Jason Lamer Interview

This week's class interview was with Jason Lamer, a Youth Alive missionary. Youth Alive is a "multi-faceted strategy to bring Jesus Christ, the message of Hope, to our middle school, junior high and high school campuses". Youth Alive provides the students with the means and support to reach their friends and classmates with the gospel. Their (Jason and his wife)focus is on the public schools in Pennsylvania and Delaware.

This ministry is great for several reasons: 1) The events are pre-prayed for weeks in advance (great battle-winning strategy); 2)schools, churches, and communities come together in support of an event that has the potential for not just impacting the kids in that community for Christ, but the whole community itself; 3)Since it's student-led, the students develop leadership skills that will go with them into adulthood; 4)There is follow-up afterwards: the students that gave their lives to Christ can get plugged into a local church and continue to grow spiritually; and 5)campus missionaries get campus clubs started to live, pray, tell, serve, and give more of Jesus.

It's apparent the way Jason's eyes light up when he talks that he loves what he does. I like that he gets his family involved in this ministry; that they WANT to be involved. Not only are they serving the Lord together, but they are teaching valuable lessons to their kids about God and His love, relationship building, leadership skills, how to have a servant's heart, placing other's needs above your own, and I'm sure many more. Not only do they get to hear about what the Bible teaches, they get to see it put into action. That's a priceless gift.

Challenges: raising more funds; wanting to reach more kids; not having enough time, manpower, and energy to do it all; keeping priorities straight---not being so busy serving God that you mistake that for time just being WITH God. Busyness for God, although important, is not the same thing as being still and knowing God. I wouldn't benefit much from creative, fly-by devotions. This may sound strange to some, but I think the answer to trying to find the time, resources, and energy to do what needs to be done comes by taking/scheduling a long enough time to still yourself and just be with God everyday. He knows what needs we have and will either care for those needs or give us the wisdom and peace we need to accomplish them.