Merry Chistmas!

I hope everyone had a very blessed and merry Christmas. The Baker family had a hectic, but incredibly fun and enjoyable Christmas. My parents were able to come out from Iowa, and despite the requisite Baker family plane troubles (3-4 hour delays each way), they had a safe and fun trip. This was really the first Christmas Annalysa could comprehend, and she really enjoyed opening presents and discovering her new toys. In fact, she still keeps checking the tree in case new gifts have miraculously appeared. We had fun with my parents, and were able to meet my cousin Pete in Beaver Dam for lunch. All in all, a great Christmas. Now if only we could start having some good weather (I love that even when we get good weather it serves a negative purpose, like today's warmth, which melted the snow so it could turn to ice). Oh, and for your info, you will notice we are updating the schedules for both groups for Winter/Spring to the right. The official version will be going out soon, but for you awesome blog readers you get it a little early.

Snow, again. yeah.

There will be no youth group tonight as all church activities have been cancelled for the day due to weather. As bad as last winter was this year is almost shaping up to be worse. Hopefully this all means spring will start in February right?

We will be moving our HS Christmas Party to our next youth group meeting in January. Same things apply: dress to be outside and bring $3 to defray our food costs. I wish we could do it tonight, but A) we probably wouldn't have been able to play murder the snowman and B) it's probably not a good idea to have you all on the road at night with all the drifting. We'll make it up to you in January and at Silver Birch, I promise.

If you look to the right you'll notice we have a bunch of pictures from our middle school Christmas Party up. It was an incredibly fun night, just as it has been an incredible year getting to work with these students. They are really fun, energetic, have great attitudes, and have been so eager and open to listening to God throughout the fall.

I hope everyone stays warm and safe today and hopefully I will see most of you on Christmas Eve and Christmas day at church. I will be preaching delivering the message "The Making of a Christmas Story" at HRC on Christmas and hope to see you there to wish you all a very blessed Christmas.

Silver Birch Info

You all should be receiving this via church box or at school, but here it is for those who always lose such items.

Departure/Arrival times: Meet at the Hingham Reformed Church parking lot at 5:00pm on Friday, January 9^th. We will return to the parking lot at 3:00pm on Sunday, January 11^th.

What to Bring:

Sleeping Bag
Warm clothes (layering is always wise). Cabins and common areas are heated, but we will be outside A LOT.
Clothes for snow activities (heavy winter coat, snow pants, gloves, hat, etc.)
Snow boots
2 pairs of socks per day
Bath towel
Bible and pen/pencil
Garbage/plastic bag to put wet clothes in
Shower supplies, tooth paste, and other hygiene stuff
Deodorant (consider this the most required item of all, especially for middle school boys).
Money for one fast food meal (on way home)

Optional:

Spending money for snacks

Camera (we prefer disposable and are not responsible for broken or lost digital cameras. Our staff will be taking pictures that will be available online).

Snacks, as long as you a) bring enough for your entire cabin (12 people) and b) take full responsibility for any mess.

What not to bring

Electronic devices (IPods, DVD players, video games, etc.)

Drinks of any kind, no exceptions. Drinks are available for purchase at the camp, and water fountains are available.

Medications:

Any prescription medications you have need to be checked in to Pastor Andy before we leave. Medication must be in a Ziploc bag with your name on it and should have the original prescription sticker with it (this is for legal reasons). Non-prescription medications (ex. Tylenol) should also be in a Ziploc bag with instructions on when, why, and how to use. Please arrive a little before 5:00 to check in medicines.

Meals: Silver Birch will provide 4 meals over the weekend. We will stop in Green Bay for lunch on the way home, and that meal will be on your own. Middle schoolers will be going to McDonalds and high schoolers to Fazoli’s.

Packing: We have nearly 70 people attending this trip, and we need to fit all of them and their luggage onto two school buses. Everyone is allowed a bus carry-on and ONE suitcase/duffle bag, preferably with your sleeping bag and pillow in it (although they may be separate).

I am so excited that so many of you are attending this trip and cannot wait for all the exciting things we have planned. If anyone has any questions feel free to contact me anytime. Have a wonderful break and see you January 9^th!

Party Week

First, thanks to all our high schoolers for being timely and listening well to Rep. LeMahieu last night. I know we're not used to spending that much time listening to a speaker in this group, but I thought he made some terrific points on how we need to live out our faith in the world. I really agree with his idea that we need to make a committment to God, we need to let others know we are Christians by our words and deeds, and we need to live out a Christian life daily. Being a political geek I enjoyed him talking about legistlation he has worked on, and like the rest of you learning about Wisconsin having the nation's #5 nude beach was certainly a combination of interesting and disturbing (especially since it is in a STATE PARK). To learn more about the beach and protest to it you can go to this article: http://www.nbc15.com/home/misc/8363502.html

The Parties
We want to thank both our groups for a great year with our Christmas parties this week. MS will be Wednesday night from 7-8:30. We will meet and return to the church. You do not need to bring anything. High school will be from 5:30-7:30 Sunday. Please dress to play a game in the snow (pending weather) and $3 to help defray our food costs (food provided by Theo's and Greg's). Hope everyone can make it

Have a great and blessed week!

Hot stove...

Just some Friday morning musings...

Just a thought, but are the Brewers going to field a team this year of just send them all to REAL teams? Sabathia does look pretty good in pinstripes... Sadly, the Cubbies have not done nearly enough so far, with the Peavy deal breakdown being quite sad.

Picasa (my photo program) has been dumb lately, but it finally got our MS party pictures up. You can find them to the right.

This Sunday we've got a couple of special things planned. All high schoolers will be attending a special program entitled The Star of Bethlehem in lieu of normal Sunday school. This is based on a DVD that shows one man's obsession to prove that the star occurred as the Bible says it did, and his research unearthed so much evidence that even NASA's head of planetary discovery sees some real merit in it. Then Sunday night our HS group welcomes Rep. Dan LeMahieu as our speaker. Dan will talk about how he serves in the legislature as a Christian, and address some of the issues (i.e. homosexuality, disability, abortion, and prejudice) we have been talking about lately. Please respect Rep. LeMahieu and arrive at 5:25 so we may begin at 5:30.

Wednesday night was another enjoyable Middle School evening. We played some games that had everyone roaring, and by plan to embarrass Cody and Jordan backfired horrifically (instead of drawing one of the 12 slips that would have made them do something embarrassing, they pulled the one that earned them a free soda, and those two NEVER need soda). We also had some good conversations on the importance of studying scripture. We laugh at the notion of an auto mechanic who has never even seen a car, yet I think too many of us are a Christian in the same way. It says Christian on our name tag, but have we really seen God through the Bible, learned what he tells us there, and started living our life according to it? If we are going to follow God then we need to read the manual, which is really way more then that. It's an amazing love note to us, telling us how important we are and what God wants to do in our life to make it simply amazing for us and others today, tomorrow, and for eternity.

Crazy Weekend!

We had a nice and wacky weekend in youth ministry land. It started Friday night with the middle schoolers setting up for the Breakfast buffet, followed by many of them (about 22) heading over to our house to party. While it was absolutely a nut house (and hahaha to those of you thinking "well its always a nut house because you live there Andy") we had a great time playing air hockey, basketball, Foosball, Wii on our new big screen, eating food, and acting in all sort of crazy ways. You can checkout the photo gallery to the side.
Saturday was our annual breakfast buffet fundraiser. Shockingly, our students worked really hard, and they had to, because we had a simply amazing turnout. From all accounts definitely bigger then the last two years, and it showed in terms of money. We brought in right around $2,000, which is fantastic. Thanks to everyone who donated items, worked, attended, and attended the breakfast.
High School spent their night Sunday playing Hinghamopoly and dodgeball. We also continued our Untouchables series by talking about Prejudice.

