Geeks that we are, Adam and I have made absolutely no secret about being fans of the Google Docs collection of free applications (did you get the free part?).  Today, the Official Google Docs Blog broke the news that it’s offline use features are complete.  You can opt to use Docs, Spreadsheets and Presentations you’ve created in “the cloud” without an internet connection.

How cool is that, for free no less!

It’s that time of year.  Only weeks from now your church’s high schoolers will be honored for completing 13 years of school.  Almost nothing else in life requires 13 years to complete! Let’s help each other out by sharing ideas on the following:

1. How do you honor graduates?
2. How do you help them make the leap from the adult-directed world of childhood to the freedom and self-direction of college or work?

Post your ideas and resources in the comments and we’ll add them to this post.

In my community we’ve had a serious amount of snow days in the last two weeks. And that has gotten me thinking… what would happen if we started a tradition of having an impromptu youth group activity when school was canceled?

Quick list of impromptu youth ministry activities:

• Go to the movies
• Sledding/tubing
• Video game day
• Service project (shoveling snow? Homeless shelter?)
• Make cookies
• Babysit for free so moms/dads can go to work

What would you add to this list? Leave a comment and we’ll update it for everyone else!

I was on a church committee to send devotionals once a week to college students. My day was Sunday. I worked my darnedest to search through Scripture writing something that was elegant, thoughtful, and edgy. For some reason, students kept asking to be taken off the list. Why, I thought, my devotionals aren’t that bad…until I discovered others in the committee were each given a day to send a devotional, so the students received one every single day. If they hadn’t checked their e-mail in two weeks, that could add up to a lot of e-mails.

Once I started reading what some of the other people were sending, I decided that I could get devos to students in a less offensive fashion. The truth is–most of these kids were deleting the e-mails as fast as they came, or letting them go directly into their spam folders. How do I know this? Because after I stopped sending devos, one of the kids started IM’ing me. He said he read one of mine because it was titled, “Stop Being a Jerk” and that was, “A cool title.”

Anyway, while my days of writing devos for college students are over for now, I still seem to be on the e-mail list to get these life-changing statements. Below are some of the inspiration thoughts:

With God, no one is every lost in the crowd.

A problem not worth praying about isn’t worth worrying about.

If at first you don’t succeed, read the instructions (the Bible)! The Bible isn’t antique or modern…it’s ETERNAL!

If life sends you lemons, make some lemonade.

You can’t have a rainbow without the sun and rain.

Umm, yeah. I don’t understand how we’re helping college students get the Bible in their lives without actually providing any Bible verses. It seems a little odd to me.

I don’t think spoon-feeding out-dated Christian cliches to college students is the way to go. They’re smart, and they’ve heard that the Bible means “Basic Instructions Before Leaving Earth” a million times. Heck, they probably had a week of Bible School with that as the “theme”. From spending time with college students who are Christians, I continually discover their intelligence (we talk down to them), their passion, their amazing ability to reason through very adult problems (managing course schedules, getting papers written, class work), and their hunger and thirst for the Bible.

These young men and women don’t need to be spoon-fed; they need to get power shakes or enriched vitamin bars of biblical insight from home to encourage their walk at college (they probably wouldn’t mind if you mailed them a package of food either). They need a voice on the other end of the line when they’ve done poorly on an exam or been dumped by a lover. They need you to be on AIM when they have a question about God at 1 AM (just when you were about to sign off). They want you to check in with them on Facebook and throw presidential candidates at them. And when you send e-mails, they don’t want them to be weak statements that are meaningless to their lives and situations; they want you to write in your voice and to recapture their imaginations like you did when they were in youth group or young adult group or college group.

If you want to really keep ministering to your graduates, get a RSS Feed and subscribe to their blogs, get AIM, and make a Facebook profile. Oh, and then e-mail them your contact information. That’s an e-mail they probably won’t trash.

For further discussion: 

What are some ways you’ve been able to connect with former students while they’re at college?

