I have a Dream

I say to you today, my friends, so even though we face the difficulties of today and tomorrow, I still have a dream. It is a dream deeply rooted in the American dream.
I have a dream that one day this nation will rise up and live out the true meaning of its creed: "We hold these truths to be self-evident: that all men are created equal."
I have a dream that one day on the red hills of Georgia the sons of former slaves and the sons of former slave owners will be able to sit down together at the table of brotherhood.
I have a dream that one day even the state of Mississippi, a state sweltering with the heat of injustice, sweltering with the heat of oppression, will be transformed into an oasis of freedom and justice.
I have a dream that my four little children will one day live in a nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin but by the content of their character.
I have a dream today.
I have a dream that one day, down in Alabama, with its vicious racists, with its governor having his lips dripping with the words of interposition and nullification; one day right there in Alabama, little black boys and black girls will be able to join hands with little white boys and white girls as sisters and brothers.
I have a dream today.
I have a dream that one day every valley shall be exalted, every hill and mountain shall be made low, the rough places will be made plain, and the crooked places will be made straight, and the glory of the Lord shall be revealed, and all flesh shall see it together.


I have a dream. One day through my dreams the world will change. I may not see that day. I will strive for that dream. The dream is much much bigger than me. I cannot accomplish my dream by my own means. My dream is not about money, power, or things. Do you have a dream? Is it bigger than you? Can you do it on your own? Will it affect others? I dare you to dream beyond yourself. Seek that desire deep down inside of you. It is much beyond you, you were created for it, and only you can make the difference YOU were created for! Martin Luther King Jr’s dream went much beyond him. Even to his grave. Are you willing to even give your life up for your dream?

2010.

Well here we go! It's another year and big things are coming! 2009 was insane. I can't believe everything that happened. From graduating MCUSA, to Sleeping Life, to living in North Liberty and working for Life Church. So many great things happened, and I'm so thankful for them all. Thankful to have a faithful God who loves me. I know 2010 has a lot in store, and I'm excited for it all. Here are some of my "resolutions" for the year.
1)Write a book. I have the idea, and plan on actually doing it this year. I know I planned on it last year, but it just didn't happen.
2)No soda for the entire year. Time to be a little healthier.
3)Run in five different running races this year. One of which will be over marathon distance.
4)1 blog entry per week. Well we tried this last year, but failed as well. Lets go again!
5)One year bible reading plan. Well here we go year 3!

I have a few more goals, but won't list them all. It's not the most fun. What are your goals or resolutions for the year?

On a less task driven level I want to love God and love people like I have never done before. I want to push to a new level in my relationships to serve others as much as I possibly can.

Piecin' it together

As I'm on this walk to find out who I really am, I am beginning to piece things together. Sometime last week I really found a revelation about who I am. Here is one of my journal entries from that day:
This morning I realized a big part of me is someone who never backs down from challenges. I knew this, but didn't realize until this morning how long that this has been a part of me. Here is a few challenges I've gone after in my life:

• Elementary: Went whole year taking my lunch and not eating at school
• Elementary: Challenged my brother Seth to a game of one-on-one basketball on a hoop on the back of a door in the basement, declaring the loser had to drink from the toilet. I lost.
• Junior High: Proved it was possible to have silver hair and be white.
• JHigh: Challenged myself to no sex until marriage- still going- note this is before I came to really know Christ.
• High School: Set goal to get Academic All-State as a freshman in high school and achieved it as a senior.
• College/2008: Running 20 minutes every day, (almost achieved)
• MC: A few for myself which need to be kept quiet

This is my life and who I am. I need to embrace this trait a little bit more and step up to the challenges posed to me and take advantage of them!

A Learning Experience

MC really challenges me. I love it here as I have learned so much already. I'm loving Restore the best. Restore is our street evangelism program in which we go to neighborhoods and want to restore them from the problems they currently have. Last week at Restore I walked past a pimped out SUV with a 20 something guy in the drivers seat. A teenage boy got out of the backseat of the car with a unique grin on his face. I happened to look through the windshield and see a girl sitting in the back. I may be quick to judge, which I try not to do, but I think the man driving was a Pimp, the girl in the backseat was a hooker, and the boy getting out just made a deal. This situation saddens me. First all the little kids running right next to these cars could see it, sad that this woman has turned to sex for money, sad that the Pimp makes his money off of taking advantage of poor women and horny kids, and sad that this kid in the back has turned to sex for some sort of fulfillment. These situations make me happy to help at restore and to show the little kids that they don't need that junk that is around them. To show love to them, that maybe no one else does and that they can be whatever they want to be. 'cuz what little kid dreams of being a pimp or hooker. I want these kids to achieve these dreams and to teach them to dream even when their situation may not be the best.

Go Big or Go Home

This has been a motto for myself for sometime now, and I'm really just beginning to understand what it means. I have always dreamed big, but mostly I have never thought my dreams are possible. I have had many dreams that have come and gone, but now I will dream and I will achieve, not on my own will, but by the power of God as he says in Philippians 4:13 "For I can do all things through Christ, who gives me strength."

