Backpack Awareness Sunday

Operation Backpack 2008 will be our first time at NHC to try this most excellent outreach to the community.  For the past month or so church members have been bringing in school supplies to give to families in need for the new school year.  Recently some other churches and local businesses have gotten on board.  We are excited to see how this year's OP BKPK turns out.  I believe this is going to grow into an awesome yearly outreach event for NHC and the community of churches on the OBX.

Today was backpack awareness Sunday and many of our members and regular attenders wore backpacks to church today.  We had a competition for the best backpack in each service.  It was super sweet when a "mature" churchgoer stood up and was wearing this awesome backpack on his back:

It's fun when we church folk "get it" and get on board!

HABITS

Habits is a great resource to use to teach students about the basic disciplines we need to grow spiritually.  This is a series I teach at least every year to year-and-a-half.  I don't want students to graduate from high school and then at the same time grad from their faith.  My desire is that when students leave the youth ministry at NHC that they know enough about the HABITS that they will continue to grow and get plugged into a church wherever they are going to college and continue to serve Christ and his church.

3 out of 4 students walking away from their faith when they graduate.  What is your church's youth ministry doing to take steps to prevent this from happening in your students?

HABITS is a an awesome resource.  I would encourage you to take a look at HABITS.  If you want to know more about this tool you can click the link to the left of this post and check it out.  (It is on sale right now so you can save some money from your youth budget!)  All we can do as youth leaders is to provide the teaching and the resources, the student has to take the steps to put what he (she) is hearing and learning into action in their own life.

Parents! Check this out.

"I think everyone would admit that there is a point in a teen's life when the influence of his/her parents becomes less, and the influence of their friends becomes greater. I did an informal survey yesterday on Twitter, and again last night at dinner with some friends. It seems that the age at which the parents' influence drops dramatically happens somewhere around 13- to 15-years old"  (Read More)

Do these animals look familiar?

The nervous member who is afraid of change

Old youth pastor contemplating change

The pastor who handles change a bit rough

Members who are not even aware of change

Members who will not move no matter what especially if you are sitting in their pew

All photos courtesy of The ADD Youth Pastor and the animals of the NC Zoo

Start Your Engines

If you ever get to Asheboro there are two places you must go:

1.  Wal Mart - The most interesting cast of characters I have ever seen (and I lived in Oklahoma) at a Wal Mart.  Trust me, you don't want to miss it.

2.  The Richard Petty Museum - I'm not a big racing fan but Richard Petty is a legend and when you are that close to the King's car from the movie Cars you just gotta stop.  Lots of interesting stuff in the museum besides just cars.  Children under 6 get in FREE!!

A couple of observations from SC

I leave S.C. tomorrow morning to head back up to N.C. for the next stop of our vacation.  Before I leave S.C. I want to make two observations:

1.  More people drive with their windows down in temps well above 90 degrees.  Everywhere I look people have their windows down and it is really hot out.  Today it hit 100 and people were just enjoying their Sunday drive with the window down.  Some even ate out on the patio at the restaurant where we ate lunch.

2.  I saw an interesting sign while pumping gas yesterday and sucking my hard earned money out of my wallet and into the pockets of  rich oil company executives.   Mind you I was at a gas station that sold fried chicken.  Not unusual for a gas station to sell chicken but was unusual was this:

 

ADD Youth Pastor Goes Wild

Hollywild that is.  Today we visited Hollywild in Lyman, SC.  Many of the animals at the park are in commercials.  The zebra from the hummer commercials. . . I saw him today.  Tank the 6,000 pound rhino that was in the cold medicine commercials last winter. . .I saw him today.  The appaloosa horse from Pipi Longstockings. . . I saw him today.  I also saw hundreds of Fallow Deer, they had them everywhere.  It was like "bubba" decided to replace the farm animals with wild ones.  No real reassuring confinement on the big beasts.

Here are a few pics.

Beacon Drive In

Today we had a short drive and along the way we made a stop at Beacon Drive In.  The Beacon was featured on Diners Drive-Ins and Dives on the food network.  We got their at about 1 and the place was slammin, lined up out the door.  Literally while we were there hundreds went through the line.  When you approach the counter there is  man there that takes your order and then hollers it out in their own lingo.  Hundreds of orders but not one of them written down.  

Basic diner food, not real healthy and not incredible as far as taste goes, but the show was incredible.  The Beacon sells more iced tea in the USA than anyone else.  It was very, very, very good ice tea.  They had ice buckets in the restaurant and then you fill your cup up and they have tea dispensers all over to get your refill.  

I had the chili cheeseburger and then piled on top was a mountain of fries topped with a mountain of onion rings.  I shared the rings and the fries but not my chili cheeseburger.  This stop was a highlight of my vacation.

Behold the Chili Cheeseburger A-Plenty

It's a Peach!

Cantina Fifteen Eleven

I dined tonight at perhaps one of the best mexican restaurants ever.  It was the best!

We met my niece for dinner since we are staying in her town tonight.

They had chips and two types of salsa on the table.  Wait a second, I know what you are thinking, "Don't all mexican restaurants have chips and salsa on the table?"  Yes, but we had cloth napkins.  Oh yeah, it was that nice.

I started the meal off by ordering guacamole for our chips.  They made the guacamole at our table!  Hello!!  That's crazy insanely unbelievably fantastico!  Our waiter even asked if we wanted it chunky or smooth.  Awesome!  The guacamole set the tone for the entire meal.

I had Cantina Chimichanga.  A chimichanga stuffed with roasted chicken, black beans, carmelized peppers, onions and cilantro.  Topped with a queso sauce and a poblano sauce.  Set a plate of it on top of your head and watch-your-tongue-slap-your-brains-out-trying-to-get-to-it good.

My son, the birthday boy, ate chicken tenders, of course, with fries, chocolate milk and ice cream - $5!  Of course our meals made up the difference but $5 for chicken tender dinner with Hagen Dahz ice cream!  Wow!

Vacation Day 1

Much fun today!  Even the 6 hour drive wasn't bad.  Summary:

• up really early
• birthday gifts
• two pit stops
• wal mart
• chik fil a
• special stop
• hotel
• birthday gifts
• pool
• dinner at Cantina 1511 (will be posting on that in a moment)

After years of getting film developed and then paying extra for a disc we decided we would quit throwing money away on pictures we didn't want and we made a purchase today.  We have finally gone digital!

It Is Official

I'm on vacation starting when I woke up at 8:00am today!  I know that is sleeping late but I was up until 12:30am looking for a good deal on condos on Maui.  I have a twentieth anniversary next year as well as a sabbatical.  Could I combine the two?  Hmmmmm........  We do love Maui!  Maui No Ka Oi!

So I may or may not blog over the next week, it will just depend on what hits me.  I will probably post more on Twitter.com and you can follow me there.  Or check my twitters on this blog page of Facebook.  I'm sure I'll have some interesting food comments and zoo comments at some point.

I'll leave you with something to think about:

According to a survey by www.lifewayresearch.com, Of the non-churchgoing respondents aged 30 and over,

• 75% would be willing to listen to someone talk about his or her Christian beliefs.
  
• 75% would enjoy an honest conversation with a friend about religious and spiritual beliefs, even if they disagreed with the friend.
• Only 28% think the Christians they know talk to them too much about their beliefs.