Forever Changed
I’m so proud of the student ministry here at Cross Point. George Stull and his team lead the student ministries which cover three, and soon to be four, campuses. In the past month I’ve heard people describe what’s going on in our student ministries here at CP as a “powerful movement of God among students.” Now that is exciting!
I saw this video the other day from their fall retreat and I couldn’t help but tear up. I’m passionate about seeing churches reach the next generation. I know the direction, support, and love I got from my youth group when I was a teenager forever changed the trajectory of my life. I’ll remain eternally grateful to God for putting a group of adults in my life who were willing to pour into an awkward, misdirected, yet searching teenager.
How about you? Did you have a youth group that impacted you?
Charge Fall Retreat from Cross Point Church on Vimeo.
29 Comments:
I was such a youth group kid – Younglife, K-Life and our church group. So much fun to think back on the trips, the mission work, the meetings. So thankful for the people who invested in me.
Lindsey Nobles´s last blog ..Scaling Back
[Reply]
Lindsey Nobles
7:36 am
I was ALWAYS at Youth. I loved it and my youth minister who took the time to invest his love for me and make sure I knew God loved me and didn’t leave even when I felt like He did. Some of my best friends came from our youth group. That group changed has been with me through thick and thin, to this day. One of these days, I hope God allows me to be a youth minister so I might be able to impact youth as much as I was impacted.
diane´s last blog ..Fun with Leaves
[Reply]
diane
8:00 am
That is one of the primary reasons I got involved as a volunteer with our student ministry. It is an added bonus that I now work for the church in student ministry.
I did not have a youth pastor or adult leader pouring into me as a lost teen. I think it would have made a huge difference in my life and the choices that I made.
Chrystie´s last blog ..Let Me Be Weak
[Reply]
Chrystie
8:09 am
I am so proud of George and his team! They are making a difference in the lives of these kids one person at a time! The power that comes with investing in these kids is so important! We need to all take time to invest in the lives of others. Change in this world does not happen in an instant, but rather through investment and continued love for others! Congrats Georgie on a job well done! I love your heart for others and I enjoy walking alongside you and working to change the world one person at a time!
[Reply]
Ryan
8:27 am
Youth group shaped me in so many ways.
I’m so proud of the team that is investing in the lives of these kids. So cool to see the highlights and hear their comments.
Jenni Catron´s last blog ..I’m Creating a Crisis
[Reply]
Jenni Catron
8:36 am
The best thing I got from youth group was a wife. Mandy and I first met in youth, but it took several years before I could convince her to go out with me. I wasn’t the most consistent youth group kid, and I most certainly wasn’t the most spiritually mature kid either. The men that invested in me during those years made a huge impact on my life and shaping me as a pastor, husband, and father. Thanks Curt & Tim!
Really proud of our SM team at Cross Point, you are making an eternal difference!
Pat Rowland´s last blog ..Advent Week 2
[Reply]
Pat Rowland
9:03 am
That is very cool.
The teens at my church were one of the reasons I was so drawn to that place the first time I visited. They were involved in music and worship, committed to the ministry and to one another, and clearly were growing in God and grace. That’s not something you can immediately see in every church you step into. It’s a powerful witness.
Kristin T. (@kt_writes)´s last blog ..You are a type. Cringe and embrace it.
[Reply]
Kristin T. (@kt_writes)
9:16 am
My chruch didn’t have a youth group when I was growing up, and still doesn’t. It’s an older church in terms of age. But in college my experience with campus ministry was AWESOME. It’s probably the biggest turning point in my faith life. I miss college because of the faith community but we all must move forward and make our own way
Sarah´s last blog ..On The Second Sunday Of Advent
[Reply]
Sarah
9:16 am
My parents basically had two rules. Yes sir and yes ma’am. And when the student ministry at church is open, you’re going.
That was cool with me. Met lifelong friends there. Met my wife there. Met my best man there. Met my college roommates there. Met the coolest minister there that taught me to read music and speak/write the language. Learned to love God there.
Later in life Mindy and I gave back as bible study leaders and student ministry support. And, our kids basically had two rules. Yes sir/yes ma’am, and be involved with student ministry. (oh yeah, and that sex rule)
One daughter left at home, but with the other two, that recipe seemed to work Pete. It’s where life change happens for so many…and I am so blessed to have had it in my life.
[Reply]
woody
9:30 am
Unfortunately, the churches that I attended growing up didn’t have anything like what we see today.
No youth pastors.
No youth specific services.
No youth specific functions (besides camp).
