Next Conference

Okay; so, in about 7 months, the Next 2011 conference is going to be starting. I know it's early, but if you've ever been to Next, you know why the excitement is so high! Below is a recording of one of the songs sung at Next 2010 by a band named Generation Letter. Enjoy! Maybe we'll see you in Orlando for the conference.

Lord, Your children have not been spared

From this world's daily trials and cares.

We know weakness, fear and sorrow

Yet we're not alone.

You are near in our time of need.

You are faithful.

You hear our pleas.

You give grace to

All who hope in Your mighty name.

King of Peace, You calm our raging storms.

All we need is found within Your arms.

We find rest by Your quiet streams,

King of Peace.

We were rebels against Your reign.

We were haters of Your great name

When You saved us

From Your justice,

And from ourselves.

You give life to our hearts of stone,

Made a way for us to Your throne -

Where we lay down all our burdens

At Your feet.

King of Peace, You calm our raging storms.

All we need is found within Your arms.

We find rest by Your quiet streams,

King of Peace.

We stand upon Your faithfulness

As we trust in You.

King of Peace, You calm our raging storms.

All we need is found within Your arms.

We find rest by Your quiet streams,

King of Peace.

The Ramifications of Na

I'm back from Na and boy do I need God's grace. Instead of depending more on a spiritual "high", I feel a great chasm between my desire and ability and God's greatness. That's a good thing, but it's also painful and hard. So, I confess that the ramifications of New Attitude are huge because I feel my need for God even more.

- I need God's grace to grow.
- I need God's grace to pursue him.
- I need God's grace to love the Word more.
- I need God's grace to enable me to fight for faith.
- I need God's grace to see him as my great Father.

This conference was enriching and helpful, and I know God is working in my life as a result of this conference since his word never returns void. For those of you contemplating New Attitude in the future, just go! It's worth the sacrifice and time spent.

Thank you all for your prayers and encouragement. May God be glorified!

New Attitude Conference '08

WAAAA WAAAA WAAAA!!!!! Why? Why is it almost over?!

I guess this couldn't last forever. All that to say, this is my final post for this trip. We are soon to be checking out of the hotel and then we're going to be on our way to our final session with C.J. Mahaney. Please be praying for us that the Spirit applies all of this Truth and that we take the Word more seriously from this point onward.

Thanks for your prayers and interest in the postings.

Farewell!

New Attitude Conference '08 Session #7: John Piper

Honestly, there's too much to write down regarding Piper's message tonight.... For notes, you can go to the New Attitude Website.

This message was an honest and helpful approach to fighting the fight of faith! Everyone should listen to this and hear Piper's heart.

Below are more pictures...

New Attitude Conference '08 Sessions #3 - 6: Al Mohler, CJ Mahaney, Eric Simmons & John Piper

Whoa, I definitely cannot give an overview of each of these messages, but let me say that the conference is growing in its impact. I have personally been learning more about worship and the value of the Word! This has been a challenging/encouraging time for me personally, and I hope the same for all the teens.

Prayer Requests

• That the Holy Spirit would speak through John Piper as he preaches again tonight
  
• That the Holy Spirit would overpower any sleepiness and other distractions
• That the Holy Spirit would reach deep into all of our hearts to grow our faith and repentance

Quotes/Paraphrases from Mohler's session:

1. Revelation is God forfeiting his own personal privacy so that his sinful creatures might know him.
2. The Law is important to show us our need of grace

...from CJ Mahaney's session on Psalm 42:

1. The psalmist doesn't constantly evaluate the state of his soul, he interrupts himself.
2. Troubled souls become hopeful souls when we sing truth to our soul.
3. "When we cannot trace God's hand, we must trust his heart." ~ Spurgeon
4. The psalmist felt forsaken by God. The Savior was forsaken by God.

...from Eric Simmons session from 2 Timothy 3:14-17:

1. If you love Christ, you will love the Word. If you are bored with the Word, maybe it's because you find Jesus to be boring.
2. The Word will not submit to my idolatry, but by God's grace it will reveal my idolatry.
3. When God breathes, life happens.
4. We easily forget the mission of God through the gospel when we focus on the day-to-day stuff of life.
5. Continue in what you have learned and firmly believed!

...from John Piper's session on the life of William Tyndale:

This session was simply convicting an so challenging (in a great way). I saw, in a more personal way, how I should value the Word. There's honestly too much to type about this message. But, if you're interested in listening to this one (or any of the other ones), you can download it on the New Attitude Website.

Just some fun pictures

Justin & TiKayla getting C.J.'s signature

SERIOUSLY, this is the lunch line for the three (maybe four) restaurants in this area....

