Preview the new NOOMA online through Wednesday

You can watch the new NOOMA video entitled "Whirlwind" for the next 46 hours by clicking here.

Enjoy!

Great Youth Mission Trip Idea

Last week, I accompanied our youth group on their annual mission trip. We spent a week in Philadelphia participating in Broad Street Ministry's Summer Youth Immersion Program. It was an excellent experience. I highly recommend it.

From their website,

The summer immersion program begins with our regular Sunday evening worship service. Groups should arrive by 5 pm. We provide several days of service learning and opportunities for authentic relationship building with the people of Philadelphia. An effort will be made to take groups to different neighborhoods in the city and discuss poverty, homelessness, hunger, and health care all grounded within a theological framework. A particular goal will be to engage youth with the poor and disadvantaged who are trying to make a difference in their community through social action. Stereotypes will be broken not re-enforced. The week will end in a service of commissioning to send students back to their own communities where faithful transformation may continue.

Why your youth group should consider Broad Street's Summer Youth Program:

1.) It's close. No long van ride necessary. Our group took the train from Harrisburg.

2.) It's well run. Rev. Erika Funk, the staff of BSM, and their talented summer interns do an excellent job of leading, teaching, and inspiring young people.

3.) It's reasonably priced. The program costs $390 per person for the week.

4.) As a leader, you just have to get your youth to Philly. The BSM staff takes care of all the logistics and programming!

Spirituality Centers

Are you thinking about starting a spirituality center in your church? The Fall 2009 issue of Ideas for Church Leaders has a short, stimulating article on one church's experience of setting one up. Who knows, after reading these two pages, you may just be inspired to start creating one in your church.

Just Arrived

The new We Believe! curriculum has just arrived. Stop in to check out all the new changes to this popular curriculum.

Fall Book Study Option

If you are looking for a book to use for a fall book study (or just something to renew your spirit), here is my recommendation. Barbara Brown Taylor's latest book, An Altar in the World, is excellent. In it she shares 12 religious practices that are meaningful to her. Hers is not an otherworldly or monastic spirituality. Some of the practices she addresses included groundedness, Sabbath, and physical labor. As always, her prose is a joy to read. But what really grabbed me were her insights into life with God that made me put the book down to figure out how to incorporate them into my life. Highly recommended.

The Misunderstood Jew

I was on vacation last week and took along Amy-Jill Levine's The Misunderstood Jew. Levine is a Jewish New Testament scholar who teaches at Vanderbilt Divinity School. Because she is Jewish, she brings a different perspective to New Testament scholarship. Because of her background in rabbinical sources, she illuminates the Jewish context of Jesus' life and teachings. She also educates her Christian readers on interpretations of the text that are anti-Jewish. This is a fun and interesting read. I highly recommend it.

The Story of Stuff

Where does the stuff we buy come from? What happens to it when we're finished with it? This entertaining video addresses our extraction-production-consumption economy and why this process is not sustainable. I found out about it from this New York Times article. Showing this video would be a good way to talk to all groups (especially young ones) about consumption (where our treasure is) and creation care.

From the website:

From its extraction through sale, use and disposal, all the stuff in our lives affects communities at home and abroad, yet most of this is hidden from view. The Story of Stuff is a 20-minute, fast-paced, fact-filled look at the underside of our production and consumption patterns. The Story of Stuff exposes the connections between a huge number of environmental and social issues, and calls us together to create a more sustainable and just world. It'll teach you something, it'll make you laugh, and it just may change the way you look at all the stuff in your life forever.

Free VBS Curriculum

We have an extra copy of Camp EDGE, Cokesbury's 2009 VBS curriculum. I will give it to the first church in the presbytery of Carlisle that emails me requesting it.

Clergy Under 40 Conference at Montreat

If you are a PC(USA) clergy person under the age of 40, you are younger than the average Presbyterian in your church; you are online, energized, underpaid, frustrated, prophetic, misunderstood, innovative, post-modern, disillusioned, hopeful, all of the above....and perfect for this conference.

Connect with a community of young clergy for spiritual renewal, mutual encouragement, relevant workshops, and worship you don't have to lead.

Bruce will be there. Montreat June 8-11. For more info on alt7 2009, click here.


alt7 2009 from Montreat on Vimeo.

New NOOMA!

Many of us spend our lives striving for newer and better things, but have ceased to be grateful for our good gifts. Rob makes the point that it is in sharing with others that we actually receive what we seek through the acquisition of more stuff. Click here to watch a preview.