Off We Go to Word of Life
July 21, 2013
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This morning we’re heading back to the northeast, this time to Word of Life in Schroon Lake, New York. Despite what the map might suggest, there are no direct flights from Dallas to Schroon Lake. We are flying from Dallas to Chicago to Albany where our friend Paul Bubar will pick us up and drive us 75 miles north to Word of Life Inn.
We’re staying there for two weeks.
That’s a first for us. Always in the past I have come for a week of Bible conference in the summer and then flown back home. This year for the first week I’m speaking on Word of Life Island to 450-500 teens from the Northeast and the Midwest. The second week I’ll speak to adults and families at the Inn and Campground.
We keep coming back year after year because we love the bustling excitement of Word of Life and because we have many friends here. Jack Wyrtzen started Word of Life as a youth ministry on the streets of New York, eventually holding massive rallies during Word War II. After the war, through a series of divine serendipities, God opened the door to buy Word of Life Island in Schroon Lake. Then came the Inn, and later the Ranch, still later the Campground. Along the way Word of Life moved its headquarters to Schroon Lake, started Bible clubs, musical productions, radio and TV broadcasts, and eventually they launched Word of Life Bible Institute. Word of Life has expanded to 70 countries, essentially replicating the plan that started in the US.
Jack Wyrtzen had a heart to reach young people with the gospel.
That remains the heart of Word of Life today.
It’s fun to be at a place that is the beating heart of a growing worldwide movement. You can feel that fervor to reach the world for Christ whenever you go there.
So we’re off to Word of Life to teach the Life of Joseph first to teenagers and then to adults. In my mind this series is now Joseph 3.0 since I’ve reworked it again since giving it at Living Waters and Cannon Beach. More than any series I’ve done, it’s a work in progress. I’m excited to see how the Lord uses it this week.
When I speak to the teens on the Island, I’m going to tell them on Monday morning that I have five questions for them–one a day. Each question comes from the life of Joseph and goes to the heart of what it means to be Christian in today’s world.
So we’ll start in 2013, journey back 4000 years to meet a teenager named Joseph, then journey back to 2013 to see what his life says to us today.
God willing, I plan to turn this series into a book.
I just need to do a couple more versions–4.0 and 5.0, and then I’ll be ready to write it and publish it.
If you’d like to follow the Joseph series on the Island, each of my sessions will be livestreamed for free on the Internet. Just go to It’s Happening Now Word of Life Island. You can pick up the live stream from the Island at 9 AM EDT Monday-Friday. The broadcast starts after the worship has ended. I invite you to join us as we Journey with Joseph this week.
They also livestream the morning Bible hour from the Campground Monday-Friday at 9 & 11 AM EDT. The speakers this week are Erwin Lutzer and Phil Moser.