Hinghamopoly Night

Every once and awhile a]I bite off a tad more then I can chew for a night of youth group, and Hinghamopoly kinda turned out to be that sort of project. We had three giant game boards set-up down stairs, with each place on a monopoly board being replaced with a place in Hingham. I thought it might be a couple of hour project, but when your creating every place on the board, money, hotels, etc. for three giant game boards it turns into a monster project. The students seemed to think it was pretty to cool to own Hingham places, especially the really cool ones like THE Soda Machine, Old Man's House, and The Old Mill. While it was a pain to get everything set-up it's done now, so it will be really easy to play again, and with how much the students loved it we'll certainly drag it bag out. Big thanks to Mary Lynn, Kenzie, and Dani for spending their afternoons helping get everything set-up and making it all look great.

The message for the night was on money and tithing. We dangled $110 in cold hard cash in the students' face, which certainly got them hyped up (some of them a little too much as they chased me all over the building trying to get it later). We then talked about how the world tries to tell us one thing about money (that it makes us powerful, happy, and is all important) while the Bible tells us quite another (that God gives power, we find happiness apart from money, and that the most important thing is God's love). We then talked about giving to God, that we give to God because it is really His money in the first place, and we want it to be used for His purpose. We closed with a story of generous giving that we've seen in our ministry lately. With the downturn in the economy we have a lot of students who cannot afford our winter retreat this year. Therefore we've been praying for some people to come forward and help us out. This past week I've gotten letters from people saying they are so THANKFUL to GIVE US MONEY for this trip. Can you believe that? People not only willingly giving hundreds of dollars, but literally thanking us for taking their money? These are people who have the right view on money and giving. If we've been blessed with money then we should be ready to give it back to God to be used in great ways.

Happy Thanksgiving!

I hope everyone had an awesome Turkey Day and that you've harmed as few people as possible on "knee them in the face" Friday. The Baker's had an awesome dinner yesterday in MN, and my stomach is still bulging from it (for my lovely critics, with names usually start with K and B, who would be quick to point to my always large belly, it has grown all the bigger). Andrea joined the ranks of America's Dumbest Idiots and stood in the cold for and hour and a half this morning to get a doorbuster (I enjoyed a wonderful warm bed and sleeping in). From the battlefield reports I've heard it's crazy out there. Our hyper two year old has been all over the place, and is especially enjoying singing Christmas songs with her cousins. She is having simply an amazing Thanksgiving.

I think sometimes we need a tad bit of a reminder that Christmas is not about waiting in lines, getting good deals, and spending lots of money to impress others and to make ourselves happy. It's certainly not about being so focused on buying stuff that we trample an innocent person to death (sadly, that actually happened today and I hope the people involved enjoy jail): http://www.sandiego6.com/news/local/story.aspx?content_id=316fb59a-e2e7-40d2-a73d-01653a1aae01
It's about Christ coming to save us, to give us a gift of salvation that can not be bought. It's also about giving in a similar Christ like way. So think about God's ultimate "doorbuster" and give out of love, and nothing else, this Christmas season.

Back from vacation

Well, I got to finally enjoy a few days away from crazy hoodlums, I mean kind, loving, and wonderful youth groupers. Actually, the Baker family did enjoy a few days in Iowa seeing family and enjoying the Kings Pointe Water Park Resort in Storm Lake. It was a nice break from the craziness of the fall ministry season. You all will get a laugh at this though. Our hotel room was placed right in the middle of guess what? A high school youth group retreat from a Reformed Church (one about 5 miles from Pastor Steve's last church)! I can just never escape it can I?!? We seriously were surrounded by amped up high schoolers (although I do have to say they were calmer then ours and no one was randomly singing to people on the elevators as far as I know), which I can say I and everyone in my family is totally used to, but it would be nice to escape it at least once. Oh well, God has a fun sense of humor.

I did get to return for a good night of high school youth group. While the game was a flop (the same movie trivia program that worked great last year seemed to this time generate all movies from the early 80's and earlier), we had three great speakers join us to talk about disabilities. Phil shared about losing his leg, and having a "rod" put in the other one, while Steve and Wendy shared about the experiences of their son. We were reminded that regardless of ability we are all children of God, created in God's very image. Major thanks to them for giving their time to speak with us.

We are starting to get really pumped up about our Silver Birch Retreat January 9th-11th. Yesterday was the deadline, but something really cool as happened. We have already filled a bus way beyond capacity, so we have to get a second one. Therefore lets go ahead and see if we can fill that one too. We'll take registrations for another week then. It's awesome to see the mountain of forms in my office and the amount of excitement over this trip.


Oh and half way through this post we lost power due to the great Hingham Power Outage. About 8 solid hours without powers because our power company has all the power for our town routed through one pole the placed just off a busy highway that I think has a magnet in it attracting cars. That thing seems to get knocked down every few months. SO ANNOYING!

Growth night and other ramblings

Well we survived another Growth Night service, with somewhere north of 100 people attending. I hope everyone is enjoying and getting at least something out of their small groups (leaders having a Sundae bar this week probably helped), and it sure sounds like things are going well with our adult groups. I'm honestly glad we don't have a December Growth Night. They take a ton of work, and it will be good to take a step back and really see what we want to do with this (don't worry, it's not going anywhere). I am totally open to suggestions and tweaking things. Our #1 goal in starting this was to provide students (as well as a segment of the adult population) a worship service that was geared towards them in a meaningful way. While we're not going to be moving away from doing worship as a part of our ministry, as it's something really important (not to mention central in the Bible) ,we want to make sure we're doing the type of music and other elements (videos, skits, mini-messages, etc.) that helps our students worship and grow. The feedback I've been getting and seeing is that we've made a nice start considering roughly a year ago most of our students knew little about contemporary worship. It was awesome tonight having people singing back at us loudly (we as a band could barely hear ourselves and we had it pretty cranked), which it pretty cool. I also see many more people opening themselves to worship in new ways (clapping, prayerfully singing, waving arms, etc.), which is also sweet. I hope to spend the next few months really talking to students and getting as best an idea as possible as to what specifically you want us to be doing. This is your worship service, so you're gonna start getting some real ownership as to what goes on.
Tonight's set list
Not to Us: Chris Tomlin
Blessed Be Your Name: Matt Redman
Holy is the Lord: Chris Tomlin
Mighty to Save: Hillsong United
No One Like You: David Crowder
Every Move I Make: Fusebox

Scripture: Judges 7:1-3

Middle school recap

Our Middle schoolers had a fun night that included the guys pretty much mopping the floor with the girls in a variety of games, from climbing over each other, to passing a ball in a crazy position, to memorizing images on the screen. I hope everyone had a great night.

