Jr. High Youth Gathering
The Jr. High Gathering is for all current 6-8th graders. It takes place July 27-29 at Concordia University in Ann Arbor.
Click the links below for more information and registration forms. The deadline to register is May 25.
Jr. High Youth Gathering Medical Release Permission Slip New.pdf
Jr. High Youth Gathering Youth Registration Form.pdf
Download the Mexicali Documentation
Click the link below to download the documents needed to attend the Mexicali 2012 Mission Trip.
Coming Attractions!
The year is in full-swing at Area 12:2 youth group! We’ve got Bible study every Sunday at 9:30am. High School Teen Night takes place every Sunday night from 7-9 pm, and Jr. High Teen Night happens every 2nd and 4th Tuesday from 7:00-8:30pm. Mexicali 2012 is open to all 7-12 grade students this year. We anticipate a huge group. Applications are due November 6 and can be downloaded from this site. Springhill Winter retreats take place in January for High School and February for Jr. High. Those forms can also be found here on this site. Take your time to check out the site, and feel free to contact us if you have any questions. Hope to see you at one of our activites!
Dave Priskorn
Director of Youth Ministry
STUDENT NEWSLETTER #514
Contents
1. Something for Your Heart
2. Surf Report
3. Random Randomness
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1. SOMETHING FOR YOUR HEART
Romans 8: Call Him Father
“For you did not receive a spirit that makes you a slave again to fear, but you received the Spirit of sonship. And by him we cry, ‘Abba, Father.’ ” (Romans 8:15)
What does it mean to you to be God’s child, to be able to legitimately call Him your father? Too often, Christianity is presented as a contract between a person and God: “Just sign here, here, and here, and all your sins will be forgiven and you can go to heaven when you die.”
It’s much more personal to God than that. He’s not selling something we need. He’s not looking for buyers. He’s looking for children. He has given us the “Spirit of sonship,” which could also be read as the “Spirit of adoption.” He’s looking to fill His family with lost kids by making them His kids.
Aside from Jesus, God has no biological children. Some of us may have grown up in the church nursery, but we were not born into God’s family just by being born. We had to be adopted to become a child of God. And once we were in the family, He gave us the right to call Him “daddy.”
Think: What does it mean to you to know that God is your Father, that He has adopted you into His family? What is the value of that? Can Christianity work without the idea of God as Father?
Pray: Thank God for giving you the spirit of adoption and inviting you to call Him “Abba, Father.”
Do: Read this great quote from J.I. Packer’s book Knowing God:
If you want to judge how well a person understands Christianity, find out how much he makes of the thought of being God’s child, and having God as his Father. If this is not the thought that prompts and controls his worship and prayers and his whole outlook on life, it means that he does not understand Christianity very well at all. For everything that Christ taught, everything that makes the New Testament new, and better than the Old, everything that is distinctively Christian as opposed to merely Jewish, is summed up in the knowledge of the Fatherhood of God. “Father” is the Christian name for God. … Our understanding of Christianity cannot be better than our grasp of adoption. (pp. 201—202)
(HT: Between Two Worlds)
Get More Daily Devotionals at PlanetWisdom.com.
2.Surf Report
Real Steel [Christianity Today]
The Ides of March [Plugged In]
3. Random Randomness:
More than ten people a year are killed by vending machines.
The Weeks Ahead
Contents
1. Something for Your Heart
2. Surf Report
3. Forgettable Fact
4. Potent Quotables
5. Uh, That’s Funny?
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1. SOMETHING FOR YOUR HEART
“. . . in all your ways acknowledge him, and he will make your paths straight.” (Proverbs 3:6)
Want your life to be complicated? Really confused and stressful and messy? It’s easy to accomplish: Just give some of your life to the Lord. Just acknowledge Him in some of your ways. And then save the rest of your ways for yourself.
Trust me. It’s like signing up for a multiple personality disorder. Why? Because God’s way is not your way. If you make a commitment to trust Him in some things and not others, you’ll always be trying to keep the parts of yourself a secret from the other parts of yourself.
I’m not saying it can’t be done. Most of us do it every day. I’m just saying it sucks. James called it being “double minded and unstable,” this trusting in God some and me some. And it leads to foolish living and giant headaches.
Want to live simple? Want to walk a straight-ahead path that’s going somewhere? Trust God with 100 percent of your heart and acknowledge Him in all of your ways.
Think: What would you lose if you trusted God by obeying Him in every part of your life? What would you gain?
Pray: Ask God to help you to acknowledge Him in all of your ways.
Do: Make a quick list of parts of your life that you tend to keep away from God, that you’d rather not let the “God part” of your life know about.
A Daily Devotional from PlanetWisdom.com, copyright 2010 Youth Specialties. Used by permission.
2. SURF REPORT
Interview with Denzel Washington about The Book of Eli
http://www.christianitytoday.com/ct/movies/interviews/2010/denzelwashington-jan10.html
Lost Character Study: Will Kate Believe?
http://blog.christianitytoday.com/ctmovies/2010/02/lost-character-study-will-kate.html
3. FORGETTABLE FACT
More than ten people a year are killed by vending machines.
4. POTENT QUOTABLES
Love is never lost. If not reciprocated, it will flow back and soften and purify the heart.
~ Washington Irving
To love another person is to see the face of God.
~ Les Miserables
5. UH, THAT’S FUNNY?
‘You should be ashamed,’ the father told his son, Andy,
‘When Abraham Lincoln was your age, he used to walk ten miles every day to get to school.’
‘Really?’ Andy responded. ‘Well, when he was your age, he was president.’