When I was a sophomore in high school I dreamed of being an Iowa State Basketball player, and well that didn't happen. I focused more on football and the girlfriend, and let the dream fall away.

At the beginning of my freshman year at Iowa State I dreamed of becoming a rich engineer that has everything, monetary wise, and has no worries about finances. That fell away as I realized the focus of my heart at that point did not match up with the rest of the way I want to live my life.

When I was a child I wanted to be a G.I. Joe, but that fell away as I realize how real war is and that not everyone is the hero and how hard it would be. So I gave up on this one, 'cuz I thought it was too hard and the next cool thing came a long.

My senior year in high school I came up with a dream. This dream is absolutely unattainable by man alone. I mainly just want to help people, and help them to know my best friend Jesus. I want to help them walk with him and have the best life they can, not an easy life, but a better life than they have. My dream is to lead or start the Largest Youth Group/Outreach in the World. I don't want the biggest to have glory to Adam, but I want the biggest, because I want to impact that many people's lives. I want to build up my Lord's Kingdom and the next generation of leaders. I know that if through God I can attain this than anyone can attain anything through him. I don't know where or any idea how to get to this dream, but I will not give up. This dream has been dwelling in me for nearly two year now, and I am establishing it now. Tear it down if you want, but it's my dream not yours. You may say it's not possible, but I already know that I personally cannot achieve it.

Go Big or Go Home. Dream big enough that if man alone can obtain it, than it is not nearly big enough of a dream. This is how I will live from now on, by faith in Christ who strengthens me. Be Extreme and step out and dream! What is your dream? You may need to write it down and let a few people know it to really speak it into truth. Email me and I will pray for your dream as I hope people will do for mine!

Dreamin'

I've been havin' some crazy dreams lately. If I remember a dream it usually has a significant impact on my life. I would not be where I am right now if it wasn't for some of my dreams. Now this is not to say that every dream I have plays a big role, but many of them do.

A few nights ago I had a dream about a girl, and haven't gotten it off my mind since. It also made me wake up in a good mood for that day. It was strange I invited her back to North English and we spent time with my high school buddies, and she wasn't freaked out by them!

Last night I had a dream about my Sethie. I dreamed he somehow came back. When he came back he was still a 14 year old boy, but I was the way I am and much older and bigger than him. This is weird to me for a couple reasons. 1) I am the little bro, and i like it that way 2) Why didn't I kick the crap out of him since I was actually bigger?! but back to the dream. Seth came over and we chilled at our house, I don't know where we were actually, but it was where I lived in the dream. Anyway, we chilled and caused trouble and shot fireworks at people walking by and threatened the people that shot back at us.

Random dreams I know, but I love them, and I love my brother and miss him very much!

Excited

I love facebook, twitter, and blogging. They are such sweet ways of communication. They help keep in touch and really hear what people have to say. I feel as if I am good friends with people, even if I don't really have a relationship with them, because of blogger. I check many blogs, but two of my favorites to read are Justin Dean and Mark Batterson. They are cool pastors and leaders.

Today I was reading Batterson's blog and he had an awesome post. He just wrote a new book Wild Goose Chase and it is releasing on August 19th. In this post he has a small excerpt from his book. It says:


I wonder if churches do to people what zoos do the animals. We try to tame them in the name of Christ. We remove the risk. We remove the danger. We remove the struggle. And what we end up with is a caged Christian.

Jesus didn't die on the cross to keep us safe. He died to make us dangerous. I would like to think that when I pronounce the benediction at th end of our church services, I am sending dangerous people back into their natural habitat to wreak havoc on the Enemy.

This is the Christianity I want to live for. I don't want to sit around and be peaceful all the time. Jesus caused ruckus. He pissed people off, I mean you can picture the nice calm no emotion Jesus if you want, but He did end up getting murdered for speaking the truth and stepping on some feet. What's holding you back from stepping on toes and making a splash in this world? Get out be Extreme and follow after the way Jesus lived! I'm not saying it's easy, but I'm saying we should!

Random Adam

So today was a good day. I worked and ran and went to Bible study. It was quite fun as we talked about love. We talked about what love really is and how God describes love and not what the world describes it as. Within this we talked a little about relationships and dating and all that jazz. Which one of the most important things that is needed in the whole dating relationship is communication. Is it a date? Is it not a date? is it a predate? Who knows, but it should be communicated even if that means getting the answer you don't want to hear.

I love people. I know generic christian comment. but really I do. I love people so much that I just want to be there and help them. I want to bring everyone to know my best friend and help them know the things He can do for them. to free them and teach them real love, but talk is cheap and I don't really get out there and do it. I don't really take time to go out of my way to share Him with anyone. I do help teach at Awaken, but other than that I don't. This may not be a big deal to some people, but my life dream is to share Him and affect as many lives as I can with his Love and Power. This is my life dream. Do you have a dream your not currently following? Why not? What's holding you back? I know I am leaving for Dallas in a little over a month, and this is a step towards my dream, but why am I not taking advantage and helping more here. I hope to change this over the next two weeks. And trust me I'll let you know on here.

