Control

So...God has an interesting plan for us all, and he often does things in very strange and interesting ways, BUT it is ALWAYS done to teach us something whether we are in the mood to learn or not! God has released us from a ministry, that, while a great opportunity, we just didn't fit. We had the opportunity to see several of the students come to a relationship with Christ and get Baptized, and I believe that is why I was there, not to save them, but to give God the stage to draw them back to Him! There is nothing that we did or nothing that the church did that caused us to be leaving Barefoot Church, it was based on philosophy and direction, and we just didn't fit. Now does that mean that there is something wrong with Barefoot Church...NO...and shame on you who think that I would say yes. God is using Barefoot Church in amazing ways, but those ways are different than how He wants to use Sara and I, and that's perfect. Now the question is, What's Next?

I can't really say at this moment what we are going to do next, but whatever/wherever that is, we are following our hearts. God has shown us things in the past year and a half that will forever change our view of Him and ministry. I could take you on the journey we've been on, but not at this time, COMING SOON!!! One of the several things that I've learned is how to completely trust His direction. It's amazing how God is just waiting on us to give up control and let Him lead us so that we can be used for what we were made for!

Control is something that I've always enjoyed. Take sports for example. If you've been around me very long, you know that I'm extremely competitive and love sports. When I played baseball, I didn't really love baseball as a whole, but I loved PITCHING! I CONTROLLED the entire game with every pitch. And if I didn't have control, I wasn't successful. I wish I had some sweet analogy or something to make my point (I tried and would have completely confused everyone who reads this except for other reminiscing pitchers) but I don't, it is the point. I love being in control, knowing what is going to happen, how I'm supposed to get there, what I need to do next. I HAVE NO CLUE RIGHT NOW! And at first it freaked me out, but then I took some time to think about it, spent some time with some great friends back in Wilmington, and then realized everything that we had been a part of and how God was teaching and using us even through this.

God is pushing us right now to follow our hearts, and you'd think it'd be easy, but when you take a leap like we did half way across the country, little bits of our hearts are left everywhere we've been. So where are our hearts? Great question, but right now its just a waiting game to get out of our lease on our current house. God is in full control of us, and I think I'm starting to be cool with Him being the pitcher so to speak...wow, lame, I know...but I'm serious. I've been in some form of control for the last couple years, or so I thought. It's funny how you think that you've mastered patience and then God decides to show you that it's not really patience that He's trying to teach you, He's trying to break you of control. Read about Jesus leading his disciples, He's constantly teaching them to release control of their own lives so that they can be used by God for greatness!

True Creativity

So, I added an album of pictures just to the right of the screen that has these pictures of the flowers that Sara planted this past spring that are in full bloom now! It brings me no greater joy than to see my wife take joy in her hobbies, check out her blog to truly see what I mean because she decided this past year that she was going to start a garden...little to my knowledge she was actually dreaming up a small farm in our backyard! But hey, last night was by far the best pepper I've ever had, not to mention the fresh green beans, broccoli, squash, and soon to be much more!

Most of the time when Sara says she has something in her mind that she wants to do, I have to realize that she already has her heart set on it and her mind working on how to do it, like with her sewing, her photography, etc...so, I think my wife is just CREATIVE and needs outlets for that...and so this is why we have an amazing camera, to take the amazing pictures of her flowers that were just kind of a side thought to her garden! Then you've got her bags that she's made that are being sold at the SURF HOUSE in Carolina Beach, NC that just blows my mind. She also decided that she was going to teach herself photoshop...which she uses over at Ribbet Salon & Shop for Kids over in Wilmington, NC...you should check out the graphics, some of which are her handiwork! It blows my mind to realize how amazing my wife is, and it took me encouraging her to take pictures this morning of her flowers to remind myself of that!

