August 13, 2007
1. 180 News
2. Something for Your Heart
3. Surf Report
4. Forgettable Fact
5. Potent Quotables
6. Parting Shot
1. 180 NEWS
Mexico Update
You've waited patiently so we're brining you as many pictures and video clips that we can in a few short minutes! We have two ways for you to experience the Mexico trip this week:
Take a look here for all of our pictures.
Also, check out the short video right here! We'll make a longer one too and let you know about it then.
Wild Waves
For those of you who registered, Wild Waves is going to be a wild time! Just remember that we leave next Wednesday, August 22nd at 8am and return home at 10:30pm. We'll post some more info next week.
Night Strike
Friday August 24th we are heading under the Burnside Bridge in Portland for a great night of serving God and our community. You'll want to keep your evening free so you can be with us for this amazing time growing together. Keep your eye open next week for times.
2. SOMETHING FOR YOUR HEART
Long before the race of Humans came into the world, there was a mighty angel—great in both rank and honor—serving in the high court of God. Though we know few details, we do know this angel wanted a station higher than the one he was created to possess. He wanted God's
place, God's throne, God's power.
And with that, God struck him down. The angel wasn't built to be God; if he wouldn't choose what he was created to be, then he'd become far less.
His angelic name was Lucifer, the light bringer. Today, he's known as Satan, and he's no storybook creature with horns and a pitchfork. Even depictions of him in movies such as the Exorcist hardly match his twistedness.
In Revelation 12:9, he's called, "the great dragon." Satan is smart and savvy. He has more power than the world's empires combined, yet he can subtly influence the hearts of men and women with prettiness, pleasure, and half-truths.
He is active in the Wild, and he desires to devour people to fill his house below. Satan is a mastermind who strategizes with his Jedi Mind Tricks on how best to capture the weak.
Why doesn't God just crush this horrible creature? If God has so much power, why doesn't God simply wipe out Satan altogether? Well, God could, and God will—one day. But not yet. The battle is not between God and Satan. The battle is over what we will do with our ideas about God.
There is a battle between Heaven and Hell over whether God is good. And the battle is for the human heart.
God could crush Satan in an instant. Yet that's not in God's purposes right now. God is more concerned about us. Will we see God as good? Will we choose to be God's friend? Or will we pretend we are God? Will we tell God to buzz off ? Satan may influence us in many directions,
but we still have the freedom to pursue God—or not.
Here's what the Bible says about the battle against the Dragon: The weapons we fight with are not the weapons of the world. On the contrary, they have divine power to demolish strongholds. We demolish arguments and every pretension that sets itself up against the
knowledge of God, and we take captive every thought to make it obedient to Christ. (2 Corinthians 10:4, 5)
The Dragon's major strategy is not swinging his mighty tail or enflaming our villages with fire. Rather, Satan works to make us believe that ideas don't matter. He wants us to lack understanding about the Wild and the way Home. He wants us distracted and ignorant. He wants us apathetic. He wants us plugged into our electronics and listening to a multitude of other voices so we hardly know our own. In other words, he wants us to trust our diversions.
The Enemy isn't interested in getting us to disbelieve God or to become atheists. That's not an effective strategy for him because thoughtful atheists are still at risk of thinking hard about God.
No, the Enemy has something more sinister in mind.
At the heart of Satan's warfare is his ongoing plan for us to misunderstand or disregard who God is and what God is like. It's an attack on our knowledge of God. So he effectively uses our diversions, which lead us to search for fulfillment in the things that don't—and can't—fulfill us, until we end up ignoring our souls' true satisfactions. Satan wants us playing in the Wild among the marshes of the dead, rather than looking for road signs that will lead us to safety. And he knows that if we misunderstand God or find God irrelevant, we'll misunderstand the importance of everything else as well.
But who will take up arms against him?
One of my favorite writers once said, "It is not that we have not got enough scoundrels to curse, but that we have not got enough good men to curse them."Our Home needs protecting from the many bad ideas that the Dragon flames down upon us. Many of us get burned, yet we don't even know it. We're just out in the fields, wearing our headphones and dancing with our eyes closed.
But there is one essential starting point to protect us, which, if we don't get it right, little else will help us win the fight. It's not more prayer, although more prayer is necessary. It's not more Bible study, although that's good, too. It's not spending more time at church, although that will help us band together with other believers in the task. Rather, our protection is to arm ourselves with the best ideas we can find and then walk in them.
Facing ideas, weeding through them, and using new tools along the way will help us understand ourselves, our hurts, our struggles, and how to deal with them without turning to easy diversions. This is no battle of swords and bombs.
This is a battle for our minds. What I think matters. And what you think matters.
**Questions to live into:
Find a place where you can have 15 minutes alone in the quiet (that means turning off music, TV, cell phone, etc.). Ask yourself these questions:
If all jobs paid $10 per hour, what job would you choose? Why? When you feel uneasy, lost, lonely, afraid, be-wild-ered what do you do? How often do you use the following as diversions?
