do we really understand what we are able to acheive?

Having been doing mission across Nottingham over the last 9 years i have been surprised, looking back, how much God has let us be involved in. Although we haven't purposely set out to be schools workers and doing Christian schools work, we have ended up being able to see nearly 2,000 young people each week through our work in schools. This has been through just serving the schools and giving them support and standing by them, in particular with spiritual and pastoral issues. Yes, we do assemblies and we do mission weeks through lessons and roadshows, but schools have really appreciated the ongoing support we have been able to give them.
To be honest, as i have looked at Jesus I see this as something that He would do. Jesus was someone who didn't judge but stood with people, got alongside them and supported them.
This is also something that we are passionate in doing. Getting alongside young people, supporting them when they feel alone, when they feel no one else is around for them, that is where Jesus would be.
Through the things we do, and looked to acheive we look back and see that by just being there, we suddenly have the opportunity to speak into thousands of young peoples lives.
Isn't it funny what creeps up on you, when you just aim to serve others.

Whose strength?

Being a bloke, i have this competitive edge. Even as a youth worker (I know i shouldn't) I very rarely will try less than 100% when it comes to playing sport or games. As i tend to play at this level quite often it is always a little embarrassing and humiliating when i lose. If it is a young person that beats me then they also like to tell me that they have beat me.

Of course then my pride kicks in, because my best wasn't good enough, and that sometimes hurt. I also look at some of the people in the Bible and see how good they were and what great things they did and sometimes wish i was like them.

I was reading in Judges about Samson and the person he was and i remember back to Sunday school and hearing how strong he was and how muscly he looked on the picture. i think i always saw him as the 'Christian superhero' (apart from Jesus obviously) and was someone who was the ultimate superman. Yet i was reading a commentary the other day saying that idea of Samson being that type of man, the He-man of his time is actually wrong and denying God. It says that people were surprised by his strength and that they couldn't work out where he got his strength from. Well, if he was that muscle bound man people wouldn't have been surprised and people would have known exactly where he got his strength from. His muscles.

So to know that Samson got his strength from God challenges me to think about how much i use my own strength and how much i depend on God. OK maybe not at table tennis, but at life stuff, things that are really important. Decisions that i need to make, Choices that come my way, i want to be strong, but how often do i realise there is no way i am strong enough on my own.

eq - mission training for young people

One of the most exciting things that Nottingham YfC have been
involved in over the past few years has been the training of young people to share their faith. Starting in 2003 it has been great to see over 40 young people trained and equipped in sharing their faith to their peers, through a year long course.
Although that generation of eq has come to an end, NYfC and myself in particular are still passionate about training and equipping young people in mission and evangelism. So the regeneration of eq has arrived. In 2 streams eq will aim to put mission and evangelism back on the agenda of young people across the city, and give them opportunity to hear from experienced and gifted evangelists and mission practicioners as well as giving opportunities to do mission.

eq:uip is our training hub. It happens 3 times a year and will give young people the opportunity to hear from the best in the business. It will be challenging and thought provoking and most of all it will give practical tips on how to share your faith with the people around you. Our first event is June 11th and we have Roy Crown (who heads up HOPE) as our speaker.

eq:mission is our experiential zone. Twice a year we will take a group of young people somewhere across the country to make a difference in a community, as well as give them opportunities to share their faith with others. Our first mission trip is July 17-18 .

Future dates will be produced with enough time for youth leaders to put these in their programme. The eq:uip events are turn up on the door for a fiver per person (youth leaders come free with 5 or more young people), and the eq:mission is thirty quid inclusive. Our heart and passion is for the young people of the church to be mission focused as part of their faith. For more details on the up coming eq events the check out http://bit.ly/9XNLPt
Let's see young people learn through hearing and doing in a world where it is all about having the experience that develops young people most, what a great opportunity to change your world.

do we dip our toes in?

I have recently been very challenged about everything i do and how much i put into it.

