So excited about what God is doing in our Student Ministry. We have been blessed to see a great group of students coming together each Wednesday Night in our Student Worship Service. A couple of years back, we began to pray that God would allow us to have a quality worship service on Wednesday night that would bring Him glory and be relevant to reaching this generation. We prayed that we would see students come to Christ and be changed by the Gospel, that we would see our students make a great impact in our Schools and community. God has answered those prayers in a great way with a gifted worship band that has been so faithful and God has brought many students to our midst. We have seen student led Bible studies launched at the High School led by our students, and many come to Christ during Wednesday Night Student Worship.
As we have been praying about taking our student ministry to the next level, we have felt that God has impressed on us to extend our Wednesday Night Services to allow for time for not only worship and preaching, but for a small group time as well. Beginning August 27th, our Wednesday Night Student Worship will begin at6:30pm. The student band will lead in worship from 6:30 to 7, followed by a preaching time from 7:00-7:30, and small groups meeting from 7:30-8. We know some students may not be able to get there till seven with sports practices and etc, but we encourage them to just get there when they can and join in. As Jim Burns of Youthbuilders and Mark DeVries of Family-Based Youth Ministry have said, "The degree to which students will stay in the church, get involved, and make significant life decisions for Christ is directly dependent on their sense of belonging to the community” It has also been shown that small group ministry produces a deeper spiritual growth than simply meeting for worship. Allowing students to step away from an often intimidating large group of their peers and be in a space where they can ask the questions they wouldn’t feel comfortable asking in a larger setting gives the small group leader a chance to really dig in to the material and make it personal. Since we know that vulnerability (appropriate vulnerability) breeds trust, the small group time is meant to allow our small group leaders to build a stronger foundations with their students, ultimately allowing the relationship to grow and the students to find a strong mentor to walk with throughout their faith journey. Having these type relationships and community produces spiritual growth and maturity and students are much more rooted in the church and their Christian walk. We have a great group of small group leaders that are excited about being able to mentor and come along side students as they grow in the Lord. Pray for our students and our leadership team mentoring them as we continue to point young people to Jesus.
Jesus Blessings.
Pastor Jason 828-371-1167
