Author: Wick

I thought it might be fun to blog thoughts before and after an important evening. It’s 3pm CST Wednesday afternoon right now.

Tonight we have a VBS meeting before church (I say “we”, I mean my wife pretty much) utnil 6:30pm. We have youth group, which will focus primarily on what “Holy” means, especially when related to places/things/us until 7:50pm. Then we have band practice, where I’ll probably get yelled at for not learning a new song yet (sorry band), and we’ll have to work on perfecting a few we already know until 10pm-ish. (probably a good thing) Then it’s straight home to watch the 4th game in the playoff series until about 1:30am.

I was going to just check the score afterwards, but this game is important. Why? Lebda’s in. Not just in, either….he’s being paired with Chelios. Here’s the article, you should read it. You should watch the game tonight…8:30pm on VERSUS. Just don’t tell me the score until after 2am Thursday.

I’ll let u know how the night went….after it went.

Moment of honesty: Yes, Detroit lost last night to the Nashville pred-heads. Along with that comes the question: Am I worried?

Not really. (except for my brother, who apparently changes loyalty based on locale…pssh..)

Out of 180 minutes of hockey (3 games), Nashville has been in the lead for around 3 minutes of play. Detroit has clearly dominated the series so far, but Nashville got a couple lucky breaks late in the game last night. So perhaps it will take us 5 games to close this series….but we will do it.

Lidstrom is strong as ever, Franzen is just as hot as the end of the season, Zetterberg and Datsuk are getting scoring chances. Lebda’s been a healthy scratch for some reason…probably because McCarty is back…but I guess that’s a good switch for a while. We won 3 cups with McCarty, so we know he can handle the stress of a long playoff run.

Nashville’s doing some dirty hits on Cleary…and a few have gone uncalled for some reason. This guy just got his jaw unwired, and is still wearing a jaw-guard. You can see them almost aiming directly for his head with the hits….which is a bit ill.

But I guess when you’re desperate, and playing against the Dynasty….you do desperate things.

Ah well…5 games it is….

Combine a week of youth ministry training, honest discussion about the effectiveness of even the best youth ministries, desperation for the Holy Spirit to move, and playoff season for the best professional sport in the world…and what do you get?

Another cheesy illustration.

But the fact remains, in youth ministry…or any ministry effort really. Heck, even in life in general. It’s really easy to start thinking we’re pretty good at things. We get an idea, even a divinely inspired idea…and “know” that it would be a success…so we move towards it.

In Hockey, most of you probably already know of the term “offsides”. It’s a term that’s called when a player moves towards the goal and crosses the blue line before the puck. When this happens, the whistle blows, play stops…and must begin again from a central starting point. The player with the puck must cross the line first.

In Ministry, and in life…so many times we have our eyes on the goal. We know that’s where we need to head….and so we move towards it. But lately many youth ministers, and people on a journey towards Christ in general…have noticed how often we’ve crossed that “blue line” towards the goal without the Spirit moving with us. We may sometimes ignore it…but “offsides” is called. We need to stop the play, and find a new starting point…asking that God would show us where He is moving us.

In hockey, the defensive players don’t have to wait for the puck to enter the zone to stand between the player and his goal. In the same respect, the things that try and stop us from moving towards our spiritual goals couldn’t care less if we move towards that goal without the Spirit. The goal wouldn’t happen.

I think this happens on a daily basis, if we were all honest. Maybe not on huge levels…but small personal ones at least. But once in a while, I think it can happen on a larger scale. I believe Ministry in general is in the season of figuring out a new starting point…asking God where He is moving. And I believe each of us can benefit from asking that in our own lives.

It takes humility. Whether in a ministry, or a job, a relationship, a family, a life, etc…that we’ve worked at for years….to stop and realize…we’ve relied too much on ourselves, and not enough on the empowering of the Holy Spirit. Humbling yes…but necessary. And freeing.

ps. recognizing that, as with any cheesy illustration, this one falls short. If you try, you’ll find things in it that don’t work….theologically. But as a hockey fan….I like it. So deal. 🙂