What I want to see...

Over the last few weeks, God has really been working in my heart. I've been reevaluating why we do what we do in youth ministry here at NSM and what I want to see in our youth ministry and students in the future. Out of several days of prayer, soaking in the Word, and spending time with God this list was birthed. It wasn't something that I had set out to create, but rather, was birthed from my heart in a time when I was seeking God for direction.

Sometime this week I'm going to be gathering students to prayer, read this vision, and act on it. You see, this list is more than a mere to do list; it is a vision that I believe we will see come to pass here at Network Student Ministries, if we continue to seek after God. We will be reLaunching our youth ministry next Wednesday, striving to fulfill the vision God has given us. May you be blessed and challenged as you read. Find out what part of this vision touches your heart the most. What can you do to see this come to pass?

What I want to see...

· I want to see students leading other students to Christ inside and outside of our gatherings.

· I want to see students totally devoted to God in every aspect of their life.

· I want to see a youth ministry that moves as one unit to fulfill its purpose.

· I want to see student leadership arise, take ownership of and be committed to this ministry.

· I want to see adult staff leading small groups of students.

· I want to see cell ministry explode in our youth.

· I want to see prayer being a radical passionate outcry to the Lord and the foundation of our ministry; students realizing that if Jesus, being the Son of God, thought that prayer was important, that we should find it important even more so.

· I want to see students using their gifts, talent, and skills for the glory of God, displaying them weekly in our gatherings.

· I want students to dig deep into the Word, strengthening the roots of their faith through personal devotional time, prayer time, giving, serving and accountability so that when they graduate high school they will not be part of the 80% that fall away from Christ.

· I want to see lives totally transformed by the power of Jesus.

· I want to see students coming to Christ; the skaters, emos, rockers, hipsters, preps, nerds, geeks, outcasts, loners, school band members, athletes, the riff raff, forgotten, hurt, discouraged, bullied, poor, the popular, and the affluent.

· I want to see students who run toward the challenge of living for a higher standard than this world has to offer.

· I want to see students for whom apathy is not an option.

· I want to see students who really get and idea of what is happening to their generation; how students are going to Hell in droves, because no one is willing to step up and do anything about it.

· I want to see the end of the church-camp-to-comfortable-Christian cycle; where you get totally rocked by God at a conference or youth camp and lose your fire within weeks of returning home.

· I want to see students totally emptied of themselves so that they can be full of God and be totally lost in Him. That wherever they go people see God through them.

· I want to see students wake up and realize that church and youth ministry is more than songs, games, offerings, hanging out with friends and sitting in a pew to listen to a speaker; that the real reason we are here is to serve God in whatever capacity that God wants to use them, be it litte (like getting the youth hall or LifeGroup room ready and setting up chairs) or large (like drama, welcome team, connection team, worship band, or preaching) and that the reason we do those things is so that other students will come to Christ.

· I want to see students who don’t care about themselves and what makes them feel comfortable, but will do whatever it takes to see their friends, family, and schoolmates changed by the love and sacrifice of Jesus Christ.

· I want to see ministry teams develop beyond the ordinary worship band, welcome team, connection team. I want to see skater outreach teams, food for the hungry teams, and others where students are willing to sacrifice of themselves so that others might see Christ; ministries that people may have never seen before.

· I want to see students take ownership of this ministry.