Our HABIT for the week was Bible Memorization, which I know sounds like the worst topic in history. It just wreaks of total boredom right? But think about all the things we have memorized. Songs, movie lines, sports team lineups, and even annoying commercial jingles (call Empire... Today! Gosh I HATE that jingle). We memorize a lot, so why not the Bible? Here's my example for why Bible memorization is important. We all know I'm a caffeine addict. I can hardly function without it. Sometimes my wife will surprise me when I get home that we have to immediately turn around and go out with a group of people, which I so don't have the energy for. So the only thing that can save me such a horrendous situation is... a nice, cool, refreshing, and caffeine laden Mountain Dew. So I tell my waitress: "I will take a Mountain Dew please." And her response "oh, we don't have that. How about a Sprite?" A SPRITE!!! Are you kidding me!?! I want the most caffeinated normal soda and you want me to have a Sprite, which has NO caffeine! Are you kidding! At that moment I am so craving, indeed almost feeling like I NEED a Dew, that I could just scream. You know, life can be like that too. I remember in Seminary when we basically had to memorize the Bible. They would pick a couple of books on an exam and we would have to literally write what happened in EVERY chapter of that book. Yeah, so that means you basically have to know what happens in the entire massive Bible. There were so many times when I just wanted to give up and do something else with my life, because I never thought I could learn all that. But that's when I'd remember "I can do all things through Christ who gives me strength." (Philippians 4:13). Having just that little portion of God's word stored in my mind reminded me that God would help me through if I worked hard and trusted Him, and indeed that's what happened. You see memorizing scripture is liking having a reserve Dew on you at all times. It gives you that extra boost, that extra focus in those tough times when you need it. Psalm 119 says "I have hidden your word in my heart so that I might not sin against you." We memorize Bible verses so we remember to live the sort of life God has planned for us, a life that is awesome for us, others, and God.

We are challenging are middle schoolers to memorize 10 bible verses each by Wed Dec. 10th (there are a few extras in Andy's office). They all received key chains with 50 verses, so they have plenty to choose from. Any small group getting all members to 10 will get a special prize, and the person memorizing the most will get a gift certificate to their favorite store.

My mega mess

So last night I was finishing dinner preperations at home when I got a call to help someone load something at church they were taking out of the youth room. It was perfect timing since I had just put dinner in the oven and it was going to be 15-20mins before it was done. So I headed over to church and started moving couches out of the youth closet of doom before the people arrived. I was about done with the last couch when it knocked over a cooler that has apparently been in the closet well before I got here. Why do I know that? Well because it opened up and every soda can in it not only hit the floor but immedietly shattered open, spilling their lovely fermented wettness all over the carpet. Now, to make things all the more fun this was about 45 minutes before I had to be at a meeting, so I spend about 30mins on my hands and knees (luckily with some help) trying to soak up fermented soda (did I mention the cooler was totally full?). Now I'm down to 15mins and smell like fermented soda, which happens to smell quite similar to beer, so yeah probably don't want to go to the elder's meeting like that. Now before I can leave I had to move a couch out of the hallway into a classroom, which normally would not have been a big deal. Except this was a hide-a-bed couch. And of course with Murphy's law in full swing the bed totally came out from under the couch. So here I am holding up this couch and the bed has fallen out and is on the floor. Now we're at about 10mins before meeting time. Fortunately my anger allowed me to have an incredible Hulk moment, forcing the bed up through the couch long enough to throw the whole thing in the classroom, shut the door, turn off the lights, and run out of the building before anyone got there. Then I went home and took a shower by dumping about a 1/4 bottle of shampoo on myself. Amazingly I was only a minute late getting back to church and smelled like shampoo and not fermented soda. Yeah crazy things happening!!!

Hanging around the office....

So I have to admit I'm just not in the mood right now to finish my message for tomorrow night, so updating the blog for the first time in awhile seemed like a perfectly good distraction.

It has been a pretty amazing fall around our youth program. We've had some really fun games and activities this year is both groups and created plenty of hilarious moments. Our middle schoolers had an awesome trip to Silver Birch, both groups did some great service projects, and I think both groups have had some good discussions on our topics throughout the fall. One of the most exciting things has been the number of students we are ministering to on a weekly basis. This past week we had fifty five students between the two groups, which is such a God thing since we only have 49 students in middle school and high school in the entire congregation. And neither group was doing anything out of the ordinary: it was simply a normal week (I just happened to count noses for once). We have over a dozen students now regularly attending our youth ministry that have no connection to HRC (and many to no church at all), which is just so exciting. I think we often hide behind this idea that their is no evangelism and outreach that can be done in Hingham/Gibbsville/Oostburg because everyone already has a church. But the reality is there are many unchurched young people, and many more whose families are "members" at a church, but hardly ever attend. You know, I love all the fun stuff we do, which is why I know many of our students come (or bear with being forced by their parents), but what energizes me more then even an energy drink is seeing all these students coming into our ministry and some of them making first time commitments to Christ. Our goal as a ministry is multi-faceted, and with good reason, but we can never lose sight of the importance of reaching the unchurched. It is just so incredibly vital and central in scripture (think back to Jesus' last words before ascending).

Some pre-election comments

I try to stay pretty much out of trying to sway people's votes in elections because I guess I don't see that as the role of a pastor. My role is to preach the gospel, present the teachings of Christ and the Bible, and train disciples of Christ. In a way that role is political in that when people live a life following God it's going to natural influence their life in a ton of ways, including how they vote.

While I'm not going to endorse a candidate here I do want to remind everyone of an issue that has somehow been forgotten in this campaign amidst the war and the economy and that is this: the next president will likely get to nominate between 2-4 supreme court justices. With the court currently fairly evenly split on many issues, such as abortion, gay marriage, religious freedom, and others, the next president will have the opportunity to influence decisions (and therefore offical government policy) for decades (usually a president nominates a 40-50 year old, who stays on well into their 70-80's). If you're still picking a candidate or deciding if it's really worth going out tomorrow I really urge you to see where the two candidates stand on many of the major social and religious issues facing our country (they're VERY different). This election could really affect this country for decades to come. Look at the candidates, the issues, the scriptures, your heart, pray, and then vote tomorrow.

Dolfin Cabin video now up

David FINALLY posted the full Dolfin Cabin Retreat video from this summer to You Tube, so you can now find it to the right of this post. Check it out and relive that awesome weekend from this summer!

MS recap of Habits week one

We had an awesome middle school youth group this week, with 27 students packing the youth room (pretty cool since the church only has 19 middle schoolers). No one died during our fun and action packed game, although there were a few close calls. We kicked off our HABITS series by talking about the importance of regularly Hanging out with God by doing things such as praying, listening to music, and reading the Bible. Why should we hangout with God regularly? Because God wants us to constantly be growing so that we may have a life that is good for us, others, and serves God. If we stop growing (hanging out with God) we will never reach our full potential, which will be a bummer thing for us, others, and God. As an illustration I talked about the San Francisco Bush Man, a guy who all he does is hide behind bushes in San Francisco and scare people. Surprise surprise but I found the Bush Man on You Tube and have posted that for your enjoyment to the right of this post (is there anything not on Youtube?). Basically he decided at some point to stop growing and never reached his potential. Who knows what great things he could have done had he kept learning and growing. By spending time with God we grow in our abilities, our knowledge, and our faith, enabling us to do bigger and better things. So, my challenge to everyone is to spend some time every day to just hangout with God.

A weekend of service

One of the things we wanted to make a big priority this fall, especially after our big mission trip, was meeting the needs of people closer to home with the love of Christ. This weekend our students did just that in a couple of great ways.

