FusionLife - Latest Comments

Re: Mad Church Disease - I won a copy!

Eric Ebbinghaus — Thu, 22 Jan 2009 20:04:38 -0000

Ben, Eric Ebbinghaus here. I just added you to my blogroll! Glad to know you're checking in. Your site looks fantastic! I'm adding it to my RSS feeds too!

Re: Mad Church Disease - I won a copy!

Chris Marsden — Tue, 20 Jan 2009 16:05:36 -0000

You should get people to submit photos and let others vote. Craziest "mad church" picture gets the book.

Re: Finally Worked Out A New Year’s Reaolution

Brandi — Thu, 15 Jan 2009 23:54:27 -0000

you won a copy of Mad Church Disease! send me the address you would like me to mail it to at embracinggrace25(at)gmail(.)com & i will pre-order it for you on amazon ASAP. Congratulations!!

Re: My Mother’s Wish: An American Christmas Carol - Book Review

Shaneen Clarke — Tue, 23 Dec 2008 02:13:02 -0000

I have bumped on that book once and its a very inspiring read for all book lovers. I have a collection of religious and inspirational books as well that I review at times.

Re: Top 10 “Must Follows” for Youth Ministry

benboles — Tue, 09 Dec 2008 12:56:20 -0000

@Mike Kupferer - thanks for all your great articles and blog posts

@Tim Schmoyer - changed the link, thanks for all the great content both written and videos

@Chris Marsden- I can't believe I didn't put Tony on there. I was actually hoping people would create their own Top 10 list specific to youth ministry but those other guys are great reads too

Re: Top 10 “Must Follows” for Youth Ministry

Chris Marsden — Tue, 09 Dec 2008 10:45:25 -0000

Two you missed (at least one of whom you follow)...
Tony Sheng - http://twitter.com/tonytsheng - for anyone interested in student missions or leadership.
Doug Fields - http://twitter.com/dougfields

But really... Terry Davis used to recommend reading creativity books and secular music magazines vs. Youth Ministry stuff simply because it taught us what was really going on, not just the theory from the handful of youth ministers who *might* have figured out what is going on (probably from reading creativity books and secular music magazines). With that in mind some social media gurus you should be following so you can become THE youth minister to be following.

@ChrisBrogran - http://twitter.com/chrisbrogan - http://chrisbrogan.com
@jnswanson - http://twitter.com/jnswanson
@scobeliezer - http://twitter.com/scobeliezer

And Most importantly... who in your area is interested in what you are interested in? Who are the teachers at the local high school? Who are the Youth Ministers at other churches? Who coaches a local sports team?

This requires some digging. Start with http://search.twitter.com/a.... Put in your city and pick a radius. Start with the obvious search terms. Make your way towards less obvious.

Also try http://twitterpacks.pbwiki..... It is still early in development and I don't see any Youth Ministry related, but if everyone on this list gets added it is only a matter of time.

Re: Top 10 “Must Follows” for Youth Ministry

Tim Schmoyer — Tue, 09 Dec 2008 01:40:18 -0000

Thanks for the link and the recommendation! :-) Do you think you could update the link to my site to link to http://timschmoyer.com instead? Thanks!

Re: Top 10 “Must Follows” for Youth Ministry

mike — Tue, 02 Dec 2008 19:52:12 -0000

thanks for the mention Ben. And I think you've got a good starting list.

Re: Getting Better at Contextualization

tonytsheng — Mon, 24 Nov 2008 16:48:39 -0000

good stuff! it reminds me of a famous triad a few missiologists like to use - learner, trader, storyteller. same kind of idea.

Re: Great video about Pizza making and Starting Sustainable Churches

Mom — Fri, 14 Nov 2008 13:23:18 -0000

Hi there handsome. Just saw this site and had a ? or two. Call me when you have time. The ? is about the beginning part of "About my Blog?, so you can remind me.

Re: Great video about Pizza making and Starting Sustainable Churches

Chris Marsden — Fri, 14 Nov 2008 10:38:06 -0000

Hey Ben... glad you found this. The pizza making thing is such a perfect example of so much of what we have talked about in ministry. We actually did this early on in Daytona and it was one of the best "events" we ever did. Too bad I didn't see the brilliance of it then.

Re: Hard Work

tonytsheng — Fri, 10 Oct 2008 10:11:33 -0000

wow - love it. intense

Re: Hard Work

ben — Thu, 25 Sep 2008 15:51:24 -0000

Chris,

In someways I think we (as a people) have forgotten about benefits of hard work. Thanks for the comment and being a part of the conversation.