How has it been beneficial for students for you to maintain a relationship with them when they leave home? 

Perhaps your job also includes “college ministry”, what do you do to reach out to local colleges? 

YMX member and blogger Chris Wilson asks readers of this post to consider which Biblical personality they most identify with and why.

So, as a call to my blogger friends, which person in the bible most accurately portrays you, your life, or your circumstances. It could be anybody, you could me Mary, Joseph, Peter, Moses, Hagar, Isaac, Paul, pretty much whomever you feel you most identify with while reading the text. You could even be Jesus perhaps, not that your feeling all that righteous right now, maybe your just feeling like you spend all your time being chased by crowds, dining with tax collector and hookers, and praying about your impending end. Anyway, to my few faithful readers, who do you feel you are the best reflection of (leave comment) and why (blog if you will).

While Chris intended this as a blogging theme, it occurs to me that this could be an interesting way to encourage (or lead) students through some character studies.  Thanks, Chris!

After watching Frontline’s special, “Growing Up Online” on PBS (you can watch the full program online here), I began to think about all the teenagers that goof around on the computer in the youth pastor’s office, with his approval of course. Often, they are looking for the lyrics and chords to worship songs, but sometimes they sign onto AIM or check their e-mail. I doubt the kids do anything too crazy, especially in the youth ministry office, but then again, who knows?

I’m fairly certain that some youth worker somewhere has had his or her computer hijacked by teenagers, and has been surprised to find some questionable websites in the computer’s browsing history. Not only that, perhaps some students have found some questionable websites under their youth workers web bookmarks (sadly, this is a statistical reality). Let’s be honest with ourselves–the Internet changes everything, even the way we do ministry. And we have to be careful to manage the technology in ways that help, not hinder our youth and our personal lives.

1. The Internet can be a ministry tool. Facebook and MySpace offer great ways to check on your students, leave them little notes, and offer reminders about upcoming events. Blogs keep students up to date on youth group and websites proudly display pictures from youth events. If a teen needs to talk, you’re only an IM or e-mail away. It’s easier than ever for youth workers to be intimately involved in the lives of their students.

2. The Internet is unchartered. Every day new technologies, programs, and software are being developed to advance the Internet and its uses. A few years ago networking sites were only in their infancy, now they’re a trend. Blogs were just getting started, and now there’s talk that they are on the outs. Who knows what’s coming next?

It’s hard enough for youth workers to return all those e-mails from parents, let alone keep up on technology trends, which is why subscribing to websites and blogs that talk about technology, the Internet, and teen issues is vitally important (YPulse and CPYU are two sites you should be reading). You need to be in the loop. Not only does it make you look “cool”, but it helps you to understand the technology your teens are using and advise them how to use it appropriately.

3. The Internet has villains. There are people out there who want to hurt your teenagers. They want to steal their innocence using any means necessary, and an uneducated teen is an easy target. Find ways to educate both parents and teens about Internet safety. Otherwise, parents may carelessly allow their kids to fiddle online for hours without supervision or become overly cautious, not even permitting their teens to have e-mail. WiredSafety.org is a great place to start looking for resources on how to have an Internet safety talk with your youth group.

Give your teens credit though. According to “Growing Up Online”, most kids know how to avoid online sexual solicitation. Unfortunately, there is much more on the Internet than just sex for sale.

Now it’s your turn to answer some questions and offer your own suggestions:

*How can youth workers start discussions on Internet safety with teens and parents?

*How do we confront students when they have questionable pictures, quotes, statements, etc. on their blog or social networking profiles?

*What type of access to the Internet do you allow students to have while in your office, in the church, or in the youth room?

Feel free to answer these questions or ask some questions of your own.

I caught this over on PK’s blog. This could be a great way to kick off a youth group. You could get students up and moving around and the whole group could mimic the dogs dance moves while the hippo sings.

Not sure how to use YouTube clips in your presentation program? Try vConvert.