I have been out of action over the weekend due to a minor op, and this has coincided with Laura deciding that we are going to redecorate the lounge. Now for me this has been quite good timing, as i am not very good at decorating, and i tend to cut a lot of corners, and it ends up looking worse than it did before.

While i have been out of action i have put our V+ box to work and while the rest of the family scuttled off to church on Sunday morning, i started to watch a soul surviour programme that i had recorded. It had the very funny J.John spaeking about commitment and how people like to dabble in something but not really jump in with both feet. There is a fear of committing to anything.

Working with young people I see that a lot, and in a way that doesn't bother me because we all tried to get away with things when we were younger. What worries me is that us adults don't seem to have grown out of the problem. A few years ago i worked with someone, that when you asked them if they wanted to do something, or plan something they would say " I'll let you know" or "we'll see" .

On the bus journey into work today i got chatting to a woman next to me and we were chatting about our kids, and she kept refering ot her other half as 'her partner'. Even in reltionships we are sceptical about getting let down or hurt, so our defense shields say ' I will keep things at an arms length.'

Now .... i suppose this could all sound logical, even to me, if people get hurt, people get trod on and things kept going wrong. What i can't get my head round is when people who claim to be Christians do the same with God. You see for me, this is the one relationship where i know i will be safe, i know I won't get let down, and yet i still, sometimes keep Him at arms length. I don't totally hand my life over to Him. Why? Because sometimes we let our nervousness that we have of people, affect our relationship with Jesus.

This doesn't make me less loved by Jesus, it doesn't mean i am a rubbish Christian, it just means i am not getting everything i can out of life and, more importantly, I am not getting everything God wants to give me. And with this in mind i think how is this going to affect 'The Church' ? because if we don't have everything God wants to give us how can we pass it on.

So the question i have is ...... do i keep dipping my toes in or am i going to get soaked?

Guest blog: Paula-Marie Leech : Decisions

Each month Nottingham YfC are having a guest blogger. This month Paula-Marie Leech, chair of trusttees for NYfC gives her thoughts...

Decisions, decisions, decisions!

I am currently trying to decide which is the best printer to buy for the NYFC office this should be a fairly simple task after the trustees at their last meeting deciding upon a colour laser printer. But no, now I have to decide which company should make it, should it be HP, Cannon, Xerox, Dell, Oki and so the list goes on... and even when I decide on who should make it I then have to decide which model it should be, the list is equally as endless..., as well as choosing how much I will spend and deciding if what it does is what we need etc. Our lives seem to be an endless number of metres of hurdles, making one decision and being immediately confronted by the next. Not to mention the worry of will it be the right decision, will I make it over the hurdle?, will I end up flat on my face? This reminded me of my eldest daughter on holiday in Switzerland trying to buy a traditionally dressed wind up Swiss musical doll as a souvenir. There were three to choose from a red dress, a blue dress or a green dress some would say this was not a difficult decision. However, she couldn't decide and trying to be helpful the shopkeeper much to my horror started bringing out more dolls with different coloured dresses and then different musical tunes!!! As I suspected this only made the decision making worse, as the more there was to choose from the more unsure she got! Needless to say we had been in the shop for what seemed like an eternity, when I asked her why she couldn't choose, she replied 'I don't want to make the wrong decision.' You will be pleased to know that she did eventually make a decision, the blue dress out of the original three choices!
What still amazes me is the sheer number of decisions that we make from getting up in the morning to going to sleep at night. But what amazes me more is that this is the way God made us to be, he gives us free choice, he allows us to make bad decisions just as so many people we read about in the Bible did, he continues to love us whatever we decide, he even allows us the decision not to return his love and be in a relationship with him. So we need to remember that God gives us permission to choose for ourselves, no doubt we won't always make the right decisions, but we can be assured that God loves us and remains with us whatever decision we make.

Paula-Marie has been chair of NYfC since last November. She is married to Pete, who is training at St. John's college to be an Anglican minister. They have 4 children.