On Saturday about 2/3 of our high schoolers got up about 4 hours earlier then normal (8:30am, and trust me certain ones of them named Becky and Kathryn complained about that over and over) to do yard work on 10 yards in our area. They picked up trash, trimmed bushes, raked up about 60 bags of leaves, piled fire wood, rode ATVS (surprise, that was Ben's group), and more. Everyone we helped would not have otherwise been able to do their fall yard cleaning, so this was a great help to them. Thanks so much to our students for working hard and giving up the chance to sleep in to help others.

On Sunday our middle schoolers headed to Iglesia Trinidad in Milwaukee to prepare and serve a meal and attend worship with the congregation. What a different experience then we normal have at HRC. Here they get the pitch forks out if everything isn't smooth and almost professional, and there they start the service by asking who wants to have certain parts in the service. Here we get on edge over certain praise band songs being to irreverant, and there they hand out instruments to anyone in the audience who would like to play along (our group liked having tambourines, maracas, shakers, and more, and actually kept pretty good beat). Here we would wonder what was happening if anyone responded to a question in the pastor's sermon, and there a dialogue is part of the plan. I personally thought that was pretty cool. The congregation and the pastor interacted throughout the sermon, making it really come alive and also helping the message be very tailor made to the congregation's specific questions/interests. The message was on loving one's neighbor, and one individual thought there should be a limit on that (he was not to keen on loving his sex offender neighbor). He and the pastor had a good exchange on what the Bible says, and you could tell it helped him wrestle with a tough question. A neat change of pace from the normal monologue sermon.
Thanks to all the parents who prepared food, and you can rest assured it was enjoyed and quickly eaten. This is a very poor congregation, and you could tell by the zeal they attacked the food (many filling 3 plates or more to the breaking point plus taking "to go" plates) that this was the first time they had eaten in a while, and perhaps the last time for awhile.

The whole weekend simply reminds us all what Jesus called the Greatest Commandment: Love your neighbor as yourself. The word for neighbor in the original Greek is really universal, so Jesus is really telling us to love the world as ourselves. Its a tall order, but one that is so important to strive towards, especially in the tough times we are facing today. May God bless ya alls weeks!

In case of rain Saturday...

Hopefully we will not experience rain on Saturday (there is currently a 30% chance though), but no matter what we would still like everyone planning on helping with our service project to head to meet at the church at 8:30 anyway. There are some projects around the church that can be done, and you never know when it is going to stop/start raining. If we are completely unable to get to the houses we might look at the possibility of one of the next two weekends, but we'll cross that bridge later.

Week of 10/20

We have some exciting stuff planned over the next week.

Wednesday night: MS youth group will be having a fun night after being great through our first two series of the year and the retreat. We will be doing a cool and exciting scavenger hunt thing, so be here ready to go outside and have some fun.

A Weekend of Service
Saturday: 8:30-noonish: Our high school ministry will be serving the community by cleaning up nine different yards of families who would otherwise struggle to do such work. Please show up promptly at 8:30 to meet your small group and head to your site. We will return before noon for a light lunch, then anyone who would likes is invited to the Baker Estate to enjoy the glorious new 52inch HD beauty for a Mario Kart Fest. We'd love to see many of you there.

Sunday: at 9:00am our middle schoolers who signed up will leave for Iglesia Trinidad in Milwaukee to worship with the congregation and serve them a meal. Please meet in the youth room at 8:50 for instructions. Normal church attire is fine, although remember we will be working in a kitchen (girls, pants instead of skirts/dresses would be a good thing).

HS Youth Group: Remember that this Sunday is our Cell Phone night. Please try to get here on time, dress to be outside a little, and bring a cell phone if you have one (although it is not required to bring one).

Pigtastic weekend!

What a weekend! 14 middle school students and four old geezers (myself included) spent the weekend at Silver Birch Ranch with 200 other middle schoolers for a weekend of incredible fun and spiritual growth. Our theme for the weekend was PIG OUT!, and our large group games certainly fit that bill. My personal favorite was our own little rendition of steal the bacon, albeit it with a 15 pound raw ham laying on a massive tarp greased with 4 CASES of laundry detergent! By the end of the game the ham had basically disintegrated, and most of the kids smelled like pig. Pretty cool huh?
I also enjoyed a crazy take on capture the flag that had pigs (students with pig noses on) trying to capture little red ridding hood from the wolves (leaders with years of pent up anger against students). Needless to say the leaders cruised to a glorious (although ethically questionable) victory. Oh and the youth pastor pudding wrestling tournament was also a neat little plus.

The retreat was not all about fun and games though. The theme PIG OUT came from the story the three little pigs, which is crazily similar to the Bible story of the man who built his house upon the rock (Matthew 7:24-27). We learned that we need to have a strong foundation in our lives, which is God. We need to get to know God, believe in God, and accept Jesus Christ as our savior, asking for forgiveness for all the bad things we have done. That builds our foundation. If you want a life that has a firm foundation that will keep your life from being a total wreck in difficult times then you first need to take those very important steps. We then have to build on that foundation by doing things such as reading the Bible, praying, and asking for help/guidance from other Christians when times are tough. This keeps us living the life God wants us to live and helps us be extra strong when people try to tear down our beliefs.

Our students were simply amazing on this trip, and we had a blast worshiping together, hanging out for hours during free time (many of us became obsessed with the game Apples to Apples, especially when judged by the always zanny Holly TB). A big thanks to them for their awesome behavior, and also to our leaders (Dan, Diane, and Maureen) for taking a weekend away from their busy lives to be a part of these students' lives. Finally, big thanks to Bob Swart for driving bus for us this weekend.

Weekend info

Sorry, but bland "info only" post following.

Silver Birch Return: I am predicting that we will return to the HRC parking lot around 2:30pm on Sunday. We will call parents when we get a little north of Sheboygan. Also, remember we are meeting at HRC at 5:15 on Friday and will leave at 5:30. It should be an awesome, hyperactive weekend, so get some sleep tonight and get ready to go!

Praise band: Please remember we are practicing at 3:30 in the fellowship hall. Please be ready to go as we have to be done fairly early for the drama team to practice.

Growth Night: This Sunday is our Growth Night service. It will feature some hyper music, a funny video, a hilarious drama with Kathryn and Alyssa, and more. Should be a great time of praise, as well as a good night to connect with your small group. Middle schoolers, remember this is also very much for you.

My Precious and other news

Hey all.
I am finally discovering that life can sometimes make it hard to post too regularly, but I have not forgotten about it entirely. We are having a beautiful fall in Wisconsin, with the trees looking so amazing right now and the temperatures holding pretty steady at this point. While it would be nice if I were still attentively watching baseball right now, I guess I'll just have to wait for next year and Mark Cuban's takeover of the Cubbies to make things right in the universe.

In other news...

My Precious: The 12 inch TV in my basement, which used to be in my room in HIGH SCHOOL, has now been replaced with a 52 inch HD beast with DOLBY digital sound. EXCELLENT!!! Even better yet for all you Hollanders out there is I got it as a floor model for only $350, which makes me even more pumped. We will be trying to have many of you over to enjoy it in the near future.

