flowers

photo challenge #14: flowers

something fun

photo challenge day 11: something fun
I took this with my phone on the way home from Publix the other day. You'll have to ask Will, Stacey, Susan, and Peter why this might be fun.

someone i love

photo challenge #5: someone I love
the man who will do the dishes.
well, really just this man who will do the dishes.

catching up - photo challenge

Julia had a stomach bug last week, that I of course caught too. After dealing with it then recovering, I put this on the backburner. So here are a couple of pictures from my files to get me started before I take more.



Day 2: what I wore
This is my baptism gown. Julia wore it, too, and I took this picture just before her baptism in June 2009.




Day 3: clouds
Here is a picture I took at Camp Sumatanga in 2007. I thought the clouds were super cool that day, and it was weird how they sort of looked like a map of the world.



Day 19: where I slept
"The big blue chair" - We bought this for Julia's room before she was born, and I've never been happier with a $900 or so purchase. We still use it today - in house #3! - and now she can sit next to me in it while we read together. I slept here a lot in snatches when she was a baby, especially after getting up to feed her or check on her early-early-early in he morning, leaning over sideways. I took this picture jsut before we left Cullman when I was chronicling where everything was in that house for posterity (also read: potential future argument settling - haha).

photo challenge - beginning

My friend Mollie is so excited about this photo challenge from this blog - awesome! - so I accepted her invitation to join in the fun. I'm too sporadic and scattered to follow this day-by-day, so I think I'll do the list like a bucket list and check them off randomly. That sounds fun. What struck my fancy today?

Day 12: closeup (today is 8/12, too- woohoo)


and Day 10: something I made (seems appropriate after having done this painting last night)



looking forward to being inspired from some of the other list items and taking more pictures soon.

Great Grizzard in Heaven

Julia is sad and dares anyone to kill anymore trees, including this one (I think a water oak) in our front yard.

I don't know what I think about people in heaven worrying over current events on Earth, but if they do, let me assure you that Lewis Grizzard, Jr. is sitting around, petting UGA VIII and shaking his head in disgust as he types up his column about Harvey Almorn Updike, crazy lunatics, and the evil empire of Paul Finebaum - because Lewis and I both know there is nothing prettier for a Georgia fan (or an Alabama fan) than the trees at Toomer's Corner early on a Sunday morning in the fall, when they stand toiletpaper-less after your team beat Auburn the night before.

runny nose, run away

Julia has been having one cold/ sinus infection/ virus after another for the last month. When we had a warm day late last month and played outside, I drew this picture, and what did she add? The yellow and the green lines of snot coming from the girl's nose.

She had a fever and felt awful yesterday, not eating anything or enjoying her Valentine's party at school, and spending most of the afternoon/evening sitting with my in the recliner, reading babybugs or watching Sesame Street.

And thank God for her love of reading. After reading "It's Check-up Time, Elmo" so many times (yay for Sesame Street books on the dollar aisle at Target), she even knew how to say "aaah" when the doctor looked at her throat with the little light tool. I think he was impressed. And she kept saying "just like Elmo's doctor." Now we just wait for the longer form strep test (the short was negative). Looks like we both have a virus this go around, but at least she's better so far today.

Strawberry Almond Snowballs

I found a version of this recipe on the back of a box of Post Strawberry Honey Bunches of Oats Cereal. I decided to document the making of it like my friend Christy Jordan at southernplate.com. I changed the recipe up a bit, using what I had on hand,which would make Christy proud. No regular marshmallows? Why, strawberry would be fabulous! Even holiday themed! You can get the original recipe here.

This is what you'll need:
5 cups of Post Honey Bunches of Oats cereal - I used Almond
1 10oz package marshmallows - I used strawberry flavored
1/2 stick butter
1 package of chocolate morsels - I used white chocolate

Melt the butter over low heat.

Add the marshmallows.

Melt them and mix them into the butter.

This takes forever - 5 minutes or more.

At this point, I really began craving a strawberry milkshake from Burger King. So random, I know, but when I was a kid we used to go there after a dentist visit when we had cavities filled. I can just smell the fake strawberry flavor.... Mmm.

Add the cereal.

In the words of Julia's favorite book from kindermusic, "Stir and stir and mix some more!"

When you think your wrist might just need rehab, it's probably ready.

Roll them into balls. You'll want to wet your hands to keep it from sticking and being a total mess. (See that glass of water - handy!)

