- January 25, 2012
This year started off with a bang as we celebrated the grand opening of our new youth room! As you may be aware, we actually moved into the rooms last January. But, before we invited our mayor and other special guests, we wanted to make sure we had the room well-equipped and decorated...and that took some time.
We began planning the event in November, and invited other youth groups in the region to come celebrate with us. We also invited in a special guest worship leader to rock the house.
On the evening of January 7th we ended up having 76 youth in attendance, as well as the mayor of our city. We opened the night with an official dedication, during which the mayor gave a short speech thanking us for caring about Trostberg's youth and giving them a foundation for their lives, not just a fun time. At the end of the dedication, we prayed and committed the facility to the Lord's use.
We had youth groups come from about six different towns, from as far as 45 minutes away. After the dedication part of the night we had a youth service, during which I preached a message about believing God for something big - that He still does miracles! The power of God was evident during the youth service, with several youth coming forward to share what the Lord had put on their hearts.
One comment we kept hearing was, "Thank you for inviting us. God really touched my life tonight. Make sure and do this again soon!" And that's what we're planning to do. We have our weekly youth group time, but we're also planning other events to continue to make a bigger impact in our region. And you're a part of that through your prayers and giving! TOGETHER we're making a difference!!!
Finishing the Year with MOMENTUM in the youth!!!- December 31, 2012
I hope you had a wonderful Christmas and were able to encounter Jesus on His birthday! We had Kirsten's parents visit us over Christmas and it was a wondeful time, especially for our kids.
As we finish off the year, I wanted to give you an glimpse of how things are looking right now. Although we had a series of challenges in the youth ministry this year, we've had a very nice end to the year and are excited about where this will lead us in the coming one!
I mentioned in the last post that we'd been talking about "the Opposite Sex" in youth, and how well that was received. We have now moved out of that series and begun talking about Spiritual Fitness.
I'm happy to say that the changes we've made in the last couple months in the youth continue to bear fruit! One of our young men paid us a huge unsolicited compliment the other day, basically saying, "I can't describe exactly "why," but youth has just been the bomb recently. It's just been awesome somehow!"
We're currently developing plans for next year to build on this momentum and take the youth ministry to the next level...and win more teens! Please be believing with us for wisdom in planning and for the youth to be engaged and active in carrying out these plans! Together we're reaching young people in Europe!
Jesus was MANLY!!!- November 18th, 2011
The last month in youth we have been teaching about "the opposite sex." We've been teaching about the purpose of the sexes and what each one brings to life and relationships. We've also taken a week for each of the individual sexes to highlight the attributes and qualities of that sex. The week where our subject was "being male" was especially interesting.
During that message I highlighted the manliness of Jesus. I talked about Him being strong and bold, even violent when necessary. I specifically went through the account of Him driving the money-changers from the Temple, and explained that actually He made His own whip ahead of time to get ready for this job. It wasn't an accident that He did what He did, how He did. It was thought through, purposeful and necessary.
The teaching obviously made an impact on our young men - as much as any message I've ever preached. Each one of them had significant things to say about Jesus as we had our small-group time later in the evening. The comments varied, but essentially had to do with the fact that they'd always seen Jesus as sort of a wimpy, emotional, victimized man, but now they see Him as strong, tough and manly. The look on each of their faces was priceless! I could see that Jesus had been exalted in their eyes and they now admire their Savior and King.
Thank you for your prayers and support of our ministry! Together we were able to reveal the Lion of Judah to young men in Germany, who now want to be like Him. Together we're making a difference in Europe!
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