Fun Friday...

To take you into the weekend watch this fun YouTube clip from Kung Fu Panda here.
If you haven't seen Kung Fu Panda before (rated G, came out in 2008) I highly recommend you try and watch it this weekend!
Pay special attention to how the main character learns from his teacher or his Master.
Kinda like the way we gotta learn some sweet skills from our teacher Jesus...


Let's review the thoughts from last week;

Jesus asked people to leave things behind and follow Him. What do you think you are to leave behind to become a disciple?

What do you think 'taking up your cross' looks like in your own life?

Do you consider yourself to be a disciple of Jesus all the time, even at school or with your non-christian friends?

What is the sign of a true disciple of Jesus?

Here's a challenge for the weekend;
Pray about this stuff and listen to the answers that God gives you...

If you want to know more look up what Wikipedia says about being a disciple here.
Also, ask your Corps Officer or Youth Leader to get their hands on an OLD SCHOOL book called 'The Imitation of Christ', it's written in old language like the bible but it helps people become disciples through prayer and reading.
Get ready for next week's theme of personal prayer...

Come, Follow Me...

How much pressure have you been under this week?
Been the victim of peer presure?

Matthew 4:18-22 says;

Jesus Calls His First Disciples

¹⁸ As Jesus was walking beside the Sea of Galilee, he saw two brothers, Simon called Peter and his brother Andrew. They were casting a net into the lake, for they were fishermen. ¹⁹ “Come, follow me,” Jesus said, “and I will send you out to fish for people.” ²⁰ At once they left their nets and followed him.
²¹ Going on from there, he saw two other brothers, James son of Zebedee and his brother John. They were in a boat with their father Zebedee, preparing their nets. Jesus called them, ²² and immediately they left the boat and their father and followed him. 

and Matthew 9:9 says;

The Calling of Matthew

⁹ As Jesus went on from there, he saw a man named Matthew sitting at the tax collector’s booth. “Follow me,” he told him, and Matthew got up and followed him.

Simon Peter, Andrew, James and John and Matthew all immediately left what they were doing to follow Jesus. Like they literally left their work where it was and got up and followed Him. Didn't even log out of Facebook or shut down their computers...
How do you think they felt about that? How would you feel about that?

Luke 14:27 says;

  ²⁷ And whoever does not carry their cross and follow me cannot be my disciple. 

What are these guys supposed to carry as disciples of Jesus? Their cross? What does that mean?

John 13:34-35 says;
  ³⁴ “A new command I give you: Love one another. As I have loved you, so you must love one another. ³⁵ By this everyone will know that you are my disciples, if you love one another.” 

Does that give us any ideas? What then is a true sign of a disciple?

How will the world recognise followers of Jesus i.e christians? How will the world recognise that you are a follower of Jesus? What does that mean for you?

You know some of that peer pressure you might be under right now to fit in and do what the crowd is doing, whatever that might be? Jesus felt that kind of pressure. Jesus was not the kind of guy people thought He was going to be. Early in His life Jesus quit his job, didn't get married and died as a criminal without a cent to His name.
The world tells us we need to have money, be beautiful and famous but Jesus trumped all that and instead put value on love, being humble and acting in service to others. In order to be a disciple of Jesus we need to do the same, stand out from the crowd and go against the grain. Stand up for what we believe and stop trying to be another sheep.

In a world where everyone strives to follow the crowd, Jesus is the best role model for our lives.
He asks us to leave the unimportant things of our lives behind, just like he did for the first disciples of the bible and follow Him. It's totally not an easy thing to do, it is going to be a struggle, ask anyone that's been trying to follow Jesus for a long time, it's a struggle each and every single day. It's also guaranteed to involve pain too, not gonna lie...
But as a result our lives will be known for their love...

Think about it, pray about it. 

Follow the Leader

Have you ever noticed when you hang out with someone a lot you start to take on some of the same characteristics?
Maybe you start sounding the same on the phone?
People might get you mixed up because you hang out so much together, or you might have the same profile pic on Facebook as your bestie (you know the rare one where you both look awesome)...

