FFUMC Youth Ministry Blog

You know how we do! Join us for our “Christmas Shoes” party. Dress as your favorite shoe or inspired by your shoes. Here is a little video promo to help get you pumped!

So, we just closed our series “The Thin Green Line”. We talked about the thin line that separates our heart from our money. Muchtabulous created a hit song for the occasion, back from his famed “Cribs” episode from last year…

We just started a new theme in 1|99 that explores giving. Each week we are highlighting an organization that is worthy of our giving. The first organization we highlighted is Kiva. Kiva demonstrates all the good that is possible with the growth of the internet. It is a very simple idea, invest as little as $25 in those who have need for help, then they pay you back and you give again. The organization is genius. You can also get gift cards to provide to friends and family so they can give. It’s a great Christmas present idea! Check out the organizations story and explore the website here… www.kiva.org

We are closing our rhythm series discussing our need to be in rhythm with each other to be in rhythm with ourselves and with God. This video shows one way we can be in rhythm with each other. The actual instructions used for this video can be found here… Dance Instructions. Enjoy!

So we looked for rhythm around Fayetteville and this is what we found!

Rhythm is our new series for 1|99. We kicked it off last night exploring the rhythm of God’s creation. There is a rhythm to our relationship with God, our relationships with each other, and our relationship with ourselves. Check out this video exploring rhythm…

Got to see Skillet with some of the kids at The Tabernacle on Sunday. The Tabernacle is one of my favorite music venues. It was a great night as Skillet really brought it. Toward the end of their show a mosh pit broke out. Moshing, or slam dancing, started in the late 1970s to early 1980s. The idea is that the music inspires an energy that causes a response of violently slamming into each other. It is almost tribal. This is a ritual that I do not understand. Almost every time they break out, the people involved just look stupid and someone always gets hurt. Usually it is a spectator on the outside.

We are about to start a new series in 1|99 called “Rhythm”. I do not see any rhythm to what happens in a mosh pit. If you want to hit and slam into other people, go play a sport like football or rugby.

Thanks to one of our Solomon’s Porch leaders, Penny Erbe, for sending this to me!

The Kanye instance at the VMAs raises a lot of great discussion topics. As much as I believe Taylor Swift is talented, it IS very odd for a country artist to receive an MTV moonman. Has that ever happened? Isn’t that what CMT is for? Granted she is “pop country”, but still… The bigger questions for me involve why there is even an event for music video awards seeing as no one ever shows videos anymore? I miss the days when MTV was truly music television and played music videos 90% of the time. I also think the whole awards concept in the arts is pretty pointless. Why can’t they just have a celebration event each year with a funny host, amazing live acts, and celebrate their art together without awards? I think it would still get viewers.

So Kanye made a spectacle of himself, again, last night at the VMAs. He interrupted Taylor Swift’s acceptance speech. I found out after reading at least 30 Facebook statuses expressing hate and rage toward Kanye West. I went and watched the clip to see what created such a response. It was pretty rude and a classless thing to do, but… really? Is this really worthy of all national news, the top twitter topic, and the focus of anger of many of my friends? Yesterday approximately 29,000 children died due to preventable diseases. I have yet to see that stat ever presented on national news. Joseph Kony and the LRA continue to displace tens of thousands weekly from their homes, turn children into killers, and murder and pillage as they see fit. Kony has never led twitter topics, and sad to say have not seen any anger of my friends regarding him represented on Facebook. There are so many more things going on in the world worthy of our anger and attention. What is the deal with our society? What does it say about us that this kind of thing gets so much attention?