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Authentic Compassion Night:

Wow.....what a crazy couple of weeks. Last week we "R.A.C.K'd" and caught a glimpse of what it is to seize the moment when God gives us a task for our community. We explored how in our daily run of the mill routines, that He is looking to use us to love where ever possible: either through an encouraging word, a gift of a cup of coffee or simply listening to someone share their story.

This week was "Authentic Discipleship" night....and it was eye opening for some. In the same spirit as last week, we explored the realities of our world being filled with "noise" and its affects on us hearing God's voice on a daily basis. How this "noise" prevents us from being able to seize the moment like we explored last week. We also unpacked what this "noise" looks like; the constant, every moment of the day Ipod, cell phone, TV and entertainment worship angle, also the marketing "noise" of what you should wear, say, want, pursue, look like and live for. It was discovered very early that these things did not affect all of the youth that came the same way but that all of us were not totally immune to its affects. Our prayer was that we could take the time to listen and look around us to see what God's want us to be seeing. We realized that this will not be easy but that it is a worth while battle and must be pursued.

Stay tuned for next week, Authentic Worship.

So tonight we had some fun entertaining and writing on each others backs what would we think our friends would want themselves to be remembered by 100 years after they were no longer alive on this planet. Then also we looked at what we would want to be remembered for as well. Their answers were not as random as I had predicted, they wanted to be know as God fearing, caring, reliable and gifted......oh and to be record breaking olympic swimmers and inventors of 20 or so new music genres.

We explored howand if  we were prepared to help each other accomplish these dreams of how our legacies will preceed us and explored the reality of the gift of what this group was through relying on each other through Jesus. We then talked about how supporting each other and bringing each other to Jesus would look like and the awesome things it could accomplish, see Luke 5: 17-20. This is messy work and you may look a little weird and counter cultural but if the effort is to bring your friends before Jesus the work is rewarding and fulfilling.

Then we decided that would follow the churchs four authentic directional values in worship, discipleship, community and compassion for this school year and brainstormed what they would look like each week. I am compiling our ideas and will share at a later date.

Awesome group tonight and stay tuned for more details!

Blessings!!!!