You might watch the same movies or read the same books. Hello Hunger Games?!
You might play computer games together and even when you're not together you're still playing together online. You're constantly communicating with each other and taking on each others characteristics. You're learning from each other which can totally be a great thing but you can also pick up some of their bad habits too...
Like everytime you catch up you eat junk food.
Or the words that you use, like using 'like' in your sentences all the time. Or sometimes using bad language. That one's a little too easy to pickup...
Maybe you start smoking or drinking because your bestie did? Or maybe your bestie started sleeping with their boyfriend or girlfriend so you thought it would be ok for you to start too..?

Who do you follow? Is there a person that you imitate?
It might be the Queen Bee at your school or it might be a favourite sports star or musician.

Who do you look up to? Who do you want to be like?

<----------- This guy? LOL!

If you're brave enough, post up the names of some of the people you follow and imitate...

I'm a Disciple

Pre-Note: Sing the above title of this post to the tune of Destiny's Child 'I'm a Survivor', guaranteed to make your booty shake ;)

So we've talked about Salvation and what it means to be saved but what comes next?
Do we just accept Jesus as our Lord and Saviour and then go ahead and everything is rosy from then on in?
Unfortunately no, just because we accept that Jesus is the Son of God and Lord and Saviour of our life doesn't mean that we automatically walk around with halos above our heads constantly singing choir songs. (Some of us do that anyway but it's definitely not a pre-requisite for being a Christian).
We live in a broken world with broken people and we've still got a lot to learn. We might still have a lot of healing to do ourselves, we might still have bad habits we need to break and we are needed in other people's lives as well. We need to gain insight, discover the specific gifts God has given us and work out what God wants us to do with our lives.
In order to do this we gotta follow Jesus' example and in order to know what Jesus did we gotta learn about him. We gotta be students of Jesus.

In old Jewish Culture (that is still alive and pumping in many different forms today) a young man of about 12 years old would start learning from a Rabbi every day in the Synagogue. So essentially a Rabbi would be an older teacher that would be wise in the Scriptures (part of what is the bible today) that would have younger followers walking in his footsteps and doing life with him every day so they could learn from him. The Synagogue was like a church.
This is what Jesus did and then he became a Rabbi himself with followers (disciples) until his death.
In order for us to be disciples of Jesus we need to walk with Jesus through prayer and through reading our bibles (the scriptures) every day.

We need to make sure our influence is Jesus and not let other things in life like negative people and peer pressure get in the way. That is essentially what the point of discipleship is, learning to listen to God in life, not other negative influences.

But, remember, discipleship is not easy. It is a challenge that can involve pain and difficulty at times...

Take a moment to think about how you learn in life. How did you learn to ride a bike? How did you learn to kick a footy? How did you learn to read and write?
We learn by watching and copying others. When we are in school sometimes we learn stuff by being told but it never really comes real for us until we do it...
Like getting your driver's license. You read the book on the road rules, you might even read a car manual to learn how to operate a car, someone might even tell you what to do. You sit for your L's, you get all your Give Way questions right and you're given your license with a cute photo of you on it. But that doesn't mean you know how to drive right? It's not until you get behind the wheel of a car that you learn (really quickly for most of us) how to steer, how much pressure we need to put on the brakes and remembering to use our indicators...

If we have a bad driving instructor we're going to make some serious mistakes when we get out on the road. It could end in us being in a car accident that might even lead to our death! So we need to make sure we choose a good instructor, someone we trust and someone that's going to care about us if we make a mistake.
The same can be said for our lives...
Choosing good role models in our lives is really important. Who we follow will determine what kind of people we will be. It's really important we follow people who are good, who we trust and who care about us no matter what happens...

Think about it, pray about it...

Animation Salvation

Last week we talked a lot about the rubbish in our lives called sin...
As we mentioned, sin can enslave us and bring harm into our lives but God wants us to have SALVATION.
Salvation brings life, freedom and a relationship with God. To experience this freedom we must believe that God died and returned to life to save all of us.

