ReThink: Living

This may have a different feel than typical posts here on the blog.  Hopefully it will flow well though and everyone will benefit from the content.

Currently there is a contest hosted by Don Miller, seeing whose reasons for coming to his conference in Portland were the best.

When I began to consider entering the contest; I first went and read the requirements/suggestions.  (How could one write a complete blog on the subject without knowing these things?).  Then I began hashing out what it is that I need to work on, in order to live a better story.

Upon pondering my life, emotions, actions, reading the tips, ect.  I came to a point of which I was ready to begin writing.  So the following is why I believe gaining a free trip to the Living a Better Story Seminar would not only benefit my life but also benefit the content of my blog as well.

When examining my current life, there is a long list of stories I have or could write about.  However, upon considering these stories I began to think about how many of them actually had content that is needed for a great story.  My personal definition of a great story: a memorable and life changing tale.

After much self deliberation I noticed that the stories I have are memorable, however they are lacking life changing impact for the people who read or hear them.  Do I believe that going to the  Living a Better Story Seminar will make my stories to where they are life changing, not completely but I do realize that what I learn there can help with this.

As I am advancing in years and maturing in my life, I have grown to realize that I have character flaws.  Now I realize that every person has character flaws and that they themselves are a part of an individuals story, but I also realize that these character flaws can hinder a persons story as well.  I am hoping that through the  Living a Better Story Seminar I will be able to learn ways to overcome these character flaws in order to live a better story.

At this point you may be wondering what a better story would look like for me.  In my future I want to impact the world for Christ.  Currently I feel the calling to either planting a church or helping with a rural church/church plant.  With my age being what it is, I am considered a prime candidate for this type thing as soon as I graduate from college if not sooner.  With this calling comes an awesome opportunity to be able to experience and then re-tell an abundance of stories.  I feel that the seminar would definitely help in this area, to be able to lay out my experiences in a way that readers would not only feel that they are a part of the story, but also be stirred to action as well.

In the next year or so, as I finish college, there will also be opportunities to experience a life full of stories to be shared with the world.  One of these opportunities is coming through a mentoring program I am starting at the church where I am on staff where college students mentor our high school students.  I believe that attending the conference would help to shape this mentoring project into something even more impacting than what my mind contains.  As well as one of the students I am mentoring would be tickled to death if I was able to bring him along as my traveling companion, seeing as he is a literary genius and admires the literature written by Donald Miller. Through the  Living a Better Story Seminar I feel that what I experience in college and ministry will be better told, in a way that could impact someone else's life for the greater good.

I would really like to see the world come to an understanding of the state of the modern church and its relation to culture and I feel that through communicating about what I see through ministry positions; currently as an intern and in the future as someone planting/growing a church that the Living a Better Story Seminar would assist me in explaining what God has laid on my heart about how to effectively reach my generation.

Hopefully this post has effectively communicated what I feel I could improve on in order to Live a Better Story.  Having just come off of a mission trip today, it was a stretching writing this and I had to proof several times for errors, however I strongly feel that these things listed above are qualities that are lacking and need to be built upon for me to live a better story.



Living a Better Story Seminar from All Things Converge Podcast on Vimeo.


http://donmilleris.com/conference