I had the unique opportunity during my college days to work for a couple of summers at an enormous Procter & Gamble paper mill near my hometown. The factory was an huge operation. On one end of the massive complex, loggers would deposit their semitrailers loaded with felled trees from the northeastern Pennsylvania forests. Out the other end would come a wide array of Procter & Gamble products ranging from Bounty paper towels to Pampers disposal diapers. The process this company went through to turn timber into paper was amazing. The logs were made into pulp, and the pulp was then turned into an assortment of paper products.

I have often wondered about this process as an illustration of local church youth ministry. At one end we receive undeveloped and immature early adolescents – called junior highers. Out the other end of our “factory” comes the finished product – high school graduates. Of course, I understand that this analogy breaks down in places. The natural resource we work with is the lives of individual teenagers (along with their families), which makes our task of molding hearts and lives vastly different than the inanimate process of turning wood into paper. Yet I do believe that we must begin to think intentionally about our product as well as the process by which we turn out graduates from our ministries. (more…)

Perhaps you’ve read the news accounts recently that chronicled the exploits of the Army Ranger and American hero, Pat Tillman, who was killed by “friendly fire” in Afghanistan in April 2004. The original reports stated that this former pro-football player, who turned down millions of dollars playing professional football to enroll in America’s armed forces following 9/11, had been killed in battle as a hero rushing to the aid of his fellow soldiers. In the three years following that original news report, the truth of what actually happened may be finally coming to light. It now seems that Tillman was actually shot and killed by other U.S. soldiers who were confused and disoriented in the wartime chaos of that encounter with the Taliban soldiers in the rugged mountains of Afghanistan.

This particularly saddening incident reminds us that it is critically important that we tell the truth and not “sugar-coat” the facts. The original account of Tillman’s death just wasn’t true. That story was made up in an attempt to put a positive spin on a disastrous and heartbreaking tragedy. (more…)

“The harvest truly is great, but the labourers are few: pray ye therefore the Lord of the harvest, that he would send forth labourers into his harvest” Luke 10:2.

The catalyst for the largest mobilization of students ever for worldwide missions was a simple prayer meeting that was held during a summer afternoon thunderstorm in 1806. This prayer meeting of only five students launched what was to become the Student Volunteer Movement that is credited with motivating twenty thousand foreign missionaries to consider global vocational ministry.

As I have been reading recently about this “Haystack Meeting,” now two centuries ago, the Lord has put a growing question on my mind: why can’t a student-led, worldwide missions phenomenon happen again?

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One blistering hot, summer day in 1806, five students from Williams College in the far northeastern corner of Massachusetts met for their regular small- group prayer meeting. On this particular day, a late afternoon thunderstorm forced the group to take shelter under a nearby haystack as one of the students, Samuel Mills, challenged the group to prayerfully consider a mobilization of students for worldwide missions. This simple prayer meeting was to become the catalyst for what has been called “the Second Great Awakening” and perhaps the largest student missions endeavor ever: the Student Volunteer Movement. This sense of revival in America coincided with the ministry of leading evangelical voices in England such as John Wesley and William Wilberforce, who has recently gained popularity from the release of the movie, “Amazing Grace.” According to historians who have chronicled this student missions phenomenon, close to 20,000 foreign missionaries sprang out of this student-led revival.

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Happy New Year from RBP Student Ministries! I admit that I’m not much for making New Year’s Resolutions. I know myself well enough to realize that I’m not all that resolute (which means stubborn, unwavering, and determined) to actually keep very many personal year-by-year commitments. After all, I’m old enough and have been in the ministry long enough to realize that I don’t exercise enough and that I really need to lose some weight. My doctor has already told me to cut down on salt and to watch my cholesterol intake. However, my ministry travels the past few weeks have made me realize that perhaps it’s time to take a fresh look at making some ministry commitments during the 2007 year. Since this is my newsletter, I’ll share my resolutions here with our readers. I know that each of you will undoubtedly come up with your own list, but here are a few things the Lord has been impressing on my heart recently.

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