You've gotta love Elisha's hair. :)

New Attitude Conference '08 Session #2: Mark Dever

Before I talk about the session, just want to make sure you all know that I'll put up pictures at a later post....

The Reliability and Authority of Scriptures

I personally thought this message was wonderful! Mark Dever clearly explained God's preservation of His Word and how the Word is authoritative and reliable.

Main Question: What do you believe about the authority of the Scriptures?

Proposition: Christianity is based on Truth about the gospel of Jesus.

Instead of me giving you more overview of the message, I'll just give you some quotes/thoughts from the message:

1. The authors of Scripture, over and over, have great concern for historical accuracy.... God is a God of Truth and is concerned about historical accuracy.
2. Just because I don't know everything, doesn't mean I don't know anything.
3. Bible study is one of the main ways we get hope!
4. There are mysterious, active things that happen to us whenever we read the Scriptures (Heb. 4:12)
5. If I am a disciple of Christ, I must treat the Scriptures as Jesus treats them!

New Attitude Video (waiting)

New Attitude Conference '08 Session #1: Joshua Harris

Title: "Ripping, Burning and Eating"

This evening we had our first session. The excitement level was high and we raced to find good seats. Needless to say, we found some pretty good seats. The worship was wonderfully God-focused and the message was challenging and a great kick-off to the conference.

The basic question that was asked during this session was, "What is your attitude towards God's Word?" The challenge was that we should respond logically and emotionally positive towards God's Word (i.e. - if I say that the Bible is from God, then I should revere the words of Scripture and respond accordingly whenever I read the Scriptures).

Joshua Harris exhorted us by using three examples from Scripture (two positive, one negative) on how to respond to the Word.

1. Josiah (2 Kings 22) - when Josiah was confronted with the Scriptures, he tore his robes and repented. God granted forgiveness and Josiah followed the Lord all the days of his life.

2. Jehoiakim (Jeremiah 36) - Josiah's son who didn't follow his father's footsteps. When confronted with the Word, he burned each page.

3. Jeremiah (Jeremiah 15:16) - Jeremiah, during a time of complaining, basically says that the only place he finds hope is in the Word. When he found the Scriptures, he "ate" them.

Below are some quotes that I thought were convicting and encouraging:

Subtle Ways We "Burn" God's Word:
1) Through ignoring it
2) Through ignoring parts of it for application (ex: focusing on passages of hope and neglecting passages that mention God's righteous anger)
3) Through how we listen to God's Word preached (ex: we focus more on the person preaching than we do the words of God being proclaimed)

Truths From Jeremiah 15:
1) God's Word meets us right where we are
2) Delighting in God's Word is sometimes something we must fight for
3) We don't love God's Word so that we can earn a standing before God. We love God's Word because he's given us a standing before him (v. 19)

Well, as you can see, we were able to spend some time with Pastor Mark and his family as we were on our way to Louisville, KY.

Our trip was uneventful, but definitely enjoyable. We left the church around 12:15 p.m. and arrived at the Galt House Hotel around 9:30 p.m.

Our rooms are great, and all the guys (right now) are just relaxing in the room. We'll be taking it easy during the day today to help keep us energized for the conference.

This afternoon we'll be signing in for the conference and this evening the first session with Josh Harris begins at 7:30!!!

For an overview of the conference, click HERE.

New Attitude Conference '08

I cannot wait for this conference. I went to it last year as was blessed in innumerable ways. This year it's my hope to bring several new and "old" teens to the conference. The video below is last year's promo. video, but I think it does a great job expressing the heart of Na. For more information visit the New Attitude website.

New Attitude Conference Overview

Hope you enjoy this overview video of New Attitude....

New Attitude Conference Session Seven: John Piper

Well, today, we had a meeting with the Rebelution (since Justin and I are both members). Most of our group went to the meeting and had our pictures taken.

Make sure you look at the picture HERE.

Also, check out www.newattitude.org for a bunch more information on the conference - including free downloads!

As far as tonight's session.... Wonderful. Since you can read more about the session HERE,I will simply write on two convicting and encouraging thoughts of Piper's sermon:

In Luke 18:9-14, the Pharisee believes that his obedience is a gift of God, but that's still not enough! Our obedience must be grace-filled and empowered. We never pay God back for His grace. We grow greater in debt to it. No obedience either in my or God's strength can be offered to God in order to find acceptance with Him.

In Luke 17:7-10 - "When I've done all I'm commanded to do, I'm still unworthy."

