Winter.

I’m skeptical of New Year’s resolutions. They’re too easy to make, rarely carried out, and often cover up what really needs to change. If we’re honest, few of us really want things to be completely different. We just want life to get better, or easier. We can handle a tune-up or face-lift, but drastic change? Medication, yes; surgery, no. Reform, maybe; revolution, never.

Materials
paper or Styrofoam cups and a rubber / foam dart gun. A ladder with steps at different heights. In place of Nerf darts you can use pink pong balls, small rubber balls or even wads of paper.

What to do

1. Give each youth a cup and allow them to write their name on the cup.

Materials
A remote control. If you don’t have one. Make one from a small rectangular box. Cover it with paper and draw the following buttons: rewind, fast forward, play, Pause, and stop.

I just noticed that you guys broke through to over 5 million hits today.

Wow! I never expected that this little effort of one guy’s love for youth would become so popular and be visited by so many people from around the world. Last time I checked the website had visitors from 205 different countries. That’s almost every country in the world… (One big country still missing is Greenland. Does anyone have a youth pastor friend in Greenland you want to recommend the site to?)

Years ago a minister in Iowa went home from a service for dinner with a wealthy farmer. This man, though not a Christian, was moral and upright. As they entered the house from the rear through a shed, the minister noticed several bushels of corn twisted together by the husks and hung from the open rafters. The farmer pointer out to the minister the finest seed corn he had ever raised. Said the preacher: “If I were you, I would always keep that corn there. You will never get any more like it.”

In the days when an ice cream sundae cost much less, a 10-year-old boy entered a hotel coffee shop and sat at a table. A waitress put a glass of water in front of him. “How much is an ice cream sundae?”

Once upon a time, the animals decided they should do something meaningful to meet the problems of the new world. So they organized a school. They adopted an activity curriculum of running, climbing, swimming and flying. To make it easier to administer the curriculum, all the animals took all the subjects.

Here’s wishing everyone a blessed Christmas!

May Christ shine in your hearts the whole year through!

In appreciation for your support of the Creative Youth Ideas website I want to give you a very practical Christmas gift.

20. You’ve heard the old saying about the Camel being the ship of the desert? WELLLLL, I’m getting seasick.
19. OK, we got gold. We got the frankincense. We got the Myrrh. Think we should get something more practical, like diapers maybe?
18. I thought this was SUPPOSED to be a WEEKEND road trip. Boy, is my wife ever gonna be ticked when I get home.
17. All this gazing at a star while riding a camel is making me woozy.
16. Wise men. They call us wise men. What’s so WISE about wandering around the the desert for three years?
15. I still say it wouldn’t hurt to drop by Balthazar’s place for another visit on the way back. That was SOME buffet!
14. 16 hours a day on a camel. Are you sure this beats walking?
13. All in all, I’d rather be a shepherd. All they ever do is stand around and WATCH the stars. We have to FOLLOW one.
12. Time to check the map again, I think we took a wrong turn at Amal’s house.
11. Why should I always have to be in the rear? It’s somebody else’s turn to get sand in his face.
10. I need to stop at the Bazaar in the next town and pick up one more gift.
9. C’mon, we gotta stop and ask for directions, if we don’t this trip could take years.
8. You guys have any idea how to treat saddle sores?
7. Man, I’m starting to get a rush from this frankincense!
6. You guys ever eat camel meat? I hear it tastes like chicken.
5. You know, I used to go to school with a girl name Beth Lehem.
4. What kind of name is Balthazar anyhow? Phoenician?
3. Hey, do you either of you know why “MYRRH” is spelled with a “Y” instead of a “U”?
2. Okay, who forgot to give their camel a bath before we left?
1. Whaddya mean we’ll be part of history? A year from now, nobody will have a clue why we did this.