God has an amazing way of revealing things to us through his creation, and I think this is a big reason why my wife is so Creative, because she can see God work in and through a lot of her creativity that most don't recognize! For most of us we see flowers, but God created them, check some of these pics out and just look at the creativity that went into making each one different. I have to slow down sometimes and take notes from my wife when it comes to creativity, because she draws from the master of creativity...GOD, and maybe I should look into being a bit more creative!

I can't wait to spend this evening on the beach with my wife, friends, and students from Barefoot Students. I'm truly blessed and I get to enjoy God's creativity daily...we just have to open our eyes and look for it! Plus I get to SURF!

Effective or just busy?

WOW...it's been over 3 months since I've written something on here, and it feels kinda weird! Life has been nuts, and that is partially responsible for fueling this post. Here lately God has been pushing on my heart to evaluate what I'm doing and see if it is effective or if I'm just doing things that make me look busy! Since my last post, the Barefoot Student ministry is finally moving in the right direction. After figuring out where and how I fit, I started getting a vision for the student ministry from God and I've been plugging at that ever since. I mean, we've got 5 students getting Baptized this weekend, can I get an AMEN (for all my Southern Baptist Family back home). There are alot of things that I do throughout the day, and some I've already stopped that just make me seem like I'm busy, but actually when I evaluated their effectiveness, seem like a huge waste of time.

When I was at the UofA, I remember spending(wasting) HOURS on Facebook seeing what everyone and now literally their Dog is up to! Pet facebook...come on people, your dog and cat don't need you living their lives for them through a fantasy social network, Sorry, just weird to me!!! Anyways, I've truly seen it all. I've been a member of facebook since the beginning of my freshman year..oh yeah, by the way, it launched in february of that same year! That is back when only MAJOR Universities had it, you had to go through an application process that the Chancellor of your school had to approve! A year or so later they opened it up to anyone with a University/College email...and I remember when I thought the world was coming to an end when they allowed High School Students to sign up!!! Now, as I said...EVERYONE AND THEIR DOG!!! So, is it a social network, marketing scheme, conspiracy? Who knows, but all I know is that I evaluated its effectiveness at reaching our students...and I had more adults and staff members on our Student Ministry Fan Page than we had students...I'm not kidding, like 6-10% of the "Fans" were actual students. And that was the trend for Twitter as well!

Now on to why I started this post. With Facebook and now Twitter, your week could get lost TWEETING, RE-TWEETING, Checking facebook status' and looking at pictures that your "friends" posted that you really didn't even talk to back when you were IN high school. I just feel like someone needs to say this, I'm a realist and to me this just doesn't seem RIGHT!

I'm a math mind, so bear with me for a sec and I'll explain! Say you spend 30sec tweeting every time you tweet, you tweet 15 times a day...that's nearly and hour a week tweeting...I'm being generous here! Then you add in all of the time you spend reading others tweets, re-tweeting, and direct messaging others when you could just call or text them, and you've probably got at least another hour if not more there!

2 Hours a week on TWITTER...now I don't even want to go into the math that is involved with Facebook, but for a social network to bring people together, it sure has made interactions with others even more secluded and shallow than ever, not to mention a huge chunk of time wasted!

Now don't get me wrong, I do have both twitter and facebook and no plans of getting rid of them anytime soon because they can be great tools to connect people...So...God has really pushed me to re-evaluate the way I spend my time, the way I use things like Facebook and Twitter in my ministry, and is pushing me to think even more strategically when it comes to my ministry. God is really pushing me right now to clean up areas of my life that, although may not be bad, are not the best for my ministry. What is God telling you to do next? How much time do you spend being antisocial on Social Networks where you could be spending that time with God? What's the first thing you do in the morning, recognize your SAVIOR, or update your status? These are all questions I've asked myself in the last several months and they can be painful to own up to, but God wants your best, not just good!