Thank you again for your continued prayers! Tomorrow is C.J. Mahaney talking about how we discern our application.

Luke, Brett Harris, Matt, PT2, Justin and Alex Harris

Praise Band (obviously the Rebelution has better pictures!!)

Luke waiting to get Piper's signature

Part of the Prayer Room

New Attitude Conference Sessions Five and Six: Eric Simmons & John Piper

"Discerning the Gray Matters" by Eric Simmons

Great comments leading us to grace-filled obedience. His transparency and truthfulness has spurred us on.

"Discerning What God Delights In: Himself" by John Piper

He definitely lead us to the ultimate aim of life - to savor God Himself. That's the point of predestination, creation, the incarnation, propitiation, sanctification and the consummation of all things.

One thing he said sticks out to me. "What is the chief end of God? Answer: to glorify and enjoy Himself forever." Isn't that sinful, you may ask? No, God has no other gods before Him! If He didn't glory in Himself and call us to do the same, He would be an unloving and hateful God because He's keeping from us all the most glorious and satisfying Being!

As a side note, I haven't commented on the music; but, may I just say, the worship times have been phenomenal. I've loved it wholeheartedly and it's definitely drawn my heart to the throne of grace.

Thanks for your continued prayers.

Click HERE for more information.

The Worship Times

Our Lunch....

Reluctantly Agreeing To This Place....(actually the girls ended up going to Subway)

Matt and the evidence of idolatry (10 White Castle Burgers?!)

The Neighborhood: a place to relax, buy books, shirts, and visit some organizations represented at the conference.

A big canvass (in the Neighborhood) on which people can write and/or draw what they're learning

New Attitude Conference Session Four: C.J. Mahaney

Powerful, Convicting, Sensational, Illuminating, Revealing!

These are just a few words that the teen guys came up with to describe tonight's session. C.J. Mahaney was so powerful and humbling in his presentation.

The theme of the night was "Discern Your Heart" and the title of the message was "The Idol Factory". Please rejoice with us because God had POWERFULLY impacted many (if not all) of our lives through the message and music tonight. Some of us were simply brought to tears as we were led to the beauties of the cross.

Click HERE for more information on tonight's session.

New Attitude Conference Second Session: Al Mohler

Click HERE for more information on Mark Dever's topic: Discerning Your Doctrine.

This was a great message. If you want to know more about purity and unity within the body of Christ, you must listen to this. He talks at length at what unifies and what separates.

Praise God for such godly discernment that was preached this morning.

Our next session is at 3:00 with Al Mohler.

New Attitude Conference Pictures

Sign-in

Look at all the people! 3,000 at this conference - representing 39 states and 3 continents

Awwww!

Feel the excitement...

Very contemplative and mature.

Justin and Luke with Joshua Harris.... They got their books signed. :)

New Attitude Session One: Joshua Harris

Unbelievable and amazing! Thanks to all who are praying. This, by far, is the best conference I've ever been to.

I would do a write up of the conference; however, the rebelution blog has done a wonderful job keeping us all updated as to what's going on in the conference.

All I can say is that the gospel is central, application is presented and the body of Christ is unified!

I'm so excited for tomorrow.

New Attitude Conference (Saturday Morning)

Right now I'm in Louisville, KY awaiting the beginning of the New Attitude Conference. I can't believe I'm already here and am SO excited for it to begin.

I'm here with several others (including Tracy) and I'm excited to see what God is going to do this weekend. I'm praying for God to wake us up from our spiritual sleepiness, grant us a greater desire for Him, but, as I was reading in my devotions, I believe the Lord has given me some more specificity.

Ephesians 3:14-21 has taught me this:

We need the Spirit's power! Without the Spirit, we're dead in our own flesh. But, if we are blessed with his strength, which overpowers our sinfulness, then Christ will be pleased to intimately dwell with us. Hence, we'll be rooted and grounded in love. And, if we're rooted and grounded in love, by the Spirit's power, we will be able to comprehend the great love of Christ - which goes beyond knowledge - and we'll be filled with the fullness of God Himself!

Think of that - "filled with the fullness of God." What a blessing. What a joy! God Himself desires to fill us. We're nothing. He's everything! Oh, that God would be pleased to bless us with his abiding presence in greater fullness this weekend.

People might think this to be impossible, but Paul's closing words are of such encouragement to all Christians. God is able to do far more than this!

"Now to him who is able to do far more abundantly than all that we ask or think, according to the power at work within us, to him be glory in the church and in Christ Jesus throughout all generations, forever and ever. Amen." (Ephesians 3:20-21, ESV).

So, please continue to pray for us.

Thank you.