11.22.2005

Nashville - recap

So I'm back. Youth for Christ and YouthSpecialties teamed up to host a conference in Nashville. We left Peoria on Friday morning, and got back on Monday night. It was so cool to stand alongside almost 8,000 other youth workers from countless churches around the globe and worship together (I think it was the closest thing to Heaven on earth I've seen yet).

Highlights:
  • Line dancing at the Wildhorse. Watching Jeff get hit on with his wife standing right next to him.
  • A meeting ... that's all I'm going to say
  • Reconnecting with distant YFC friends
  • Stretch Hummer (see photo below).
  • Crowder ... Tomlin ... 3rd Day ... Starfield
  • Worshipping inside the War Monument
Challenges:
  • 36,000 people will die today because of starvation. There are 200 million orphans. What am I gonna do about that?
  • Jesus met people's REAL needs ... and I haven't figured out how to do that yet
  • Start a "12 and one's trying to kill you" discipleship ministry
  • Worship is nothing more than our response to God - forget about style
  • Consumer vs. Consumee worship (curious? ask)
  • I need to FEAR God more. To rid critical spirits, forget about me and what I need, and FEAR the living God. I want a new attitude towards Church, ministry, and conferences.


There were tons of great bands and speakers, and I took so many notes. It's funny though ... the few words that spoke to my heart the most came from an old and simple hymn:
take my heart, Lord.
take and seal it
seal it for thy courts above.

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

Ditto on Crowder, 3rd Day, and line dancing, and also on those powerful lyrics: take my heart, Lord, take and seal it seal it for thy courts above. Dan L

Anonymous said...

I love that hymn, its probably one of my favorites in fact we should sing it tomorrow at worship...glad your trip went well :-)

Right now