I think I experienced the other side of the spectrum from what we see today. Having worked in the youth ministry as a non-staff leader, I am encouraged and enthused by the heart of our youth today.
However, there are 2 things that we must be very careful of:
1. Creating an ‘experienced-based’ religion. While God does work in those mountain-top moments that we experience in times of worship and fellowship, He is also very much at work in the mundane aspects of our life. Kids need to see that truth as well.
2. Creating a niche mentality. I have seen kids struggle with where they fit in once they graduate from the youth program. All of a sudden they are not part of a banded age group that is close to their own. They are now part of a great sea of ‘old’ people.
I have heard it said that Sunday morning is the most segregated time in the United States. This is most often applied to the race divide, but I would surmise that it may also be very segregated by age.
I am saddened by reports that churches have ‘adults only’ worship services. My children need the times where they are exploring faith with their peers as much as they need the time worshiping God as part of the whole body of Christ.
The foot is very different from the knee, but they both need each other to take a healthy step.
Tony York´s last blog ..Movie Scenes That Stick With You
[Reply]
Tony York
9:30 am
I didn’t have a solid youth group that impacted me growing up. I grew up in a fundamentalist church (and not the good kind of fundamentalist), so the youth group was more of a ‘don’t do this, do this’ type deal instead of a community of grace and the Gospel.
The cool thing though is it actually made me MORE passionate about sharing the Gospel and showing grace to the next generation instead of turning me the other way, so I’m actually thankful for it.
[Reply]
Jon Smith
9:37 am
Since I didn’t meet Christ until 24, I never had the chance to be in a youth group. I’m so glad to see how CP is impacting youth because I wonder how my life would have changed if I’d been exposed to him as a youth.
Jason´s last blog ..Is it always satan who causes us to do dumb things?
[Reply]
Jason
9:46 am
I think I was my youth group. I went to a small church with a youth group that always changed. But yes, it influenced me. One highlight I’ll mention:
Leading worship at a youth camp when I was just 13 years old. I’d done it at my church before, but the dynamic at camp was completely different. I think it went well, but it was a truly humbling experience, that God would use me for such an important task. I still get encouraged from kids (no longer kids now) saying they started playing particular instruments or participating more in church because of that event. And all this because my someone encouraged me to start participating in worship leading.
-Marshall Jones Jr.
bondChristian´s last blog ..What do you have to give away?
[Reply]
bondChristian
9:59 am
I didn’t become a christian until after high school (ten years on December 17th woop!) but I served as youth staff in our high school ministry at my old church. I love the youth. I love watching their eyes light up when the bible starts to make sense to them and they start making it apart of their life.
I love our young adult ministry. God has moved in ways that is not even explainable except that it is the Holy Spirit. The passion that I see in both our Jr high, High School, College and Young adult ministries is awesome!
Tiffany´s last blog ..
[Reply]
Tiffany
10:27 am
So awesome to see God at work in the up and coming generation! The students and young adults of our day are passionate for Christ in their world. I LOVE IT!!
I, unfortunately, did not have an extremely active youth group growing up. I did have the great privilege of going back to my home church as a college intern and serving to lead the youth group for a summer. I saw God at work there for that short time. Later, I served as a student pastor and have recently been reunited with many of those students who are now married and have families of their own. It is such a blessing to hear how God was able to impact their lives through that ministry.
Thanks for all you guys are doing to touch the lives of the next generation!
Randy Kinnick´s last blog ..You’re a Mean One…
[Reply]
Randy Kinnick
10:31 am
Awesome video. Awesome looking youth ministry. Praise God! My youth group experience looked nothing like this and I’m so thankful for exciting, active, “willing to talk about the hard stuff and be real” youth groups like CP’s!
[Reply]
Mike in Milwaukee
11:02 am
My youth group did not help me reach for Jesus. Sad, but true. There was so much turmoil in the generations before us that they had a difficult time getting over themselves…let alone teaching the younger troops.
I learned through watching. And stumbling. A church that focuses on training its youth is beyond words. Hope stirs.
Thanks for sharing.
jessica´s last blog ..Saving Christmas
[Reply]
jessica
11:38 am
I was very involved with my youth group at my church when I was growing up. It definitely helped shaped me. I have found at times when I have felt far from God that I would often desire/search for the same feeling/closeness that I felt when I was in youth.
The past 10 or so years there had been a decline in the youth in my former hometown church. However, when I visited recently I saw that the youth group was growing again not only in numbers but also with God. It’s also being lead by a former youth member from my days!
