A Crazy Week

Wearing a lot of hats this week...

1. YOUTH LEADER'S COACH OPERATIONAL DIRECTOR. I just finished checking the edits the boys made on the latest Source, Recovering My Cutting Edge, and Youth Leader's Coach, Coaching a Pleasure-Driven Youth Culture. As usual, Jeanne's brilliant. However, not so brilliant, is the fact that we only offer them on CD. Our summer goal is go digital with the current and future resources, as well as the 180 back issues (all the way back to 2001). I want to break out the skits and illustrations as well. Honestly, the stuff is amazing but we need to get it out there better. The way I look at these resources is this ... if we can help youth pastors prepare a great service more easily, it frees them up to do the one thing we can't do for them long-distance and that is to get out from behind the desk and go love on their kids.

Jeanne and I are also together tomorrow to come up with a plan of attack on some new resources I think will be helpful to youth pastors.

2. JUNIOR HIGH DIRECTOR. This week is our last small group night with the MC student leaders ... Desi, Rey and I (the "Home" team) for the summer middle school students then take over. So, it's a pool party on Wednesday with the students and the entire MC gang, then the three of us will put our heads together and come up with the summer plan. I'm itching to get more strategic. I think we can do that this summer.

3. CHURCH FINANCIAL ANALYST... at least that's what I call myself. I consider this part of what I do my gift to the church. There was a need and I could fill it. I don't do any of the daily accounting grind, but analyze the data and trends ... and prepare and monitor the budget. I represent the accounting department at the board meetings. I thought I'd totally hate it, but actually totally love it. We've got a fun group of guys on the board (yes, old school, all guys except Jeanne...I am in the south). I've helped to bring some stability to the department, so I've got their favor which is fun. It's kind of a rewarding little side job except for this week. I looked at the numbers so long, my head is swirling ... no seriously, I think I could puke even though I brought good news.

4. NATIONAL YOUTH LEADER'S CONFERENCE CO-EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR WITH JORDAN. It's official the conference will be in DALLAS MARCH 30 - APRIL 1, 2009. The theme is EPICENTER. I am totally stoked that Ed Young will be among the speakers. I am a BIG fan. I've got to do some pre-planning for out scouting trip out there later this month.

(On a side note, I heard a Jentzen Franklin message tonight ... he's amazing! I never heard of the guy before I moved down to the ATL. He's doing a youth confernce in July at the Gwinnett Center with Louie Giglio, Chris Tomlin, Ron Luce, Delirious, Jeremy Camp, John Gray and I think Steve Fee. It's 89 bucks ... I think I should go in the name of research :-)

5. MC ATLANTA. The MC students graduate this week ... all 80 or 90 of them, I always lose count. it's a week long event full of dinners, ceremonies and surprises. I do not have a direct role to play on a daily level, but do play a pretty decent indirect role. Thoughout the year, they've been on at least one, most of them serveral, of the CADRE teams I run. Plus, I took 19 of them on a mission trip to Monterrey, Mexico last month and oversee the eight who help lead in middle school (kinda, I've been pretty pathetic this year, hope to get better). I'm pretty tight with about 1/2 of them, but love them all dearly. Scott and Mike are graduating this week and I'm so stoked to be able to spend time with the entire Infalt family who get in on Thursday.

6. CADRE OPERATIONAL DIRECTOR. The advances are over for the year and all we have left is a couple of conference calls :-( However, we're getting the apps in for a new round of youth pastors. 196 have gone through at least a year of Cadre, over half two years. With another 70-80 new Cadre members expected this year (35-40 in each of the two new groups), it will bring the total up to around a 270. Nearly 90% of this year's first class indicated they wanted to do a second year. If that plays out, we might have to do two second year Cadres (vs. the normal one) as well ... should be interesting. I don't have to do anything with Cadre this week, just make sure the girls are getting the nomination and acceptance boxes out. I will always heart the Cadre.

7. TECH SUPERVISOR. I provide a little, and I do mean little, oversight to the boys in the tech area. I love these guys, they're like lil brothers. Basically I'm helping them learn what to say "yes and no to" and to develop teams in order to get their priorities accomplished. They're so good, they used to just say yes to everyone and it resulted in a lot of dropped balls. They are fun and we are a fun team. Plus, I help get them some of the stuff they need ... that makes them real happy. However, we've been CRAZY busy doing a gazillion other things and haven't had time to meet weekly like normal. Hopefully, we'll slip in a lunch this week. Especially since one of them got engaged tonight and we need to celebrate ... as well as knock out some important stuff ... like how to back up one very vulnerable server.

With all that swirling in my head, no wonder I can't sleep tonight.