Ta da! 24 snowballs. No, wait... 28. Some of mine must be too small. Bit sized - then you can eat 2 and not feel bad. ;)

Then go melt the chocolate - I used a glass bowl over a regular pot so I could see the water and know it wasn't touching the glass before I added in the morsels.
Once it starts to thin, but its still lumpy, stir continuously to get this...


Dip the tops of the snowballs.


Put back on the wax paper. Then refrigerate about 15 minutes until the chocolate sets.


You'll be left with a mess to soak, but it's worth it!


A yummy Valentine's treat.


P.S. I think next time I'll use small marshmallows- would probably melt faster, and crunch up the cereal a tad before trying to mix it into the butter/marshmallow mixture.

more than one message

Have you ever looked at the bottom left of our church newsletter? You'll see a passage of scripture that Mark, me, or whoever's preaching will be focusing on for that coming week. Just like you can learn more by teaching a class than by sitting in a class, worship can be far more engaging when you understand and have contemplated the perspective it
is emphasizing.

This week, we're continuing a sermon series on "Questions for Lent and Easter," and Jeff and I will be preaching from John 6:60-71. Our question this week is "Do you also wish to go away?"

A beautiful thing about scripture is that there's always more than one message in a passage. John 6:70 reminds us that Jesus called his disciples despite the fact that one would betray him completely. That Jesus would call Judas, that Jesus would minister to Judas, that Jesus
would spend so much time with one who would betray him is fascinating to me, because that's not the way I think. If you're going to let me down, if you're going to betray my trust, if you even have different political views or cheer for a different team, it can be hard to spend time together when forced, much less choose to. Yet in addressing my own issues and insecurities, realizing the insignificance of the differences that are so upsetting to me when compared with the overwhelming love of Christ, I appreciate that we are called and loved by the same God. Perhaps Jesus was onto something, and we should use time with those who differ from us or frustrate us to remind us of what's really important.

Julia's first birthday bash

Julia's first birthday party was a blast! The weather was gorgeous, giving us all spring fever and allowing for some outdoor fun in the front yard with bouncy balls. All the family was there - Grandma Young, Maw Maw, Grandpa Fred, Nana Betty, Grammie, Poppy, Uncle Todd, Aunt Andrea, and Uncle Martin. The Sandlins - Tara and Destin and Sadie and Sawyer - came, too! Sadie and Sawyer helped Julia figure out how to open presents and play with her new toys. She had such fun playing with them and trying out her all new toys.

The theme - since everyone says you have to have a theme- was pink and white polka dots. We had cake (and a smash cake shaped like a number one for Julia), ice cream, pink m&ms, and polka dots and 1st birthday balloons. For lunch we ate chili and grilledcheeses Peter made-to-order for us on the George Foreman grill.

As you can see, Julia was super excited to have so much company! I'll add more pictures soon.

sur-reality TV during recovery

One of the ways that communication engages people on a personal level is by connecting with their individual experience.  At least that's what I've heard.  You can typically identify in successful dramas major themes such as friendship, trust in relationships, and loss that are common to every person's life.  So it's not uncommon to find myself going through things or having gone through things emotionally that characters on TV are going through.  

Sometimes, however, the connection between my life and the lives of characters on TV can get downright freaky.  Such has been the last few episodes of Grey's Anatomy as they've run tests, located the source of Izzie Stevens' hallucinations, and done surgery to remove the part of her brain in which the tumor resided.  

As that storyline has progressed, I've decided two things - 1. I like Emory's setup better than Seattle Grace's, and 2. I am SO SO GLAD that my surgery happened before the season ended.  Because, well, watching a TV show in which a character goes through the exact tests I went through, faces the same decisions I just made, has the same surgery I just had, and dies just afterwards, well, that gets a little weird.  At least her dying was really due to the chemo and the cancer, not the surgery itself, but it's still weird.

It was kind of amusing, though, feeling like I could have been a medical consultant and calling shenanigans at various points.  I'm sure a random observer would have thought I was crazy (or realized that I am crazy) as they overheard some of the following as I yelled at the TV:

"Oh, come on, the EEG cables are multi-colored so you look like a freakin' clown - they're not all silver.  Why you gotta make it look all pretty just so they can be romantic?"

"Don't be whining to me - You got Denny to show up in like 10 minutes.  It took me 3.5 days to have a seizure when I was in the seizure monitoring unit."