Julie´s last blog ..Boys, Boys, Boys
[Reply]
Julie
12:42 pm
I was really active in my church’s youth group, but while that laid a solid foundation in my heart, I would say I was more “forever changed” by the group I belonged to in college. I will be thankful for the rest of my life to the Baptist Student Union and what it meant to me.
[Reply]
Mary @ Giving Up on Perfect
12:43 pm
I was never much involved in my church’s youth group until high school. I spent what I consider to be my most formative years (middle school and high school) overseas and the only friends I still am in regular contact with are my friends from that youth group and our youth pastor. We all still live in different states and countries but it is just as important to us today as it was then to encourage each others’ faith. They taught me to completely redirect my path and I know I wouldn’t be as aware of His grace and presence in my daily life now if it weren’t for them. It is so important to invest time in our youth. I never thought I was lost until I realized I had been found. They changed my life forever.
[Reply]
Amy
2:04 pm
@mary, that group had a major impact on me as well!
[Reply]
Pete Wilson
2:36 pm
Since I didn’t grow up in church, I missed the youth group opportunity. But I am so thankful to be a member of a church like Cross Point that does have a fabulous youth group. I look forward to my daughter experiencing this blessing in several years.
Jennifer´s last blog ..Madison
[Reply]
Jennifer
2:52 pm
I definitely had a youth group that impacted me. Pastor Larry was such a wonderful man of God and he cared deeply about all of us youth. I remember all the stupid games he would come up with like one was called Flower Pot. Do not remember how it was played, but I remember the name of the game lol And every year at the beginning of the school year we’d go out to the orange groves and play Mission Impossible. All of us were on teams and we had to get from the bottom of the orange grove to the top where the train tracks were without getting caught by a gunner (a youth leader with a flashlight). If we got caught we had to start again at the beginning (there was a lot of crawling on our stomachs). And at winter retreats we’d play Air Raid and Assassins all weekend. Larry would yell air raid wherever we were and we had to hit the ground as fast as we could. He actually yelled this once in the dining hall in the middle of breakfast. That was real fun. And we did musicals in youth choir and sang from the Petra songbook and went to a Stryper concert (I like to say I had a progressive youth group). My senior year we were going to be going on a trip to San Diego where we were going to do some ocean beach outreach with Point Loma Nazarene University. We were even going to be doing a musical there, but we never did go on the trip. Larry had five seizures in one day and ended up having to step down as youth pastor. Five years later (1991) he passed away from brain cancer. That was the biggest funeral I have ever been to. That said a lot about the love he had for us and how much he cared about us and the impact God allowed him to make on our lives. I still miss him. He used to tell me my senior year of high school that I was on the 5 year plan lol
[Reply]
Kathi Waddle
3:25 pm
while youth group did have an impact on me, i’d have to say that the group of people from the group on campus that i’m involved with have made a bigger impact and continue to do so. =]
Susan´s last blog ..Freedom
[Reply]
Susan
4:15 pm
I didn’t have this. I was such a loner that I think I was fine with it. Now that I am older I realize how important and great community is.
[Reply]
David Knapp
4:19 pm
Our church really lacked in youth groups. I went to Catholic school, so it’s not like I didn’t have that influence, but there was nothing beyond that, outside of school, to join and be a part of. I think it would have made a difference in a lot of lives of kids I grew up with. My first real experience with that type of thing was in college, and I soaked it in like a sponge. It was something I didn’t even know was missing until I experienced it.
gitz´s last blog ..I’m Irish. Where’s My Luck?!?
[Reply]
gitz
6:50 pm
youth group, choir and mission trips – all provided me fundamental scriptural guidelines that though I threw aside during my 20′s, today provide me the knowledge needed to fulfill God’s plan for my life.
[Reply]
Paula
8:43 pm
My youth group from 6-8th grade totally changed my life. I was a Christian before then, but it was during those years I learned what it meant to “own” my faith.
PS – not related, but I moved my blog back to blogger from wordpress, if you could update your link? thanks!
Amanda´s last blog ..Crim Pro – Check!
[Reply]
Amanda
11:12 pm
The student ministry that I was a part of for 4 out of 7 years only had a youth pastor for 9 months, so we as students decided we were going to reach our friends, leader or not, so we as a small group of students stepped up and became the leaders. (I was 14 at the time) Though, my student ministry experience was much different than a lot of other people’s that experience forever changed me and I believe helped shape me for the work I did in Student ministry for many years and now as a pastor.
Nick´s last blog ..The Devastation of Losing Trust
[Reply]
Nick
6:58 am