Uprising headed to the DR...

I remember in High School and the opportunity that I had to go on my first missions trip with Oasis Student Ministries (at the time).  We ventured down with G.O. Ministries and I could not have imagined what was in store for us as we served a pastor in Hato Del Yaque, Dominican Republic.  The relationships I made and the bonds that continue to run deep are amazing, not to mention I was able to communicate a little bit with my knowledge of the Spanish language.  

Now, as a Student Ministries Pastor I have the honor of bringing along 4 students of my own & 2 adults on a trip with G.O. Ministries.  We will be headed to none other than Hato Del Yaque and staying at the church that my team from Oasis built.  Such a great thing to be a part of and I cannot imagine what God has in store for the students from the Uprising.  I know it is going to be a stressful, exciting, passionate, scary, and amazing week.  God is going to move in mighty ways and I am so excited to be apart of it.  

To keep updated make sure you follow my Facebook Page as well as the Uprising Facebook.  Also, GO Ministries will be keeping an update on the team's progress on their Team Tracker website.  (Team Tracker Site) .   We continually ask for your prayers as the week is going up very fast.  

till another day, 

normallyINDIE. 

Thank You...

I want to officially thank all those who call Twin Oaks Christian Church & the Uprising.  Below is my letter of Resignation as the Student Ministries Pastor here.  Thank you so much for all that you have done and all that God is continuing to do.

Dear Twin Oaks Family, 

Jenny and I are so honored to be able to call this place home and specifically have the opportunity to work with you as members on a regular basis.  I, Alec, have been so blessed to be lead by a great man in Randy Wheeler and could not be more excited about where the future of Twin Oaks, specifically the Uprising, is headed under his Christ-centered leadership.  

With all of that being said, Jenny and I must regretfully inform you that as of July 24th I have resigned as the Student Ministries Pastor here at Twin Oaks CC.  Jenny and I will be pursuing a job opportunity for her in the graphic design field in Indianapolis, IN effective immediately.  We have spent the last two weeks praying over this decision and although it hurts us so much to leave a church family that has been so loving and wonderful, we are 100% positive that this is what/where God is calling our family to next.  Jenny and I are still very much looking forward to spending a week with your students in the Dominican Republic as well as finishing the summer Uprising Events, but our final Sunday will be August 25th, 2013. 

It has been such a blessing to come under the leadership of an dynamic Pastor and staff.  We could not be more heart-broken to leave a church family that is truly doing the work that God has called them to.  I fully trust that God has already ordained the next Student Ministries Pastor for the position and I am so excited to see the powerful impact Pastor Randy and this entire church family is going to have on this community despite our departure.  

You all have been so loving toward us and we could not be more honored to have spent the time getting to know Randy, the Elders, and our entire team.  You all are such amazing men and women of God.  

God Bless, 

Alec M. Tod 

Let Go & Let God...

I had the honor and privilege of taking 11 High School students & 5 adults to CIY Move in Holland, MI this past week.  For those of you who don't know, Move is a Nationwide HS week of worship that takes place at numerous locations throughout the summer months.  It has been going on for many years now and more specifically I have been going to CIY Move since the summer of 2005 (5 Times as a student, 3 times as a leader, missing 2011 & 2012).  This week of worship, intentional growth, and fellowship was one of the most formidable weeks of my teenage years, therefore I jumped at the possibility of leading a group of students from the Uprising.

After lack of interest forced us to lower our numbers, I was discouraged wonder whether it was even worth it for us to go on the trip all together.  But the second I stepped onto the campus, boy was I wrong.  God began working in my heart, our adults' hearts, and in the hearts of our students immediatly.  Little did we know that we would have the opportunity by the end of the week to baptize 5 students, 2 students rededicate their lives, and 6 students commit to full-time vocational ministry.  Here is just a glimpse of the week that changed the Uprising forever.

This was just a glimpse into the amazing week that our students and adults had at CIY Move.  I encourage you to check out The Uprising on Facebook or Instagram (@uprising_sm) as well as get in touch with some of the students that went on the trip.  Ask them about their experience and I am sure you will be encouraged.  

till another day, 

normallyINDIE 

the Modern Christian...