"Shepherd's doing a craniotomy.  So what's he doing once he gets in there?  That's just what they do to get into your head for the surgery.  Surely he's doing more than just a craniotomy ..."

"So, you're going to remove her hippocampus?  Y'all going with a selective amygdala hippocampectomy, or a mesial temporal lobectomy?  Cause we decided to go with the amydala hippocampectomy, but I know the literature isn't unanimous about which is the best ..."

"Come on, chief.  Y'all should put the picture of the brain with the contrast going into it on the big screen like they do at Emory during the WADA test.  That's the cool part, not the brain wave mess."

"They clarified what you should be saying when they showed you the flashcards?  I thought they were just looking to see whether I'd say the same thing both times.  And that's stupid that they just told you to repeat back - they showed the cards to me again and asked if I'd seen them before."

"They let you shake your head during the WADA test?  They told me the catheter was sitting in my carotid artery to shoot the chemical into my brain, so there was no way on earth I was gonna be shaking my head.  Although, I only remember what happened when they put my non-language side to sleep.  Who knows what I did when they put my left side to sleep."

"Huh, Izzie's right hippocampus controls her language and most of her memory?  I guess she's either left-handed or abnormal, cause with most right handed people the right side controls visual-spatial memory, which is why they felt safe about taking mine out.."

"That's funny, Shepherd cuts higher than Dr. Gross for the craniotomy to get to the hippocampus.  You would have thought he'd be more up on the latest techniques"

"The next day to wake up?  Come on, Izzie.  I was 'awake, alert, responding to commands', and grumbling obscenties about the Unversity(sic) of Georgia within a couple of hours of them closing me up."  

But, the season has concluded, so I can stop considering myself a medical expert and wondering if I'm drawing pain-killer induced comparisons between my life and Izzie's.  And, luckily, I was through surgery with my memory intact and recovering before Izzie got out of surgery, had memory problems, and then had her heart quit.  Because sometimes it's entertaining to see how life and art are similar, but sometimes it's nice to say - "nope, we're going off-script."

So that's been the last two weeks of Friday afternoon Tivo-watching and recovery.  Gaining my strength, taking my pain medicine, and being VERY glad to be on this side of the surgery.  

A Day

Stupid Joakim Noah and his complete lack of body control. The foul he committed to send the Celtics to the line, thereby sending the Bulls - Celtics game into overtime, was so blatant I'm surprised they didn't call an intentional foul on him. Even I could be more discrete than that, and well, there's a reason that my last year in rec-league basketball that I managed to get four fouls in the first quarter when we only had five players.

In any case, we're enjoying the opportunity to watch A-Day on ESPN, even if we did have to miss the entire first quarter thanks to Noah's debacle. McElroy looks good at QB, but it's always hard to say in scrimmages whether that will translate. It seems obvious that our defense is deeper than our offense at this point, but it looks like we might have some depth at the skill positions.

Watching Terrence Cody chase down Terry Grant running across the field was definitely fun to see - Cody's definitely taking things seriously, and should be better this year than he was last year. That should be fun to see.

Also, it definitely looks like we're pushing hard in the "successful throughout the athletic department" with all of the ads with Anthony Grant. I'm still waiting, though, for the Harvard "Rammer Jammer" ad. Maybe we fell off in our USA Today All-Americans.

84,050 at A-Day. Roll Tide.

are you ready?

"Are you ready to become a dad?"
"As ready as I can be."
"Well, what you need to do is ..."

As a new father, I have received an endless stream of advice about how to best raise our daughter. From sage to silly, from "if you let her sleep in the bed with you, she'll never stop" to "every time Amanda gets up, you should get up - and get a bowl of ice cream while you're
at it," I've been preparing for my daughter's birth for some time.
Yet as much preparation as I did, as much advice as I got, nothing could have prepared me for how amazing it is to be a dad. But I also realize more and more each day how much I don't know and how much more I could have done earlier in preparation to live the life of a father.

We are now in the midst of the Christian season of Lent, the season of preparation before Easter. And like becoming a parent, the joy of Easter is something that will always overwhelm our senses and is something that, in many ways, we can never be fully prepared for. Yet
the more we can do, the more we can prepare, the more we can savor the experience and the better we can live once the time comes as an Easter people. Preparing, by giving something up to remind ourselves of Christ's sacrifice, by taking on a new commitment to recommit
ourselves to Christ, or by simply reprioritizing our life, will not change the overwhelming power and life-giving message of Christ crucified and raised. What it can do, however, is change us - make us more aware, make us more sensitive, and make us more equipped so that when He comes, we will be ready to shout with joy that He lives.

