LIFE

So, here's the deal on LIFE. The church denomination I grew up in and go to now has a HUGE youth conference every three years, and it's called LIFE. I went twice when I was in High School, and it was awesome. The best quick description I could give you is that it's like church camp, but on steroids.

The main attractions for LIFE is that everything is awesome. The speakers, the worship leaders, the bands and concerts, the seminars, the things that are available in the activity center, and even the "services". They are actually called sessions, but most of the time it's like church. Fun stuff to start off, singing, special presentations, and speaker, all designed to speak to teens where they are. But, I will tell you that I am NOT a teen, and I loved every minute of it.

So, some examples of this awesomeness would be...

Speakers: Francis Chan, Derwin Gray, James Grout

Worship: Logan Martin Band. They are from Salem, OR, and if you haven't heard of them yet, you will soon. They were GREAT!

Special Presentations:Trace Bundy (guitarist), Bradley Hathaway (slam poet), Carlos Oscar (comedian), Danny Ray (illusionist), and lots more.

Bands: Hawk Nelson, Kutless, Proxy (hip-hop artist), Flynn Adam (DJ before each session)

If you want to know any more about these awesome people, you can check them out, but I just don't have the time to tell you about each one. I loved them, the kids loved them, and a good time was had by all. It all combined to make the sessions less like "church", and more like a fun get-together. Very entertaining.

The theme for the week was "collide", and all the speakers talked on this theme, and how it relates to us. The first day was on the collision that was creation - God spoke and everything we know came out of his mouth. He created eating! Francis Chan talked for several minutes about how weird eating is. But God chose to create eating, rather than creating us like trees, sucking up nutrients and water from the soil. This was all very vividly demonstrated with a Kit Kat bar!

The second day was the collision that was incarnation - Jesus' choice to become human and messy, and take on our sins. That Jesus came down to earth to live outwardly through us.

The third day we talked about the collision of our Faith with our lives, and what it means to live out our faith. James Grout talked from James 1, and basically said that we need to live out our faith - if there is no evidence of our faith in our day-to-day lives, then our religion is useless.

That really struck me - what evidence of my faith is there in my every day life?

Friday night was the Project night, and we got to choose from all of the concerts or performers. It was pretty cool, I thought, that there were so many choices. The Hawk Nelson concert was a big draw, but several of my kids went to different shows, like Danny Ray the illusionist, or Carlos Oscar the comedian.

Saturday, the last day was on the collision that is the church. James Grout talked from Luke 10, and reminded us that our "job" is to love God with everything we have. Often we get so busy doing the "work" of the church, that we forget to love God with all our heart, all our soul, all our mind, etc. If we love God with everything we have, we will act as the church should act.

This morning, was pretty cool as well: there was a missionary parade, with Alliance missionaries carrying flags from all the countries where the Alliance has workers or a missionary presence.

Here's what it looked like from above:

Saturday night was the last meeting, and Jason, our "pastor" for the week gave us all glow sticks! It was pretty cool to see 6500 teens waving glow sticks. Here's a picture:

It just reminds us that in order to bring light to the world, Jesus had to be broken. Such as it is with a glow stick.

So, I haven't even touched on half of the things going on at LIFE, but I think you've got the idea. The most amazing part of this week was that God put a call on several of our kids' lives to go into the ministry. I am SO grateful that they were in a position where God could speak to them, and they listened.

Any time God can grab ahold of a teenager's life and change it for good, I'm all about that.

So, now LIFE is over, and until 2013 in St. Louis, I guess we will have to look back at the pictures and notes on the speakers, and continue to apply all that we've learned.

Thanks for reading, and here's to living out the collision in your life.

K