The Facebook song

This is a song I wrote with a couple of friends while in a comedy band called Dr. Thunder and the Generic Sodas called “Facebook (I Poke and I Poke)”. It was written and recorded in the spring of 2006. Enjoy (Click below to play).

Lyrics ↴

My name is Andrew and I just transferred here
I don’t know nobody but I’ll conquer my fears
See, the ladies they frustrate me; I break out in a sweat
But the answer to my problem lies on the Internet

There’s this girl in my class, she sits ahead of me
Blonde hair and blue eyes, 5′2″ or 5″3″
I try to catch her attention but she won’t even look
At least she’ll be my friend on the Facebook

Facebook, Facebook
I know all about you, I read it today
And now our friendship’s just a click away
On the Facebook

We like the same movies, like Armageddon
I looked at all your groups and I joined the same ones
I’m not from Minnesota but I know this is true
When we sit down in a circle, it’s “Duck, Duck, GOOSE, bitches”
(Whoa bitches)

I’ll take friendship, I’ll take dating, or whatever I can get
I’ll take random play or maybe a relationship
I know that you’re a liberal, that’s alright with me
There’s a party in my room, why don’t you R.S.V.P

Facebook, Facebook
I know all about you, I read it today
And now our marriage is just a click away
On the Facebook

I poke and I poke and I poke
and I get nothing in return

I poke her to the left and I poke her to the right
I poke her in the middle and I poker her all night

Well I would do anything, I’d walk the plank
I poke and I poke, but my wall is still blank
On the Facebook

I poke and I poke and I poke
and I get nothing in return

• Long-time readers of this blog will remember the series of posts about the famous plane and the conveyor belt question (2, 3, 4). Well, as promised, the Mythbusters tested it and will air the results this December:

  If a plane is traveling at takeoff speed on a conveyor belt, and that conveyor belt is matching the speed in reverse, can the plane take off? “We put the plane on a quarter-mile conveyor belt and tested it out,’” says Savage about the experiment using a pilot and his Ultralight plane. “I won’t tell you what the outcome was, but the pilot and his entire flight club got it wrong.”

  I can’t wait to see the plane take flight. 11/09/2007
• What Does the Present Owe the Future? from Dot Earth, the New York Times’ new blog that “examines efforts to balance human affairs with the planet’s limits”. From the article: “Scientists found that it would take at least 20 or 30 years for the climate to measurably ‘notice’ the difference between freezing greenhouse emissions now, or having a global fossil fuel party — with everyone jumping in Hummers and jacking up thermostats. So it is all about our legacy in the end.” 11/09/2007

Reflections on the National Youth Workers Convention

Now that I’ve had a few days to collect my thoughts, talk with friends, and reflect on my experience at the National Youth Workers Convention, here are a few things I’ve been mulling over.

The next time I go, I won’t go alone. I’ll invite my volunteers and/or coworkers. More than once I thought to myself “I wish my volunteers were listening to this.”

I wish there had been more mainline protestant speakers. Marko has been outspoken in the fact that getting these people to speak at the convention is a difficult endeavor (”we ask two or three times as many people as we get!”), and I understand. It’s also true that my experience with NYWC is extremely limited, and they’ve had many mainline speakers in the past. Although certain speakers left a sour taste in my mouth, I think that the diversity is ultimately a good thing. Productive conversation and progress can’t occur with only one theological party present.

As a side note, I wasn’t the only one who had problems with Greg Stier’s talk. In fact, it’s kind of “blown up” in the blogosphere. If you’re interested, check out Marko’s email conversation with someone who was extremely offended and be sure to read all of the comments, where the speaker himself even gets involved. Greg has a post on his own blog as well called YS fallout continues.