This Past Sunday: I got to pull double duty this past Sunday, delivering messages for big church and high school. In big church we looked at Paul's conversion (Acts 26:9-18) and talked about how Paul went from being out of control in his life (persecuting and even killing Christians) to being out of this world for God (telling everyone he could about Christ, even traveling to the ends of the known Earth to do so). Using my snazy pink vacuum with the clear container we talked about how easily our life can vear out of control, filling with sin, but that God can transform all that because if God could transform Paul God can transform all. One point I'd really like to make about Paul is that his transformation by God is fairly tantamount today to Osama Bin Laden all of a sudden become a Christian televangelist. That's how against Christianity, and even perhaps how violent (although we can't be entirely sure how personally violent Paul was, but his actions did lead to Christians being killed), Paul was in his own day. Yet God transformed him, which God can do for any of us.

This week: this is another big one around here. Wednesday night middle school will finish our series on the End times, and then Friday through Sunday middle schoolers will head to Silver Birch Ranch with about 400 other middle schoolers for a denominational retreat. On Sunday we will have our second Growth Night service, with a great set list of worship songs, a fun drama, a silly video, and my yapping about something. Hope to see a ton of people there. For now, I'm off to school.

Bad goat!

Well, surprise surprise. Despite the best record in the league, amazing pitching, the best run producing line-up in baseball, yada yada yada, the Cubs looked like a Hingham Softball league team (and I don't mean to be THAT mean to those squads). After game 2 you had to wonder about the curse (by the way, there is no such thing as curses, the Cubs have simply bought into this dumb thing, especially so this year). Just appalling how the Cubby bears played. So Cub like really. Oh well, at least Brewer fans will now have to be quite as the Crew is getting hammered by the Phils.

Anyway, I'm off to get ready for youth group tonight. We're talking about Peter's jail break and playing a number of pretty good games, so hopefully it will be a good night. It will also be a busy week in our area as Oostburg celebrates homecoming with a ton of exciting and crazy activities leading to the game at the new stadium on Friday.

Seriosuly, stay away goats!

Well, It's October alright. Ryan Dempster, automatic all season, becomes a walk machine last night, then gives up a lovely grand slam and the Cubs get smoked 7-2. In fact, Dempster walked more last night then he did in the entire MONTH of September. The goat also decided to appear in my life today while visited Oostburg High School as two workmen carrying a mirror dropped it directly ahead of me, shattering it into many pieces (I can't make stuff like this up). If the Cubs lose tonight I'm blaming it on the mirror. Seriously Cubs, get it together behind Big Z tonight and pull this thing even.

Schedule change: Please note for High Schoolers that we are flipping our plans for Oct. 12th and Oct. 26th around to accommodate a Church musical event being held that evening. Please bring your cell phones and be ready to go outside for a fun and zanny night on the 26th. The schedule on this site has been updated for this change.

Middle School: Last night we started our serious called It's the End of the World as We Know It. We also got to hit celebrities over the head with noodles, which was pretty fun to watch. We're going to be looking at the End Times for a few weeks, and we started by looking at the many places scripture tells us that the World will end. The world, with it's good things (Cold Stone Creamery, Wii, me) and bad things (The Yankees, death, hunger, etc.) is going to be replaced by a perfect heaven on Earth when Jesus comes back someday. We don't know when this is going to be, but someday it will happen. This is something we should be excited about, because we will be brought back to life in perfect new bodies to live in a perfect world forever. Next week we'll continue our series by looking at the issue of the Rapture, which was made very famous by the Left Behind books.

I declare war on goats!

I want to make it known that I am openly declaring war on all goats for the next several weeks. Now, I am normally a quite, reserved, and non-violent guy, but goats must be destroyed. Why you ask? Because I am sick and tired of goat-kind ruining the the championship chances of my beloved Chicago Cubs every single year. So goats of the world, if you ruin the Cubbies this year (especially if you were diabolical enough to have the Brewers somehow end our run in the NLCS in blackcat/Durham/Bartman/Gonzalez/Prior fashion, an event which would probably force me to move to Canada or something) there will be no hope for you goats. You will be vanquished forever! Consider yourselves put on notice goats!

Ok, with that out of the way, I hope everyone was able to have a good weekend. I know there were many sad football fans in our state as the Badgers followed one of the best halves of their lives with a totally anemic display in the second to lose to dreaded Michigan, and the Pack was less then wonderful while Favre looked unstoppable. The Crew did somehow manage to snag one from the AAA Iowa Cubs and make the playoffs for the first time in my lifetime (note: the "lovable losers" have made it now 6 times in my life time). But hey, no one determines a good weekend based on sports right?

In the realm of youth ministry we got to enjoy the pain of Zach eating six of the nastiest hot wings on the planet, which were so hot he went though 3-4 ice packs trying to get feeling back in his lips. Note: the eating of insanely hot products and church will be suspended as I don't want any lips falling off, plus Matt found this article that makes me worry a little: http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/3099484/Chef-dies-after-eating-superhot-chilli-for-bet.html. Last night we continued our Church as it Should Be series by talking about how Church needs to be concerned about the lost (the unsaved). We looked at Acts 7-8 which showed that despite knowing they would be killed if they told others about Jesus the early Christians did it anyway, spreading the gospel throughout the world. They wouldn't have had to do that (they already knew they had eternal life and the authorities would not have persecuted them if they wouldn't have vocally told others), but CHOSE to risk it all and tells others because they wanted all people to have eternal life. What an awesome love for others and what a wild ride they went on to spread the good news. It is my hope we can have that same love for the lost here at HRC.
Well, everyone enjoy your week, especially the MLB playoffs, and go Cubbies (and stay away goats!)!

Wednesday full of stuff

There are some awesome things happening this Wednesday.

7am at Oostburg High School will be the annual See You At the Pole. This is a time where a whole bunch of high schoolers will meet before school to pray about their school, friends, community, leaders, teachers, and more. With all the things going on in our community right now I think it's great for us all to pray together for God to do amazing things in our area. Please give Andy a call if you need a ride that morning.

The afternoon at Oostburg will be the annual Kool to Be Kind Day, with students serving the community in a bunch of different ways. I will be with a group doing some work in Hingham and I wish all groups a productive day of serving and loving our community.

Wed night our middle schoolers will be concluding our series on Evangelism, How to Shout Without Screaming, by playing Romans and Christians. Please dress to be outside, hide, and run. It should be a really fun and exciting night.

Growth Night underway and other stuff..

Wow! Thanks to everyone for making our first Growth Night a solid success. Our band and media teams worked really hard to craft a passionate service, and our many adult volunteers made by life really easy by lending great leadership to our many small groups and class offerings. Several people have asked me where we get many of our funny video clip from, and the answer is that many come from www.bluefishtv.com. You can browse their many great clips for free. In all we had about 110 people in attendance for week #1 (even in the shadow of a Pack game), including some new to HRC. I continue to pray that God will use Growth Nights as a great opportunity for worship and digging into scripture throughout the next few months.
Another question several people have had is who wrote all that music? Here's the set list with the band who most famously recorded it.
Not to Us: Chris Tomlin
Undignified: David Crowder Band (written by Matt Redman)
Grace Like Rain: Todd Agnew
Every Move I Make: Fusebox
God of This City: Chris Tomlin (written by BlueTree)
No One Like You: David Crowder Band

On some other notes of update, my prep work paid off last week as I successfuly devoured 3 1/2 racks of Jerry's Ribs (see previous post for more). How yummy, yet how horrible my stomach felt by the time I got home. I also enjoyed my Cubbies cruising to the Central title this weekend. Too bad the Brewers couldn't have been a little bit of competition this season.

Huge weekend!

