My wife and I had a great time in Daytona with the EFCA youth workers and their spouses! The weather was definitely not the expected sunny beach getaway - but it was wonderful nonetheless. Got to stick my feet in the Atlantic and enjoyed the sand between the toes in the brief moments the beach wasn’t getting pelted by sheets of rain or pounded by heavy surf. It was great to get away and I was pleasantly surprised at the response to my presentations on Christian Spirituality.

The Free Church folks welcomed me back to the tribe in gracious and affirming ways. It was very cool to be with them. Some great thinkers, and also a group of folks who are committed to quality youth ministry and longevity in youth ministry. It is encouraging to listen to the dialogue of these folks - there is a wisdom and a depth of care and understanding that is often missing from too many places in the youth ministry world. It was great to be sharpened and challenged by my old tribe.

I spoke on the idea that youth ministry must start within the youth minister. I covered the following topics:

Be the Beloved - before we are anything else we are beloved by God.
Be Real - we must strip off all the fig leaves and embrace our true identity as we are found in God ( I think I deluged the participants with information in this session.)
Be Prayerful - the life of Christ is a life of dependence — which is a life of prayer.
Be a Traveler - finding the heart of the journey to travel up, down, in and out.
Be Present Tense - enter the moment to be fully present to others that we might fulfill our calling as shepherds.

It was a great time, God definitely helped me and hopefully helped others to gain some new perspective and to refresh my faith as I was part of this get-a-way.

One final highlight was ministering with the worship pastor from my church here in western, PA. That was pretty cool. We also went to Sea World together - SHA-MU, SHA-MU!

Any Rebound folks out there? Share a comment.