Finding Community

As I mentioned yesterday, the youth ministry of the Union Church of Hinsdale had no sense of true community when I arrived there in 2000. Turning it from a "youth group" into an Acts 2:42 fellowship was high on my list of priorities- although I admit that list was very long.  The more that I became aware that God's purpose for me in Illinois was to Plow the Road, the more important building that fellowship became.  When I started our small group Bible study in the Fall of 2000, I had no idea what God was about to do to my life and that ministry.

The group that was to become the core of our Acts 2:42 project at UC had a lot in common with the disciples of Jesus.  They were a odd collection of ragamuffins, misfits and outcasts.  Many of them didn't own a bible when we started.  Kristen Mann was involved in numerous school activities and never made it to youth group on Sunday.  Greta Staat, though only a freshman, had "leader" written all over her.  One had tried to kill herself twice in the preceding months.  Cara Stevens was much younger than the rest of the group; she was also the furthest along on her spiritual journey.  The three guys who were coming had previously seemed to me like total goofballs.  And almost none of them had strong relationships with one another.  It hardly seemed like a group that could change the culture of an entire church.

But they did just that.  The more we were together, the more they wanted to be together. We were finding community.  We studied the very basics of our faith in scripture.  We prayed together each week- and I discovered only a couple of them had ever prayed out loud before.  We brought in food and occasionally did our study at the Jade Dragon for dinner.  We became a fellowship, sharing life together and learning to lean on one another and on Jesus.  We began discussing life's important issues and how faith could and should be a part of our everyday lives.  It was incredible to watch what happened to that little group in one school year.  And David Knecht- the person to whom I felt God was entrusting the long term care of that ministry- was a part of all of it as well.  When it finally came time for me to leave UC in October of 2001 I had trouble letting to of that amazing, spirit-filled bunch.

When you spend as many years in ministry as I did, hindsight often gives you surprising answers when you seek to determine the people who had the most impact on your life.  The names you see above would fit that description.  And tomorrow I will induct into my Youth Group Hall of Fame a co-worker from Kissimmee who is always on my mind in the Christmas season and should have made the HOF way before now.  See you then!

Jesus- the only hope for me is you...and You alone!