Q&A with Brad

Brad Curtis is the Student Life Director at First UMC in Springfield, IL. He brought his group to the Osage Nation community this summer.

 

Why has YouthWorks been meaningful for you and your students?

 

Before partnering with YouthWorks our church – First UMC in Springfield, IL – worked with the same mission organization for nearly 25 years. While this organization excelled at connecting students with meaningful work projects, somewhere along the way they lost sight of the purpose of these acts of service: pointing people to the Risen Savior Jesus Christ.

 

YouthWorks has been instrumental in aiding my student ministry is helping our students understand this principle. Whereas, before, our students came home from missions trips grateful for all of the “stuff” they had and discussing how “blessed” they were, for the past two years our students have traveled home aching to serve their local community so that the glory of God would be revealed in and through them. They are beginning to realize that being the hands and feet of Jesus means serving “the least of these” and also being an agent of God’s restoration of his good creation by first allowing the love of God to be shed abroad in their own hearts and lives.

 

What are some specific highlights from your trips?

 

Without a doubt our amazing site staff was a HUGE highlight from the trip. They went out of their way to make our students feel loved and appreciated. They also spent an incredible amount of time loving on our adult leaders.

 

Beyond that, our students were incredibly blessed by the theme of the week. Many of my students come from very high-capacity, competitive home lives. That is to say, they are pushed to excel in all areas of their lives, even to the point of harmful results on their self-esteem and ability to enjoy being teenagers. I can’t count the times during the week one of my students expressed a sense of freedom in being able to claim that, yes, they are broken and imperfect but that did not disqualify them from being pursued and restored by God.

 

The unrealistic standards and expectations they may wrestle with at home did not mean that they were not uniquely created in the image of God to participate in his mission of redemption and restoration. My students found freedom in knowing that while they are imperfect, the perfect love of God sought them out and is daily drawing them into the incredible story of a resurrected and restored creation that God is writing IN and THROUGH his people.

 

How have summer staff been valuable in helping create meaningful experiences for students?

 

Again, I can’t say enough good things about our site staff: Michael, Vince, Kelly and E.B. They loved and served me and my students without any thought of their own exhaustion. Many of my students have expressed interest not only in serving with YouthWorks again next year but also in serving as site staff in the future. Their example has sparked in my students a desire to do and be more than passive “Christians” who put their own self-interest ahead of the needs of others. Our site staff helped my students create memories and explore new aspects of discipleship that will continue to challenge and encourage them to grow into the men and women God created them to be.