Evotional.com - Mark Batterson

My head has been swirling lately with thoughts. Here are a few of them.

I have a growing passion to help twenty-somethings. I feel like it is so central to my calling. I think the third decade is one of the toughest because there is so much uncertainty. What am I going to do with my life? Who am I going to marry? Where am I going to live? We spend our entire lives managing those major decisions. And most of them are made in our twenties. I'd love to do some quarterlife conferences to help twixters navigates those big issues.

I really would love to see NCC have a more "formal" mentoring program for different life stages and vocations. For example, married couples mentoring engaged couples. And I'd love to see vocational mentoring. For example, political veterans mentoring hill staffers. I'd also love to mentor church planters. And I'd like to do it on a large scale. I'm not sure how we get there, but God is putting that in my heart.

Here's the thing with mentoring. It is so hard to be a match maker. There is an old adage: when the student is ready the teacher will appear. I think people need to find their own mentors. I think there are potential mentors in all of our circles of influence. The way we can help is to formalize a mentorship or apprenticeship program. For example, I'd love to have a school for church planters where we are mentoring planters all the time.

So many twentysomethings want to be mentored, but its this nebulous feeling. It doens't just happen by osmosis. I think it has to be relational or vocational. I think twentysomethings need to hear lots of stories about how other people have navigated their twenties and survived the twists and turns and trnasitions!

Here are a few of my other random thoughts:

Most people have their best ideas in the shower. I had one the other day. I'd like to invent and market a water-proof pad of paper and pen to write ideas in the shower. I'm half serious. If anybody is interesting in running with this idea let me know!

I'd always had a tough time deciding on shake flavors so years ago I had this idea to do some custom designed cup so you can get two flavors in one shake! Then I heard that 7-11 was doing it with their slurpees. And California Pizza Kitchen does it with their soup. So here's my idea for Ebenezers--a coffee cup with two sides and two sippy holes! Call me crazy, but I think it's a good idea. A new take on mixed drinks.

One more thought:

According to Leith Anderson, we're experiencing more than a Pentecost per hour! We are living in God's finest hour. More than 3,000 people per hour and putting their faith in Christ.

I'm thinking bigger these days. I'm always cautious about numbers, but I have it in my heart that the day will come that we're influencing five digits of people on a weekly basis. I don't know how long it will take to experience that kind of influence, but I believe that day will come!