The Edge 2007...

For the last few years, I have been so incredibly fortunate to partner with Jeremy Wilson and Jessi Ford from Forest Hills UMC in Macon, GA in doing an event we call "The Edge." Now, the Edge has a bit of a story. It started as a middle school event and was loosely related to the North Georgia Conference. And days before the first one, the leader of the event bailed out and Jeremy and I stepped in with some other people to clean up the pieces. And in doing so, we realized that we think and work alike and started partnering on more and more things.

So, the next year, we decided to keep the Edge event alive, despite it moving away from being a conference event, etc. So we bought the logo from Matt and kept using the name. And every year since, the Edge has been a great middle school event for our two churches. We have never tried to grow it larger and are happy with it.

So last weekend, we held the Edge 2007 at Whitewater Express. And it was great. Here are some of the key elements and ideas of it:
1. Whitewater Express. I hadn't been there since 2004(?) and they have done some great improvements. It really is becoming a world class camp for the kind of retreats we do. It isn't Young Life level but really nothing is. But it doesn't come with the headaches that renting a Young Life Camp comes with (work crew, etc.)

2. We used material from the Simplyjuniorhigh.com website and ordered the curriculum Action Heroes. It looked at different Old Testament characters and was very good and adaptable. It saved us from bringing in a speaker as Jessi and I covered the talks. Jessi has come a long way and is becoming a really solid communicator. One day we may be able to say we knew her when...
(And personally, I haven't had a speaking experience where I really felt in the zone in awhile, which has made me nervous because I have some speaking gigs coming up. And Saturday night, God was merciful and moved me into the zone and I just let him speak through me. Great joy when we are doing what God made us to do.)

3. Activities. Most of my kids decided to play paintball and it was fun. I got tore up and I am still nursing some bruises. But it was a great bonding time. And my high level pain threshold has won me street cred with my middle school guys.

4. Worship. Jeremy is really the best worship leader you have never heard of because he has been so dedicated to serving the people of Forest Hills. He has talent but works hard and knows how to build a great worship team, even if it took his church until this year to figure out that they need to just hand him the ball and let him run with it. I always know that when Jeremy is leading, we are going to have a moving, meaningful worship time.

So we are already thinking and praying about next year. It is amazing when God calls people together and all their gifts move in unison to do his purposes...