Friday, March 31, 2006
Found out a man ain't just being macho
FROM: ONTHEOTHERFOOT.BLOGSPOT.COM
It's a long article/post, but a quick read. Some interesting thoughts on ministering to boys/young men in this day and age... your thoughts??
Joseph Bayly has some excellent thoughts on the societal current today against masculinity, which caused me to do some thinking on the subject myself. My oldest son just turned 17, and he's going off to college next fall, and I'm afraid for him because he's male in a culture that despises maleness. My next-oldest son doesn't live with me, but with a mother who has (let's put it this way) conflicted ideas of what positive masculinity is. The first I've only raised for the last three years; the second only during summers. How do you convey to a boy what a man is with that kind of time constraints?
Between the contradictory role models of "new-age sensitive man" and "clueless Tim-Taylor man," it's no wonder today's boys don't know what a man looks like. I'll give you a hint: neither one is accurate, because they're both self-centered and immature. The one is whiny, the other overblown, but both of them are completely missing what a man is and does.
So what does a man do?....
A man works. Like a dog if necessary. Not just at a job, but at home, as well, because if anybody tells you that child-raising isn't work, they've been smoking the drapes. A man gets up in the night with a crying baby, or works a double shift, or makes trip after trip with the moving van. If it takes a lot of coffee, drink it. If you don't do it, it won't get done. Rest when things are finished, not when you're tired.
Erma Bombeck once listed off qualities her dad had had, and one of those was that he was always the one who went to the parking lot in the rain to get the car. That's a man. The women and children may stay under the shelter; a man may not. If someone's going to get wet, it should be you.
Ditto with disgusting things. Yes, I'm talking about diapers, but I'm also talking about things like stopped plumbing, pet messes, hairballs, and whatever's in that container in the back of the fridge. Clean it up, gag a couple of times if you must, then go wash your hands. God made your skin washable for a reason.
Tim the Tool Man notwithstanding, no man is born with a knowledge of gadgets and machinery. You acquire it a bit at a time. If you're lucky enough to have a father who is skilled at those things and available to teach you, great. If you're not (as I wasn't), you'll just have to figure it out. When I was in high school, my dad gave me a beater car, and I had to figure out how it worked. I'm still not a mechanic, but I've learned that a screwdriver and a wrench aren't magic wands. Read a manual if it helps, but if you can't, then take the thing apart and try to figure out which part does what. Never let "I don't know how" be an excuse for not doing something. Do or do not; there is no try.
As a man, you are stronger physically than women. You are also bigger than they are and hence intimidating to them, if only on a subconscious level. Never loom over them, never yell at them, never treat them as though they were men. (On the other side of the coin, don't condescend to them either. They're small, not dumb.) Bear in mind that you have all the equipment and strength necessary at any moment to overpower and violate any woman. It's therefore vital that you conduct yourself in a way that makes obvious that you not only wouldn't do something like that, but you'd step in front of a bullet or a grizzly bear to keep her safe. This isn't something you say out loud, but an attitude that stays in the back of your mind.
Men speak a different language from women. You should be able to handle "Woman" as a second language, but it's never going to come naturally to you. Don't make it your native tongue. Women talk through their feelings, but if you do it, it just sounds neurotic. Talk when you have something to convey to someone else.
On the same note, remember that men talk differently according to whether there's a woman present or not. If your vocabulary doesn't run toward vulgarity, good. If someone else's does, live with it. My father is a gentle, polite, soft-spoken man, and my mother knows for a fact that his language is invariably fit for the Ladies' Sewing Circle. She believes this because she's never heard him speak when there are no women around. Some of my most colorful phrases I learned from him.
Religion is not a female thing. I don't mean that it's supposed to be male-dominated, but it is male-led. Look around you at Mass, and see how many families are there without Dad. Don't let yours (when you have one) be one of them. Make sure your kids see you genuflect and kneel. Make sure they know you pray. They may appreciate their mother's faith, but it's yours they'll imitate. If you want to raise Godly sons, show them what one looks like.
Remember that although not every woman is potentially a wife or girlfriend, all of them are still women. Treat every female with the same respect and care you would show a woman you wanted to marry. Believe me, once you master this, you'll never lack for a date when you want one. Kindness, good humor and gentlemanliness aren't just for a girl you're hitting on. They can see through that a mile away. It's how you treat the ones you're not letching after that they'll notice. If you open doors and carry packages as a matter of habit, word gets around. After that, it doesn't matter if you look like Boris Karloff; you'll still be a hot property. And even if you're not looking for a woman at the time, what the heck? It never hurts to be well-liked.
Finally, as a great writer once said, "If my father was the head of the house, my mother was its heart." A man isn't the soft comforting lap the kids sit on to be rocked to sleep, or the kiss that makes owwies all better. He may be called on to do those things sometimes, but he's not really constructed for it. A man is the solidity in his family, the rock that can't be broken. He's also the wall that shields them from storms, and the roof that keeps their heads dry. Which usually means getting rained on or wind-beaten himself. If you don't do that, a woman has to, and it's something they're not constructed for.
