Being a Community

NOTE: TO PARTICIPATE IN ANY OF OUR OFF CAMPUS EVENTS, YOU WILL NEED TO FILL OUT A MEDICAL RELEASE FORM. EVERY student AND adult needs to fill one out. The student forms are valid for one year or but should be updated as often as the information changes.

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Being a Loving Community

One of the most important needs that all teenagers have is the need to belong, the need to be accepted and welcomed, to be liked, appreciated, noticed, and valued. At HOPE, we get this. That’s why our youth group feels more like a family than a “ministry”. The adult volunteers serve more as caring “aunts and uncles” or older brothers and sisters who really care about the spiritual growth and development of high school young people. Sometimes they are like mothers and fathers. We care for one another and seek to provide several adults for the teens to look up to, to talk with and ask questions about life. We encourage one another. We pray for one another. We love one another. We celebrate one another.

Community + Worship

We are not just a loving community, however. We are loving community that worships the Living God of Scripture. We seek to know Him, experience His presence, receive His gifts, anointing, love, power, healing, forgiveness, and life. We hunger for more. We seek to live simple, humble, and surrendered lives in pursuit of our one obsession, Jesus.

Community + Worship + Discipleship

We are not just a loving community that worships, however. We are a loving community that worships as we seek to make disciples of Jesus, teaching them to obey all the life giving commands to love God and love people. Our D-groups are one way that we invite our friends to grow deeper in their faith and obedience to the Father, but it’s not the only way. We desire our students and leaders to love the Word, study it daily, teach others how to abide in it, and hear God’s voice through it. Then we desire that we are not just hearers of the Word, but doers doers of the Word (Matt 7:24-29)

Community + Worship + Discipleship + Mission

We are not just a loving community that worships and makes disciples, however. We are a loving community that worships, and makes disciples of all peoples, even to the ends of the earth. We seek to develop a passion for Jesus and His purposes in the earth. We believe that the church is the hope for the world. We believe that the church is the hope for our campuses. We believe that the church is the hope for our families. We believe that the church is the radiant body of Christ, the beautiful expression of God, in flesh, on the face of the earth. We love the local church and have experienced that it’s the best place for broken people who are trapped in darkness to be set free and then grow as fruitful disciples of Christ. It is the church that has the mandate to stand up, stand together, and demolish the spiritual powers and authorities that fuel the unacceptable and horrid injustices of the world. The high schoolers at HOPE are exposed to the heart wrenching realities of injustice and poverty of our community and of our world. They are then challenged to allow Christ’s love and power to flow in them and then through them in both word and deed. We serve the poor in our community, we serve the poor in the slums of Tijuana at least once a year, then we offer short-term trips with the larger church body of HOPE to go to nations that God is leading us to; nations where we have long-term missionaries or associates or nations that are that are unreached by the Gospel. We do the 30 hour famine once a year, and serve at the senior center up the street. Teenagers are equipped, trained, empowered, and then released into ministry. Then we keep repeating this process, over and over and over again, and we have a ton fun along the way!

Gifted – Called – Anointed

So yes, we are a worshiping community on mission to make disciples of all peoples of the earth, starting in our circles of influences and campuses. And in order to develop a passion for Jesus and His purposes on the earth, we must begin to discover the realities of the Holy Spirit in our lives and the differing ways that He has gifted us and anointed us. (Eph 4:11-16, 2 Cor 1:21-22, 1 Cor 12-14) We need to begin to be able to hear and obey the voice of God for ourselves. And we believe that the teen years are the ideal years of opportunity to test the waters, then become rooted and established in the core identity as God’s beloved children, radically loved, radically accepted and embraced, and eternally secure. Jesus calls us first to Himself, then to the world around us. (Matt 11:28-30, John 4:13, 32-42).

We challenge our high school students to not think of college as a means to chase down the American Dream and build up their own lives, careers, and personal kingdoms. Rather they are challenged to think of college as a means to prepare them for their “mission field”, regardless of the career or region of the world that may be. The church needs relevant followers of Christ in each and every aspect of society and culture to redeem every aspect of society and culture. The complex problems of our corrupt and fallen world require sharp minds that are educated and developed and hearts that are compassionate and resposonsive.

If you have questions about the youth ministry at HOPE, please do not hesitate to contact Pastor Mike Gabelman at mikeg@hopechristianfellowship.net.

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