man, i haven’t had time to blog! crazy.
yesterday was the official day 1 of the sac convention. great stuff, man. it’s hard to get 2500 youth workers at a convention and not have it be a cool thing, though. i love these people – they’re my tribe.
the opening session went well — great talk from sherwood carthen. and i had a good time in my afternoon seminar, with a great group of rookie youth workers who asked wonderful questions. but the highlight of the day for me was our evening general session. we tried a new format, with three speakers following this format:
– intro by the host
– 18 minute talk from the speaker (there was a clock on one of the big screens, so everyone knew exactly how much time was left)
– 8 minutes of unguided discussion with the people sitting around you
– 8 minutes of hosted Q&A, using questions people had text messaged in
first, jeanne stevens hosted her husband, jarrett, who did a wonderfully compact bit about knowing the difference between the means and the end.
then, i hosted andrew marin, who talked about homosexuality and the church — i was nervous about this, but thought it went really, really well.
finally, tic hosted shane claiborne, who talked about shane stuff, including living in the kingdom of god.
people seemed to really dig the format (i know i did).
this morning, i’m on an early flight to dallas, to spend 24 hours with our spanish convention. i’m stoked to be a part of that event, but it feels really weird to be leaving this one for a day. i’m on an early flight back to sacramento tomorrow.
I thought your bit with Marin went pretty well. You could feel a bit of the “tension” in the room a couple times, though. But I’m glad you guys had him speak; it’s important to talk/hear about different ways of ministering, etc.
I didn’t add this on my evaluation but I thought that was a cool format for the NYWC. I was a little suspect about it, but I thought it was cool! Way to keep thinking outside the box!