We never arrive in this life. We never get to a point and say I'm happy to be done to be where I'm at. We never say God I'm done take me, my life is complete and I don't want anything else. If you can say this. I call you a liar. This life is a never ending journey and story. It is a mission, an exploration. We will never reach the perfect destination, but as we walk toward Christ and our dreams the story will grow, and lives will be changed.

So this post is random and basically just what came to my mind as the fingers were typing. I don't really care about the punctuation or spelling in it, just random and my mind for the night.

Dreaming

Here is a dreaming cloud. Actually I took this photo on the 4th down at Rathbun, but often time clouds are correlated with dreams, and since I'll be dreaming a little in this post I figured it'd fit to put this cloud!

I have big dreams. I refuse to settle for anything lower than them. Why do I dream? I don't know what else to do. I love our kids at Awaken. I loved the kids at Shift 2:24 (Heartland youth group I helped with this last semester). I love teenagers. I don't want to do anything else with my life than to help them be the best they can be. I want them to know Jesus, and have a major impact on our world. I may not have had a huge impact on this world, but I'm only 19, and I will before I die. I'm not stepping out and being cocky or overconfident. I am stepping by faith in God and believing him that I have been called for something much bigger than myself.

I have been through and seen a lot in my 19 years of life. If you know me I'm not the normal kid. I'm a dreamer, not just the dream upon cloud dreams, but visions of Christ. I have been commanded to "GO" and not just from the Matthew, but by Christ direct in vision. I know he wouldn't give me this without having a major plan. Does this make me better or more special than anyone else? Absolutely not! I just have been lucky enough to have been given direct guidance. I love Jesus and He loves me. I want to share this love with the world and specifically the teenagers who will be our next generations leaders. I want to teach the kids of this world to be Extreme for Jesus. I don't want to be a normal youth leader, and I refuse to be normal, 'cuz I haven't been yet in my life, and don't plan starting anytime soon!

Most of you that read my blog already know most of these things, but I just have been feeling it on my heart a lot more than usual lately, and just needed to write it out there!

AWAKEN!

Tonight at Awaken Youth we had an amazing time! I was set to "preach" for the first time, but really I didn't preach. We started slow with just a couple kids, then started talking about how God has a purpose for our lives, as we are talking about "The Purpose Driven Life" by Rick Warren. This was our third week of it, which is God's third purpose for our life, to be like Jesus (discipleship).

As we got going with things more kids kept coming in and out of the room. Many of the kids became very interested in the discussions we were having. The kids had so many questions tonight, and I loved it. My brother Aron and I kind of tag teamed the answers and the "sermon".

These questions weren't easy ones either, but we gave them all the Biblical truth we had. Some questions we had to say flat out we didn't know, and others we had to give them answers they didn't want to hear, but it was right out of God's word.

Also, normally we get done with the "church" part of Awaken about 8:15, and play games and stuff 'till 9, but tonight we had to cut the conversations short as we were being kicked out of the rec center as they close at 9!

One of the more encouraging parts at Awaken tonight, was when Aron and I were walking to the car we walked past all the kids and stopped for a minute. One kid said "so you guys do this every week?" I then replied "yes, every Thursday 7:00 except next week for the holiday", he says "right here?" I nodded and said yes, then he said, "cool, I wish I'd have known you guys were doing this, I'd have been coming for a while." This is encouraging for this kid to see God, through our love and truth.

It was an amazing night, I praise God for those kids and pray for them to have a wonderful week, and hope they seek after a real relationship with Christ!

A Runner?

This picture shows how I have felt a few times when I've been running this year! Many thoughts could fill a bubble above the head as I run. The most common ones are probably "I hope in you Lord, 'cuz there is no way I'm going to make it on my own," (praying with Isaiah 40:31) or sometimes the "am I going to make it to the toilet or be carrying a little extra at the end". Or the "15. . . 10. . . 5. . . minutes left".

On January 1st of this year my brother Aron, brother-in-law Roger, and I set off on a journey. The journey to run at least 20 minutes every single day in 2008. Winner gets. . . nothing, just satisfaction and the pursuit of becoming a more disciplined person. The origin of this challenge did not come from any of us. It came from our cousin Travis, as he is an ultra-marathon runner. He runs in a 50 mile race every year and the running everyday is part of his training. It was his idea to try to run 365 days for at least 20 minutes, but he has not successfully completed it yet. One cool thing about our challenge is that it is a leap-year, so we get to run 366 days this year, if successful.

The year is nearly half over, and one question I continue to ask myself is, am I a runner. It's hard for me to consider myself a runner, even though I have done it everyday so far this year. It's hard, because I used to hate running so much, but I've really learned to appreciate it much more over the past months.

Some of my most spiritual conversations with God have been while running these past few months. Running helps me get away a little and just hear His voice. Since I've been here in Iowa City, I've been able to run with Aron a lot. I like this, as we can really talk and dream, and tell each other things to pray about for each other.

If anyone knows me, they know I'm a dreamer. I've had so many ideas for dreams and hopes come through my head as I run. One stays constant. That is to bring Jesus to as many teenagers and youth as I can. I want them to see the love Christ has for them, and how great there life can be with Him!