Sometimes all the 'church talk' around 'being saved', 'coming to faith' or being 'born-again' really does our heads in! What does it all mean? How do you even know if you are 'saved'? If you have questions around these things than please ask your leader or officer about it. They can pray with you and ask God to make it real for you too! If you feel you don't have anyone around or nearby that you can talk to about this stuff comment on here and we would love to start a discussion with you (publicly or privately) and we can pray with you over the virtual world :) Being part of an emerging generation is so fun and has so many benefits! We don't have to feel isolated by space or time, use technology to connect with friends, leaders and your faith!

Here's some discussion points to get the ball rolling or for you to think about;
What does God want to rescue us from in our lives?
What might that look like in your own life?
What has God done to save us?
Why did God save us?
What must I do to be saved?

I tried making a video for you guys this week but it was first of all too big and then when we tried to convert it to make it smaller it was sideways. So we abandoned that idea. But if anyone knows how to compress video without turning it sideways give us a holler, we would love some help.

Read the book of Romans this week to understand salvation in your own time.

P.S if you wanna know more check out what Wikipedia says about Christian Salvation here, or watch this cute Salvation Animation.

Go!

Sin, Salvation and the bit in between.

Today we have a guest blogger, Tash Lovelace from Eaglehawk! :) She has helped us put together todays blog. Enjoy...

Last week we mentioned sin…

Have you thought some more about it? What do you think? When we think about what kind of people sin we often think about really bad stuff and really bad people…

Well actually, everyone sins, even you.    

We mentioned a few things about what happens when we sin last week but here’s a re-cap…

When you sin you are hurting yourself your friends and even God. You may not realise it but you are and after you have sinned there is almost always regret.

Freedom from sin makes us happy…

Freedom from sin gives us relief…

You feel happier about yourself when you don’t have to worry about shame…

Our friendship or relationship with God can be restored. But what saves us?

How do we have a restored friendship with God? Sit down, pray and ask God to forgive your sin, be willing to let the rubbish in your life go and let God guide you to a life free of sin.

Romans 10:9-10 reads; ‘If you declare with your mouth, “Jesus is Lord,” and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved.  For it is with your heart that you believe and are justified, and it is with your mouth that you profess your faith and are saved.’ 

What do you think about that?

So, salvation, how do you get it?
Salvation is not inherited from you parents or family and it’s not found within a church. Salvation is a choice that only you can make. God offers salvation to all humanity in love but we can only receive it if we turn to him only you can choose salvation.

Sin can control us and bring harm into our everyday lives BUT God offers salvation because he loves us.  This salvation brings us Life, freedom and a relationship with god. To accept this salvation we must believe that Jesus died and returned to life to save us all then confess it with our mouths.

If you have never done this before perhaps take a moment now to speak to God about the rubbish in your life, give it over to Him and ask him to give you life. Let us know what happens!

Salvation? What the?!

Helllooo crazy guys and gals!

Ever wondered what the 'Salvation' in The Salvation Army is all about?

Hmmm, good question!

Salvation is the experience of being rescued and protected from pain or harm and it can mean many different things to different people. We can be saved from a burning house or from a boring conversation at a family reunion, but it always means avoiding something unpleasant and finding something better.

There can be all sorts of painful and harmful things in our world, so what has God got to do with it? What kind of Salvation does God offer us? Have you ever played the game 'Stuck in the Mud'? Sometimes our lives can feel a bit like that, stuck, bored, angry, frustrated.

When we are set free it changes though doesn't it? We're happy, relieved, free...

Ever heard about sin? That's the stuff that goes against what God asks, commands or wants for us. Examples of (Big) sin are; murder, theft, adultery but there are other (more secretive) sins like; lust, lies, jealousy and selfishness.

What kind of consequences do you normally experience when you commit a sin? Guilt, sadness? Do other people often experience consequences when you sin too? Sometimes they do... One other big consequence is it affects your relationship with God too. Whether it's Big sin or more secretive sin.

Look up Romans 3:23 in your bibles or look it up here what do you think salvation has to do with sin? Discuss.