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Nehemiah

This is Exciting!

By Nehemiah, Local FP Communities
We received the email below from a new club that launched this year and we just had to share it!

“I know I recently sent you an email but I just had to send another one after experiencing the launch of First Priority this morning at our school.” This group took jumping multiple hurdles to begin! It started the first time 6-8 weeks ago. Everything seemed to be moving along, but it was quickly shut down by the administration. There was confusion of what First Priority really was. After much parent and student involvement, conferences with staff and emails, today finally arrived as our new official launch. The leader team is 5 7th grade girls and their faith will inspire yours in minutes! They are oozing with excitement for the Lord and preparing days in advance. (Something quite notable with their younger age!) It is the only group that is meeting before school and at 7:15am! But that did not stop students from coming. 47 students came this morning!! They had to borrow chairs from the other teacher’s classrooms next door.  It is the first meeting and we are at our max! We will look into meeting in the media center next. The teacher host told me she was up at 4am praying over this meeting. The director of FCA is supporting First Priority by graciously sponsoring all of the donuts this year. Today he met me in the parking lot at 7am with 48 donuts and two boxes of donut holes. While picking up the donuts, he strikes up a conversation with someone who just so happens to be a past substitute teacher for our school and he tells him that he has been praying over that school to experience God. I am so amazed at what God is doing here!

The girls opened the meeting reading about love from 1st Corinthians and shared that THIS is how God loves us. Then they went around the room and every single person gave a suggestion of what loving others could look like on their school campus. I was speechless. It was so beautiful. Afterwards, a student said, “Wow, that was so soothing.” Next week, we are going to jump right in to Engage week and let a male student share his faith story. Apparently, it is an amazing story and he is excited to share it. He will be moving soon, so we are changing things up a bit to give him the chance to speak.

Please be praying over this student and the gal who will share the Gospel afterwards.

Wow! God is moving. What an incredible story of faithfulness. Be encouraged and know that God can move where you are too!

Campus Ministry is Student Ministry

By FP Tools, Nehemiah, Local FP Communities

By Cameron Crow

I recently started my second year in Campus Ministry, and it is amazing. God is doing great things through the obedience of a few students who are being bold in their faith. One of the best experiences, not only as a Student Pastor, but as a Christian, is watching a student lead another student to a relationship with Christ. Last year, we saw over 60 students in one high school give their hearts to Christ. One of my favorite stories is of a senior named Noemi during an evangelism training meeting. We were in the middle of reviewing the “3 Circles Evangelism Tool,” by Jimmy Scroggins, that we had used all semester when Noemi promptly exited the room with no explanation. She opened the door and rushed out leaving us all in a confused state. Three minutes later she returned back to the room to ecstatically introduce us to our newest brother in Christ.

Noemi saw her fellow classmates through spiritual eyes and wanted to give each one of them a chance to respond to the Gospel. Her passion for her campus and her obedience to God’s calling on her life was addicting. Together with Chelsea and Carrie, Noemi gave over 1,000 students a chance to respond to Jesus Christ and to be equipped to share the gospel on their own. That year, our Christian Club grew from 8 students at our first meeting to upwards of 300 students squeezed into a much larger room. This was my introduction to Campus Ministry.

CAMPUS MINISTRY IS VITAL TO REACHING STUDENTS

In my opinion, Campus Ministry is the most effective form of Student Ministry. It is more effective to go to them than to attempt to get them to you. The days of 1990s event driven Student Ministries are in the past. Don’t get me wrong, events are still a vital part of Student Ministry, just not the central focus anymore. No matter how cool or relevant your ministry is, you will not be able to draw that many students to your church. The reality is that students spend 25% of their waking hours at school, and you cannot compete with that. So, like the old saying goes, “If you can’t beat them, join them.”

The majority of our campuses are plagued with the religion of “False Christianity.” Every day I encounter students on campus that tell me they are a Christian. Upon further discussion, we discover that their “Christianity” holds that salvation is obtained through inheritance, church attendance, good deeds, etc. According to the Pew Research Center in 2014, two-thirds of people under 30 do not go to church regularly, much less have a relationship with Christ. That means over two-thirds of students are lost and going to spend eternity away from God if we do not bring the Gospel of Jesus Christ directly to them. This is our mission field as Student Pastors. Matthew 9:37-38 says it like this, “The harvest is plentiful but the workers are few. Ask the Lord of the harvest, therefore, to send out workers into His harvest field.”

