New and Old

Well another year has come and gone and to say that this year has been full is an understatement. Of course Amy and I welcomed our daughter Ally into the world this summer and that has led to such an incredible amount of joy and wonder.  How God continues to teach me lessons through the joy and trials of parenthood is astounding and quite humbling as well.

Apart from being a full time dad, husband, and youth pastor this past year was my first year of my Master of Divinity work.  This new challenge has definitely been just that, a challenge.  School is not my first love but the knowledge that has come from what I have studied, read, and learned has been priceless.  Next to the lessons I learn about God through my daughter this has been probably the biggest push for a spiritual awakening of sorts in my life.

This awakening has been one that has been rumbling deep in the core of my being for awhile.  Longing for more than just the ordinary.  Desiring more than just getting by and biding my time.  Wanting to touch the very face and heart of God and then refusing to be the same.  I want to experience the unimaginable and discover the unthinkable in reference to what God has for me.  Hopefully along the way I challenge, encourage and inspire others to do the same.  Between family, school and then all of it coming to a culmination at NYWC I have been moved to a new place.  I have been pushed to accept more and to not be satisfied till I get more and more and more.  If God is more then I want God.  If God is never ending than my more should be the same.  It should never stop.  This excites me as what the next year holds for both me and my ministry as I look to be an agent of change in the lives of the teens who walk through my doors and who I come in contact with in their world.

With the new year there is almost always the thought that goes to resolutions and new beginnings and I have to say that in almost a cliche way I am doing the same.  I have made some resolutions for my life and the last paragraph is the bulk of what I hope for.  There is always the traditional get in better shape, be a little better on the organization part of things, etc... but the desire to experience more of God is one that if all others fail and that happens then it will have been a successful 2009.  In January I am starting a series entitled "Leftovers" and how those leftovers are detrimental to our resolutions and how in our Christian walk leftovers can be the killer of a burning passion.  I hope that through this series I learn something.  I hope that the teens do as well, but I want to be the first student of the messages that I share with the teens.  Who knows I may post some of the sermons here for you to look over or just to share with someone who might stumble on my page.  May the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob be a presence of peace, hope, joy and salvation in your life as the new year begins.  

I am outie 5000,

Robb