There are some things, like being a parent and knowing Christ's love and forgiveness, whose explanation simply exceeds words. But let's do what we can to get ready, because when that day comes, I want to truly be as ready as I can be.

now the moment you've all been waiting for ...

JULIA

FRANCES

von HERRMANN !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

"Hey Peter, what do y'all want for lunch?"
"Hold on, let me ask the boss."
"Isn't three days old a little early to be speaking?"

This conversation between my father-in-law and myself basically describes the last week of our lives. Miss Julia has been the center of everything, and I'm imagining will continue to be for quite some time. And we're loving every minute of it.

Born Monday, February 23 at 12:44 p.m., weighing in at 7 pounds 2 ounces and 19.5 inches tall, Julia has already gotten a marriage proposal, and I've already put several strapping young toddlers on notice. She's of course daddy's little girl. Momma's pretty fond of her too.

It's been interesting, however, seeing the effects that stress, the overwhelming amount of things to know, and general fatigue have on us. As I put it yesterday, between the three of us (me, Amanda, and her mom who's staying with us for a few days), we've got half a clue at the moment. I was sitting in church Friday during a funeral and realized that I had no idea what socks I had on. I hoped they matched my shoes. Shoot, I was just hoping for even being dress socks, rather than white socks or hiking socks. Luckily, I had in fact correctly dressed myself, but I realized that the next several years will be interesting, because I'll be doing a lot of flying by the seat of my pants (I really hope I remember to put on pants).

But now the adventure is beginning, and the three of us are on our way. I'm off now, though. She's sleeping. Time to go and admire.

getting the nursery together

Our new baby furniture finally arrived, so work has finally begun on the castle of Princess von Herrmann. Well, it's not really the size of a castle, more like a really really big closet. And we're not going with a princess theme - more ladybugs and butterflies, lots of pink and blue, too. We still have some things to add, decorations for the wall and such, but wanted to share the fun thus far.


































This cute diaper bag was a present from Stacey and Will (author of some of our favorite online reading) and looks so cute now that we had it monogrammed (It is a pretty popular bag now, but I'm certain no one else has this on theirs - the ladies at Monograms Plus sure won't forget me now hehe).

a superior tradition - Georgia Tech or Auburn?

It's my typical practice to simply read football commentary on the internet - mostly newspaper sites, a few blogs from people I know and from people they recommend, stuff like that. Rarely do I write anything. But today, I read something that made me decide to throw my hat into the ring.

It's from one of those "friend of a friend" blogs (Joe Cribbs Car Wash in this instance), and it looked at the potential that Georgia Tech's coach Paul Johnson would accept the coaching position, if offered, at Auburn. A very well written, thoughtful analysis that breaks down reasons that Paul Johnson might and might not bring his flex-bone offense to the Plains, however, it contains one serious flaw that must be addressed.

From the post "

1. Ca$h Rules Everything Around Me, homey, and whatever Tech can pay, Auburn can pay more. Them's the facts, jack, as are Auburn's advantages in fan support, facilities, program tradition, etc. Auburn and Georgia Tech are similar programs in a lot of ways, but Auburn's is a little bit bigger, a little bit better. And we'll pay more. That's the main thing.

That flaw: the claim that Auburn has an advantage in program tradition. I can't argue with the other advantages that Auburn has over Tech and could probably throw a few more onto the list (for instance, it is easier to get into Auburn and every SEC school sans Vandy than it is to get into Tech). But to claim that Auburn has more "program tradition" than Georgia Tech is simply wishful thinking.

A few facts, if you will:

National Championships
Auburn (1) - 1957
Georgia Tech (4) - 1917, 1928, 1952, 1990

Conference Championships
Auburn (10) - 3 SIAA, 1 Southern Conference, 1 SEC pre-1963, 5 SEC post-1978
Georgia Tech (15) - 5 SIAA, 3 Southern Conference, 5 SEC pre-1963, 2 ACC (post-1978)

Bowl Games:
Georgia Tech - 22-14 overall
Auburn - 19-13-2

Stadium
Tech has the oldest Division I-A football stadium. The only Division I stadiums older are Franklin Field of University of Pennsylvania and Harvard Stadium.

