conversations from the couch

OK–for those of you who are new to the NYMC blog–this is the behind-the-scenes report on all conference happenings as they move from brainstorm to execution, plus breaking news, cool stuff, and the good, bad and ugly parts we’re probably not supposed to share. The year-long journey of planning a conference is a huge part of our team’s real-life ministry to youth workers, and we thought we’d share the the glimpses of holy grace that compensate for the gritty frustrations along the way. You’ll get inside the heads and hearts of the folks on the conference team who are thinking/planning/praying for youth workers needs. And, your comments and input on the blog give us the feedback that makes the conference great!

FYI for returning readers: the blog took a hibernation when I took a sabbatical of sanity. (the event team continued on with some exciting staff/company changes, but I (Kami, the self-appointed NYMC blogger among a variety of other conference roles, took a time out.) Since this blog is about the real truth behind our conference ministry–here’s the scoop: I returned from NYMC 2008/Cincinnati in February full from the experience, but ultimately broken by the long journey that took us there. Part of it was the sheer strain of the amount of work on a tiny staff, but it went beyond that. I had felt God’s call on my heart to serve youth workers so loudly that it drowned out the balance in my life for anything else. I totally neglected my role as a wife, mother and friend, and rationalized my workaholic ways all in the name of God. It became clear that my own prideful addiction to performance/achievement/affirmation overtook what began as authentic calling to ministry. Exhausted, disallusioned, broken and bitter I wrapped up some final projects, left my position at Group and limped home to heal my life.

It’s now been 5 months and I’ll share bits and pieces of that healing time in future posts. I’ve learned that committing to ministry of any kind means committing to continual personal and spiritual recovery and renewal along the way. My friend Megan Hutchinson from Saddleback and NYMC 2009 Track Leader for Helping Hurting Kids has said it best: just breathe.

So, with a great big breath I’m throwing a healthy leg back on this conference pony. I’m totally inspired when I watch the NYMC promo video, and reminded about healthy spiritual balance in the words of the accompanying song, Sweetly Broken, by Jeremy Riddle. I’ve been there. I’m grateful for the amazing team that continued planning NYMC 2009–I’ll re-introduce the whole crew (and new faces) soon. Thanks to Doug Fields for refusing to believe I could really walk away, and a huge thanks to Rick Lawrence for carrying this torch high and keeping it burning so brightly along with everything else on your plate: you are a true champion!

If you haven’t met Jeanne Mayo (NYMC Track Leader, and founder of Youth Leader’s Coach) you’ll definitely know her after attending the conference. Word’s can’t really describe her heart for ministry and her amazing impact on people…but this attempts to sing it.

Believe it or not, Doug, Josh and the gang are really on the ball this month. The Christmas episode of the Simply Youth Ministry Podcast is in the can and it should arrive later today. Not much youth ministry in there though, just as a warning.

We’re home from So. Cal after wrapping up a massive programming meeting with Doug, Josh, Rick, Tim, Kurt Johnston, and Jeff MacGuire (from Mariner’s) We went through the entire conference schedule (made a few great tweaks), and walked through the morning and evening general sessions in detail. It’s all looking awesome–Rick went through his plan for the mornings,  Josh presented plans for pre-show and evenings, and Doug massaged it all together with his special loving Doug-touch.

For a creative meeting with a bunch of passionate people, it flowed suprsingly smoothly. I enjoyed actually NOT being the most talkative person in the room, and kicked back to absorb the dynamics as these guys integrated their gifts:  Rick’s passion for deep Jesus-centered thinking and interaction, Josh’s radiant energy and humor, and Doug’s profound insights, experience and vision for staying true to the message we’re trying to communicate in each session.

It was a great day–productive, powerful and humbling.

Tim and I headed home on a late-night flight to CO. He slept, and I worked through conference details and logistics in my head. Honestly, I’m struggling with it all right now. Normally a fearless champion of optimistic move-it-forward action, I’m beginning to get overwhelmed with the responsibility associated with executing these great ideas without letting someone down. Karen, Sherri and I have been sprinting so hard through the last few months, and I feel like we all just rounded the home stretch and there’s a mountain to scale before we cross the finish line.

