Had a great second day at the Orange Conference.  I’ve shook hands, made fun of friends, introduced my staff to other friends, and ate more food than I usually eat in an entire week.  Here is the “Official Second Day” recap:

• I started the day with breakfast and the wisdom of Jim Wideman.  Jim was kind enough to let me and 4 other 30-somethings pepper him with children’s ministry questions, parenting questions, and life questions.  He’s got to be one of the most honest, wise, and available leaders I’ve ever met.  If you’ve ever got a question for Jim, then go email him.  He’ll respond…promise.
• General Session #2: // Heard from Jeff Manion this morning on living in the land of “in between.”  Such a powerful, powerful word about how living in the space where one of two things happen:  We either lose our faith all together, or we move into a new place of faith.  Dangerous, risky, and inspiring to take advantage of the season of the in between.
• Breakout #1 // Volunteer Assimiliation: Nina Schmidgall packed about 2 hours of content into the one hour session I had with her.  The breakout was specifically about what to do with new volunteers into existing systems and processes.  But she added in a half hour of volunteer recruitment tips.  The content wasn’t ground-breaking; but it was a good reminder to those of us that depend on help.
• Breakout #2 // Changing the Church into Orange: Chap Clark lit my brain on fire in the conference, as he talked about the history of age-specific ministry in the past 40 years of church history.  He challenged us to reach the entire family within the church, and work to merge all areas of ministry into one cohesive unit taking advantage of all our gifts together.
• General Session #3 // Heard from Jud Wilhite as he took to us with a message of Grace.  He’s a wonderful communicator, and really spoke to how we all walk into a mess sometimes; and it’s our reaction to that that speaks of what God is doing in us.

I also had a great time with my team here at Trinity, which is a new for my Orange Conference Experience.  Fun hanging out eating, talking, and generally getting to know each other each evening.