THE BIBLE IS ALLOWED ON CAMPUS

I remember sitting in a principal’s office as we reviewed the different clubs on campus and how our Christian Club could be effective. As we were scrolling through the list, the ex-Student Pastor turned high school principal grumbled on the fact that political correctness had infiltrated the schools. He voiced his concern at the message that these clubs promoted and his desire for them to go away. It was at this point God grabbed my attention with this one verse, “For the word of God is living and active, sharper than any two-edged sword, piercing to the division of soul and of spirit, of joints and of marrow, and discerning the thoughts and intentions of the heart,” Hebrews 4:12. God reminded me that HIS proclaimed message was stronger than any secular agenda that was currently popular. He also pointed out to me that not only did this group of students need to hear the Gospel of Jesus Christ, but He had gathered them all together in a group so that they were easier to reach.

It is popular for Christians to plaster social media with the issue of Christ being taken out of schools and blame the politicians for removing the Bible from campuses. THIS THINKING IS DEMONIC. Legally, Christ and the Bible are allowed on campus, but stupid people are not. When a Student Pastor stands on a table in the cafeteria with a “Turn or Burn” 1980’s style message, he forces the school administrators to guard their school against becoming a distraction instead of a place of learning. By discovering and respecting the campus rules and district policies, student pastors can infiltrate our school campuses with the gospel of Jesus Christ. Schedule a meeting with the principals and/or superintendents to learn how you can PARTNER with them to better their campus. School administrators would love to have all of the behavior issues removed from their campus. We just have to do it the right way, relationally.

TRANSFORMATION DOES HAPPEN ON CAMPUS

This year was a frustrating start for me on campus. God had called me from Houston, Texas to Big Spring, Texas in late August. We had to start all over at a different school, with a different culture, and a different group of students. We had to find a different way to reach students on this campus than how we did in Houston. Starting the new school year, we offered Bible studies and training sessions. We were inviting students to attend through morning announcements, 3″x 3″ personal invite cards, and school approved posters. None of this worked. We rejoiced in the fruit of two students who give their hearts to Christ, but we knew there was more in store. My pastor growing up always said, “Figure out what God is up to and get on board.”

We started praying and seeking what God would have for Big Spring High School. In what way did he want to reach these students? Through this process we began to be drawn to First Priority of America. First Priority of America is an organization that I knew from past ministry opportunities, but I had never worked with them. As we continued to seek God’s will, meetings began to happen between the First Priority regional director (40 minutes down the road) and us. Stories started to pile up of how God was moving in the Midland/Odessa Area where over 600 students had given their lives to Christ. God is moving through the obedience of 26 First Priority Clubs in Midland/Odessa, Texas. We immediately knew this was how God was moving and we needed to jump on board. God is moving on School Campuses across America and lives are being transformed.

PARTNERSHIP IS IMPORTANT!

What I am about to say will be affirmed by almost every local pastor vocally. The devil is secretly attacking each of us in this area, targeting our flesh and our pride. It is easy to focus on growing our own ministry rather than the entire body of Christ. We are called to work together as pastors, not against each other. We must get rid of our selfishness, bitterness, and pride, and build up each other in the faith. Paul says it like this in 1 Corinthians 12:12-14, “For just as the body is one and has many members, and all the members of the body, though many, are one body, so it is with Christ. For in one Spirit we were all baptized into one body—Jews or Greeks, slaves or free—and all were made to drink of one Spirit. For the body does not consist of one member but of many.”

Not only is it important to partner with ministers from other churches, it is important for us to partner with different ministries. When God moved me from Houston to Big Spring, He decreased the ministry budget that I had been used to. The best way for us to do Campus Ministry effectively in this new reality was through partnering with First Priority of America. First Priority of America not only brought a huge financial help, they were able to fulfill the lack of structure and excitement that our current Christian Club desperately needed. First Priority provides each club with curriculum, student leadership training, and a structure designed for success. Through local donations, each student that attends also receives a t-shirt in their school colors, a lanyard, donuts, and a chance to win really great prizes. The excitement generated by the structure and promotional items gets students to the club, while the training allows for the development of student leaders to lead their friends to Christ.

FOLLOW UP…FOLLOW UP…FOLLOW UP

Follow up is where Campus Ministry and your Student Ministry connect. Getting students from campus to your church happens here. As students make decisions to follow Christ or grow in their relationship with Christ, they will naturally begin seeking a place to connect. You are that connection point. This does not mean that students end up always attending your Student Ministry. It means students are connecting to a Bible believing church where they feel comfortable and able to grow in their walk with Jesus Christ.