But that’s all water under the bridge. I think my favorite seminar might have been Tony Campolo’s “What Youth Ministers Can Learn from Sociologists” (I would post my notes, but my MS Word is being obnoxious). Good youth ministry is inherently affected and influenced by other academic disciplines such as sociology, neuroscience, computer science (technology), linguistics, gender studies, psychology, and so on. Why not invite some leaders in these fields to come and talk about what they’re learning and discovering in regards to youth? They don’t even necessarily need to make their message relate to ministry; the point would be to simply inform youth workers, who are working intimately with youth, what the heck is going on with them from multiple perspectives. My mind was blown when Marko, in his “A New Vision for Middle School Ministry” seminar, talked about new research in neuroscience as it relates to young teens. What if whole seminars were devoted to such topics? My point here is that youth ministry needs to be well-informed and not huddled into its own corner of the universe.

There were a couple of “Book Clubs” available, but I would like to see this made a bit more prominent within the conference. For example, when people register for the event, Youth Specialties could suggest 5-10 books (and comp them?) to read before arriving at the conference. There would then be multiple meeting times for individual groups that read particular books, perhaps even moderated by the author him/herself.

Overall, I was pleased with the conference and I can see myself going back again for sure. Although there were a couple of things that I didn’t like, I found a way to make the conference really benefit myself and my ministry, and Youth Specialties should be thanked for building that kind of freedom into their conference.

• Thanks to JohnTP for allowing me to write a guest post on his blog entitled How To Become A Semi-Successful Blogger. 11/08/2007
• After updating to Firefox 2.0.0.9, all of my bookmarks suddenly disappeared. After a mini heart attack, I Googled the problem and found a solution. It doesn’t seem to recover bookmarks from the “Bookmarks Toolbar” though, which is still a bit frustrating. Has anyone else had this problem? 11/07/2007
• Getting a Life: The challenge of emerging adulthood discusses new research into “emerging adulthood”, the phase of life roughly between ages 18 and 30 and its implications for the church. “When the space between high school graduation and full adulthood was fairly short, as it was 50 years ago, the length of time spent out of church tended to be rather short. But with the rise of emerging adulthood in recent decades, churches are now looking at 15-year or even 20-year absences by youth from churches between their leaving as teenagers and returning with toddlers—if indeed they ever return.” Yikes. 11/06/2007
• Nicholas Carr writes about the revival of Marshal McLuhan’s theories in light of the internet. “The internet does seem to represent the fulfillment of McLuhan’s vision, at least in some ways. As we’ve seen with the explosion of blogs, podcasts and homemade videos, the net encourages media participation on an unprecedented scale. If a global village is emerging, it’s on the web.” If you’re a member of LibraryThing, they’re giving away Nicholas Carr’s new book The Big Switch: Rewiring the World, from Edison to Google as part of the November Early Reviewers. 11/05/2007

NYWC ‘07 Day 4: A new vision

look! i’m friends with tim from starfield, originally uploaded by jakebouma on flickr.

Before I begin, you should know that the picture above is way funnier if you 1) watch the Colbert Report and/or 2) know who Starfield is.

Today was a little more relaxed than yesterday. I went to two seminars and tonight’s general session and also did a bit of reading on my own, which was nice.

The first seminar I attended was entitled “The Greening of Youth Ministry: Why Your Youth Group Should Care for the Earth”, hosted by Peter Illyn of Restoring Eden. There weren’t that many people in attendance, which made me both feel bad for Peter and sent the message (to me) that people still don’t really think environmental concerns are a legit topic of discussion in Youth Ministry. I hope YS brings Peter back (this was his first time at the NYWC) and promotes his sessions more. One of the reasons environmental concerns are not addressed in youth ministry, as Peter pointed out, is that in our culture it’s always associated with politics. “The issue,” Peter said, “is not how we make environmental concerns non-political, it’s how we make them non-partisan.” Right on.

The second seminar I attended was “A New Vision for Middle School Ministry” with Mark Oestreicher (a.k.a. ysmarko), the president of Youth Specialties. It was absolutely fantastic. Marko combines information from sociology, psychology, brain science, theology, and other areas of study to fuel his own reflection on middle school ministry and his seminar was a well-presented distillation of these studies and observations. I am for sure going to get an mp3 of his seminar and give it to my confirmation volunteers; it was just excellent.

