Making the Most of the Ten Years
January 1st will mark ten years of Dorie and me serving in fulltime local church ministry. What a ride it has been!! As any of us could and most of us do, I think back on those years; I ask myself questions like, "How have I impacted students, parents, and leaders in that time? How have I been impacted by others in that time? What will the next ten years look like?" These are exciting and humbling questions to ask.
Making the most of my time and opportunities in ministry is paramount to my family as well as to student ministry. I can look back and ask the same above questions in regard to my four year old son. "How have I impacted him over the last four years of his life? How has he impacted or changed me? (Boy, I would need a lot more space to answer that one!!) What will I do in the next four years to impact him? What will he look like spiritually as an 8 year old?" Once again, very humbling questions to ask!
For you, over the course of seven years that your student will spend in this student ministry, would you be willing to ask yourself the questions, "What have I done to impact the life of my teenager? How has my teenager impacted or changed me? What will I do to impact my teenager in the years he or she has left in student ministry and beyond? My hope is that these questions would excite you more than they humble you.
No doubt, God is the central figure to the outcome of all of these questions. God can and will take away the fear, impatience, disregard, frustration, discouragement, and more that we have sometimes when raising teenagers if we will simply humble ourselves and come to Him for guidance.
Thank you for impacting your teenager!! Continue to impact them in ways that you will be able to look back on and know that you did what you did because you followed after God as you led and loved your teenager!! Blessings!!
Jason