That's the essence of being a man. Sometimes what you have to do sucks. That's the way it is. A man has both rights and duties, but when there's a conflict between them, duty always wins. Period. Your rights will be compromised over and over, but your responsibilities must never be. A man does what needs doing and worries about his rights some other time.
Don't be a guy. The world is full of guys. Be a man.
>>ORIGINAL BLOG POST HERE
It's a long article/post, but a quick read. Some interesting thoughts on ministering to boys/young men in this day and age... your thoughts??Joseph Bayly has some excellent thoughts on the societal current today against masculinity, which caused me to do some thinking on the subject myself. My oldest son just turned 17, and he's going off to college next fall, and I'm afraid for him because he's male in a culture that despises maleness. My next-oldest son doesn't live with me, but with a mother who has (let's put it this way) conflicted ideas of what positive masculinity is. The first I've only raised for the last three years; the second only during summers. How do you convey to a boy what a man is with that kind of time constraints?
Between the contradictory role models of "new-age sensitive man" and "clueless Tim-Taylor man," it's no wonder today's boys don't know what a man looks like. I'll give you a hint: neither one is accurate, because they're both self-centered and immature. The one is whiny, the other overblown, but both of them are completely missing what a man is and does.
So what does a man do?....
A man works. Like a dog if necessary. Not just at a job, but at home, as well, because if anybody tells you that child-raising isn't work, they've been smoking the drapes. A man gets up in the night with a crying baby, or works a double shift, or makes trip after trip with the moving van. If it takes a lot of coffee, drink it. If you don't do it, it won't get done. Rest when things are finished, not when you're tired.
Erma Bombeck once listed off qualities her dad had had, and one of those was that he was always the one who went to the parking lot in the rain to get the car. That's a man. The women and children may stay under the shelter; a man may not. If someone's going to get wet, it should be you.
Ditto with disgusting things. Yes, I'm talking about diapers, but I'm also talking about things like stopped plumbing, pet messes, hairballs, and whatever's in that container in the back of the fridge. Clean it up, gag a couple of times if you must, then go wash your hands. God made your skin washable for a reason.
Tim the Tool Man notwithstanding, no man is born with a knowledge of gadgets and machinery. You acquire it a bit at a time. If you're lucky enough to have a father who is skilled at those things and available to teach you, great. If you're not (as I wasn't), you'll just have to figure it out. When I was in high school, my dad gave me a beater car, and I had to figure out how it worked. I'm still not a mechanic, but I've learned that a screwdriver and a wrench aren't magic wands. Read a manual if it helps, but if you can't, then take the thing apart and try to figure out which part does what. Never let "I don't know how" be an excuse for not doing something. Do or do not; there is no try.
As a man, you are stronger physically than women. You are also bigger than they are and hence intimidating to them, if only on a subconscious level. Never loom over them, never yell at them, never treat them as though they were men. (On the other side of the coin, don't condescend to them either. They're small, not dumb.) Bear in mind that you have all the equipment and strength necessary at any moment to overpower and violate any woman. It's therefore vital that you conduct yourself in a way that makes obvious that you not only wouldn't do something like that, but you'd step in front of a bullet or a grizzly bear to keep her safe. This isn't something you say out loud, but an attitude that stays in the back of your mind.
Men speak a different language from women. You should be able to handle "Woman" as a second language, but it's never going to come naturally to you. Don't make it your native tongue. Women talk through their feelings, but if you do it, it just sounds neurotic. Talk when you have something to convey to someone else.
On the same note, remember that men talk differently according to whether there's a woman present or not. If your vocabulary doesn't run toward vulgarity, good. If someone else's does, live with it. My father is a gentle, polite, soft-spoken man, and my mother knows for a fact that his language is invariably fit for the Ladies' Sewing Circle. She believes this because she's never heard him speak when there are no women around. Some of my most colorful phrases I learned from him.
Religion is not a female thing. I don't mean that it's supposed to be male-dominated, but it is male-led. Look around you at Mass, and see how many families are there without Dad. Don't let yours (when you have one) be one of them. Make sure your kids see you genuflect and kneel. Make sure they know you pray. They may appreciate their mother's faith, but it's yours they'll imitate. If you want to raise Godly sons, show them what one looks like.
Remember that although not every woman is potentially a wife or girlfriend, all of them are still women. Treat every female with the same respect and care you would show a woman you wanted to marry. Believe me, once you master this, you'll never lack for a date when you want one. Kindness, good humor and gentlemanliness aren't just for a girl you're hitting on. They can see through that a mile away. It's how you treat the ones you're not letching after that they'll notice. If you open doors and carry packages as a matter of habit, word gets around. After that, it doesn't matter if you look like Boris Karloff; you'll still be a hot property. And even if you're not looking for a woman at the time, what the heck? It never hurts to be well-liked.
