£4.50?
Just discovered the seminar I did at New Wine is available for £4.50 on CD or cassette!
It's down as "Intentional Youthwork" by Paul Unsworth, but Paul got me in on the act.
If you're really keen the link is here

Back to work...
Last week was a week off, which was nice! Lots of day trips and visits to National Trust properties. Good to get some time out. Even made it to sunny Greenbelt for the day on Sunday, which was fun! Bumped in to a few people which made it even better, including Amanda and the Volland family.

Trying to get back into work now though...

CD's
It's 25 years since CD's started being marketed! Yahoo story here.
Makes me feel old...
I didn't get a CD player until 1995, so I was a late adopter (and a vinyl record fan).
CD technology has had quite an impact. I remeber thinking how exciting it was when I installed my first CD burner into a PC - all that data on one disc, plus for music it seemed like a step up from the compilation tape (which I still have boxes of).

Will they survive in a world of MP3's and downloads, plus portable hard-drives for data transfer?

Know Yourself
Inspired by Roy I took one of those online personality tests today (it was a good break from admin.)
I'm not so inspired to paste the graph thing of the results here, but I was "INPT- Engineer" apparently (Introvert, Intuitive, Thinking, Perceiving).
As were Einstein, Darwin, Tiger Woods and the Olsen Twins!!
Great company to be in.

Size Matters?
Sometimes when the Mrs is not taking her car to work (as happened yesterday) and I've got to get somewhere I take her car (Ford KA, similar to the pic). Usually I drive what in the UK would be a medium size car (until recently a Toyota Corolla).
One thing I've observed (unless it's my paranoia) is that some other drivers treat you differently in a small car. This is especially true of drivers of so-called "prestige" make cars. The KA handles well and has plenty of "umph". But on dual carriageways and the like some people think you shouldn't be in the over taking lane in small car. I could be driving the same way in a bigger car and it would be no problem, but in the small car people don't seem to like it.
In a weird way for some (usually men) size matters. Maybe something deeper is going on for them...

Irrelevant but vaguely related link: what would Jesus drive?

Mission and young people
Been catching up on some reading with a view to writing some stuff.
"Young people and Mission" edited by David & Alison Booker arrived recently.
It's quite a good little volume, the chapters on relating to other faiths and uniformed organisations were especially helpful in the way they put stuff (and relating to some questions I get asked).
It's not a challenging or in depth volume if you've done much thinking around missiology and stuff, but it would be a good place for youth workers, payed or volunteers to start.

This quote appealed to me:
"Youth wokers need not only to focus on the young people they serve, but also to be advocates for change in the wider church so that young people can feel welcomed and accepted there without needing to learn a new culture first"

The necessity of youth ministry?
Some interesting thoughts on the need and place for youth ministry being batted around the blogs.
Caleb posts here reflecting on some reading of "Four views of youth ministry and the church", and Calvin responds here (thanks to the guys at rethinking youth ministry for the links).
At the moment I'm thinking that youth ministry needs to be: intentional yet connected to church, in touch with youth culture but not enamoured with it, missional and real. There is a place for separate groups, yet that should not be all.

Things Christians do in the Summer Holidays
This week my schedule has included 2 things that lots of UK Christians and churches do in the summer.
Holiday Clubs: I went to a church in Greenwich I had done some training with a few weeks ago to see their "Vacation Bible School" (VBS) in action.
They were using "Game day" material from Lifeway (US based if you couldn't tell from calling it VBS!). The material would need some cultural adapting for many UK churches, but seemed to work where they are, and seemed to cover most bases (lots of songs with backing tracks, materials etc.). Interestingly they ran for up to age 14, not just kids and it seemed to work. It was encouraging to see how much of the church was involved and pulling in others from outside too. Many churches run these things, and the big question is always how it links with life after the holidays are over. That's not straightforward to answer, and pouring all you energy into one week can be dangerous, but it shows what a great opportunity 6 week school holidays represent!

Festivals: Christian festivals abound in the summer. In fact showgrounds, race tracks and such venues must do quite well out of Christians! Andy has posted on the bewildering choice of what to take groups to.

Yesterday I went to New Wine's summer festival (week 1 anyway). I was helping a mate out by speaking at a seminar called "Intentional Youthwork", which was kind of fun. My friend Paul was heading up one of the youth programmes so was pretty tied up with stuff, so it was nice to be able to help! It was also good to check out the youth venue. It was good stuff. Although it was interesting to watch the young people seemingly switch in and out the morning meeting, one minute hands in the air seemingly lost in worship, the next minute chatting, flirting, or whatever. Actually that's probably OK, I think we can sometimes fall into the trap of thinking intensity is reality in worship, but it may not be.
Anyway it was good - but again the big question is how does what happens get lived out and followed up?

Flying Ant Day 2
Seems to be flying ant day part 2 out there tonight.
Watch out!