And You Thought YOUR Confirmation Classes were Tough...

I've taken it upon myself to upload an image and short story of a commemoration from the Lutheran and any other Christian Calendar that interests me every day on Facebook.  It's really been fascinating.  If I can't find something uplifting and inspiring, I can find something downright interesting Like St. Dunstan who was known for being very good at outsmarting the Devil.  He was a blacksmith and the Devil asked him to shoe his horse.  Instead he shoed the Devil!  This, as you can imagine, was very painful and the Devil begged him to unshoe him.  Dunstan agreed, but only if the Devil agreed to never enter a building with a horseshoe over the door.  The devil agreed, and this is where we get the idea of a lucky horseshoe. 

St. Boniface, Apostle to the Germans, whom we commemorate today was killed while preparing some Frisians (a Germanic people from the modern day Netherlands to Denmark) for confirmation on Pentecost eve by a gang of pagan Frisians.  . Although his comrades were armed Boniface urged them to lay down their arms, saying "Cease fighting. Lay down your arms, for we are told in Scripture not to render evil for good but to overcome evil by good." All were massacred.

The story is told that his killers were looking for gold and silver but instead found pages of scripture in his bags.  There is also a story of Boniface attempting to save himself by holding a bible over his head.  

Along with the remains of Boniface, the Fulda Cathedral holds a slashed bible, known as the Ragyndrudis Codex, which is said to be the Bible which was held by Boniface when he died.  Father Anonymous will, no doubt, attempt to dispute the authenticity of this story but the association of this book with Boniface's martyrdom is goes back pretty far. 

To me it doesn't matter whether or not it REALLY is the very book, anymore than if the chains in the Church of the Chains of Peter and Paul are really the actual chains.  Peter and Paul were held in chains and seeing them makes it real.  Looking at that slashed manuscript makes it real to me that there was a man who was slashed to death while trying to each people about Christ.  To me, relics are not magic  nor history, they are icons we need the same way we need water and bread for the sacraments.  We are earthly people and earthly things help our faith.

Which is why I use power point and pictures in Confirmation, to bring this back to my heading.

Here We Stand Confirmation Curriculum

Dennis asks me what confirmation curriculum I use.  I cannot say enough good things about Augsburg Fortress's Here We Stand.  Note I've given the Older version.  I do not like the newer version.  I hope they keep this old page because this has much better power points and videos.  Well the new one has NO videos.  

You need to tell your church to get a computer projector because power point is the way to go with confirmation.  You can whine and moan about how spoiled kids are and how they have to be entertained or you can just shut up, use the new media tools and keep the kids engaged and interested.  That's all there is to it.

Even before this came out I was making my own power points.  These are better.  I do cut and paste and edit and put some of my own stuff.  I use pictures from the Brick Testament for the bible stories.  Note  YOU MUST SCREEN these pictures because this guy is a weirdo and likes to illustrate the sex stories from the bible with Lego people.  They are hilarious but not appropriate for confirmation.

It's very flexible - you can use it with large and small groups. You can teach it all yourself or use helpers.   It is more work than just going through a book but most things that are worthwhile do take more effort.

Confirmation Tonight

Tonight was my second class at the new parish.  Last week there were like five parents sitting in (about 15 kids).  Apparently they've had some rowdy kids and the parents were brought in for reinforcement.  I could not get the kids to talk.  I suspect the parents were inhibiting them.   Personally I prefer rowdy to silent.  

So after last week's class a couple of parents said they felt like I had it under control and would I mind if they stayed home.  Not at all.  

Tonight only one parent and it was a different story.  Lots of talking.  Giggling.  One kid who would only give me smart ass answers.  I told him he had used up his quota of funny answers and had to give me a serious one.  At the end of the class I make them all tell me one thing they learned and lo and behold he had a serious answer.  

Also at the end of class they all have to pray outloud.  Very simple--just finish these two sentences "God I ask you ..." and "God I thank you".  Last week Mr. Smarty Pants prayed that some teacher he didn't like would retire.  This week he prayed "Dear God, please let there be no more crazy people shooting up people"  I think I'm gonna like this kid.

I LOVE CONFIRMATION!

It may have been “Stupid” but it was still good!

So I took my confirmation class on a Youthworks "Revamp" in Minneapolis this weekend. I've never done this but I did take a high school group on a mission trip to Houma Louisiana with Youthworks. I was very impressed with how they were organized and their trips are reasonably priced.

