I went to my first Children’s Ministry conference 5 years ago. It was the Children’s Pastors Conference in Atlanta, GA. I went with two of my staff. Other than them, I didn’t know anyone. Actually, I did know Ryan Frank (I spoke at his church’s camp the summer before).

Orange is my 4th conference since that first one and just the first day has been characterized by meeting new and old friends. At the very start, I met up with the youth pastor from the first church I worked with in Texas (he’s actually my room mate for this week). Then this morning, I met up with the Children’s Pastors I served with at Cross Timbers for the last two years. A few hours later I met spotted Allan Phillips in the hallway and chatted with him for a few minutes. Then, totally randomly, I ran into someone I knew from much further back (actually he spotted me… and I’m glad he did). I ran into Tim Lawrence, the Children’s Pastor from New Hope Family Church in SD. I actually met Tim nearly 8 years ago when I first became a full-time children’s pastor in IN. He moved away shortly after I got there, but he was a volunteer for the elementary ministry. Now he’s in full time ministry.

I’m looking forward to connecting with Jim Wideman, the Kidology group (I heard they’re all getting together for lunch tomorrow) and several others tomorrow.

This is fun!