Two years ago, I flew down to San Diego, California with the two youth pastors from church for a Youth Specialties conference there. It was the first conference of any type that I had been too and I loved every minute of it. From the worship times, musical guests, skits performed, hanging out at the beach, a delicious love affair with In-N-Out, not to mention all of the free stuff that I was able to accumulate. One of the things that really stuck with me though was the message that Francis Chan, one of the speakers, gave during one of the main sessions. Francis gave an amazing message about really falling in love with Jesus. He talked about how nothing parents, or pastors, or youth leaders do can make someone fall in love with Jesus; only God can draw a person in. He also asked a tough question: Are we trying to be more like Jesus-or increase the numbers in our area of ministry? He doesn’t play around and his words and passion will punch you in the gut. He ended it with a great image of him holding his seven year-old (at the time) daughter in his arms and asking if this is what we’re like with God. Do we let him hold us in his arms? Do we love on him like a young child loves on his or her dad?

I love listening to Francis Chan preach. He always preaches with passion and conviction like peoples’ lives depend on it… and in some cases, they do. Since that message in 2007, I can officially say that I have developed a pastor crush on Francis Chan.

Who is your pastor crush? Who’s your favorite preacher/speaker is your and why?

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This entry was posted on Saturday, July 4th, 2009 at 12:47 pm and is filed under A Day in the Life. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.