Growth Nights
Grow through worship, Grow through fellowship, Grow through learning…
Grow in Christ

The Growth begins this Sunday at 5:30

After months and months of planning we are finally launching our new Growth Nights program this Sunday. I actually started working on Growth Nights when I was forced into bed for a week after having surgery last December, and it's crazy seeing it almost be here. Growth Nights are principally about two things: worshiping God in an energetic, relevant, and meaningful way and growing spiritually through small groups. These are two needs many younger people have really been expressing in our congregation, and I'm excited to see how God uses it. We will have four small groups for our high schoolers, at least one for Middle School, at least 2 for adults, plus a special parenting class. We've also got nursery care available, as well as some special programming for k-5th grade that I'm leading. That's certainly a pretty big change for me, but I've got to say I'm pumped to be with kids who probably are as energetic as me! The band will be playing some great music this week, including a couple from David Crowder as well as at least one good old Silver Birch favorite. I've been being a geek today working on the video and lighting, which I always love. So yeah, if your in the Hingham area Sunday join us for Growth Nights beginning at 5:30 in the fellowship hall. It will be a powerful worship experience and a terrific opportunity to really grow as a disciple of God.

It will also be a huge weekend as hopefully by Sunday the Cubs have clinched the Central, although they are being awfully Cubby as I write this as they are again getting killed by the Brewers. There is also the HUGE Green Bay-Dallas game (thank you ESPN for the 15min after Growth Night start time!).
Well I am off. Tonight is our monthly pilgrimage (and I don't use that term lightly) to Germantown, WI to Jerry's Oldtown for all you can eat ribs. There are simply no better ribs on the planet then Jerry's, and the youth staff has been starving themselves all day for the journey. If you like ribs and you've never been to Jerry's GET THERE NOW! They serve more pork per seat then any restaurant in America, so that alone makes going a requirement. Thursday is the best night as all you can eat is $16.95, versus a rack being like $24 alone any other night. Check Jerry's out at www.jerrysworldfamousribs.com. You'll love it.
Have a great and blessed weekend all!

Thursday morning

Morning all!
As today is September 11th I would encourage everyone to take some time to go to God in prayer today. Ask God to continue comforting those who lost loved ones that day and to help return peace to our world. Having lived in New Jersey I know many people who lost loved one's that day. The uncle of two of my youth group students there died on one of the flights, one of my leaders lost most of his co-workers as he has JUST left his job working at the World Trade Center, and Andrea and I attended the church attended by the Todd Beamer, who famously led the rebellion on Flight 93. Today is a day for us as Christians to remember what happened and to be very prayerful.

Well our youth programs are all officially off and running. We had a great kick-off service on Sunday. Thanks to the congregation for allowing us as a staff to be very innovative and to drive our point home through various different means. My message Sunday really tried to hammer home why we do Christian Education. The big three from scripture are: to learn of eternal life, because the Bible is inspired by God, and to live a more Godly life. Well, I'm off to the high school but expect some more postings the next few days focused more on sports (as a Cubs fan expect some pretty angry rants). Have a great and blessed day all!

Gustav update for Houma

While Hurricane Gustav did not wipe Houma off the face of the planet as had been feared it still hit very hard. The eye wall hit Houma and surrounding communities as a Cat 2 Hurricane, and conditions were particularly bad in East Houma, which is where we stayed and where Senator's Circle (where Kid's Club was) is located. From reports I have seen there has been little or no deaths reported in Houma as most people wisely obeyed the mandatory evacuation. The problem now is that it's Wed and they still have received little recovery efforts. The people in town have no food, water, supplies, medicines, gas, or power. The national guard is on the scene but they too are running out of gas. Those who left are not supposed to return home until Friday, which FEMA and such are hoping conditions will be better (power is still going to be an issue). From what I've read there has been flooding and wind damage to homes, but things are fixable. The community will need help, support, and prayer, but loss of homes and, most importantly, lives, seems to have been very minimal. Thanks to all who have been praying for Houma and the rest of LA this week. They still need those prayers, so keep them coming. If you want to read more and see pictures and such go to the Houma Carrier website at www.houmatoday.com. They have some pictures of Gulfport, MS where the Ocean went right to that Mall we parked at to go to the beach. Again, keep the prayers going.

Fall schedules and Gustav

As an exclusive to this site you can scroll down and on the right hand side find the schedules of Middle School and High School this fall. They are NOT OFFICAL because of the lack of a school calendar, so don't etch it into you fridge yet or anything. I am really pumped about what we are doing this fall and can't wait to get back in the normal gruve again.

It has been really strange the last few days to see Houma on the news so much. CNN has a camera on the bridge that ends about 3 blocks from where we stayed, NBC's reporter is stationed by that old white historical church we drove by a couple of times, and Senator's Circle (the housing project we worked at) was even mentioned in a newspaper article. While Houma still looks to get the "dirty" part of the storm it is an answer to prayer that it has gone from a category 4 to a cat 2. I ask that you keep the people of Houma and all of the Hurricane zone in your prayers over the next week as this will undoubtedly be difficult for them. If you want to follow the events in Houma specifically you can do that at www.houmatoday.com.

Fall Schedules

Just letting everyone know that we're in a holding pattern on publishing the fall-winter 08-09 Youth Ministry schedule as we, with many of you, await the incredibly tardy arrival of the Oostburg School Calendar. While that calendar does not involve all of you it does about 80% of our students and we want to make sure it is consulted before we make certain ideas firm realities. Once it can be finalized you will find it located here, www.hinghamchurch.org/youth, and in church mail boxes.

Tropical Storm/Hurricane Gustav

As you may know Tropical Storm Gustav, which is predicted to quickly turn into a major (The secretary of homeland security said perhaps even a 100 year bad type storm (read: worse then Katrina)) is headed for Louisiana. It is still early and Hurricanes change course frequently, but Houma (site of our July mission trip) is currently in line to get hit fairly directly. The city is prepping for the storm as best as possible and it is possible that the city may need to be evacuated as early as tomorrow. You can follow events in Houma at www.houmatoday.com. Please be in prayer for the people of Houma and the Louisiana Gulf Coast. This has to be nerve racking and scary for them and they can certainly use your thoughts and prayers. Thanks for your thoughts and prayers.

Gearing up for fall

While it may still feel like summer we all know it's getting scary close to school returning. Teachers officially return Monday, meaning your freedom is down to about 8 days everyone. As you prepare to go back to school things will be pretty quite around the youth department as we prepare for all of the ministry programming for fall. There will be no HS or MS youth group this week, as well as no HS youth group next Sunday. MS youth are invited to our house for one last summer grill out this Tuesday from 6:30-8:00. As always, bring your own meat. MS youth group will return on Wednesday September 3rd at 7:00pm, with HS returning Sunday September 7th at 5:30pm.

I will be in the office all week preparing for the fall and, to be honest, I get sick of office work, so feel free to stop by and say hello. Just don't feel bad if I have to kick you out eventually to get back to work. Have a great final week of freedom all and good luck to all who have projects at the Sheboygan County Fair!

Crazy fun to close the summer

We closed our summer programming last night with our crazy fire fighter night challenge. We were blessed to have the Waldo and Oostburg Fire Departments donate time, equipment, and personnel so that students could compete against each other with fire hoses. The students had a blast, and it really served as a great way to close the summer.

