gavoweb

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Prayer

Funny, a Labyrinth in the Middle of the City

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So we are up in Seattle for this pest control meeting. I flew up after Youth 2011 & Erin flew in a few days early to check out the town. We are pretty much doing the tourist things in our short time here but one thing I never expected was on the outside of the ‘experiential music project’ and down the hill a bit from the space needle is a huge labyrinth painted onto the cement.

Not sure why it was placed there. They do have a lot of public art in the city. Maybe that is reasoning enough. It had a different vibe than the ones we had in all the Youth 2011 events because this was more like a playground piece with parents and kids racing through the lines.

I suppose everyone encounters a labyrinth with their own experience. It just seemed funny to me.

shalom
-gavin

http://youthworkercircuit.com | http://gavoweb.com

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Youth 2011 and Claiming Space

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Last week Kevin & I spent the week alongside my nephew & Josh Vegors putting together the ‘Sacred Space’ for Youth 2011 in Purdue. So what was this ‘Sacred Space?’ Well, it was a contemplative prayer & arts space that we set up that the youth could experience God on their own, where they were, and express that however they felt it.

The thing with crafting contemplative space is that you give up control. In a contemporary worship environment you can control the flow or the highs and lows of emotion through the time. When we do these contemplative spaces you set the stage, but whatever dance that happens after that is out of your control.

I was completely and beautifully reminded of this in this one moment at our Youth 2011 Sacred Space. Josh who was helping out started to take pieces of the artwork that the youth created and placing them in the hallway in a display type manner. Not part of my original plan but it is what he was led to do so we went with it. Hours later I was coming out of the sacred space room and I see this girl sitting on one of the chairs in the hallway. She looks distressed enough that it gave me some cause for concern. So I was just about to walk up to her and ask her if she was okay when I realized that she was actually visually meditating on the art pieces and probably in prayer. So I backed off.

To my surprise even more. She, just then, fell from her chair to her knees and proceeded to hold that prayer posture for some five to eight minutes. It was crazy. This was the freaking hallway.. There was not anything sacred about this hallway, until now. This youth broke some of my ideas of the space we set up in a contained room and took the sacred into the hallway and claimed it as something special.

I think it is neat that teens are wild and uncontrollable. God probably thinks they take after him.

Claiming Space as Sacred
Claiming Space as Sacred

 

Contemplative Christmastide Worship Free Resource

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This originally published for YouthWorker Movement

I’ve been designing and dreaming up contemplative worship experiences for over 8 years now with youth, young adults, regular ole’ adults and multi-generational groups. It has been one of the most mysterious and gratifying things I’ve done in ministry.

Being a part of the movement I thought I’d put together some ideas on pulling together your own “Contemplative Christmastide Worship” worship experience in these coming weeks. If you give this a go, it is designed to be a pretty simple set up and to go around 45 minutes to an hour. You are welcome to blow this out of the water and do some crazy stuff with it. That would be awesome!

Download : Contemplative Christmastide Worship

If you do use it and get some pictures, could you send them to us to show on the site? That’d be really cool as well.

Have a fabulous Advent and Christmastide experience.

shalom

loosing a young person : grieving in the digital age

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Picture 2

last night i read about the passing of a young man, soldier from our local area. this caught me more than other reports for two reasons. 1. he's a young man from our local area & i knew that some of the teenagers (now young adults) i know were more than likely friends with him 2. my little brother just returned to home from his second deployment to Iraq.

strange behavior that acted on.. i went to see if he had a facebook..

wired covered a beginning of this phenomenon a few years back & it continues to grow as our grieving many times goes from the physical presence act of leaving crosses on the streets, creating memorials & altars at doorsteps/fences/etc. to the digital profiles of the people we are loosing.

Picture 1

here become the places that we go to leave our last words and condelences. it is here that we find solice with others. here where we tell stories. here where we post old pictures and remember times past.

i have seen it a number of times as i am sure you have as well. a question to ask ourselves is this..

is a digital rememberance enough in caring for those who are grieving?

i worry if our digital nature will compromise our grieving by keeping the physical presence of people away or shortening it. it is no doubt encouraging to see the impact a person has had on a life shared in a time such as this, but it cannot make up for hugs, face to face conversation, and just sitting & being. i appreciate Jewish traditions in how they sit and wait for the initial impact to settle then they, as a community, spend months in supporting the family's need. my Christian traditions seem to whirlwind around the family in the immediate moment then wane quickly over the next two weeks. grieving however, goes on for much longer.

it isn't lost on me that this post is in some way reflective & ironic in the very acts that i'm referring.

Specialist Michael Stansbury Jr. thank you for your ultimate sacrifice on our behalf. may you find the peace of Christ surrounding you. prayers for family to find strength & comfort.

a prayer for your fellow servicemen & women

Almighty and eternal God,
those who take refuge in you will be glad
and forever will shout for joy.
Protect these soldiers as they discharge their duties.
Protect them with the shield of your strength
and keep them safe from all evil and harm.
May the power of your love enable them to return home
in safety, that with all who love them,
they may ever praise you for your loving care.
We ask this through Christ our Lord.

take up your cross : midday prayer

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Take up your cross, the Savior said,
If you would my disciple be;
Deny yourself, the world forsake,
And humbly follow after me.

Take up your cross, let not its weight
Fill your weak spirit with alarm;
His strength shall bear your spirit up,
Shall brace your heart and nerve your arm.

Take up your cross then in his strength,
And ev’ry danger calmly brave,
To guide you to a better home,
And vict’ry over death and grave.

Take up your cross and follow Christ,
Nor think till death to lay it down;
For only he who bears the cross
May hope to wear the glorious crown.

To you, great Lord, the One in three,
All praise for evermore ascend;
O grant us here below to see
The heav’nly life that knows no end.

Blog posted here.