I have learned that getting students involved in church is tricky. Students typically do not just jump in feet first. It takes some encouragement. The threshold of any church is scary to cross. So how do we work to fix this awkward disconnect? Relationship, relationship, relationship. We must constantly work on teaching our student leaders to be relational as well as leading by example. Students will not do what we say. They will do what we model. Be their Barnabas. Lead and train up Paul’s to go out into a broken world to be the light on the hill.

OTHER WAYS TO MAKE AN IMPACT

I have found that Christian Clubs alone are not the most effective way to do Campus Ministry. Campus Ministry needs to be a well-rounded strategy, not just a box to check off each week. Not only do we need to be ministering to the students, but we need to be ministering to teachers, staff, administrators, and parents. In Matthew 28:18-20 Jesus lays out the Great Commission in this way, “All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me. Go therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all that I have commanded you. And behold, I am with you always, to the end of the age.” We need to look at the Great Commission in a way that we normally do not. We need to find the different “nations” on our school campus and strategize ways to reach each one. Click here to see a few different ideas to reach local school campuses for the Gospel of Jesus Christ.

God calls us to go. When we follow the calling that He has on our lives, we get to dwell in the blessings that He has prepared for us. Student Ministry must be a calling that you are willing to go to the ends of the earth to fulfill. You have been called to a mission field full of nations. Are you willing to do whatever it takes to reach those different nations? How will you be obedient to the calling God has on your life?

Your Day of Prayer

By Nehemiah

We send this out the most.  If you have been on our list for two years, you have seen this at least four times.  The heart and burden is what is most important. O Lord God of heaven, the great and awesome God who keeps covenant and steadfast love with those who love him and keep his commandments, let your ear be attentive and your eyes open, to hear the prayer of your servant that I now pray before you day and night for the people of ________ your servants, confessing the sins of the people of __________, which we have sinned against you.  Even I and my father’s house have sinned.  We have acted very corruptly against you and have not kept the commandments, the statutes, and the rules that you commanded your servant Moses.  Remember the word that you commanded your servant Moses, saying, ‘If you are unfaithful, I will scatter you among the peoples, but if you return to me and keep my commandments and do them, though your outcasts are in uttermost parts of heaven, from there I will gather them and bring them to the place that I have chosen, to make my name dwell there.’  They are your servants and your people, whom you have redeemed by your great power and by your strong hand. O Lord, let your ear be attentive to the prayer of your servant, and to the prayer of your servants who delight to fear your name, and give success to your servant today, and grant him mercy in the sight of this man.” Nehemiah 1

“Networking” with Dan Price

By Nehemiah

First Priority

presents

“Networking”
w/ Dan Price

Friday, February 28
9:00 AM Central Time
Live on Google Hangout!

Once you are on Google+, add bradschelling@gmail.com to your circles.  You will then be invited to the Hangout that Friday.
If you need assistance with ‘Google Hangout’, contact Brad via email for more information.

DPrice7

Dan Price is a board member with First Priority of America.  Hailing from the state of Colorado, Dan is a natural networker.  Dan attended Wheaton College on a football scholarship graduating with a degree in Business Economics.  Dan currently leads a Vemma Marketing Team as well as owns and operates several Fedex truck routes.  He and his wife Trish and son Lucas currently reside in Pheonix, AZ.  Join us on Google Hangout as Dan shares tips on how to influence your community for Jesus Christ.

Obedient to the Vision

By Nehemiah

Has God called you to do something that you have not done because of fear?

Paul said to King Agrippa in Acts 26:19, “So then, King Agrippa, I was not disobedient to the vision from heaven. 20 First to those in Damascus, then to those in Jerusalem and in all Judea, and then to the Gentiles, I preached that they should repent and turn to God and demonstrate their repentance by their deeds.”

Paul was been prison for years because he was obedient to the vision from heaven. Wow, look where obedience get us; locked up!

No wonder we get scared to really jump out there and do something that God has told us to do, like start a campus ministry, go to the mission field, etc. We are scared of the unknown, the uncertainty of money and stability, the fear of failure. All of these things and many more keep most Christians on the sidelines of life, watching everyone else play. We wait for the players in the game to write a book or a song on how exciting it was for them to play in the game and then we run to the next conference to hear them speak and leave like we did at summer camp ready to charge hell with a water pistol. Once we get back home, we get caught up in back to business as usual and we sit and watch.

