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Friday, March 28, 2008
There is nothing to do
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There is nothing to do is all I ever heard from all my
friends every Friday night growing up. I would always ask “what are you talking
about? You mean there are not good clubs or bars that will accept your fake ID.”
Shut up, was there response (no wonder I did not have very many friends is high
school). I always found something to do
and many times it was with my family. I could not get in much trouble doing stuff
with my family. Yes it does take effort, but trust me it is worth it. Plus you
will miss them when they are gone. When you get home today from work, pack the
car and go to Ventura harbor for a cheep fun time with you teens, watch the
sunset, get some ice cream, go see a cheap movie at the sticky foot theater ($4
movies) the Buenaventura 6. What ever you think they may enjoy, you could take
them to MB2 sports, it’s an indoor go-cart racing. So fun! Have fun and
remember they actually do want to spend time with you, they act like they don’t
but they do. Love you all. _pastor tim
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Tuesday, March 25, 2008
Meet the Leaders of UTURN
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Meet Karen Fortier (married to Mark, mom of Jacob-14, Hannah-12,
Joel-6, and Isabella-4 mos). Karen is currently a full time mommy,
but also has a photography business and is a teacher. Karen is a born and
raised Southern California girl, and grew up
in Mission Hills--a self proclaimed "Valley-girl." Karen shares
her heart for UTURN, "I just love hanging out with the Gurlz.
They're fun and open to the Lord. I was raised in the church and in a
youth group, and loved the Lord passionately. Yet, the pain of losing my
father as a child left a huge hole and I made very wrong choices, especially
when it came to boys. I hope that in some small way, my mistakes can be
an example of what not to do and perhaps having someone to talk to might help a
Gurl out along the way."
Karen's favorite scripture verse, "-'I will repay you for the
years the locusts have eaten' Joel 2:25. What the enemy has intended to use to
destroy my life and my faith, the Lord has turned and made it the strength and
beauty of my life. He turns tears into diamonds."
For those of you who know Karen, this may surprise you, she adds,
"It might be hard to imagine, but I was an insane, obnoxious,
loud-mouthed, hyper, dare-devil teenager. I craved attention and
the
thrill of danger. I never wore shoes and would climb any random building
or scale the wall of a house just to walk on the ridge of the roof. Born
and raised a Valley Girl - "Rad Karen" (RK) was my most common
nick-name and depicts the overuse of my favorite adjective (rad)."
Karen and her hubby Mark are wonderful members of our UTURN family,
they help with hospitality and getting a new believers class together for our
youth. The next time you see 'Rad Karen', say thanks for all she does for the
youth here at the Sanctuary, and you might even add, " Karen, you are
RAD!!!" _pastor tim
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Friday, March 21, 2008
Meet the Leaders of UTURN
 Continuing on with my UTURN leaders series (I featured my wife about a
month ago), today get to know Dail Salzarulo (man, Salzarulo is such a common
name! JK, Dail is my mom, and she along with my Dad have been serving the youth
at the Sanctuary for almost 8 years). Dail is the mom of 3 strapping young
men. Myself, Luke and Jake. She and Marc are business owners, and have a huge
heart for your youth. In UTURN, Dail is cuurently heading up the Gurlz events,
and she states her heart for UTURN as, "At every opportunity looking for key
ways to impart the Love & Truth of the Gospel to each individual that goes
beyond conventional methods with Eternal consequences." She also shares, "I
snore..and the girls love me anyway!" Her life verse is from Psalm 19, "Let the
words of my mouth and the thoughts of my heart be pleasing to you, O Lord, my
rock and my redeemer." The next time you see her, give her a hug for me and
thank her for all she does for me and for your kids. Love,
_pastor tim
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Tuesday, March 18, 2008
Judges 13:1-24
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So Manoah
asked him, "when your words come true, what kind of rules should govern the
boy's life and work?" the angel of the Lord replied, "Be sure your wife follows
the instructions I gave her."
Why no
rules for the child? That is what I asked myself. This is my thinking. It is up
to us to live the lifestyle God has instituted and the children will
automatically follow. That is a testimony to us. If we do the right thing our
children will be influenced for God by us. Love you all _pastor tim
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Tuesday, March 11, 2008
MorePeople Leave the Faith of Their Youth
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The United States is a land of spiritual seekers, more eager
than ever to shed the religion of their youth to explore new avenues of faith
or, in some cases, discard traditional belief altogether.
