2011 Youth Report

The 2011 Youth Report

2010-2011 has been a challenging and blessed year for the Selah Covenant Church Youth Groups. As I have entered into my 5^th year of serving as Pastor to the Youth of our community it is a huge blessing to see the fruit of our labor as a congregation as I hear from previous students who are taking lead roles in College campus ministries, leading other youth groups, and becoming stronger in their faith and walks with God.

On the other hand, I also see students who continue to walk away from the faith and take Christianity less seriously as they grow older. This realization drives me to rely more and more on God and His strength and wisdom to reach the generation of youth I have been entrusted with.

Many of the highlights from the year are relational, so they do not make for a good report. The multitude of conversations, prayer times, Bible studies, worship meetings, counseling sessions, and calling kids to account for their actions have been fantastic, but they are too personal to make this report.

So, what does make the report? Activities. And there are a lot of them. And why do we do all these activities?

1. We were created for relationship. Activities foster and grow relationships.

2. We live new and abundant lives in Christ. We celebrate the excitement and vitality of life empowered by the Spirit through our actions and activities.

3. We are called to serve. Activities help us know how to serve one another and many of our activities are service projects as well.

So what were these Activities? I’ll categorize them in three areas: Summer, Activate (Jr. High), and The CORE (High School)

Summer 2010

· Service Projects

o Painting Doors at Robert Lince Elementary School

o Helping set up City Fest (a Luis Palau Evangelistic event)

o Weeding at Rod’s House (a home for homeless teens)

o Weeding and working on the church garden

· Outdoor Club

o Hiking Boulder Cave

o Tubing the Yakima River

· VBS – We have many students helping in various roles at our summer “Egypt: Joseph’s Journey from Prison to Palace” Vacation Bible School.

· Creation Festival – We took 17 people to the Enumclaw Expo Center to hear Christian music, awesome speakers, and enjoy a week of fellowship!

Jr. High Activate

Every Wednesday I was helped by Georgann Howie, Alice Anderson, Bill Maier, and Preston Wade as we spend 1.5 hours playing, eating, worshipping, and studying God’s Word with our group of 7^th to 9^th graders. We began the year with 45-55 students coming and as many of them realized that this was not all fun and games, we shrunk down to 25-35 kids coming consistently.

Our Confirmation Class had 12 kids coming and Riley Maier graduated the two year Discipleship course.

We took a small contingent of 8 students to Thunder Retreat at Cascade’s Camp and had a wonderful weekend there in October.

The 30 Hour Famine was a great weekend that raised $432 toward World Vision and gave our group the opportunity to study how God’s Word calls us to serve the needy in our world.

High School The CORE

We began the year with an outreach event at the Selah High School watching the movie “To Save a Life” on a giant screen at the football field. This started our year off with the focus of reaching our community for Christ.

Brenda and Mel Brink assisted me in leading our weekly Youth Group meetings. Our High school meetings consist of 2 hours of games, snacks, worship, and message. We also often break up into small groups for more personal discussions of how God’s Word applies to our lives.

This year we took 12 students to MUD retreat at Cascade Camp and 17 SCC students to Mexico to build two houses near Tecate with Amor Ministries.

Thanks

Thank you so much for your incredible support of our Youth Ministry. I am so touched by to calls, notes, and encouragement that I receive as Youth Pastor. I am also so blessed by the many donations of food, money, vehicle use and time donated to make these activities possible.

Please pray for God’s continued guidance on our Youth Ministry. Also prayerfully consider how you can be involved in student’s lives as we enter this 2011-2012 season!

In Christ,

Bob Nass