Youth Worker's Congress

Last weekend, I attended the Youth Worker’s Congress in San Jose for youth pastors and youth leaders. It was an awesome time. The chance to hang out with Matt, Lynn, Jason, Sharmin, and the interns is always fun.

The first session was taught by Pastor Eddie Rentz on dealing with discouragement. What a powerful session. He shared that every minister will deal with discouragement, but the difference maker is how it is handled. Part of it is knowing where the Source of your strength is. Many ministers are taken out because they don’t handle discouragement well. It was very good.

The second and third session were by Pastor Richard Crisco. Pastor Crisco was the youth pastor at Brownsville Assembly of God during the revival that began in 1995. Never in my life have I seen anyone more passionate about getting teenagers connected to the heart and person of God. Both of his sessions were powerful, convicting, and challenging.

His first session was on community, the core of Christianity. An interesting point he made was that Adam had the perfect relationship with God before the Fall. He had everything he could possibly want, and God still said it wasn’t good for him to be alone. So He made the woman, a companion for him. Even though Adam had a perfect relationship with God, he still needed other people, and so do we. It was good stuff.

His second session was what every teenager wants. It boiled down to a few things. They want leaders, not friends, who are brutally honest. They want people to lead them to a place where they can meet God. They want people that are real with their lives. They want people to teach them how to succeed in life. Ultimately, they want to be loved more than anything else. Those were the highlights. I remember that a lot of it hit me.

I missed the fourth session with Pastor Abe Daniels. Jason, Chase, Richard and I had to return to do Switch that night, which I’ll talk about in the next post. After Switch, we drove back that night to San Jose for the remainder of the Congress.

The last session was on your motives in ministry, by Pastor Bret Allen. Every time I hear him speak, I am not only challenged, but it really moves me to change. God will judge us not on our performance in ministry, but our reasons behind it. The why is far more important than the what. May I be constantly reminded of the why as I do ministry.