YMNews.com

"TATTOO on the HEART" the book you'll recommend to your teens and they'll actually read

From YMNews.com on Wednesday, September 3, 2008 @ 3:00 PM PST
in the "Announcement" Category.

"failing at my own attempts to earn salvation by grace through faith."

Living in this paradox is the way Paul Dabdoub described himself as a teen – and as an adult. And it's led him to write a book entitled "TATTOO on the HEART" which is already garnering rave reviews in the Christian community.

Why did you write the book?

Originally when I started writing this book it was going to be a book about the missing essentials of discipleship. I was a long-time youth pastor who was devastated and challenged by the fact that most students walk away from church before they're 20.

I was one of those kids myself. I was moral, knew the Bible, had leadership gifting, and was at church 3 times a week my whole life. And then I was toast by the time I reached 16 years old.

I changed my mind about writing a book just for youth ministry though. The problem is that we're always trying to create programs and formulas and unveil secrets to solving problems in ministry. What we have here is not a retention problem; it is a relational problem. Our students are cool with us and everything we do. They just don't have a relationship with God.

Yeah, they're there every Sunday and Wednesday, the missions trip to Mexico, and at the canned food drive. But they have never stepped intimately, and personally into relationship with Jesus and been caught by Love.

What's the difference in this book and other books that you might call "Christian Living" or "Spiritual Growth?"

There are a few things.

One – we wrote the book intensely conversational with a lot of stories and illustrations wrapped around the profound theology of grace and relationship with God.

Theology?

There's a lot of theology in there, but no one who's read it has told us that. They haven't even noticed. You know why? Because we're not talking about God anymore, we're having an experience with Him as we go through the book.

I'm personally against filling people with more head knowledge of God. Knowledge Biblically was understood relationally – through experience of a person. My goal in the book was to connect people with the Person of God not just have them read another book that they walk away from unchanged.

Secondly, it was written for the average American who doesn't typically read. I deliberately kept the book short so that people would give it a shot. We filled our test group with procrastinators and they found the read as easy as it was profound. I love the response that we've gotten of "looking forward to part 2" and "I turned the last page expecting and wanting more."

Is this book written for students?

This book is written for broken Christians. I think that we can all be included in that. Our test group was composed of people age 12 to 50 – pastors, longtime Christians, new Christians, teenagers, etc. This book is definitely not just written for students. It was written for many of my church friends of Gen X who still haven't found their way back to God. It was written for an agnostic friend from college. We're finding it's that readable.

One student age 14 wrote me and said: "I realize I need more intimacy with God." When was the last time a student told you that? Another comment by a student was, "It made me really think about God in a way I normally don't think about Him. Like a person. Someone who needs love back not just Him loving us, but us loving Him. It made me question if I showed my love for God. It opened some new ideas that I have never thought of."

What's next?

We're recording the audiobook and it will be out by mid-September. We're really after that non-reading demographic. If someone has an iPod or MP3 player, we're going to have a real shot at them.

We're also going to create a video series for small groups and upfront teachings that go along with the book

Where can we get the book?

It'll be expanding into the market over the next couple of months, but for now, you can find it at: www.tattooontheheart.com Just remember that tattoo has two "T's" and two "O's!"

New Free Revolutionary Games Database Launches.

From YMNews.com on Sunday, December 11, 2005
in the "Announcements" Category.
David Mackey recently launched GameSecretary.Com, a revolutionary new website for youth ministers. While there are many game databases on the internet there are few with the range of features GameSecretary currently offers. For example, GameSecretary offers advanced filtering of games, allowing one to quickly sort games by popularity, title, or type. It also includes personalization features which allow it to minimize the amount of time that a youth minister needs to prepare games. Finally, it includes a dash of artificial intellignece which can generate great games for a youth minister within minutes.

Personal Pastoral Library Survey

From YMNews.com on Thursday, July 28, 2005
in the "Resources" Category.
Who paid for your personal pastoral library? Do you have a book budget? How big is it? Do you spend your own money on books? Over 600 pastors have already taken ThePastorsLibrary.com survey. Take the survey and see how you stack up!

How to Shout Without Screaming

From YMNews.com on Sunday, January 30, 2005
in the "Resources" Category.
Download week 1 of this 3 week series where Doug Fields teaches teenagers how to talk about Jesus with their friends. Week one is titled "Shouting With Your Friendships".