Re: Hard Work

chris — Thu, 25 Sep 2008 13:09:52 -0000

Hey man thanks for the link. I love this new commercial. It does have some implications for the life founded on faith.

Re: Counting the cost

Mark Gaeta — Fri, 12 Sep 2008 10:35:52 -0000

Hey Ben
Like the new look. How is your family?
With the pigs and Legion, I think it's interesting that the pig owners(?) valued their pigs more than this person Legion. I can't remember if this was an original thought (since I have so few) but how many times does the church value their pigs more than people. Pigs such as- programs, location, comfort, convenience, etc.

Re: Counting the cost

Ryan — Sun, 31 Aug 2008 14:50:56 -0000

Great thought, Ben. An excellent job of thinking outside of the box and beyond the text. It reminds me of leaving the 99 to rescue one. I imagine that in the first century one sheep was worth more than one pig (perhaps 99 sheep were equal in worth to one pig) and yet Jesus basically told us that we need to abandon many so that we can search out and save one.

Jesus calls us to throw caution to the wind so that we can seek out the one. 100 is only an illustration, for I believe that Jesus would also tell us to let go of 1,000, 10,000, 100,000 or more so that one can be saved. I'm willing to put money on the belief that shepherds were not willing to jeopardize 99 sheep for the sake of saving one because of how much 99 were worth. Well, in both of these stories Jesus tells us to not look at the monetary or materialistic dimensions, but instead the eternal and spiritual.

Great thoughts.

Re: Wild Goose Chase - win it before you can get it in the store

Ben — Mon, 11 Aug 2008 10:10:47 -0000

Thanks Mike, I've also learned some big lessons from God in the in between ministry times.

Re: Wild Goose Chase - win it before you can get it in the store

mike — Mon, 11 Aug 2008 01:03:04 -0000

One of my biggest adventures was over 2 years ago when I was between ministries. There was a period of 9 months that I had a "sabbatical" from full-time vocational ministry. Each day brought a new adventure and blessing. We learned a lot about trusting God to provide and He always did. Even when we didn't know what would happen next, God took care of us each step of the journey.

Re: Thoughts about Young Christian Leaders from Mark Driscoll

Ben — Thu, 07 Aug 2008 11:05:16 -0000

Oscar,

I've been told to many times that church comes first and you look at their family and unfortunately its not what God intended. Now there is a new breed of leaders who say focus on your family and let your example be a part of your ministry. That's the boat I'm in. God didn't give us families to neglect, if we were supposed to give our all the ministry He would have called us to be single (and there is another great ministry we should be talking about). Thanks for the comment.

Ben

Re: Thoughts about Young Christian Leaders from Mark Driscoll

Oscar — Tue, 05 Aug 2008 14:32:05 -0000

Thanks for sharing this post and your insightful comments. I really appreciate what you mentioned about making time for family ... it is so easy to forget that we need to "quest for maturity and holiness at home".

Re: Finally Got My Mug

Ben — Fri, 25 Jul 2008 20:31:56 -0000

Kurt,

You are right for some reason the new ones they are making are not vacuum sealed, but rather have styrofoam insert instead. You can still find some of the originals you just have to take the bottom off and look for the vacuum seal and you'll get nice hot coffee for longer.

Re: Finally Got My Mug

Kurt — Wed, 23 Jul 2008 09:17:27 -0000

Contigo is the brand name and they sell them at Bed-Bath and Beyond. However, while the cup appears to be structurally the same, I'm not convinced it is the same. It does not seem to keep the coffee as hot for as long and the outside gets hot which did not happen with previous copies I've owned (I've had at least 3 others)....

Re: Vision - seeing beyond the here and now

Ben — Mon, 14 Jul 2008 21:08:02 -0000

@Mark Gaeta -We are all doing well. Judah turned 2 last weekend and Chloe starts kindergarten in a month. We are staying in Ormond Beach for now and still looking for a new ministry. It was preached by Larry Cline at Holly Hill Church of Christ this last Sunday.

@Mike -You are right about that.

Re: Vision - seeing beyond the here and now

Mark — Mon, 14 Jul 2008 16:28:56 -0000

Hey Ben
Hope you and your family are doing alright.
Sounds like it was a good sermon. Who preached it?
Caleb is one of my favorite Bible characters.
God bless! Mark Gaeta

Re: Vision - seeing beyond the here and now

mike — Mon, 14 Jul 2008 15:24:23 -0000

vision is a tough thing. Even harder when you are in the minority.