A Youth Ministry Summer (Week Eight)

Week eight of the summer, Bethel Teens put on our fourth and final missions trip for the year- Samaria Missions Trip. Our Samaria Trip is a local missions trip . Our goal for this is to show our students the mission field that is their home town and surrounding areas. We took 16 students (middle and high school students) as well as 7 leaders. Our youth ministry does a missions trip blog to keep parents up to date about the trip, so instead of giving highlights of the trip here is the link to that blog. http://alphaomegasamaria.tumblr.com/

A Youth Ministry Summer (Week Seven)

This week our Church sent Kaci and I to Berlin, Germany to join a team of a few others to put on a teen camp. Crossway International Church puts on a Summer Camp style "Teen Camp" every summer, but this year a team that had intended to go had to back out at the last minute. The Church in Berlin, where my sister is a missionary, frantically called everyone they know in youth ministry in order to try to put together a team at the last minute. I gave the proposal to the staff here at Bethel and they allowed me to go and help.



The Lord miraculously put together a team from all over the United States to put on this camp for Students in Berlin. Dan, a phys ed. teacher from North Carolina, Chaplain Marty, the chaplain of Purdue University, Nate, and engineer, Kaci and I and my sister Kristi. Most of us did not know each other before this trip, but God allowed us to work very well together in order to spread his love with over 40 students.


We arrived during that churches VBS style childrens camp, where we got to see and hear of over 40 children who made professions of faith. Then on monday we started our program for the week. We averaged right around 40 teens each day, and the majority of them unsaved. We even had the opportunity to share the gospel with a few that this was their first time ever hearing it. Instead of rambling on about each day i will just give a few highlights of the week.

Highlights from Teen Camp
1. Meet a Senior in High School who for the first time in his life heard the gospel. His girlfriend brought him to church and for these two weeks he was confronted with the truth of the gospel. Through many conversations with Kristi and rubbing shoulders with true followers of Jesus, i believe he is on his way towards a relationship with Christ. He told us at the end of the week he would like to be more involved in the youth ministry next year to continue to grow.
2. Meet a student who just graduated high school and is on her way to an ivy league school in the states. The amazing thing about meeting her is she is still searching for truth. She Dad is a scientist and teaches her evolution, so she is still wrestling with what is truth. She has been actively involved in this youth ministry for years and desires to come to a knowledge of who Jesus is, but is actively wrestling with this. To read more about her... http://kristiwalkeringermany.blogspot.com/2011/08/dedicated-to-helena-hengelbrok.html
3. There is a student who comes from an unsaved family who was saved through this churches ministry, but his parents have been opposed to the gospel for years. One of the nights i had the opportunity to speak, due to circumstances and God's sovereignty his parents had to sit in and listen to the gospel presentation. I found out later that God used that week and his word to urge them closer to himself and they told the church leadership that they want to start coming to church on Sunday's.
4. Every night we had someone share their story with the students. One night we asked a German lady from the church to share her story of how God changed her. Her testimony was an awesome story of God's grace/ mercy and rescue. What was awesome was that it had to be translated into English for the English speaking students at the teen camp. The lady giving her testimony got choked up as well as the translator and many of the audience as we heard of how God rescued her from her sin and how God offers that same salvation to all. Powerful stuff
5. A funny story- one night we were playing water games and their was a poisonous moth that drops hairs that cause a rash, and many of our students came back the next night covered in that rash. The cool part of the story is that night we taught about the 10 plagues and how God allows big things in your life sometime to get your attention and show you your need for a rescuer. Great object lesson.

A Youth Ministry Summer (Week Four - Six)

These three weeks went by in a blur. As I reflect on the events of these three weeks its hard for me to remember specifics, luckily Microsoft Outlook has a better memory than I. After returning from Woodlands camp i had one week of some what normalcy. We went and picked up our children after camp and spent the next weeks having a lot of family time and i was in the office a lot making final preparations for the rest of the summer. But, here are two highlights from these three weeks. 1. VBS- My daughter had the privileged of being involved in Bethel's VBS this summer. It was amazing, very high energy, loud fun and professional. I was awesome being in the office trying to get work done while 600+ children are all over the building, a great week. 2. My wife and i will be in Berlin, Germany for week seven, so in order to make this trip happen we need to again drop the kids of with family. This week my parents, who live in PA, would be taking them. So, Monday we were able to drop the kidos off with mimi and papa. This gave Kaci and I almost a whole week to ourselves. We horribly missed the kids, but it was really nice to have a week long date. (Much needed)
Overall these were some nice and relaxing couple of week during a crazy busy summer.