go off and populate the world.

We talked about whether this story was actually plausable or not. We decided that it is plausable for a few reasons.
1. Linguistacally we know that there are thousands of langauges in the world but that these langauges have similarities that can be traced to common languages that can be traced back further and further, leading us to believe that all human languaged devolped from one common lanuage.
2. There are common designs around the world of these towers/pyramid/zigguarats. One way to explain this is that those people that scattered took this design to the areas they went to.
3. Etemenanki (the temple of the foundation of heaven and earth) is a zigguarate found in Bablyon. It was rebuilt in the 6th century B.C. by Nebuchadnezzar 2. This is what he wrote, "A former king built the temple...but he did not complete its head. Since a romote time, people had abandoned it, without order expressing their words. Since that time earthquakes and lightning had dispersed its sun-dried clay; the bricks of the casing had split, and the earth of the interior had been scattered in heaps." There is the possiblity that this is the same tower built that was talked about in the story in Genesis.
4. All across the world there are similar stories of a tower being built in order to get to heaven and the builders either dying or being scattered with different languages. Some might say that this shows the bible is myth borrowing from a similar source. Instead I believe it shows that the bible is truth and the others have a memory of what happened in the past but have twisted it into the realms of the fantastic over the years.

The main point of this story this morning was that they built this tower out of pride and because they were disobeying God. One of God's first commands was to fill the whole earth, to spread out,a nd conquer it, yet they were fighting against this command by trying to draw people to one place and then also trying to make a name for themeslves greater than God. We often pick a fight with God, we know what he commands us to do or not do but we deliberately choose to do the wrong thing, even though we know the right thing to do.

We concluded by reading Hebrews 10:26-27 -- "If we deliberately keep on sinning after we have received the knowledge of the truth, no sacrifice for sins is left, but only a fearful expectation of judgment and of raging fire that will consume the enemies of God."

I give this morning: A-
Favorite Moment: The reaction to the dead bird

Baptisms -- Wednesday, August 19th

Today was our 3rd Annual Baptisms and Potluck at Maryhill State park. We baptized 9 youth and 4 adults. If you want to check out some pictures head on over to our picture site at: http://thetabyouth.spaces.live.com/ .

Infection -- Sunday, August 16th

Today we continued the story of Noah. We found out last time that Earth was filled with evil and that God decided to destroy the people of the earth because their every thought was filled with doing evil. But, God picked one man, Noah, and his family to be saved from this flood. Why? Because Noah had found favor in God's eyes for being righteious, blameless, and he walked with God. He had a relationship with God and he lived right, unlike the rest of the people in the world.

The flood occured, God rescues Noah and his family in a boat and they land after the flood subsides. We pick back up the story in 9:20-27 of Genesis. In it we find Noah has planted a vineyard, got drunk and passed out in his tent naked. His son Ham finds him their naked and goes and tells his two brothers so that they can mock him too. But instead they go in and cover up their dad. Even though God had wiped the evil people from the earth, evil still remained in Noah and his sons.

We all have two types of sin in us. We have personal sin, that is when we choose to do the wrong things. We also have a thing called original sin, which we inherited from Adam (like a bad gene). it means we have a tendency to sin from the very beginning.

Sin is like a snowball it tends to buil on itself over time and get worse (we will talk more about this next week)

Sin is like a disease. We have sin in our system from birth and it was passed on through Adam because of his sin. Every person that was ever born (save Jesus) was born with this defect. We were infected by that sin and now pay the price for it. But the flipside is this: even though sin entered the world through one person and thus infected everyone, an antidote was provided through Jesus' death and if we accept him we can be healed, one person spread it on to the rest in both situations.

I give this morning: A+
Favorite Moment: My hatred of ladybugs

Gossip Girl -- Wednesday, August 12

Tonight we talked about gossip. What is gossip it is the telling of personal or sensational facts or rumors about someone else. Is it bad? Yes, according to God it is bad. Infact in Romans 1:28-30 he lists it as a sin among: slander, God hating, insolence, arrogance, boasting, inventing evil, disobeying parents, being senseless, faithless, heartless, ruthless, greedy, lying, envying, and even murdering. So according to God it is a vary serious thing and should be taken seriously as a sin. We can both be guilty of gossip if we are the person saying it and if we are the person hearing it but not stopping it. It is not just a girl's issue either. Boys struggle with gossip just as much.

James 3:3-12 describes the tongue to us, meaning speech. In it he stells us that our tongues will control our direction and destiny. We can be drama or not drama by how well we control our tongues. Proverbs 26:20 says, "Without wood a fire goes out; without gossip a quarrel dies down." I demonstrated this by burning a bowl full of paper. When we had gossip to our tongues it ignites the paper spreading until we douse it with water. If we don't stop it soon enough it will spread out of control and harm many. This is the second thing James tells us: our tongues can hurt or help. A good way of making sure our words help is by THINKing before we speak. THINK are the words you are saying: True, Helpful, Inspiring, Necessary, Kind? Finally James tells us that we shouldn't both claim to be Christians and gossip. He asks if fresh water and salt water can come from the same spring, can a fig come from a olive tree or a grape from a fig tree. Of course not and when we are gossiping we are from one part of us worshipping God but from the other cursing men.

Many of us have been hurt by gossip and many of us have hurt others with gossip. If you are hurting others with gossip you need to ask for forgiveness and change your ways.

I give tonight: A+
Favorite Moment: Almost burning the church down

Video from Wednesday, August 12

Gossip is not good!

Covenants -- Sunday, August 9th

Today we picked up the story of Genesis where we left off: Genesis 6:1-9:17. These chapters are about a man named Noah, who was righteous in God's eyes. The rest of the world was filled with evil, to the point that God decided to destroy it all, except for Noah and his family and a few animals and start over. After the flood destroys the world God makes a covenant, a deal, a promise, to Noah. He tells him that from then on he would never destroy the whole earth by flood again and set a rainbow as a way to help show he remembers his promise.

God has made many promises/covenants. Some to a person, some toa family, and some to all the world. God's promises are everlasting, guaranteed, and he never forgets them. He does them knowing the cost. This is quite different from man's promises/covenants which are often temporary, broken, forgotten or done on a whim. When God makes promises we can trust in them. His biggest promise/covenant with us was the new one through Jesus that through his death we could have forgiveness and life.

I give this mornings: B
Favorite Moment: Jared not hearing the joke about Alex's underwear

Videos from Wednesday, August 5th

Lacey's Pre-Delivery Delivery

Wipeout -- Wednesday, August 5th

I got back from my 3 week vacation tonight. I brought our newest addition: Emma Gorrod to the youth group for the first time. I am so thankful to Sharon, Karen, and Gordie for speaking on Wednesday night while I was gone and Jana for speaking in Sunday School.Tonight we did a one shot called: Wipeout -- Water Baptism. We talked about what water baptism is (being dunked underwater). What baptism represents (dying to serving yourself and instead serving God and publically declaring that you want to follow God). Whether we are supposed to get baptized (yep). And then we concluded by giving each of you an opportunity to decide if you are ready to be baptized or not in our upcoming baptismal service.

I give tonight: C-
Favorite Moment: Megan running and trying to spot Emma