Life, real life, abundant life, is a life of obedience. If God told you to do something, then do it. Paul, like Nehemiah, was right where God put him. He was speaking to a king and proclaiming the good news. You are on this Nehemiah list because we believe God put you right where you are to unite your city to reach thousands of students. In 2014, don’t let Satan keep you on the sidelines. Do something. Get in the game.

Mark Roberts

Building a Movement

By Nehemiah

It has been said that ‘timing is everything, but it’s not the only thing’. Remember that as you continue to follow God and walk into this new year. As the year starts, there will be moments filled with pressure to speed through to an ‘end’. Whether your end is to launch three new clubs, get your Initiation Team together, or get through the Vision Casting so you can get on with the rest, take your time and remember your goal: the Hope of Christ in Every Student. Your goal is not to start a club; students have lots of options for those already. Your goal is not to network youth ministers; there already is a ‘National Network of Youth Ministry’ that gathers them together because they are youth ministers. Business Leaders definitely do not need another nonprofit knocking on their door. But students do need eternal Hope. The only way to reach them all is with a united church effort in your community. Is anybody organizing them? That is why you are where God has placed
you. He has given you a burden; not for another thing to do, but to work this plan. Your end?

Uniting the Local Body of Christ
With a Plan of Action
To Influence the School
With the Gospel.

That’s it. Period. You do not start clubs. Sure, you may be actively involved in one, even Nehemiah worked on his part of the wall. But Nehemiah’s success wasn’t in his ability to lay bricks, it was his vision for the big picture and willingness to be used by God to bring his people together for a common purpose. If not you, then who?

Student Evangelism

The first steps to getting FP going in your community

First Priority is Influencing 8,373

By Nehemiah

 

8,373 students have shared that they began their walk with Christ as a result of them hearing the gospel in a First Priority club in 2013.  Here is a story of one club influencing their peers and getting them plugged in to the body of Christ.  God works in his ways.

At one local school’s first Help Week (Helping Students Understand & Present the Gospel), a Student Leader trained fellow students how to use gospel surveys to share their faith. Each student that attended received copies of the surveys and were challenged to use them and come to next week’s meeting ready to share how God worked through them.At the beginning of their Overcome meeting the following week, students were asked if they had used the surveys. Everyone there said no.  Surveys were handed out again and students were issued the same challenge. A Student Leader then shared the week’s devotion: Overcoming Your Fear of Rejection When Sharing Your Faith.

As students were leaving the meeting, one of the Campus Coaches encouraged them to survey several students who were sitting around in the hallway. Stepping up the the challenge, Student Leaders began putting into practice what they had learned in First Priority. 

Here is part of a text message I received from one of the Student Leaders later that afternoon:

“I talked to a Muslim. And I asked her the questions and she said she would love to know more about a God who cared about her future. So I told her the gospel and my testimony and invited her to church. I wrote my church hours on a piece of paper for her. It was amazing!

The following week, First Priority met for their third week in the new HOPE Cycle…Prepare Week. As students learned about the details and purpose of a personal testimony, the Muslim girl they had met the previous week entered the room along with two of her friends. She had not been told when or where First Priority met…she had simply come looking on her own, drawn by the Holy Spirit. 

Seizing the opportunity, Student Leaders began sharing the vision and purpose of First Priority, including the desire that every teenager at the school go to heaven. One of the friends got up and left the room expressing, “I don’t want to hear this.” The other two girls remained throughout the meeting and listened intently.

The following Sunday, the Muslim girl and the girl who got up and left the meeting attended the church of one of the Student Leaders. Here’s part of a texting conversation I had with that Student Leader that afternoon:

“She really seemed engaged. She said she wanted to come back next week! She also brought her friend (who was the one that walked out of First Priority last week).”

“Her friend had her headphones in the entire sermon but she kept typing something and when she finally showed it to her, I caught a glimpse of the note and it said “I want more information about this myself…can I really go to heaven?” And that was the topic that made her leave FP last week!!!”

The story continues……

There you have it…what First Priority is all about! Students Engaging their campus with the gospel, sharing the Hope of Christ with other students!!

Christmas Outreach

By Nehemiah

Students find Jesus at Christmas?