I recently had the honor of preaching a 2 week series at Twin Oaks CC centered on the idea of modern day christianity.  God has recently put a lot of feelings on my heart regarding the "christian" world's interaction with the real world and how most of the time that is limiting the gospel.  Here is the graphic that went along with the series as well as the videos from both weeks.  Enjoy:

Designed by Turquoise Feathers Studio, LLC. 

5/19/13 - The Modern Christian - How the World Sees Us

5/26/13 - The Modern Christian - How we Must Respond

till another day, 

normallyINDIE 

Trains, Trains, & More Trains...

We had the opportunity this past weekend to head down to Indianapolis with 4 student leaders from the Uprising to begin our first annual student leadership trip.  We ventured down to Downtown Indianapolis, IN and stayed at the Crown Plaza Union Station hotel.  If you are familiar with the Union Station, you know that it is a working train station & you can hear the sounds of trains throughout the night (sometimes scary, but very cool) you can also have the chance to stay in a repurposed train car.  Although we did not get a chance to stay in the actual train car we did get to act like we were fresh out of a Harry Potter movie :).

Although the trains were great, we had much more in store with this adventure to Indianapolis.  Starting in January of this year we begin to meet together with a group of student leaders from the Uprising Student Ministries.  We meet once a week to develop and grow as leaders and have the opportunity lead our Growth Groups which happen every other week on Sunday Night.  These are groups that are 100% student led and are great opportunities for students to grow as they are being taught by other students.

In Indianapolis, we were gifted with the opportunity to spend some time with Shane Combs who is the Director of Student Ministries at Bridgeway Community Church in Fishers, IN.  He is not only the pastor at this church, but is a great friend and brother in Christ.  I have had the honor of working with him in the past and could not have been happier to invite him to join us.

Shane Combs had so many great things to share with our students, but I would like to share with you some keys that stuck out to me as he shared them to us.

First of all in order to be a Leader you must first be a follower.  It is important to look at the leaders of the bible and realize first that they had to be leaders in order to understand how to be a leader.  Some keys he had the students write down were as follows

1.  Must be ALERT
        Be aware of What Jesus is doing in your life & your ministry
2.  Must be BRAVE
         What if no one else believes in Jesus, would you still follow him
3.  Committed
          You are so crazy, zealous that you will follow even to the point that it seems crazy

He also shared in our second session some nuggets that were important to keep in mind as our students lead our ministry.  They are as follows:

1.  Leaders Lead
        Leaders do just that, there is no time off of being a leader.  If you are a true leader you ALWAYS      
2.  Law of the Lid
        You will never be able to lead someone past the point of your leadership, must continue to learn
3.  What you allow to be inspected, will be expected
         Must let someone into what is wrong w/ you, a mentor that can push you and teach you

These were just a few of the points that he was able to share with our students and they were so motivated by his wisdom and knowledge when it came to student leadership.  I am so excited to see them implement what they learned into their daily lives.  God is doing some great things in our students lives and I am so excited to be apart of it.



till another day,




normallyINDIE.

The Uprising (Update)...

As you may know,  I am currently the Student Ministries Pastor at Twin Oaks Christian Church meaning I am the director of the Uprising Student Ministries.  It is an amazing ministry dedicated to creating a movement of middle school & high school students that are fearlessly making known the gospel in Detroit.  I have been blessed with the opportunity to work in a place like this and most of all be a part of some great student's lives.  I continue to thank God everyday for the opportunities my wife and I have been given.  That being said, I would like to give you a little update on how everything is going and what we have to look forward to in the future.