This was a junior high event. I brought my confirmation class. My first mistake was bringing 9th graders because our confirmation is 8th & 9th graders. So right off the bat the 9th graders felt put upon that they were surrounded by "little kids". So of course anything "little kids" would be happy to do, they as mature high school students must , by logic, NOT enjoy. The first night was a Christian Hip Hop concert at Elim Baptist. I don't like Hip Hop but I've been doing stuff with kids long enough to just go with the flow...so I'm getting into the beat, starting to move...and my kids are just standing there motionless. "This music is horrible." "This is just noise" "I'm getting a headache" I told them they sounded like a bunch of old people. Then a very energetic youth pastor, good message. We are in the territory of evangelicals who have caught onto the Gospel imperative to reach out to the poor.

The next day we went to Seward church in a very diverse neighborhood - I think they said there are 117 languages spoken "And we are just here to let people know we love them" was how the church was described. It's an old church building and our service was to clean up the mouse droppings in the upstairs so it could be clean enough to have an after school program. I tell you one thing my kids can do is work. Iowa children can work. Not one word of complaint from them.

Then we were dropped off in a neighborhood with $1 per person ($7) to figure out how to eat. We found an Aldi's and bought a jar of peanut butter, a loaf of white bread, some chips and some cookies. They had some cheap apples but i could not talk them into it. The worse part of this was not the food - but the fact that we had to sit and eat outside when it was like 10 degrees.

Then it was "neighborhood stories" where we visit someone who is doing ministry in the city. We went to this beautiful old house and were welcomed by a young man with hip length dreadlocks and earrings. And his Australian wife and baby. They are part of an intentional christian community that decided they would live together with other Christians and pretty much live like they did in Acts. There are several houses of them and there's always a guestroom and anybody can live with them. And they understand that "lives are not turned around in an instant and sometimes it can get pretty messy but you don't give up on people" They don't go to church. Their lives are the church. I could not do that to save my soul...but it was interesting.

Then we had a tour of all these ministries all over the city but the kids got bored and I got very tired. One of the stops was the Midtown Global Market and we decided to just hang out there and be done. Most of the kids enjoyed that stop. Although one girl was bored.

Back to church for ice breaker games which were "stupid" and the bean game - also dubbed stupid but I made them do it. And the dinner was deemed "terrible".

Next we saw "30 Days Minimum Wage", the documentary where Morgan Spurlock and his girlfriend Alex try to survive a month on minimum wage.

Then more Christian contemporary music that my kids liked a little better. Which I think is pretty horrid and self centered because it's all about how I can't live without Jesus' arms around me -( I think I'm supposed to be singing to Jesus anyway...)

I was a little concerned about the message of the speaker because he spoke about what faith was to him - and faith to him was his friend who just wasn't really sure if he had "real" faith because he was just going through the motions, but he didn't really really know if his faith was real so he just quit his job and went and lived among the homeless for a year so he could find out if his faith was real.

Yea at one of our last class sessions, we went over the third article of the creed and how faith is a gift of the Holy Spirit and you DON'T have to agonize and try to muster up good enough faith. Or go and live among the homeless to prove your faith is "real". So I might have to do some debriefing on that.

So as the weekend is going on and my kids are complaining and saying "Do we HAVE to do this..." I'm beginning to fear this weekend is a bust. Because you know, usually I take kids to fun stuff and entertain them and make them happy.

Then it dons on me. These kids have gone to the same school system their whole lives. They haven't had opportunities to socialize with different kinds of people...so this is uncomfortable for them. Many of them have never been in a big city, and have barely been out of the small town in which they live. They are WAY WAY out of their comfort zone. This is not a bad thing.

One of the discussions we had was about how they felt when everyone was jumping around and yelling "Yea Jesus" and they just didn't want to do that. They felt others were staring at them and judging them. So we had a good talk about what's that like when you feel like you are judged for being different.

And on the way home I asked them, "So assuming I don't make YOU go on this again--do you think this is a worthwhile experience for other confirmation kids? Do you think it's good to do this at least once"

All of them said, yes, but only for the junior high kids. So I may do it next year. I just hope I don't have to miss my favorite figure skating competition again like I did this year!

Confirmation Tonight

So I didn't really have enough prepared tonight. We suspend classes for Lent - I find I get better attendance at worship and I'd rather see the family worshiping together than dropping the kid off for class.

I had a little power point prepared on Martin Luther which didn't last long. Then I just started my story telling. I'm a pretty good story teller. They like it when I tell them bible stories. I try to get them to read the bible "No you tell us the story, Pastor - we like to hear you tell it" Yup, feed my ego. I'll tell you a story.

So I told them the story of Martin helping Katie escape from the convent in a pickle barrel. And how Martin tried to get Katie to marry some of his friends and she wouldn't settle for anyone less than him. And how he reluctantly agreed to marry her because he was not setting a good example marrying off his monk friends but refusing to settle down himself. And I said how that wasn't a very romantic start but what a deep and lasting love they had and what a comfort Katie was to him in the difficult times and how they comforted one another when they lost their dear daughter.

"Wow," breathed one of the 15 year old boys. "That is a great story!"

Yes it is.