The general session featured Leeland and Starfield leading worship (both great bands) and Greg Stier as the speaker. Again, I was not pleased with his message at all. He is a passionate Christian to be sure, but his message was way off mark (in my humble opinion). Essentially he told us that the only thing that matters in youth ministry is “preaching Christ and Him crucified”, and that youth ministry has “gotten off track” as of late. Aside from making sweeping generalizations, he preached “the gospel” from 1 Corinthians, and not one of the gospels. He didn’t once reference Jesus’ earthly ministry, referenced the resurrection once, and beat the cross and crucifixion to death (no pun intended).

I don’t mean to bash the guy - seriously, he is totally passionate and committed - but his message is like the antithesis of what I want my youth ministry to be. In my paper Toward A Postmodern Youth Ministry: An Examination of Postmodern Youth Culture in Conversation with the Emerging Church I quote Pete Rollins, who says, “In a world where people believe they are not hungry, we must not offer food but rather an aroma that helps them desire the food that we cannot provide.” I felt like Greg was all about shoving food down kids’ throats.

And finally, a quick rant. This convention makes CDs and mp3s of every general session and individual seminar available for purchase at the ridiculous price of $6 per mp3 and $8 per CD. Seriously, Youth Specialties? Not only did we already pay a bunch of money to attend the convention, but you’re going to charge us more for something we potentially already paid for? In an age of $0.99 music downloads, you still feel that it’s cool to charge me the price many Youth Specialties books for what’s essentially a 90 minute podcast. Additionally, you’re actually being biased towards bigger churches with the higher price: If I could afford to bring 5 people to the conference and we all went to a different seminar, I wouldn’t have to buy as many seminar mp3s. But since I’m the only person here from my church, I have to buy more mp3s on a smaller budget. Doesn’t that seem counterintuitive? I mean, it’s not the end of the world, and it didn’t “ruin” my experience, just something to think about (that means you, Marko, if you’re reading this).

Tomorrow marks the conclusion of the conference and my return home, which reminds me - I need to pack.

NYWC ‘07 Day 3: New faces

rob bell - everything is spiritual, originally uploaded by jakebouma on flickr.

Unfortunately I don’t have much time to write about yesterdays events, even though it was my favorite day thus far. The wireless internet was so log jammed last night that I couldn’t even check my email, let alone post something here.

I had a one hour “personal youth ministry consultation” with Mark Riddle yesterday morning, and it was fantastic. He helped me see that my current situation is very good compared to many other youth workers, and answered some smaller questions I had about specific things. We discussed how I could more effectively run the youth ministry at St. Mark, as the more abstract thinker that I am. Really good stuff. Mark, if you’re reading this, thanks a lot… I appreciate you taking the time to meet with me.

After lunch I met briefly with Tim Schmoyer and his wife, and we talked about youth ministry (duh), blogging and other stuff.

In the afternoon I went to a session called “What Youth Ministers Can Learn from Sociologists” with Tony Campolo. His seminar blew my mind. He talked first about sociological perspectives on counseling and how the pre-Freud view of counseling valued reconciliation and community, while the post-Freud view values the self-actualization of the individal, or “save yourself” mentality. Later on he talked about the importance of ritual in religion and family life and then went on to answer questions for an hour or so. I have lots of notes and quotes from the seminar that I’ll post later.

At the session w/Tony Campolo I met a youth director from the St. Louis area named Adam Mustoe. We talked for a while and he invited me to eat dinner with him and five of his ministry volunteers. Good times.

Finally, after the late general session in which Doug Fields spoke about “ministry envy”, I went to a screening of Rob Bell’s new DVD, Everything Is Spiritual. It’s basically an 80-minute combination of biblical hermeneutics, explanations of anthropic fine-tuning, apologetics, scientific history, and jokes that somehow manages to be compelling the entire time. While I’m not sure all of the ideas therein would stand the test of scholarly scrutiny, they certainly make sense on a giant whiteboard.

NYWC ‘07 Day 2: Mixed feelings

*dcb - wholly yours, originally uploaded by jakebouma on flickr.

To be totally honest, I’m not quite sure how to approach blogging about the event thus far, because some things I have totally enjoyed and others I haven’t. Now, I know it’s only the second day and I have a lot more great things left to do and experience, but some things have rubbed me the wrong way. Let me explain.