So says a new,
comprehensive study of America's changing spiritual landscape from the Pew Forum
on Religion and Public Life. Researchers interviewed more than 35,000 adults and
found that America is growing increasingly secular ? confirming a trend that
other polls had previously uncovered. But Pew's study went into greater detail
to see just how these changes manifest themselves, and it found that more than
25 percent of Americans have left the religion they grew up with for another
faith or, in many cases, left religion completely. For instance, more than 31
percent of Americans grew up Roman Catholic. As adults, less than 24 percent of
Americans claim adherence to the Catholic Church ? an attrition rate of 7.5
percent. Rates of Judaism and Mormonism are dipping, too, while Buddhism and
Islam are growing. Atheism has seen significant growth: While only about
one-half of a percent of Americans were raised atheist, about 1.6 percent of
respondents now say they don't believe in a supreme being ? a more than
three-fold increase.
If one takes into account folks moving from one
Protestant denomination to another, the rate of spiritual swapping increases to
44 percent.
The United States is still overwhelmingly Christian: 78
percent of Americans say they adhere to that brand of faith, compared to the 16
percent who claim no affiliation (which includes atheists, agnostics, and folks
who said they didn't adhere to any particular religion). The bad news is that,
if all the respondents had stayed committed to their childhood faith, the number
would?ve been well above 85 percent.
(Associated Press, Pew Forum on
Religion and Public Life)
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Friday, March 07, 2008
Give your teen a hug and a kiss!
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Embrace your
teen. Allow God's Love to flow through you to them. Their view of God is
strongly incluenced by their view of your relationship with them. They need
closeness to you and if they don't get it from you they will go find closeness
to someone, and many times- in the wrong place. Dads: tackle your son, give him
a nuggie, and tickle him. Show him you can still throw down (in love). Again;
dads: grab your daughter, give her a huge squeeze then kiss her on the forehead
and tell her how much you love her (yes use words). Moms: take you son to the
batting cages, skate park (before it closes soon), or arcade, whatever you son
loves. Moms: take your daughters out and do not say one word about anything that
has been bothering you with her, nothing. Allow her to just be with you. Just like God pursues us, He laughs with us, hugs on us, and wispers in our ears, "I love you, and I am proud of you," lets allow our teens to taste and see the love that we receive from our heavenly Father, from thier earthly fathers (and mothers).
Love you all.
_pastor tim
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Tuesday, March 04, 2008
Pop-Christian Culture!?
I like to watch, not only people but the culture and the
heart of people around me. One of my observations over the past few months is
today's pop culture and how it has influenced our Christianity. I was reading
(really flipping through) a well known Christian magazine and noticed that the
ads had many similarities to that of a secular magazine (but not as good). The
articles mirrored many ideas in secular magazines but with God/Truth stamped on
them. The Christian music scene same thing, and so forth. I began to ask myself
why? I continued to look at the Church (capitol "C") with the perspective of
Pop-Christian, and I believe that we have missed the mark. We live in a shallow
culture, take a glance at the covers of the magazines in line at the grocery
store, but we are not shallow people. I see people are becoming board with this
life. They are becoming tired of the same music, T.V., magazines, and so on.
People want deep spirituality but they don't know where to find it. The Church
does not have it; we give a Pop-Culture approach to Christianity, faith, love,
and truth, and people are board with it. They are done with it. It is like the
saying "if we want pure deep refreshing water, we have to dig the well deeper,
not shallower." Our wells are shallow and plentiful. We try to get the water we
need in small doeses from the wells of youth group, buble study, worship in
song, devotionals, you name the other wells. Christ said it that He is the
living water, so the only well that we should be focusing our efforts on to draw
the water we need is His well. When we gather water from His well, it's
abundant, it overflows, it covers us. Not only does it cover us, it overflows
onto the people around us, and they want it to! When we gather water from His
well, and people get touched by it too, they become clean and
refreshed; so they know what they have is an encounter with Living water. They
experience a satisfying of thier need for the deepness that they are looking
for.
Our teens are here, the one well I want us to give them
is Christ, so they can experience the Father in the deep way they are striving
for. Instead of pointing them to lots of shallow wells like the world does, lets
point them toward the one well that will give them Living, refreshing,
all-encompassing water. _pastor tim
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