 I’m really tired right now. I think the team is tired. We need to catch our breath and get a second wind.

Natalie’s bummed because her tree doesn’t shine as brightly now. My solar calculator is working though–I’m happy about that.  

A whole bunch of us are going to see Jeremy Riddle in concert tonight in Ft. Collins. I’m excited to hear him live because there’s a cool story how we connected with him for NYMC. This was a God-thing. 

Last spring we wrestled through tough decisions on which Christian bands to hire for the evening concerts at NYMC. I thought this would be the fun part of event planning, but working with some of the booking agencies was sometimes pretty discouraging. I realize it’s a business like anything else, but the conversations just felt so far removed from the DNA of the event. ($40,000 for a 30 minute set? You need to have WHAT in the green room? ) 

Actually, I almost quit at that point, my job was so burdened by a number of shallow administrative details it just sucked the fullfilling ministry part right out. I couldn’t justify the sacrifices on my family if this was it. So I was driving to our final band meeting, fuming and praying (nice blend), and a song came on the radio that blew me away. I didn’t know the singer or the title, but I pulled over and wrote down the lyrics. 

I came bursting into the meeting with the news that we had a band for the Saturday night general session concert, but I’d have to google the lyrics to figure out the song/title/artist first. The team was much less inspired about this God-delivered song, but we ended up giving it a shot. About 2 hours later we figured out the mystery song and artist–Sweetly Broken, by Jeremy Riddle. I contacted his booking agent (the part I always hated) discovered that Randy McCoy, Jeremy’s agent at Creation Associates, actually lived a few miles from Group.

Randy wanted to meet for coffee before we signed anything though. He explianed that Jeremy doesn’t book events that just want him as a “gig”.  He values the integrity of his worship ministry, and chooses opportunities that fit his filter of authenticity. A few cups of coffee later, we had Jeremy Riddle filled into the Saturday night spot, and I had a new favorite song I listen to whenever I need some inspiration.

I haven’t listened to it yet, but Doug, Josh, Jana and Matt just finished taping a podcast yesterday- actually, it’s kind of a big deal since they’ve been scattered lately. Check out Simply Youth Ministry’s Episode 62 hitting iTunes later this week. I think they’re talking about senior pastors…it should be interesting.

I just talked with a youth worker who noticed that a lot of our conference leaders and speakers were from big mega churches, and wondererd if there was anything in the event geared for small ministries. GREAT question to address.

NYMC is absolutely NOT geared towards a bigger-is-better mentality and we’re not interested in playing the “how big is your youth ministry” game. Our goal is simple–meet youth workers’ needs for deeper training that they can genuinely use in their ministries, and feed them with ideas, encouragement and authentic interaction. We’ve asked all of our track & workshop leaders to take some time in each session to specifically discuss applying ideas for various ministry settings. We’ve also launched an affinty group specifically for small churches (called Small but Mighty) that will meet throughout the entire conference for connection, idea sharing and debriefing of what they’re are learning through a small church filter. Stephanie Caro (one of NYMC’s speakers) is excited to be the leader/ministry mentor for the Small but Mighty affinty group, this is her ministry sweet spot.

Tim Timmons is our conference worship leader, and he’ll be opening each evening general session, as well as the closing general session on Monday. He also leads worship at Mariner’s Church , and is another one of Doug’s youth group legacies. Tim’s so talented, and has one of the most authentic, humble spirits. It’s so cool to see all of these guys grown up and passionately leading different ministries because they were so impacted by their youth ministry experience as students. We’re excited that Tim’s bringing his whole band this year.

Chris Tafalia (Taffy) is also part of our conference worship team. He’s the student ministries worship pastor at Saddleback, is absolutely hilarious, and has an incredible heart for leading students in worship. He’s bringing his student worship band to NYMC–a bunch of 15-18 year old kids that share this passion. They’ll be leading worship in the morning general sessions. Taffy is also doing a workshop on Leading Students in Worship at the National Youth Ministry Conference.

We had another meeting today about some more worship ideas, including a “worship unplugged” feature each day where we’d have some stuff going on outside of the general sessions. (late-night, etc.) We’re also talking about adding an affinity group for youth workers who are also involved in student worship. More on all of that soon…