Last night I spoke on Proverbs 12:18, which tells us that words used recklessly can have the same affect as a sword. Using a couple of volunteers we showed that while we are willing to hit a friend over the head with a pool noodle and nail a nail into a chunk of wood we're not nearly as quick to hit that friend as hard as possible over the head with a hammer or nail that friend to a chunk of wood. Why? Because we know that would be reckless. We know it would harm them, cause a mess, and ultimately get us in trouble. Basically we think about the consequences first. But do we do that with words? God challenges us to think about the words we use and to use them not as a sword that pierces, but as "a tongue of the wise that brings healing" (Proverbs 12:8). As we go back to school I really challenge everyone to think before gossiping and tearing others down, instead using words of wisdom to encourage and build up others.

Fond farewell

This Sunday was a big one around here. It started with our morning service where I asked the question our you Comfy yet? Throughout the Bible, especially in a place like Psalm 119 which was the verse for the morning, we see God speaking about comfort. In our age comfort has taken on a meaning it did not use to have. To my grandmother's generation being comfortable meant having what you need to survive, but today we view being comfortable as having what we want when and how we want it. God's comfort, however, is not what we want when and how we want it, but it gives us what we need. In fact it gives us the biggest thing we need, and that is eternal life. As Christians we should be all comfortable despite maybe not having all we want, having a sick loved one, or having a life far short of our dreams, but our supreme comfort is that God gives us eternal life.

Sunday evening we said a fond farewell to our seniors. We had an amazing class of four seniors this year, who have set a terrific example for those following them. They have shown a maturity that often makes me think their adults already, and I'm so excited to see how God uses them as they head to college and the work place. We will continue to pray for them and wish them the absolute best.

Happenings week of August 11th

As usual we have a lot of stuff happening at HRC this week. With so many great opportunities I hope to see everyone at least once this week.

On Tuesday all high schoolers are invited over to grill out at our house from 6:30-8:00pm. Please bring your own meat, but everything else will be provided.

Wednesday middle school youth group will be having a swimming party at Mike and Diane Smies' house. Please meet at the church at 6:30, and we will return to the church at 8:00.

Thursday: We will take 13 middle schoolers to Six Flags for a crazy day of coasters and fellowship. We will leave HRC at 8:30am and return at 10:30pm.

Sunday: HS youth group will meet at HRC at 7:00pm, which is of course not our normal time. This is Super Senior night, and the super seniors have requested the later time so we may play a game best played in the dark. They also request you wear dark clothes.

Slip and slide II and vacation

Tonight the Middle Schoolers get to enjoy the pleasures of the mega slip and slide, and according to the weather people lightening should not shorten the fun this time around. We will also be talking about Baptism tonight in addition to the wet and wild fun.

As soon as youth group finishes tonight I will be taking a half week of vacation to return to Iowa with Andrea and Annalysa. We will be seeing my parents in Sioux City as well as my Grandma in Schaller. Due to the craziness that is life as a youth pastor and our little tiny rollover accident at Christmas time it has been over a year since I have been home, and over two years since Andrea has. So yeah, it's about time. Andrea and I hope to make this a total vacation from HRC so we can reconnect a little and charge our batteries for the year. So, don't expect updates or responses from me until we return Sunday night. Of course please do contact us if their is an emergency. Otherwise, have a great rest of your week and we will see high schoolers on Sunday night for Slop Fest!

Worship and slippery fun

What a big day for our ministry. This morning our ministry led every aspect of morning worship as we shared about our mission trip experience. Our praise band did a great job considering how thrown together we had to be (three of our singers had never played with us until 1 hour before the service). Our set this morning was Not to Us (Chris Tomlin), God of this City (Chris Tomlin), and Every Move I Make (Fusebox). We've been playing Not to Us and Every Move I Make a lot lately, but they seem be really well liked by our students (and they seem to really worship whole heartedly when we play them). It was awesome to see students clapping, jumping, and even putting their hands in the air in the SANCTUARY. God of this City is a new one from the mission trip and really fit with the message. The students did a wonderful job sharing the funny, powerful, serious, earth shaking, and silly from the trip and I know their words challenged our congregation. I'm just so in awe sometimes at how mature our students can be when given tasks such as today's. I guarantee you many adults could not have shared so well.

My message this morning was entitled Church as It Should be and was based on Acts 2:42-47. The Church of Acts shows us Church as it Should be is selfless for one another, committed to reaching the lost and needy, and led by the Holy Spirit. The that struck me the most in writing this message was that the Acts church was so unified by their awe for God. I think many today have ceased to be in awe of God, but after all we experienced on our trip I know we all had moments when we were certainly standing in awe of the power of God. Sometimes we just need to step back and remember this is the creator of the universe that CHOSE to be a God with and for us, comming to Earth to suffer and die so that WE may live for ever. How can you not just be in awe of that? And for me standing in that awe really puts things in perspective and reminds me of the love I have for God, and that life (and indeed church) should never be just about me.

Tonight our high school group had a mega slip and slide at the Mullikin's, and it was a thrilling (if not soapy, cold, wet, pine needly, and grassy) time. And yes, I did manage to run into a tree, a hay field, Alyssa, and Erin. The bummer was lighting cut our night short, so we may just have to do it again some time.

Sweeps Week

Like TV's annual week of its best shows this has been a jammed pack week at HRC, and it's not even the weekend yet. Oh, and of course sweeps week also reminds us that the Cubs EASILY swept the Brewers, making them look like a AA squad. Here's what's already gone down

On Wednesday we took 10 middle schoolers and four adults to Milwaukee to spend the day serving at Iglesia Trinidad, an RCA congregation ministering to the Hispanic community of Milwaukee. The students helped clean-up and beautify the outside of their facility, clearing brush, trimming bushes, pulling weeds, staining wood doors, and doing some painting. They also got to here from Pastor Madeline about the poverty of the area and the different ways Trinidad is trying to meet the needs of their neighbors. She stressed that the biggest need the area has in Jesus, and so we pray that Trinidad can continue preaching the good news and causing positive change in the name of Christ in Milwaukee.

Wednesday night our Middle School students looked at Jeremiah's letter to the exiles in Jeremiah 29. It is a powerful letter because in it Jeremiah is basically being asked to summarize the mega points of the faith to those in exile. At the center of his letter is the importance of prayer. Anyone, even those whose sins caused God to force them into exile in the first place, can speak to God and have God answer prayer. Prayer is not simply a members only thing, God wants ALL people talking to Him.

Here's what's coming up:
Tomorrow is the annual Hingham Carp Derby. This is an always fun and competitive fishing competition that occurs on the Mill Pond, and this year the proceeds will go to cover our unexpected mission trip costs.
Sunday our mission trip group will be sharing in worship about their experience. Several of our team members will be sharing their musical talents, our student praise band will lead worship, and I will be preaching.
Sunday night our high school group will be doing a mega monster sized slip and slide out at the Mullikin's. This should be a fantastic way to end a massive week.

Site Updates

I've actually had a week to mess around with technology a little bit, so you'll notice we've got some new pictures up from this summer as well as a comedic selection from our soon to be released Dolfin Cabin Video that we like to call Andy and his Smelly Socks. This was a totally spur of the moment thing that happened on the middle school retreat, and it still makes me laugh. We'll try to get the full version of the retreat video up in the next week or so. We've also done some major overhauling to the HRC site's section on Youth Ministry (www.hinghamchurch.org/youth). We're done not with everything yet, but it's better then having two year old information up. Our goal is to keep the blog site as a continually updated source of information on all things HRC Youth Ministry for those involved in our ministry (as well as a place for me to vent about other things), while the more official HRC site is designed to convey basic information about the program for those shopping for a church/youth group home. Again, please send us any pictures you have from this summer and we'll try to get them up here and in our slideshow. We now have almost 250 up on this site, and many more that we're going through for the slideshow. While we have a ton of pictures they're from about 5-6 cameras at this point, meaning those people are in basically every picture and some of you are hardly in any. If you want to appear in the slideshow please get us pictures this week.

