Our Ministry Culture Is Shifting

Can you tell us a story of when you saw your students live out a Gospel Advancing lifestyle?

We challenge our students to go out every week and pray with someone, care for someone in Jesus name, and/or share the Gospel with someone. Then, at youth group later in the week, we take a moment during worship to allow students and leaders to share their stories of success and failure from throughout the week. It has become a sweet time of keeping the main thing the main thing! A few weeks ago, one of our seniors, named Bailey, shared a story that happened when she was on a trip with her family. While she was reading her Bible on the dock by the water, her younger cousin came out to her and started asking questions about Bailey’s faith. Bailey was able to share the G.O.S.P.E.L. acrostic with her cousin and led her to Christ right then!

What’s something you see your students struggling with currently, and how are you approaching it?

Students are busy! It feels like all the hobbies and things teens added to their schedules during Covid stuck around, even when everything was added back in. Students are often overwhelmed by their schedules. Unfortunately this means that youth group takes a back seat during the busier seasons. As youth workers, we can either get frustrated by this or we can approach it with a Gospel Advancing focus. Instead of growing self-conscious and insecure during busy seasons, we can unleash our students with the tools they need to bring the Gospel wherever they go. There’s already so much pressure to show up to everything. We shouldn’t pastor them only when they are in the building, but pastor them and unleash them into their environment, and then cheer them on from the sidelines. Their sports teams, drama clubs, and schools would look a whole lot different if the Gospel weren’t locked within the four walls of a church building.

If you could describe your ministry in three words, what would they be, and why did you choose them?

Prayer – Care – Share! We shamelessly stole the Cause Circle from Dare 2 Share! We are daring students to actually live out what Jesus calls us to do: to make disciples who make disciples. We do it imperfectly, and we’re still learning and growing. But after I attended Lead the Cause in 2023, God shifted something in my heart and gave me a fresh vision and desire for advancing the Gospel through our students. It has taken a few years for Gospel Advancing to really grab a hold of our youth group, but I’m slowly but surely seeing our culture shift. I have to say, I’m more excited than I’ve ever been in 17 years of ministry!