It's About Calling Them to Service

From Bill: "[I]n our young high school we shut down for a week in the spring for mission trips designed to help our students live out there faith and realize that serving others while sharing the love of Christ is what God has called us to do. Praise God that we have seen our students graduating with a very real, alive Christian worldview. Many are continuing to seek ways to serve others through short term missions trips, but we are also seeing some who are considering going into full time ministry, both here and abroad. That quote from the Baylor study [that students who are actively serving tend to hang onto their faith] is exactly what we are seeing and we are so thankful that God helped us to see that our students needed opportunities to live out there faith as they serve others."

It's About Calling Them Out

From Jolene: "As a teacher my husband called students to a higher standard, challenged them first, to think, and second, to think Biblically, and given opportunities for rising to the occasion to those thought "beyond help" or with a reputation of unworthiness in regard to simple responsibilities. Within days of the start up of school, a few "tough guys" began to respond to my husband's mentoring and nurturing and challenging. They tried (sometimes succeeding) to change their electives to include more of his classes. They respond to challenges to live honorably by taking on the hardest physical labor involved in agriculture class rather than letting someone else do it or leaving it undone. In biology pond experiments, they volunteer for the grittiest, messiest, or sweat-equity portions of a project. They smile when someone else gets commended for a job well done. And they absolutely glow, yet with humility, when congratulated themselves. They seem to take on honor as an inward motto, and begin to walk in ways that lead to reaching the mark."

It's About Being Good Role Models

From Bill: "Years ago I polled the youth in our church and asked, "How many adults in this church have a walk with God such that when you're their age, you want that kind of walk?  The average answer was two...or less!"

From Anne: "The true solutions come down on our knees, asking God to work out the condemnation, hypocrisy, etc. People don't want to see better Christians. They want to see Jesus. They are starving for Him... not a better us!!...We need a heart for Him... not a more polished suit."

From Ron: "Unfortunately we Christians tend to do one of two things. We either preach a message that is contrary to our actions or we change the message to match our actions.  Either way we come across as hypocritical and it makes us totally ineffective in our witness for Christ."

It's About Living the Truth

From Allen: "Living in the truth will expose and reveal God. Those who reject Him (or us) will at least have been exposed to the truth. We're not compromising truth with these new perceptions, but becoming truth through them."
 
From Beth: "Many christians have slipped into becoming "religious" and not spiritual. These kids aren't dumb and they're watching to see how we adults are living Jesus before them in everyday situations...we're bombing right and left here on the homefront! If we really took the time to see how are lives are matching up to Jesus', we'd be humbled, I'm sure."

It's About Being Honest and Trustworthy

From David: "You said (and I think very rightly and accurately) that millennials are looking for mentors not mass media. Taking that fact a bit further, it is also accurate to say that they require us to prove our difference over time so they can see we are trustworthy. A lot of this starts with our leaders being honest, open, and bold."

In the 1980s the province of Isabela, Philippines was controlled by the New People's Army, an insurgent communist army so threatening that it still makes America's terrorist watch list.

Isabela is now at peace, but there is no air service and the US State Department strongly discourages Americans from going there. If it was up to our American team, Christian schools would probably have never been able to receive the Passing the Baton workshop.

So imagine our excitement when Lili Garcia and Vangie Mandapat, two of the Passing the Baton speakers we trained in the Philippines earlier this year, conducted a Passing the Baton workshop right in Cauayan City, Isabela!

Says Lili, "We prayed for 80 participants and there were actually 115 teachers who came from 20 schools! Two participants came all the way from the nearby province of Cagayan, some even had to cross the great Cagayan River just to be here!"

So many people came that the group had to move from the Merry Sunshine school to the Jesus Christ the Deliverer Church in Cauyan City.

The responses of the attendees displayed great enthusiasm at being charged with passing the baton of godly faithfulness to the next generation:

• "The task of being  responsible leader passing the baton is a serious task God has entrusted unto us, an opportunity we shouldn't miss! We are accountable to God for the fulfillment of that task and we should take courage doing that!"
• "I am in this world as a teacher to change the world. I was encouraged much to continue on teaching and to be  a part in the great commission. Sana maulit muli (Hope we'll have another one like this!)."
• "I learned that being a teacher is not just a lesson bearer, but we have a great responsibility to develop character and bring our students closer to the Giver of their life."
• "Very nice and practical topics.  Excellent speakers!"
• "Great lesson!  Bible-based and the examples given were very real!"
• Much passion from the speakers on the seriousness of Passing the baton correctly. I strongly agree!"
• "I thought 'imparting knowledge' is already a noble calling, but now I realize that my highest calling should be DISCIPLING!"

We're thrilled to see that our investment in "training the trainers" is having an impact in places we cannot reach. We pray that by 2015 we will have hundreds, if not thousands, of trained speakers who can deliver the Passing the Baton workshop in churches and Christian schools all over the world.