A few thoughts after the skate pilgrimage. Flow as God, has had a powerful effect on the young people. At first Flow was all about their interpretation and worldview of it, however as we journeyed together their view was corrupted (redeemed?) to include God. As the Spirit invaded their frame of reference it has changed their view. Whilst on the one hand they can reject this they will not forget it. A critical questions for us in this generational work is how do we create space and opportunities to maintain contact, grow or stretch to be trans-generational? My initial thought is that Flow is the trans-generational experience (the yp have had an experience / encounter with God) that is more than the story of God (I think this may be really important but not sure yet). The critical issues now would be How do we enable the young people to encounter the rest of the story which tell the whole of life and will enable them to see/experience Flow in the whole of life; both over time terms and in terms of the scope of life?

It is interesting to note that we have started with their experience of God, and used this to frame the story of God. The interpretation of this story in the light of their experience of God is up to them. On one hand this could be seen as little different to youth ministry that centres on sung worship, where young people are drawn into the corporate experience, then get the story. The CRITICAL difference is that we suggested they were already experiencing (at least an inkling) God, (or God was present in the moment of Flow) further more this is a redeeming process of something that is already intrinsic/internal to them, rather than a borrowed non culturally relevant experience, and finally the onus rests with them to explore the experience and make sense of the experience, we will simply tell the stories of Flow and allow them to interpret.

Apologies if this makes little sense to you, but I wanted to get the thought down.Eastern Promises the movieCurious George Goes Green The Doom Generation dvd

Good chat with Paul Reservoir Dogs hd

today, (thanks Paul) reminded me that I needed to put up the diagram from church on the edge process and links with Off the beaten track that the other Paul helpfully did. For more info on the circles check out the links in the right hand column either “The Tacking Church” under articles or “Off the beaten Track” under Talks and Presentations

So much happened over the weekend it is hard to know where to start. At the beginning of the weekend in the bus we did a Flow gauge, where (using pictures of a skater in various stages of performing a trick) we asked the young people to gauge where they were in their understanding of what flow was all about eg 1 if they were clueless and 9 if they thought they had is sussed. At the end of the weekend they again completed the gauge to see if their understanding had changed. What was most interesting was that the young people who we had the best conversations with either marked themselves the same or decreased, whilst the yp that didn’t engage so much increased or stayed the same.

We told the story of Abs which was great and some really good dialogue around it although I would not tell them what I thought the story meant. One guy was really anxiously trying to work it out, asking all sorts of questions trying to get a handle on what it meant he did not see how you could break your board and flow all the time or even experience Flow when not riding. The following day we get to this great skate park, that was too wet to ride and he is stoked and calls up from the bottom of the bowl “hey Rich I think I know what Abs was on about now I can feel Flow even though I’m not riding”. Yet on the gauge he marked his understanding as lower than at the start of the weekend.

I think this is something about God being beyond their paradigm of understanding, and blowing their concepts of Flow. It was real upside down kingdom stuff. Paul helpfully reflected on this with me earlier citing about how the disciples must have had preconceptions about the Messiah but Jesus quickly blew this out the water and they must have experienced the same confusion.