The Uprising is currently running between 20 - 30 Middle School & High School Students at our Sunday evening service.  We have had 2 - 3 new students consistently for the last month and God is truly blessing us with life change amongst the students that we currently have.  We have been very patient with this growth and our staff is hoping to continue to cultivate and make the best of the situation we are apart of.  We are currently running a Sunday night service that is similar to a church setting with a bit of a twist of fun, food, and shot's at the pot (currently at $40 in Amazon.com gift cards).  Every other sunday night we run our small group programming called Growth Groups.  This is a pilot program that has our student leadership team leading each small group that is segregated based on grade.  It has been an amazing outlet for those that are otherwise outspoken and a good opportunity to dissect what is being said during the sermons and how it applies to their lives.

Looking forward, we are currently in the middle of our fundraising for our Dominican Republic Missions team that will be headed to Hato Del Yaque in August.  Are number to raise is currently at $11,000 and we are so excited to see how God provides for us in the coming months to make this trip happen.  I am so excited for that opportunity for our 4 students.  We are also going to be headed to CIY Move in July.  This will be my 8th Trip to Move & first in 3 years, I could not be more excited to see old friends, see God move amongst our students, and lead our group to make some amazing decisions for God.

God is doing so many amazing things amongst our students and I cannot begin to describe to you all that is taking place.  I am so honored to be serving God in this way and I am so excited to continue to work in his ministry.  It is truly an honor to be apart of his ministry and I am truly blessed.



till another day,



normallyINDIE

Bearing Fruit...

As many of you know, I had the opportunity speak at Twin Oaks CC's main stage.  It was an amazing opportunity to speak to our members that I do not always get.  I had the chance to not only speak to our students and their parents, but also a ton of new visitors that were excited to try our church for the first time.  We are currently in our 40 Days in the Word series this past week being Meaning of the Text.

It was an amazing opportunity to speak to our church and most of all to go through the text of John 15. Never before did I fully think about what it meant to bear fruit and the fact that Jesus has called all of his disciples to do so.  I understood that we need to "bear fruit" we are told that hundreds of times, but never did I really look into the text to understand how to do that.  What I found was amazing.  Like the majority of our faith, it comes down to the idea of remaining in Christ, taking up residency in his arms.  That being the case we will bear fruit, we will see God's glory, and his joy will be made complete in us.  It is as simple as that and the simplicity behind this idea just makes my life that much better.

I serve a creator that has made himself available to us all through is word and I am so excited to continue on this journey of discovery.  If you would like to listen to the message from Twin Oaks CC Click Here



till another day,



normallyINDIE

Why God?...

I had to opportunity to meet with a friend of mine today at one of my favorite spots in Woodhaven, MI, Starbucks on Allen & West.  It was an awesome time of encouragement and growth with one another, but there was sometime particular that came out of this time together.  What was revealed to me was the importance with trusting God with everything that we have.  

I feel like I have written on this topic before, but I never feel that we an spend enough time focusing on trusting God or having true faith that requires something.  He reminded me today that anyone can believe in God, but faith is something that is not as easily found.  I began to think about having faith and even having faith when it seems that everything else is falling apart.  I am reminded how easy it is to have faith in God and his power when everything is going great and we are at the peak of our existence.  

It reminds me of the story of Job and the fact that his entire story was centered on the fact that everything was taken from him.  The important part of this story is that God did not take everything away from Job, but instead he allowed Satan into the situation to destroy his life, knowing that Job would continue to have faith in God.  This reminds me that Satan never overpowers our God, but that he is on a leash and he can be let off the leash when God wants.  But ultimately, God is the master of all things including Satan.  What we can't do anymore is ask Why God?, instead we must endure realizing that God is in control of all of these situations and faith must be at the center of everything.  Our faith in the living God, must endure even if we do lose everything.  Because what we know is that our life is worthless unless we are seeking the power, hope, love, truth, and justice of our all powerful God.  

This story reminds me of the ultimate power and faithfulness of God and also reminds me to be as faithful as our living God. 

till another day, 

normallyINDIE   

Burning my Plows...

At Twin Oaks, we just finished a series centered on the fact that God is Greater Than... the series being loosely based on the fact that we have to recognize that our God that we serve is much greater than we give him credit.  So much of the time we spend thinking about how we are going to do this or what we are going to do can be washed away if we realize that our God is Greater.  