God is Pushing Patience

I tell you what, when God wants to teach you something, He typically goes all out! So, with the process of moving comes all sorts of things you end up having to deal with, and in our case that included breaking our lease at our apartment in Wilmington and signing a new lease in SC. Our lease in Wilmington was a 13 month lease that we had started back in September, but to break our lease we had to give a 2 month notice, two months rent on top of that, and any concessions we had been given, so the cost was quite pricey...but the only way out of it was to find someone to sublet our place. SO...in short, we had about 60 days to find someone, and lets leave it up to God to wait till the 59th day to find someone to sign the contract, take it off our hands, and save us some money! It was truly the only thing that was holding us to Wilmington, and it caused alot of stress over the past couple of weeks trying to figure out how we could show it living over an hr away, finding people who were interested, getting them to take an application, and actually hoping and praying they would sign it. God's humor is amazing because I was with a friend of mine here in North Myrtle Beach when Sara calls me and says "They took the apartment!!!" You've got to understand how nearly hysterically she was on the phone because it was finally something we could let go of and be done with, and save money! I had so many discussions with God trying to figure out what he was doing, because I couldn't understand why he would allow for money to be basically thrown away, when it could be used in a better way! I guess it was the point where Sara gave the apartment complex the check to buy out the lease and were personally able to let go of that money, that God was good with our mindset enough to bless us with that money. Now we've got to figure out what God wants us to do with it. I pray that God lays it on our hearts what we need to do with that little bit extra, because I'm pumped to use that to bless someone else! God is growing us constantly and you're probably getting sick of me saying how much we've grown, but as we grow, I am constantly reminded of how much I still DON'T KNOW!!! I've got a long ways to go, and I pray that as you seek God, he will reveal His awesome power and make you realize like I have that I can't do this without HIM!!!

I'm back, and hitting the ground running!

So...once again...it's been a while. Since my last post we have successfully moved down to a town just outside of North Myrtle Beach called Longs, SC, started work as the Student Pastor at Barefoot Church, and pretty much dug up the entire back yard so we can have a garden for this Summer. Basically, the past couple weeks have been an absolute whirlwind, but I think it's safe to say that it's pretty much been nonstop since we decided to move just over a year ago. You won't believe how jacked up I am about what is going down and coming up at Barefoot Church in the coming days, weeks, months...you get the idea. God has really started to give me a clear vision over the past several days on where the Student Ministry is going, and it has been crazy how He's been doing that. God has revealed things to me over lunch with potential leaders, in talking with current leaders over pizza before LIFEGroups, and even while I'm sitting in bed reading. It blows my mind that it hasn't come during the times I've set aside for ministry, like office hours, study times, etc...God likes to work in my life in really random ways...it cool, but extremely confusing sometimes! But the best part is that it's never planned, and I think that is what God is trying to show me, I can't plan a ministry, I can only guide it in the direction He gives me. It brings me back to the ideas that you can't plan a move of God, you can't plan a revival, you can't plan a salvation, but you can prepare yourself to minister to someone where they are in a situation that you have been given a vision for.

Pastor Clay has laid out a very clear Vision for our church "We are Changing Lives that Change the World!" My job as a Student Pastor is not to create a new ministry, but to take the vision that our Pastor has been given and focus it in a specific area of ministry, Students. We are not trying to create another church for students. We are going to build relationships with student meeting them where they are i.e. School, Weekend Services, Sporting Events...and guide them to Jesus! That is what God has called me to do, and if you are reading this and would like to jump on board and help me in this, just shoot me an email at nross@barefootchurch.com I will get back to you ASAP and we'll get you plugged in with our ministry. God truly gave me a clear vision tonight hanging out with our students at our LIFEGroup night over pizza and I can't wait to see what God is going to do through this core group of students that we have at this time! I'm praying that our students don't end up just attending a weekly bible study and church service, but that they get involved, serve God, learn to trust in God and live life through faith, and build relationships with others that will forever change their lives!

So, now that I've rambled a bit, I plan on blogging a bit more, not to mention starting some new stuff for the student ministry here in the near future. Love you guys and let us know if we can help with anything at all!!!