For Sunday School, 9th graders are allowed to stay if they want or they can attend the service. In Fall, we had a 15 week study with the girls based on the book “Sexy Girls, How Hot is Too Hot?” Don’t be alarmed by the title, it was meant to catch the girls attention. It dealt with Christian morals on modesty and respect of one’s self and the reality of benefits that come along with good decision making or consequences of mistakes. At the same time, Wes led a 15 week guys study based on the book “The Young Man in the Mirror.” This study was to teach guys since they are becoming a man…how to be a real man and a man of God. It dealt with a great variety of topics from your direction in life, Christianity, healthy relationships, how to treat women, integrity, and plain old life skills. For Spring, we are back together, guys and girls, studying the book “Facing Your Giants.” It is based on the story of David and Goliath. Each chapter deals with a different giant we may face and like David’s example, how to stay God-focused rather than giant-focused.


















For Youth Group, we usually have an activity, eat pizza, and study God’s Word. We are using 24/7 Ministries curriculum which teaches teens that their Christian walk is a 24 hours a day, 7 days a week adventure. The Middle School curriculum is called “Trek” and the High School curriculum is called “Journey”. For high school, we studied I Corinthians the first half of the year. The curriculum taught us great historical details about the society of Corinth and the struggles the church of Corinth faced. We understood why Paul even had to write back to the church of Corinth and we learned that what we face in our world today is not that much different. The group chose an elective study they wanted for the second half of the year which happened to be “Faith on Trial.” It is an excellent, deep apologetics study of several topics. Each lesson is a court room theme where we learn the prosecution’s side (an atheist) and the defense’s side. It is important that we study both sides so we will be educated to have an intellectual conversation with someone about the Bible. Both Curriculum's are strong Bible studies relevant to the age of the kids and encourage Scripture memorization. The youth group has also decided to sponsor a child in Rwanda, Africa through Compassion International. We write to our 5 year old little boy monthly along with sending support. This has been a big reminder to us of how blessed we are and how we should help others. We were proud of the kids for deciding to do this as a youth group on their own.

Because 24/7 is a branch of Awana (which is an amazing program) we were able to participate in new fun activities. We got to take the Middle Schoolers to the annual Awana Olympics where we took on other churches throughout the state of Florida in 10 events. Our Middle School team won their circle and got to go to finals. At finals they surprised everyone with a 3rd place finish their first year at the competition. The coolest part was that they all memorized 8 key verses of the faith in order to compete. We were so proud of them!! Although grounded Bible study is the most important element of Awana, they do a fantastic job of providing outside activities that draw teens in.

A Ministry Team has been formed of teens that have stepped up and said they are interested in being leaders in youth group. My prayer is that more teens, as they move up through middle school youth group and into high school, would commit to be a leader. We are looking mainly for three things amongst the leaders; spiritual growth, faithfulness, and help with planning ideas and befriending visitors. There are occasional Ministry Team meetings.

Events - We kept up the tradition of Night of Joy and WAYFEST. We had a couple weekend retreats. One was to River Ranch, FL where they have a Saturday night rodeo show, archery, skeet shooting, swimming, paintballing, etc. Plus, we had games, an ice cream social, and Bible studies on how to live where you Leave a Legacy. We also had a retreat at Disney’s Ft. Wilderness in Orlando. The theme for our Bible studies will be the life of King Josiah. With no godly training and the Bible lost, he was only a teenager when he found God’s Word, took a stand, and turned a whole nation back to God! Ft. Wilderness offers lots of fun activities for free time. Plus as a group, we had a survivor contest on the beach with clues relating to the lessons, an arcade visit at the Contemporary, and a large screen outdoor movie. We had some other smaller fun events throughout the year such as the parent/teen party. This was meant to provide a night where teens and parents could have fun together (in some cases, to the teens surprise). We ate dinner (teens served parents first) and played some fun games like army cot races, relays, and guessing questions of how well teens know parents and vice versa. We also have tons of summer events! The teens help with VBS and have a wonderful mission trip to North Carolina. We go for a week to Asheville and help repair the house of an underprivileged family. This trip is a wonderful tradition because it gives us not only a mission trip, but a Christian camp experience as well. Each morning we worship and are challenged by a message along with several other churches and then all the churches go to their work site during the day. In the evenings, the teens have free time for Christian fellowship. We take Wed. off of work and go white water rafting. We do several fund raisers for this trip to make the cost very affordable. We have about 3 events a week all summer…usually two fun and one community service activity to provide an option for the teens in town at the time. We also have combined youth group on the beach which is a great change up. We play, eat, and have devotion in God’s beautiful creation of the beach.

We have Youth Choir which rehearses once a week and sings in church about once a month. They are a talented group of teens that have fun together. We recently had a Youth Sunday in church in which the teens got to do everything from greeting, ushering, leading songs, children’s time, prayers, and preaching. We were so proud of them for stepping up to lead a worship service.