In Ephesians 4:11-16 the apostle Paul shows the relationship between pastors and those they serve. Pastors are given by Christ to the church "to equip the saints for the work of service" (Ephesians 4:12). It is vital that our students take what they learn in our student ministry and go out into the community and to the rest of the world to serve. In this brief article I would like to share about a recent experience God gave the students to take what they learn and serve others.

Our student ministry was recently invited by the Northpoint Healthcare Facility to perform a service for the in-patients. We had a little over a month to prepare. My desire was to have a student only service similar to the way we do things here at Wellington on a Sunday morning.  One of our students, Drew Koenig, has shown an interest in ministry and so Drew was given the opportunity to teach from God's Word. He chose to teach on John 3:1-21. His topic was on what it means to be born again and how someone is truly born again. I had the privilege of meeting with Drew as he prepared and it was a thrill to watch Drew think through those verses, what they say, what they mean and how to best communicate God's Word. Drew did an excellent job.

Other students showed a desire to lead in worship. Cody Oney and Victor Castro met together and prepared several songs. Cody played the guitar while Victor played the bass.  Charlotte Castro, Sydney Atterbury, Kate Davis and Kristy Koenig helped lead the singing. It was very encouraging to my own heart to be led into worship by those I seek to serve here on a weekly basis.

One of the most important opportunities of service was inviting people to attend our service. Sandy Oney did an excellent job walking around room to room, telling people who we were and inviting them to come. When we got there another church had shown up and taken over the room we were supposed to be using, but that did not stop us from following through with the opportunity. We were able to use another room, and through Sandy's hard work, we probably had around 10-12 ladies who were able to join in the service, one of which was Robbie Shawley who is our oldest member at Wellington Church. I was thankful that the students were able to follow through on their preparation and the people at Northpoint were adequately served.

The early church gathered for worship and scattered to witness. For them to remain in one place in Jerusalem would have stifled the purpose of the Holy Spirit. We want to model the mission of the early church. We gather to sit under God's Word to make sure we have an accurate understanding of who He is, but we do not want to stop there. We want to take the truth out from here and share it in a loving way with the world around us. Please join me in praying that God would continue to provide opportunities for our student ministry to serve in the community and the rest of the world.

Hope this helps,

Blake