Transmit Vol 1: 2 Free Motion Backgrounds for Presentations

From YMNews.com on Sunday, January 30, 2005
in the "Resources" Category.
This month's freebie is from our brand new media resource Transmit Vol 1. These twenty-second videos can be set to loop behind your announcements, praise and worship lyrics, photos of your goldfish, or whatever you want.

Conclave 2005 is almost here

From YMNews.com on Monday, November 29, 2004
in the "Conventions" Category.
February 17-19 - Conclave exists to encourage, motivate, and equip youth ministry leadership to penetrate the youth culture with the gospel, thereby mobilizing them to shake the world by reaching every continent with the life-changing message that Jesus saves and transforms everyone whose life He touches.

What is Good?

From YMNews.com on Wednesday, November 10, 2004
in the "Articles" Category.
From cereal commercials to "The Simpsons", from "Grand Theft Auto" games to movies - programming for children and teens is increasingly written to encourage the worst of anti-social behavior, immortality and violence. And yet, we happily tune-in, pay admission or purchase the product, sit back and proclaim it "good".

Discussion Tool - Movievangelism

From YMNews.com on Sunday, September 26, 2004
in the "Resources" Category.
Because we live in a truth-bound world, all films make truth claims. These claims are either consistent with, or opposed to, the truth claims of Scripture. The position the film takes doesn't really matter as long as we know the truth - the film just serves as a starting point for discussions. As long as we can pinpoint the significant arguments in a film, we have an opening for spiritual dialogue.

Examine America's Spiritual Legacy in New Book: Under God

From YMNews.com on Wednesday, September 22, 2004
in the "Resources" Category.
Under God includes sixty such profiles and forty additional sidebars, as well as an essay exploring "What Is Freedom For," which ends with the Authors, Toby Mac and Michael Tait, stating, "These Americans took their place and proved, over and over, that 'One person acting with God can make a difference.' Can we do less?"

Recognize Hidden Opportunities for Creative Evangelism

From YMNews.com on Tuesday, September 14, 2004
in the "Articles" Category.
Most non-Christians are not looking for God, and we know from Isaiah 44:18 that they have, often willingly, created a blind spot in their lives. In God's grace, we may be able to bypass their blind spot and smuggle ideas into their hearts, by unusual and creative presentations of the gospel.

FREE 4 Week Passion DVD Curriculum

From YMNews.com on Friday, September 10, 2004
in the "Resources" Category.
In order to help facilitate the outreach/teaching opportunities that the release of The Passion of the Christ DVD will provide, we have put together 4 weeks of curriculum to be used in conjunction with the DVD. This effective and thought provoking material is available to you free of charge.

Challenge Sunday Church Service Planning Guide (PDF)

From YMNews.com on Friday, September 3, 2004
in the "Resources" Category.
As you plan your church services on the weekend of September 12, 2004 (or whatever weekend you choose to use), realize you are being joined by literally thousands of other churches – which are also standing with hundreds of thousands of passionate Christian students. This "Preparation Booklet" is designed to serve as a menu to choose from, not a recipe to follow. Use your creativity and tap into the passion and involvement of those already involved in God's kingdom work within schools in your community.

Urban Answer presents "THE PAIN PROJECT"

From YMNews.com on Thursday, August 26, 2004
in the "Announcements" Category.
Street Life plans for thousands to attend the city-wide showing of PAIN, which they plan to host later this fall. This event promises to be a tremendous opportunity for community outreach, as well as clean but quality entertainment. They are asking Senior Pastors, Youth Pastors and Outreach Pastors to attend a planning meeting for this September 3rd event.

How Religious Parents Royally Screw Up Their Children

From YMNews.com on Friday, August 20, 2004
in the "Articles" Category.
parenting is only part of what God will use in the life of a young person to bring them to himself. He will also use poor choices, bad friends, failures and hard knocks. We would like to make sure God doesn't have to use those tools, but then they worked pretty good on most of us, didn't they?

Now Accepting Headline Submissions

From YMNews.com on Saturday, July 31, 2004
in the "Resources" Category.
YMNews.com is now accepting news headline submissions for syndication. You can use the online form to submit your news headline, a short description and a link to your online article.