September 2013 Newsletter

When I arrived 15 short months ago, I only had one leader on the ground at Fort Stewart. He was new to the ministry but had a heart which was passionate toward reaching our students whenever and wherever we could.

A great glimpse of the leadership team we have on the ground gathered together.

Now, I sit at Fort Stewart with nearly 20 active adults on our leadership team only 15 brief months after my initial arrival here in Georgia. People are invigorated to be part of a leadership team and see us reach more students all over the installation. Included in our team are rejuvenated adults coming back from an impactful year and ready to expand even further with our ever-growing student population.

Personally, I feel the biggest area that has brought the most joy to my heart has been the area of spiritual hunger within our leadership team. I felt led to offer a ‘small group’ for ongoing growth for our leaders’ faiths and for us to pray and lift one another up on a regular basis. When I made the suggestion at our leadership meeting, an astounding number of leaders raised their hands showing desire for this opportunity. Then God showed up even bigger. We had 12 adults show up for our first small group. Stories and heartfelt prayer requests were shared within the group and true relational ministry was lived in that evening.

Let’s take a look inside our leadership team and see a few highlights which follow, and one will see how selfless they really are. One pair are a husband and wife team where the husband, Walter, is continually swamped at work in his high-demand job and is assisting wherever necessary with our Chapel Next community as well as a motorcycle ministry dear to his own heart. The wife of this dynamic duo, Cathy, is the current Protestant Women of the Chapel (PWOC) president which is an ever-expanding women’s ministry of the Chapel and keeps her on her toes all the time. If that’s not busy enough, this husband and wife team has 2 young boys whom they adore and they reside about 25 minutes outside of Fort Stewart and endure the commute for God’s call on their lives to serve.

A picture of Jason, although stoic in this picture, he's a
greatguy and our guy students love hanging out with him.

Another leader, Jason, is relatively new to the ministry leadership team, but his passion and his desire to help out outweighs anything. We were initially introduced when he was willing to give us a hand during the Easter breakfast that our students were involved in. As of late, Jason and his wife have joined us in our small group on Mondays and have taken an interest in getting back into their faith and leading their children in that way and then allowing Jason to be filled so he can ‘pour into our youth’ in God’s way. Quoting his wife specifically of the impact of Club on her husband’s life was “Jason has become a better father at home and he has more patience with our own boys now that he has been working with the youth at Club Beyond.”

Finally, we’ve had a fresh couple of faces in another married couple, Mark and Heather. This couple comes with the experience of Heather being a former Club kid from her time spent living in Europe. She specifically remembers what she loved the most about Club Beyond and wanted to see the same for their daughter. They jumped right into things immediately to help out plus they also wanted to assist us in getting our first-ever fundraising committee launched. Mark and Heather too have made the choice to further their own growth in their faith together in joining the Monday night small group, investing in themselves so that they have a great foundation when they are working with the students.

A fun photo of our newest leaders
Mark and Heather.

If it weren’t due to the amazing generosity of so many leaders like those who have come alongside us at Fort Stewart, we wouldn’t have the amazing expansion that we have had over the time here. Our focus this semester is upon the Ten Commandments and how we can show our students the idea that God isn’t just about rules, but He is all about relationship. It’s true that I have been blessed with not just people who come each week to help out, but I am blessed to know each of them and their story. Truly living the idea of loving others more than myself in relational authentic ministry – exactly what we do with our teenagers regularly in this mission.

Honored and humbled to get to work on Christ’s mission here in effort to reach every military teen.

Prayer Requests:

1.       For each member of our leadership team to grow in their own personal walk with Christ, so they can pour into our students.

2.       Our upcoming ‘guys marathon days’ as outreach events, and many are reached!

3.       For the expansion of our ‘beyond club’ small groups to be offered to each age group.