This weekend I am in San Diego for the NYWC. I am really looking forward to being there as it is always a great time to hook up with friends, interact with people; making new friends. It is also a privilege to have the opportunity to speak into the development of youth workers as well as experiment with some of my thoughts and ideas in the seminars. The weather is almost always perfect in SD, so I got that going for me which is nice…

I am doing two seminars the time around. The first is called, “Living, Loving and Leading in the way of Jesus.” It is roughly a one hour seminar and is a simple but helpful look at the life and ministry of Jesus. Not so much his strategy for ministry but his approach to modeling what it means to live in the intended ways of God. Hopefully, it results in some transferable principles that any youth worker can take back and immediately apply to their life and ministry. I also hope that it is something that youth workers can use to train their volunteers. If you have been to Sonlife’s Enroute experience, there will be some overlap in regards to the virtues of Jesus’ life that we teach.

The second seminar is called, “Story, Signs and Sacred Rhythms: A Narrative Approach to Nurturing Students.” I am really excited to share some thoughts/ideas I have been having that hopefully lead some of us toward a new paradigm for shepherding students. I believe that we (the youth ministry world) are ready for a creative and fresh approach to the principles that have been guiding us for decades. I will attempt to help youth workers “see” a design for ministry that starts with helping students engage with God’s story and results in the formation of behaviors and practices that are in line with God’s mission. I will let you know how it goes…

If you are one of my occasional or regular blog readers and will be in San Diego at the convention, I would love to meet you. Look me up. You can find me at the end of my seminars which will be shown in the convention handbook.