Unplug. Try going one day without listening to music. Any music. Then write down how you felt when you wanted to listen to music as your diversion. Were you surprised? Do you find it hard to admit how you really feel about this? After you go one day without music, next time
try a whole weekend. After that, try a whole week. See what happens.
Find a friend and ask, "Do you think about your purpose in life?" See what happens. If your friend says yes, follow it up with, "Does it change how you think about life?" Discuss that a bit.
Hunt for Jedi Mind Tricks. Watch your favorite TV show. Pay close attention to the commercials. Whom are they trying to convince? What are advertisers trying to get you to believe? Do you find it easy to believe what they're telling you? Do you find you suddenly have new "needs" that you didn't have before you watched the commercial? Does the commercial change what you buy?
**
Taken from "Living with Questions" by Dale Fincher, copyright 2007,
Zondervan/Youth Specialties. Used by permission. Order the book here:
http://www.youthspecialties.com/product/276647
3. SURF REPORT
~ HowStuffWorks
Learn how lots of stuff works
http://www.howstuffworks.com
~ Answers.com
http://www.answers.com
4. FORGETTABLE FACT
When opossums are "playing dead", they are not "playing." They actually pass out from sheer terror.
5. POTENT QUOTABLES
"Have patience with everything that remains unsolved in your heart. Try to love the questions themselves, like locked rooms and like books written in a foreign language. Do not now look for the answers. They cannot now be given to you because you could not live them. It is a
question of experiencing everything. At present you need to live the question. Perhaps you will gradually, without even noticing it, find yourself experiencing the answer, some distant day."
- Rainer Maria Rilke
"Being religious means asking passionately the question of the meaning of our existence and being willing to receive answers, even if the answers hurt."
- Paul Tillich
===========our|sponsor===========
GET HELP WITH YOUR QUESTIONS
As a teenager, you naturally question your faith and purpose in life.
You might wonder if God's real, if God's listening, or what happens
when you die. You're not alone in these hard questions, nor are you
wrong to ask them.
Living with Questions is a book written for you—to help you form
answers to your questions, and to give you a place to be safe to work
through both.
http://www.youthspecialties.com/product/276647
Also available at your local Christian bookstore.
=================================
6. PARTING SHOT
Right now I'm having amnesia and déjà vu at the same time. I think I've forgotten this before.
2. Something for Your Heart
3. Surf Report
4. Forgettable Fact
5. Potent Quotables
6. Parting Shot
1. 180 NEWS
Mexico Update
You've waited patiently so we're brining you as many pictures and video clips that we can in a few short minutes! We have two ways for you to experience the Mexico trip this week:
Take a look here for all of our pictures.
Also, check out the short video right here! We'll make a longer one too and let you know about it then.
Wild Waves
For those of you who registered, Wild Waves is going to be a wild time! Just remember that we leave next Wednesday, August 22nd at 8am and return home at 10:30pm. We'll post some more info next week.
Night Strike
Friday August 24th we are heading under the Burnside Bridge in Portland for a great night of serving God and our community. You'll want to keep your evening free so you can be with us for this amazing time growing together. Keep your eye open next week for times.
2. SOMETHING FOR YOUR HEART
Long before the race of Humans came into the world, there was a mighty angel—great in both rank and honor—serving in the high court of God. Though we know few details, we do know this angel wanted a station higher than the one he was created to possess. He wanted God's
place, God's throne, God's power.
And with that, God struck him down. The angel wasn't built to be God; if he wouldn't choose what he was created to be, then he'd become far less.
His angelic name was Lucifer, the light bringer. Today, he's known as Satan, and he's no storybook creature with horns and a pitchfork. Even depictions of him in movies such as the Exorcist hardly match his twistedness.
In Revelation 12:9, he's called, "the great dragon." Satan is smart and savvy. He has more power than the world's empires combined, yet he can subtly influence the hearts of men and women with prettiness, pleasure, and half-truths.
He is active in the Wild, and he desires to devour people to fill his house below. Satan is a mastermind who strategizes with his Jedi Mind Tricks on how best to capture the weak.
Why doesn't God just crush this horrible creature? If God has so much power, why doesn't God simply wipe out Satan altogether? Well, God could, and God will—one day. But not yet. The battle is not between God and Satan. The battle is over what we will do with our ideas about God.
There is a battle between Heaven and Hell over whether God is good. And the battle is for the human heart.
God could crush Satan in an instant. Yet that's not in God's purposes right now. God is more concerned about us. Will we see God as good? Will we choose to be God's friend? Or will we pretend we are God? Will we tell God to buzz off ? Satan may influence us in many directions,
but we still have the freedom to pursue God—or not.