I have family who were teachers of English as a second language, AKA missionaries, at a university in China a few years ago.  They were not allowed to share Jesus or Christianity with ANYONE!  If they were to do so, they risked being deported themselves and those they shared with, and their families, being imprisoned and beaten – even if they hadn’t actually converted.  The risks were great.  So they found [legal] ways to share.  As ESL teachers, they were allowed to talk about American culture.  What is more American than Christmas and Easter!?!  The school administration allowed this in the classroom.  Students in China found Christ through them sharing “American Culture”.  What opportunity would lie in your local middle and high school if there was an organized group of Christians ready to share their faith at Christmas?  Would the subject of Christmas be something that already has everyone at school’s attention?  I think so!  They may not believe, but they get days off for it so they love it.  What would happen if you took those Christian students and had them invite their non-believing friends to the school commons one day after school to watch the movie Elf, eat spaghetti with syrup, and talk about Christmas?  Would lives be changed?  Maybe.  Could lives be changed?  YES!  The sky is the limit on your creativity in how to make this happen.  But the first need is for a group of Christian students to get together and pray about who God would have them invite.  If your goal is life change, the program is the means to the end, not the end itself.  So, start in prayer for the lost, start talking to students about being a missionary at school this Christmas, and gather 3-5 other churches to get in on the action.  Time is limited and your youth budget may be already gone, but together life change can still happen in 2013.

Merry Christmas,
Brad

Want to do this but need to talk through it before getting started?  Give us a call:

Happy Thanksgiving

By Nehemiah

First Priority of America

wishes you and your family a

Happy Thanksgiving

We are thankful for you.  For who you are and where you are leading in your family, church, and community.  I have been led in my heart to Isaiah 40 this week remembering that no matter my worry in every situation, peace comes from my relationship with God, not solving the problem.  So here it is.  Happy Thanksgiving.  Brad

Do you not know? Have you not heard?
The Lord is the everlasting God, the Creator of the ends of the earth. He will not grow tired or weary, and his understanding no one can fathom. He gives strength to the weary and increases the power of the weak.  Even youths grow tired and weary, and young men stumble and fall; but those who hope in the Lord will renew their strength. They will soar on wings like eagles; they will run and not grow weary, they will walk and not be faint. Isaiah 40:28-31 (NIV).

I have a confession to make

By Nehemiah

I am an imperfect leader helping to lead an imperfect organization.  Sounds logical [to my wife], but there are days and weeks that I don’t believe this is true.  I feel like First Priority of America, being an evangelistic local church strategy to teenagers, is better than or equal to anything else a person could give their life to.  I feel like God has placed me in the perfect place and nobody else in the world has the privilege I do.  Have you ever felt that way?  My pride comes before my fall, every time.

I am an imperfect person, helping to lead an imperfect group.  So what does imperfection mean for me on a daily basis?  It means that I need to manage myself and put structure in place to keep me humble and focused.  Andy Stanley says, “Don’t trade your blessing for a bowl of soup.”  He is referring to Isaac and Jacob when Jacob trades the generational blessing of his father for his immediate need for food.  I need to put priorities on my thoughts, actions, words, deeds, emotions, physical health, spiritual health, finances, marriage, and time.  I cannot allow my immediate physical desire to have a bowl of ice cream to override my goal of being below 190 pounds for the rest of my life.  At the moment, I am at 199 pounds, so the answer is no.  If I am at 189 pounds, then the answer can be a yes.

What does this have to do with leadership, especially leadership in a Christian movement?  Everything.

When my wife and I started to manage our finances well, we each lost 10 pounds.  It wasn’t because we were focused on our weight, it was because our pile of finances got cleaned up and we saw another layer of life that was a mess.  Jay Strack says, ‘Eat the big frog first.’  Why do all the little ‘easy’ things all day if you are going to get fired for not doing this one hard thing you are avoiding? If you aren’t going to do it, just quit at the beginning of the day and save yourself the day of worry.  Get up and exercise today [speaking out of imperfection again today on this one], then the next difficult task at work will be easier cause you’ve already overcome the biggest mountain of the day: to exercise.

This is important because today is important.  Today matters.  Justin Irving said, “Your barrel of leadership can only be as full as your shortest slat.”  If you are emotionally distant because you are fighting with your wife, the rest of your relationships will be affected.

I offer friendship and perspective from experience as an imperfect leader helping to lead an imperfect organization.

Confession: I have committed all 7 deadly sins, most recently, at a Pizza Ranch buffet.