Tech has also scored more points in a game than Auburn, but then again, they scored more than anyone else (222-0). Just in case you're wondering, if you're ever going to rig a baseball game against a football-focused school, don't have them scheduled to play you in football the next year. You can even try to disband your football team, but it won't work. You'll still have to play, and you'll still get demolished. Just ask Cumberland College.

I'll give you the fact that the ACC isn't exactly a powerhouse conference, but still, Tech had a 13-5 lead in conference championships while playing in the same conference as Auburn, and Auburn's only made up 3 total conference championships over the subsequent 45 years (15 of which Tech played as an independent, and therefore couldn't win a conference championship).

I'll concede that Auburn does lead the all time head-to-head series, something like 47-41-4. However, a program's successes, if they are to be at all significant, must be measured against their performances playing more than one team.

But overall, I would say that based on total national championships, total conference championships, and bowl records, Tech is superior in the tradition department.

And on a less factually based note, I challenge anyone to argue that Auburn's fight song is better than Tech's. "Ramblin' Wreck from Georgia Tech" was the first school song played in space. Nixon and Khrushchev sang it together in Moscow in 1958, since it was the only song they both knew. On an ironic note, it was written by a Tech player on his way to play Auburn in 1893.

As an Alabama grad and having a brother, father, and grandfather who all earned degrees from Georgia Tech, I'm definitely more than just a little partial toward Tech, but tradition in my mind is measured in excellence and championships.

new classic children's books

This is freakin' awesome: "When Mama Bear decides it's been too long since they've attended church at the Chapel in the Woods, the Bear family works to get back in the habit. It isn't long before the family remembers what a wonderful place the church is and finds that going to church is something they look forward to every week."

This one is a close second:


Each of these a mere $3.19 from Cokesbury.com. Go, support my pension. You know you want to.

The fact that I'm getting excited about children's books is probably an indication that I've been working on my ordination paperwork too long (and that I felt our little girl kick this evening :) Yipee!)

change in the air

Thought some of you who don't see us often might like to see a picture of pregnant Amanda. As you can see, I'm "showing," as Peter likes to call it whenever I'm whining, "Oh my Gaw, I'm soooooooo biiiiiiiiiiig!" It's strange to me now that strangers are asking me about it - it was so long that noone could really notice, or at least not enough that they thought they could talk to me about it. At least 3 or 4 clerks/cashiers/random strangers have commented recently.

Thing are rolling right along. I've decided this year, this being our third year with Peter serving as a pastor, that October, and to an extent the first part of November, is the busiest and craziest time of year for pastors, at least United Methodist ones. Between finalizing year end budgets and meetings getting ready for charge conference, and planning the stewardship campaign meetings, plus all the regular stuff, there were weeks he had a meeting every night of his work week (Sunday - Thursday). Maybe things are slowing down on that front now that we are approaching the holidays.

Hope everyone has been enjoying the beautiful fall colors - this picture was taken at Mt. Cheaha last weekend.

Yay for the Second Trimester!

Everything is going great today with the baby-to-be. We had the doctors nervous last week when I had some stomach problems, so they did an ultrasound to check everything, and everything is as big as it is supposed to be and in the right place and the "heart tones" are good. Click here for pictures if you'd like to see (I didn't post them herein case any of you think like I did that it was a little weird to look at them - until it was mine I was looking at). It was a neat experience - we saw the baby wiggle and open close its mouth.

And now that we are at 14 weeks, we are in the second trimester, which has so far meant much less nausea and more energy and appetite. Yesterday I out-ate Peter at Cracker Barrel. I think he was impressed. He had three pancakes and eggs and I felt the undeniable urge to slap away his hand when he reached for one of my biscuits, even though I had a roast beef dinner with three vegetables. Hehe I ate at least 80% of my meat and 90% of the carrots, green beans, and hashbrown casserole, and a biscuit. (I took home the one I wouldn't let him have for breakfast or a snack today.) I think it is the most I ever ate under 45 minutes.

Also, I've begun to outgrow some of my clothes. I went shopping for maternity clothes last week and have a stockpile now. Which is good - I need the pants already. They are very comfy. I love them. And I love the fact I found some on sale - I even found three wintery/Christmasy t-shirts on sale at K-mart that were $.60 each - cheaper than a thrift store!

