halloween then crave - a wild 2 weeks!

Wow, I am thrilled to see Monday...well compared to last Monday I am Stoked this Monday is here. Just made it through our first retreat at relevant that we called CRAVE. It was just a weekend to get teens away and ask how and if they are craving God in their lives. We held the retreat at the Galt House Hotel and Convention and had the Josh Wilson Band and Jeff Miller (great communicator!)lead us. It was an amazing weekend and a great experience for our teens. It was wild to have the event in a major city and have full control of the schedule, we had way too much fun. God really challenged us all to evaluate where we are at in our commitments, our relationships, our bravery, and our passion for HIM - every life group session was filled with kids talking through stuff with their leaders. It was so thrilling to see it come together. It was so different being able to just focus on this retreat for the ENTIRE FALL. This is such a new concept for me. The idea is to do more by doing less. Our ministry revolves around one weekly event for students called remix where we put tons of energy and about 4 major events a year, we took the entire fall to build to this retreat. It was amazing to focus and great for our kids to understand that our weekly gathering is the big deal, the event is just a great chance for us to get away and focus for a few days...the event never becomes the driving force in ministry, just another tool. Here's to leaving event driven youth ministry behind.

Halloween came and went and the kids had a great experience. Koz was Belle and Kelyn a flower and thy both had a blast trick or treating. The highlight for me was to answer the door to a bunch of middle schoolers dressed up, to give them candy, then to have a little kids act like he was chopping my arm off with his plastic chain saw - wow - I LOVE America! I will drop in a picture of the girls, OH they are so great!

Go Vols, Go Titans - Go michael bayne's fantasy teams! yes it matters!