Here's what the Bible says about the battle against the Dragon: The weapons we fight with are not the weapons of the world. On the contrary, they have divine power to demolish strongholds. We demolish arguments and every pretension that sets itself up against the
knowledge of God, and we take captive every thought to make it obedient to Christ. (2 Corinthians 10:4, 5)
The Dragon's major strategy is not swinging his mighty tail or enflaming our villages with fire. Rather, Satan works to make us believe that ideas don't matter. He wants us to lack understanding about the Wild and the way Home. He wants us distracted and ignorant. He wants us apathetic. He wants us plugged into our electronics and listening to a multitude of other voices so we hardly know our own. In other words, he wants us to trust our diversions.
The Enemy isn't interested in getting us to disbelieve God or to become atheists. That's not an effective strategy for him because thoughtful atheists are still at risk of thinking hard about God.
No, the Enemy has something more sinister in mind.
At the heart of Satan's warfare is his ongoing plan for us to misunderstand or disregard who God is and what God is like. It's an attack on our knowledge of God. So he effectively uses our diversions, which lead us to search for fulfillment in the things that don't—and can't—fulfill us, until we end up ignoring our souls' true satisfactions. Satan wants us playing in the Wild among the marshes of the dead, rather than looking for road signs that will lead us to safety. And he knows that if we misunderstand God or find God irrelevant, we'll misunderstand the importance of everything else as well.
But who will take up arms against him?
One of my favorite writers once said, "It is not that we have not got enough scoundrels to curse, but that we have not got enough good men to curse them."Our Home needs protecting from the many bad ideas that the Dragon flames down upon us. Many of us get burned, yet we don't even know it. We're just out in the fields, wearing our headphones and dancing with our eyes closed.
But there is one essential starting point to protect us, which, if we don't get it right, little else will help us win the fight. It's not more prayer, although more prayer is necessary. It's not more Bible study, although that's good, too. It's not spending more time at church, although that will help us band together with other believers in the task. Rather, our protection is to arm ourselves with the best ideas we can find and then walk in them.
Facing ideas, weeding through them, and using new tools along the way will help us understand ourselves, our hurts, our struggles, and how to deal with them without turning to easy diversions. This is no battle of swords and bombs.
This is a battle for our minds. What I think matters. And what you think matters.
**Questions to live into:
Find a place where you can have 15 minutes alone in the quiet (that means turning off music, TV, cell phone, etc.). Ask yourself these questions:
If all jobs paid $10 per hour, what job would you choose? Why? When you feel uneasy, lost, lonely, afraid, be-wild-ered what do you do? How often do you use the following as diversions?
- Money-seeking
- Fashion
- Church
- Music
- Busyness
Unplug. Try going one day without listening to music. Any music. Then write down how you felt when you wanted to listen to music as your diversion. Were you surprised? Do you find it hard to admit how you really feel about this? After you go one day without music, next time
try a whole weekend. After that, try a whole week. See what happens.
Find a friend and ask, "Do you think about your purpose in life?" See what happens. If your friend says yes, follow it up with, "Does it change how you think about life?" Discuss that a bit.
Hunt for Jedi Mind Tricks. Watch your favorite TV show. Pay close attention to the commercials. Whom are they trying to convince? What are advertisers trying to get you to believe? Do you find it easy to believe what they're telling you? Do you find you suddenly have new "needs" that you didn't have before you watched the commercial? Does the commercial change what you buy?
**
Taken from "Living with Questions" by Dale Fincher, copyright 2007,
Zondervan/Youth Specialties. Used by permission. Order the book here:
http://www.youthspecialties.com/product/276647
3. SURF REPORT
~ HowStuffWorks
Learn how lots of stuff works
http://www.howstuffworks.com
~ Answers.com
http://www.answers.com
4. FORGETTABLE FACT
When opossums are "playing dead", they are not "playing." They actually pass out from sheer terror.
5. POTENT QUOTABLES
"Have patience with everything that remains unsolved in your heart. Try to love the questions themselves, like locked rooms and like books written in a foreign language. Do not now look for the answers. They cannot now be given to you because you could not live them. It is a
question of experiencing everything. At present you need to live the question. Perhaps you will gradually, without even noticing it, find yourself experiencing the answer, some distant day."
- Rainer Maria Rilke
"Being religious means asking passionately the question of the meaning of our existence and being willing to receive answers, even if the answers hurt."
- Paul Tillich
===========our|sponsor===========
GET HELP WITH YOUR QUESTIONS
As a teenager, you naturally question your faith and purpose in life.
You might wonder if God's real, if God's listening, or what happens
when you die. You're not alone in these hard questions, nor are you
wrong to ask them.
Living with Questions is a book written for you—to help you form
answers to your questions, and to give you a place to be safe to work
through both.
http://www.youthspecialties.com/product/276647
Also available at your local Christian bookstore.
=================================
6. PARTING SHOT
Right now I'm having amnesia and déjà vu at the same time. I think I've forgotten this before.