Finally, as a great writer once said, "If my father was the head of the house, my mother was its heart." A man isn't the soft comforting lap the kids sit on to be rocked to sleep, or the kiss that makes owwies all better. He may be called on to do those things sometimes, but he's not really constructed for it. A man is the solidity in his family, the rock that can't be broken. He's also the wall that shields them from storms, and the roof that keeps their heads dry. Which usually means getting rained on or wind-beaten himself. If you don't do that, a woman has to, and it's something they're not constructed for.
That's the essence of being a man. Sometimes what you have to do sucks. That's the way it is. A man has both rights and duties, but when there's a conflict between them, duty always wins. Period. Your rights will be compromised over and over, but your responsibilities must never be. A man does what needs doing and worries about his rights some other time.
Don't be a guy. The world is full of guys. Be a man.
>>ORIGINAL BLOG POST HERE
Kirk rules... but maybe he wouldn't make a great a youth worker...
One of the big projects I have taken on at my church is making our sermons available online. Three years after being placed on the sound and media team at the church, we have finally acheived one of those original goals. Although it is not directly related to web design, this task is usually give to whomever is in charge of a church’s web site. I thought I would share a few things I have learned in the process.
Do you ever feel your teenager doesn't show you enough respect?
Back in a former life, really just a few months ago, I was a pastor primarily to young people, there was a phrase that many in my professional circles liked to use: The Jones Memorial Carpet. This term was coined, I believe, by the late Mike Yaconelli; it represented the "sacred cows" and limits placed on youth ministry. Many youth workers could and can regale you tales from their ministry where something wonderful happened; only to meet with the ire of the church family because, in the process, The Jones Memorial Carpet was soiled. [Discuss this in the forums]
A little old, but I hadn't come across this story before...
America is raising a nation of sleep-deprived kids, with only 20 percent getting the recommended nine hours of shuteye on school nights and more than one in four reporting dozing off in class.
Okay... not really student ministry news, as such, but maybe it is if you're in Israel. :) I actually never heard of this "Biblical ban," I'll have to look it up...
March 10, 2006 — Drinking to excess has always been a tradition and a problem among college men. But now college women are a growing concern. They're binge drinking in alarming numbers — and not just on spring break. They're out in public, staggering in the streets, falling down drunk, and becoming easy targets for sexual assault.
2 Samuel 11
Friday, March 24, 2006
In his classic book, All Grown Up & No Place to Go, author David Elkind addresses the issue of “disappearing markers” in-depth and warns of the consequences that our adolescents face as a result. Elkind writes regarding the importance of “markers” saying, “Markers are external signs of where we stand… (they) are signs of progress to others as well as ourselves… (they) confirm us in our sense of growing and changing as individuals.” On the whole, our culture has not done a great job in marking our kids’ progress in passing from childhood to adulthood. In fact, a prolonged adolescence coupled with a disappearance of “markers” happens to be one of the hallmarks of contemporary culture.
I remember one Christmas when I was a kid, there were a lot of gifts waiting for me under the tree. After I opened them all, I was very happy—until I went over to my friend’s house, that is. He got a toy that I did not have: a battery-operated, plastic skin diver. I thought it was the coolest toy I had ever seen. Suddenly everything that I had received seemed worthless in comparison, because in my mind, this was the toy that I really wanted.
It doesn’t matter where I go, but people always ask me, “How do you start a youth band?” Many people want to have a group of teens lead worship, but they rarely feel qualified to actually gather the necessary resources to get it going. If this is you, then this article should really help. 
WHAT TO COMMUNICATE TO PARENTS 
A new Gallup survey is reporting a mixed picture of how American teenagers feel about homosexuality. The survey, conducted from December 2005 to January 2006, reports that 51% of the 546 teenagers polled, ages 13 to 17, approved of same-sex marriage, while 55% approved of civil unions.
This list of mission experiences is not meant to be an exhaustive list. Rather, it is a list to get your mind thinking about some possibilities. You might also consider connecting with an established mission organization for your first few experiences to gain exposure to even more mission ideas.
Teens who passionately kiss multiple partners run a higher risk of getting meningococcal disease, according to a British study.
Sooner or later it seems like everyone in youth ministry has to deal with losing their job. There are times when this is by your choice, there are times when it is mutual, and their are times when you are forced to leave your ministry against your wish.
Many teenagers consider their parents a key resource for accurate information about sex, a new study suggests.
Research shows that teen and pre-teen girls need more than nine hours of sleep a night. Without it, they become cranky, don't do as well at school, and may feel depressed.
Evangelical Christian colleges are attracting record numbers of applications this year in a trend that bodes well for an educational niche that was struggling to survive just a generation ago.
FROM: DAILY MAIL - UK
Jonathan McKee of 
Westley Clark is a doctor and a lawyer, no small accomplishment for a black guy who grew up poor in Detroit. He could have gone on to make plenty of money, no doubt, and never looked back. But he couldn't forget where he came from or ignore the devastated lives of those left behind.
The news is filled with frightening stories about Web sites where teens post their pictures and personal information, raising parents' fears that their kids are putting themselves at risk. To explore the issue further, "Good Morning America" spoke to three mothers and their daughters, ages 13, 15 and 16.