Mission Trip Mussings

Now that we have been back a few days I wanted to blog just a little more about our life changing trip to Louisiana.

Houma, LA is a community quite different then ours. For starters, the average family there makes about $14,000 less then the average family in the Oostburg area. When I think of trying to cut our family budget down $14,000 to the level they make in Houma it makes me want to cry. I don't know how we'd ever do it. Houma also had a very have and have not feel to it. There were certainly many new glitzy homes that have sprung up since the hurricanes (it was hit by both Katrina and then it's already stressed levees overwhelmed by Rita), likely those who had good insurance and strong savings accounts. They stand relatively close to many homes that are in sad shape. While many of these, such as the home my crew worked on, are good on the inside they are lacking on the outside. Those without means are also still not prepared for another Hurricane. The house I worked on is built about 3-4 feet off the ground, but to do any renovations to it the house would have to be raised 10 feet off the ground. Talk about massive expense. That places a family in a tough situation. You want to improve your house, but can't because you can't afford to raise it. You do want to raise it to be safe AND to be able to renovate, but it's simply out of reach financially.

Oh, and did I mention the economy in the area has been hard hit as its traditional fishing centered industry has fallen due to competition from overseas producers who can charge way less for seafood? With the economy weak many have taken to illegal activities to stay afloat, with drug dealing and prostitution fairly wide spread. Fortunately there is a fantastic ministry called Hope Extreme that is doing a great job battling the drug trade and trying to protect children from being lured into it. This shows that there are some great people in Houma trying to make it a better place again. To further show you the degree of poverty we encountered one girl in the day camp we assisted at told us she had not eaten in 2 days. Tough stuff for teens from our area to encounter.

If we got even just one thing out of this trip it was that their are a ton of people at need in this world and God is calling on us all to tend to them with love and humility. One of our goals as a ministry is to be much more aware of the needs in our own area and strive diligently to meet them in Christian love.

If you would like to learn more about some what is going on in Houma check out these two great non-profit groups we worked with: www.hopeextreme.org and www.bayougrace.org.

Houma Worship

From talking to many students our worship services in Houma were one of the highlights of the trip, and it was certainly awesome watching basically every student singing, and many of them jumping, clapping, and really giving God their all through worship. Many of you have been asking for music from the week, so here is to the best of my memory the songs we sang and the artists who made them famous. Most should be available from Itunes or other major music sources. If their are songs you really loved please let me know so we can learn them for August 3rd and for our new once a month super-contemporary evening service (coming September 21st).

The Time has Come: Hillsong United
One Way: Hillsong United
Mighty to Save: Hillsong United
Fire Fall Down: Hillsong United
Every Move I Make: Fusebox
There is no one like you: David Crowder Band (DCB)
I Saw the Light (DCB remake of Hank Williams Jr. classic)
Undignified (DCB)
Did you feel the mountains tremble (Delirious)
God of the City: Chris Tomlin
Not to Us: Chris Tomlin

Pictures

I've started putting photos from the mission trip up, but I need your help to have a nice and full collection of the trip both for this site and for our slideshow in worship. Please email photos to andyhinghamrca@yahoo.com soon so we can start compiling. You can also bring your camera, a disc, or your memory card into my office during the afternoon this week. Thanks for your help!

It's too cold!

Yes, those were actual words spoken when we got off the bus last night around 11:35pm. Of course it was still 70 degrees out, but compared to 105 that is pretty darn chilly. Our week concluded in a pretty amazing way. On Wednesday my group flipped from working on a home damaged by both Katrina and Rita and moved to working at Kid's Club. It is nothing for kids at Kids Club to be coming from homes where parents are in jail, on drugs, drug dealers, or prostitutes. While our work there may have seemed insignificant to many, playing games, running around for hours with kids on our shoulders/backs (they ALWAYS wanted to be doing that) singing a few songs, making crafts, and doing a skit with a meaning, I think we were making a pretty big difference with God's help. If it was not for Youth Works and offering this program 3 hours a day 4 days a week most of the summer many of these kids would have few positive role models and would not hear about Christ, right and wrong, or be shown constant love and attention. I know this was a really eye opening experience for most of our students, seeing poverty first hand and really bringing the gospel to those who needed it. You will no doubt here some powerful stories about Kids Club from our students in the coming days and weeks.

Thursday night was a real emotional night as we were led in a footwashing service. Jennifer told us that we all need to be willing to descend as Jesus did, lowering ourselves and serving Christ in humility with a God first, others second, me last attitude. This was a real emotional and challenging service for me personally, and many students said it was for them as well. This night also saw our group really come together and love and unity in a way that I can only describe as amazing and miraculous. God is certainly working in our youth in great ways!

Friday saw us say goodbye to the youthworks staff and to the many friends made throughout the week. How funny that we went from the #1 fear of the trip being having to be with other people to many students planning trips to VISIT other people. Thanks to the Internet I have a feeling many of these new friendships will continue for awhile. Our group then loaded the bus around 8am and headed for Gulf Port/Biloxi Mississippi for a day at the beach and malls. The ocean water was bath tub temperature, so yeah pretty much like Lake Michigan. The day concluded with pictures and devotions done overlooking the ocean at sunset.

As many of us were changed by God this week, and as the ocean water washes away so much, we are all now challenged to return home and descend on behalf of God. God washed away much this week, now its our time to live new lives that our focused on God.

Update from Houma

Hey all! Was able to quick hop on the Internet and just wanted to update everyone on what's been going on since we left. On Saturday we were able to stop in St. Louis to take in the Arch, which the students seemed to appreciate. Saturday night we stayed at a mega church in Missouri and worshiped at their very contemporary service. They were great hosts and their facility was amazing, complete with a Disney-like children's center called the rain forest. Sunday we made the rest of our journey, albeit with a slight malfunction of our door that set us back about 45mins. We were also able to drive through Memphis, stopping to see where Martin Luther King was shot, as well as driving by Graceland and many other cool sights. When we finally arrived in crazily warm Houma I saw quite possibly the greatest sight I've ever seen. Greater then Mount Rushmore, the New York Skyline, or even an original Vang Gogh. The sweet cold sight of air conditioning in our sleep rooms! Oh the excitement!
Houma is certainly a depressed area, which you'll see from pictures when we return. We've been splitting our time between working with children at a govt. housing project and doing painting at homes out on the Bayou. The children we work with come from a tough area and very mixed family lives. We literally go out into the projects each day to encourage them to come out, and most of them are very excited to come play, sing songs, and hear about God.
As far as the home work goes, the home my team worked on was pretty hard hit by the hurricanes, but the people have an amazing ability to keep positive and bounce back. As far as the students they have been wonderful. They've handled being with other groups well and have worked crazy hard, even in the 103 degree heat of yesterday. Tonight we will have a worship band come in and go out for ice cream, so I should probably go get ready for that. We appreciate your continued prayers as we continue to serve the people of Houma in Christ's name.