Understanding BIG

I have worked for a youth group ever since I my first year of college here in Starkville. It has been a great experience on top of a whole lot of fun. God has shown me great things there and I have witnessed God's hand in a lot of things at First Presbyterian Starkville. But all of the things I have seen over the past 3+ years were belittled by one thing that God did last Tuesday.

My first thing to do with the youth group was a Disciple Now my freshman year. I had the 7th graders. Jesse was one of the kids in my group. He has truly been the only one of those kids who has consistently come to youth ever since. Well his 7th year he was a tough bigger kid who always got picked on, but was funny and seemed to have a niche as being the class clown. But God allowed me to see past that and I saw great potential in him, that is to say that I saw God wanting Jesse to be an amazing Christian leader. Upon talking about it with another youth leader, he kind of laughed and pointed to another youth that I had grown close with over the weekend, but I never forgot what God showed to me that weekend in Jesse.

Over the past 3+ years since that 1st DNOW Jesse has grown up a little but has still been the same bigger kid who tells crazy jokes and is picked on by most everyone else. He is now in the 10th grade.

This past weekend was the last DNOW that I will probably ever do in Starkville. Jesse was one of my guys again, just like he has been every year. During the weekend, he was the oldest guy that we had so he was lumped in with all of the younger kids.

Let me rewind a little to the beginning of this school year. We felt like God was calling us to get the 10th graders together and just have a "group" with them on Tuesday nights. This group would talk about God and the Bible and answer tough questions that they had, as well as be a safe place for them to talk about what was going on in their lives. Up until this past Tuesday the "group" had been really fun and we had talked about some things that we youth leaders had just started to grasp. It was good but I hadn't felt like anyone had really grasped or truly understood or took to heart anything that we talked about.

Well on Tuesday we met for the "group"(that's the name of our 10th grade group, very creative i know). One of the youth leaders wasn't able to make it to DNOW so he asked the guys what their favorite parts were. They started talking and pretty soon we began talking about "Mountain Top" experiences or "spiritual highs". This escalated into some very good conversation about God and how He interacts with us.

Then the question came out...... "I don't understand.... How was God not created? I mean everything was created.... this blows my mind and it doesn't allow me to see Him anymore than just like my principle.... just scary!" Me and the other youth leader Clay looked at each other and nearly burst into song right then, but God spoke some words of truth through Clay that left Jesse with his head in his hands saying "I just don't understand it..... He is so amazing and so big and so huge that we can't understand Him? That is mind boggling.... And He actually wants to know me and to love me and get to know me?" Clay and I could no longer contain our excitement as we spilled out inadequate descriptions of how amazing our God is!

Jesse was and is changed.

He grasped it... He understood it and still does! It is amazing. Every time I see the kid now He is asking questions and is wanting more and more of God. He is thirsty. He is David in Psalm 63 "O God, you are my God, earnestly I seek you; my soul thirsts for you, my body longs for you, in a dr and weary land where there is no water."

God rocked Jesse's, Clay's and my world in about 3 minutes.... more like 3 seconds! and He is still rocking them now....

I challenge all of you guys, open up your mind to the greatness of our God and let Him blow you away by his vastness and I promise you that your world will be rocked.... over and over and over again!

Be blessed.