First, I will go on the record and say I didn’t appreciate (understand?) Chris Hill’s message. I appreciated his passion and conviction, just not his conclusions. For those who aren’t here at the conference, he spoke about the story of Absalom in 2 Samuel, and through a series of verbal gymnastics made it (kind of) relate to youth workers. I think we were all supposed to feel encouraged and empowered by it, but I just felt deflated and saddened that people actually were encouraged and empowered.

Second, I feel like this conference in a lot of ways is like a mirror image of the very culture that many people here feel compelled to damn. When I walk into the exhibit hall, I am pretty much seen only as a subscriber, a buyer, a consumer of whatever this or that company is marketing. Of course there are resources and companies and products here that I find extremely useful, and indeed have used in my own ministry, but something definitely smells fishy.

Now, those things being said, I am actually still having an enjoyable and enlightening time. YS has brought in an artist by the name of Joe Castillo who creates mind-blowing (seriously, my mind was blown at one point), constantly-changing pieces of art out of sand that he calls SandStories. I have personally found this to be one of the most worshipful aspects of the event thus far.

My interest in theology got the better of me today. I went to Tony Jones’ seminar “Theological Tools for Your Youth Ministry Toolbox” and later went to an informal discussion on theology that were both great. More than once in both sessions I thought to myself, “Dude, you have to go to seminary.” Seriously.

Finally, they screened the newest Nooma video. Of course it was good, but I’m eagerly anticipating the screening of other new DVD, Everything Is Spiritual, tomorrow night.

Busy day tomorrow, but before I go I’ll leave you with the “quote of the day”:

“I’m not trying to say that subjectivity is good, I’m saying it’s all there is.” - Tony Jones

Chew on that.

NYWC ‘07 Day 1: Sensory overload

Youth Specialties owns St. Louis, originally uploaded by jakebouma on flickr.

As I was exploring the exhibit hall and all of the various booths, someone asked me how I was doing and I replied, “I’m kind of in sensory overload right now.” There is A LOT to take in here. So many orginizations pitching their “ministry transforming” software or mission trip or magazine, so many publishing companies selling the newest and hottest youth ministry books, so many NYWC staff members, and of course so many youth workers - I hardly know what to do with myself. I’ll settle in, I’m sure, but I guess I wasn’t really prepared for the spectacle of it all.

Anyhow, the traveling went smoothly. I sat next to a man named Michael Maddock on the way down here (if you’re reading this, Michael, thanks for visiting!). I told him that I was in town for the convention and he talked about how he and his wife attend St. John Lutheran Church (LCMS) in a suburb of St. Louis. I would visit it on Sunday, but there’s just too much stuff to do.

I’m trying to take advantage of my time here, and one of the ways I’ve done that so far is by signing up for a personal youth ministry consultation with Mark Riddle (a good deal, considering his company does this stuff professionally). We’ll meet for an hour on Saturday morning - I’m totally pumped.

I’m pretty tired from traveling today and there’s really not much to say yet, so I’ll just conclude the post by posting my tentative schedule for tomorrow.

10:00 - 11:30am: Seminar - What Monks Can Teach Us: Helping Students Discover the Ancient Art of Listening to the Voice of God, with Dave Ambrose

1:00 - 3:30pm: General Session - Speaker: Duffy Robbins, Worship leader: David Crowder Band

4:00 - 5:00pm: Seminar - Theological Tools for Your Youth Ministry Toolbox, with Tony Jones

7:30 - 10:00pm: General Session - Speaker: Chris Hill, Worship leader: David Crowder Band

10:15 - 11:15pm: Mini-seminar - So You Want to Get Published, with Jay Howver

I’m out.

• Westboro Baptist Church, known for it’s slogan “God Hates Fags”, was ordered to pay $10.9 million in damages to relatives of a U.S. Marine who died in Iraq after church members cheered his death at his funeral. Fred Phelps and crew were in West Des Moines a while ago to protest a high school production of The Laramie Project. Related: The Church of Hate 11/01/2007

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