Out of this message from our senior pastor Randy Wheeler, came a discussion regarding the book "Greater" by Steven Furtick and most specifically the chapter in the book regarding Burning your plows.  The chapter is based on Elisha and how he was called to leave his old profession of leading oxen on plows to doing something greater.  The fact is that Elisha could have stored the plows or given them to someone for safe keeping or kept using them, but what he realized was that if he was truly going to follow the call he was given that was much Greater, then he had to purge his life of everything he used to be.  This meant taking his plows and burning them.  We began to discuss as a staff what this meant to us, what plows in our life was God calling us to burn in order to live a life Greater.  

Thinking about these plows can be a humbling experience because throughout the process you rationalize to yourself that this is not needed or that you can be fine with just storing the plows because who knows you may go back to them at some point and you don't want them to be gone.  But what God continues to say to us is that we have to be willing to sacrifice who we used to be in order to be something greater and if we are called to be again what we once were, the plows that are needed would again be provided.  

Personally I have a lot of plows that need to be burned before I am willing to do the something greater that God is calling me/us to.  I am currently in the process of lighting the matches and burning them myself, but even as I write this I am continuely reminded of the importance of this process.  We all are hoping to do something much greater than we can even imagine, but there has to be an element of sacrifice attached to this.  

If you haven't already pick up the book Greater by Steven Furtick and if you are looking for a church home in the Detroit area, join us at Twin Oaks CC in Woodhaven, MI.  What are the plows that God is telling you to burn?  How long are you willing to wait before becoming something GREATer. 

till another day, 

normallyINDIE

the Slaves are Freed...

Last night was our first night of the Uprising since our atmosphere redesign thanks to a great friend from Metro South Church, Jon Whaley.  If you do not already know, the Uprising is a movement of students in the Down River area of Detroit that are passionately spreading the gospel to the "10,000" students in our area.  It is an exciting time in our ministry with the new year rolling around and we all feel that the Lord is leading this ministry to do something amazing in 2013.

We started out this redesign by working through Mark 5:1 - 13 specifically focusing on the Demons that took control of the man called "Legion".  It was an opportunity for all of us to come together, worship the Lord, and rejoice in the fact that just like Legion we have demons, and just like Legion those demons have been cast out.

God changed many of us last night.  He showed many that we are truly freed from what seemed to bind us, not because of our own doing, but because the demons that so easily destroy our lives tremble at the sound of our Messiah.

Our Messiah has saved us and there is nothing we can do, but rejoice, bow and do everything we can to tell the world just that.  It is an honor to serve in this ministry and I am so excited for the students in the Down River area to be drastically changed by the power of the Messiah.

WE ARE FREED!!!!


till another day,


normallyINDIE

A Childlike Gospel...

I had the honor of speaking at Twin Oaks Christian Church's Main Sunday Morning Service this past sunday.  It was an amazing opportunity and I am excited for what the future has in store.  By clicking the link you will be sent to audio of the message (video coming soon).


First Sermon @ Twin Oaks Christian Church


Thank you for listening.

till another day,



normallyINDIE

2012? We are still here...

It is now January of 2013 and the Mayans were wrong and we are still here.  With that being said, I would like to take a look back at the year that was truly amazing for the Tod Family.  If you received the wonderfully designed Christmas cards from my Wife, Jennifer of Turquoise Feathers Studio, LLC, you know that 2012 was a big year for us.  Just to lay out a couple reasons for why 2012 was such an amazing year for us.

I accepted my first position in ministry as the Community Youth Coordinator at Groesbeck UMC in Cincinnati, OH on Jan. 2nd 2012.

Jennifer & I tied the knot at the Harrison Center for the Arts in Downtown Indianapolis, IN March 10th, 2012.

Jennifer & I moved into our first apartment in March in Downtown Cincinnati, OH.

Jennifer & I graduated from Herron School of Art & Cincinnati Christian University (respectively) on May 12th - May 13th 2012.

