Each year we give an exit interview to our Senior youth ministry students. We ask questions about ministry abilities, beliefs, personal devotional life, and other things. The students are always really nervous, but it has become one of my favorite parts of my job.
Yesterday we interviewed Kareny and Josue, a couple from Monterrey who will be graduating in June (if they pass all their classes next quarter). Their stories reminded me of how God works in our lives and weaves His grace into every circumstance.
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On May 18-19 of this year, over 700 youth leaders from all of Mexico are coming to Mexico City for the National Youth Specialties Summit. It is going to be a great time of training, connecting, and motivating.
I have been working with the team who is planning the Summit. My job is to help coordinate the breakout workshops, so I’m working on topics and logistics for that part. I will also be teaching a workshop and a “super-course”, so I would appreciate your prayers.
I have been praying that this event will change Mexico by motivating and encouraging the youth workers who attend. Please pray for this event and those who will be in attendance.
I’ve mentioned our certificate in youth ministry program before, but I wanted to share here about our new group of students in the city of Oaxaca.
A few years ago we started a program that would offer youth ministry training for those who couldn’t come to Seminary full time. It worked well in Mexico City. Then one of our students from the Bachelor’s degree wanted to take it back to his home city of Puerto Escondido (in the State of Oaxaca), so he started teaching last August.
Then a pastor living in Oaxaca City contacted Juan, our graduate, and asked if we could open a group in Oaxaca. We started that this month with 20 students.
Then a graduate of the Seminary who lives in Puebla asked me if we could help with youth ministry training at an extension of our Seminary in that city. After talking it over with the Seminary dean, we decided we could start in August.
So right now we have over 50 students studying on Saturdays in the certificate program, and next fall we should have at least 65 students. This summer we will have around 30 graduates from this certificate level program, and some of them have already expressed interest in continuing their studies at the Bachelor’s degree level.
It’s exciting for me to see that the interest in youth ministry training is increasing all over the country. We are constantly getting requests to do conferences and participate in various projects to propel youth ministry in Mexico.
Unfortunately, we can’t always say yes to every opportunity. We have two basic needs. We need more professors, and we need more resources. Please pray for God to grow our team. Also pray for more financial resources. If you would like to donate to help us train more youth workers, please check our our ministry partner team page to find out all the ways you can give to this ministry.
This quarter at the Seminary I’m teaching a class called, “Contemporary Youth Missions.” Each of my students is planning a mission trip to a different country.
As part of their project, each student has to give a presentation about the country to which they are planning their trip. Yesterday we heard about Ecuador and Bolivia.
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Maybe it’s because I’m teaching “Contemporary Youth Missions” this term. Maybe it’s because my class is reading part of “Let the Nations be Glad: the Supremacy of God in Missions” by John Piper (affiliate link). Or maybe it’s just because God has been impressing this on my heart. I’m not sure, but I do know that the Great Commission has been on my mind a lot lately.
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At the end of December, I saw that one of my Spanish speaking friends on twitter posted a picture from his youth ministry with the caption “Esto es Ministerio Juvenil”, which means, “This is youth ministry” in Spanish. It gave me an idea to do a contest asking our friends to send in a picture they thought would show what youth ministry is.
We had over 60 photos sent in for the contest. It was really fun to see the representations from different countries. People sent in pictures from Columbia, Mexico, Panama, Ecuador, and other places.
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