Hope everything is going well with all of our dear friends who read this occasionally. Keep Peter and me in your prayers. They'll be running a few more tests on him and they've scheduled them for next Monday.

nurturing or recruiting young leaders?

The following is a post that will be replicated in a young clergy blog for the North Alabama Conference.

Any effective conversation about young church leaders has to be about more than saving the traditional structure of the church. We might find a few people willing to do CPR on our church, but those few will only be those who are already deeply embedded in the church, and the parts of the church that will be able to survive in that kind of situation will be a far cry from the biblical model of Christian community. Rather than focusing on how the church looks, we need to focus on how the church is and what the church does.

We as a church have always been about the outwardly transformational work of the gospel, thus outreach and mission are a part of who we are. We are also, however, about the inwardly transformational work of Christ, which is something experienced only as we are drawn into Christian community. People will be drawn to outwardly transformational ministry, but they can also be drawn into the church by transparent ministry that is inwardly transformative.

Part of the absence of younger people in the church is an unavoidable demographic shift - people are getting married later, moving more, and having kids later, all of which decrease likelihood of church attendance. There is also financially little incentive for church to invest in young adults - they rarely have money to give, and even if they do they will probably move in a few years anyway. So those churches who do have young people around them would rather focus on other investments with a more predictable return on investment.

When it comes to young Christian leaders, both clergy and lay, our primary failure as a church lies more in nurturing than in recruiting. Talking about recruitment is nice for young clergy and helps us feel a little more comfortable going into ordination interviews. But the fact is that young people who are engaged in the church, particularly young people who are unmarried without children, are hard to come by. Getting more of them is not a matter of having better ads in the classifieds - it is a process of discipleship that cannot happen overnight. Even when someone is called with little previous experience within the church, that person must then rely even more heavily on the church to help them learn those things that they never learned. So in many ways to talk about recruitment is more trying to treat the symptom than solving the problem.

It is curious that we talk so much about young adults, yet fail to focus on where a vast percentage of young adults are. We have an undersupported model for reaching people in this age bracket in campus ministry. What percentage of people under 35 go to college these days? And the reason we don't have a campus ministry at every college is . . . ? It is confounding that we can talk about how important young leaders are and young ministers are and yet not make more efforts to be present when people are deciding their careers. Few individual churches are equipped to engage college students, yet campus ministries are doing so despite meager support from the broader church.

The North Alabama Conference last year budgeted $37,000 to support campus ministry programming. You can almost buy every college student in North Alabama a Coke for that. Almost. Yet campus ministry is a situation in which the actual members of the community have extremely limited ability to provide financial resources. Advertising and outreach are even more vital than in the typical community, given a 4 year (or 5, or 6) turnover in the population. We have systemically forced our campus ministers into being primarily fundraisers rather than actually initiating some of the varied programs that can and should exist to reach people on a college campus and nurture young Christian leaders.

Campus ministry is unique because it has the opportunity to allow young people to become leaders, try various ministries, to become in many ways a test lab for future leaders as they investigate their future careers to also investigate their future involvement in the church. That, however, takes resources that the students themselves don't have, and that we currently force our campus ministers to spend most of their time raising. People are nurtured into the faith, nurtured into deeper faith, and many are nurtured into accepting a calling into vocations of ministry. So that is one example, although definitely not the only one, of a type of ministry that is effective with young people but could do much more if given broader support.

There's also the issue of how we attract people to our church. We as a church do attract some people by what we do and our ability to transform the world. But to be willing to be a part themselves, people need to experience Christian community in order to buy into the church. The United Way is working to transform the world as well - what separates the church is that it is also working to transform its members into Christ's likeness through community. As the underlying argument of much of Willimon and Hauerwas's works argue, we as a church simply need to be truly ourselves in order to transform the world. We draw some people in by what we do, but we also draw many in by who we are, with transformation of both ourselves and the world. As people become part of us and we become part of them, God will call nurture Christian leaders. The sooner we as a church are faithful to our calling to engage people, the sooner they will hear that call.

Above all, to recruit young Christian leaders we need to carry out the work of transforming the church and the world. Our conference priorities are currently directed internally at transforming ourselves into a better church, assuming that in doing so we will then be able to transform the world. Perhaps we should look outward to how we should transform the world, assuming that in doing so we will be transformed into the church. Or perhaps we should look toward Christ for our transformation and all work as hard as we can with what God has given us where God has put us. Isn't that why we're in the resurrection business in the first place?