I transitioned into the position of Pastor of Student Ministries at Groesbeck UMC in Cincinnati, OH.

We introduced Indie Tod into the world as we adopted our first puppy in August of 2012.

I accepted the position of Student Ministries Pastor at Twin Oaks Christian Church in Woodhaven, MI.

Jennifer & I moved to Southgate, MI in the Down River District of Detroit, MI.

I introduced the rebranding of the Student Ministries at TOCC entitled The Uprising

Jennifer accepted the position of Graphic Designer & Social Media Director at Mousetrap Mobile in Royal Oak, MI.

Jennifer's freelance graphic design business became an official LLC under the name, Turquoise Feathers Studio, LLC in November of 2012.

I preached my first sermon at the main sunday morning service at Twin Oaks CC on Dec. 30th, 2012.

As you can see, this year has been as crazy as they come.  We are looking forward to not moving as well as transitioning into new jobs.  But we are also excited about the new opportunities that will come to us in 2013.  Just a few things we are looking forward to are, Turquoise Feathers becoming a huge company, Missions Trip to Dominican Republic, Moving into our first house.  It should yet again be an exciting year in 2013 and I will keep you updated through this blog.


till another day,




normallyINDIE

the Uprising...

As many of you know as of September I accepted a position at Twin Oaks Christian Church in Woodhaven, Michigan to become their Student Ministries Pastor.  I have been working for this church for just over a month and last night we were able to launch our brand new Student Ministry service called the Uprising.

This is going to be a church led by students for students purely to spread the gospel to all of the students that are in our Down River Area.  The Uprising is dedicated to building up a group of students that will faithfully, humbly, & wholeheartedly serve the Lord.

I had the honor last night of putting on our Fall Kickoff with all the help I could get from my Adult Sponsor team.  We had a wonderful night of worship, fun, fall inspired food, and relevant speaking.  It was so exciting to see over 50 Middle School & High School Students there who were excited to hear what all of the Uprising was all about.

Now outside of all of the logistics and everything else, I am so excited to be serving God here at Twin Oaks.  To lead a service like this is what I have been dreaming about doing since I felt the call to go into Student Ministry back in High School.  I have been dreaming of the day when God will give me a chance to preach the gospel to a group of students that are anxious to hear it.  It is such an amazing feeling and I am so honored to be serving him in this way.

I cannot imagine what God has in store for us at the Uprising, but I am so excited and I know he is going to do some amazing things.

If you would like to keep up on all things the Uprising then check out:

Facebook: The Uprising

Twitter: @Uprising_SM

Website: www.twinoakschristian.com

I am so excited for the school year and to see what is going to happen.


till another day,


normallyINDIE

The New Guy...

My wife and I most recently decided to take a leap of faith and accept a position in a state we have never visited, moving further away from family, and did I mention doing all of this in 2 weeks.  Yes, my wife and had recently decided to accept a position at Twin Oaks Christian Church in Woodhaven, Michigan as their Student Ministries Pastor.

We did not know much about the church or about Michigan in general before visiting just a few weeks ago.  But as we had our first Sunday this past week as well as my 2nd week in the office, I could not be more pleased with the decision that God allowed us to make.  The church is filled with hundreds of great people that are truly seeking after God and his mission and vision for their lives as well as students that are fully engaged in their relationships with christ.  

Upon our meeting this past Sunday Night, I challenged the students with the idea that there are 10,000 students in the Down River District, many of which who do not have a church home.  Our students here at Twin Oaks Christian Church have begun to shift their focus away from themselves, but to the 10,000.  As the year continues, we will continue to focus on this number believing that our mission is not complete until all 10,000 people have heard the message of the love of Christ as well as have found a place to grow and fellowship with other believers.  

As far as Student Ministries goes, their will be a couple changes that take place very soon and I am very excited to unveil those changes on October 7th at our Fall Kickoff.  I am so ready to see what God has in store for me with these students here as well as what role my wife and I can play in the family of Twin Oaks Christian Church 

till another day, 

normallyINDIE