Praise the Lord with us for all that was accomplished this week.  TO GOD BE THE GLORY!

LODI HIGH SCHOOL:

Lodi Club Leaders

• Lodi HS Hosted 10 rallies in 5 days in their Theater
• Over 600 students attended the rallies throughout the week – many coming multiple times
  
• 10 Students accepted Christ (that we know of)!!!!
• 44 Rededicated their lives to the Lord
• 16 students turned in response cards, asking to meet with a Christian club member for more information about Christianity
• 24 students want to get plugged into a local youth group
• At the rallies, the Christian club passed out to the students: 158 Bibles, 188 Gospel Tracts, 97 Gospel of John booklets, 16 More than a Carpenter Books, and 11 Jesus Films.
  

Tokay High School

Tokay Club Leaders

• Tokay HS Hosted 8 rallies in 5 days in their classroom!
  
• Over 250 students attended the rallies throughout the week – many coming multiple times
• 4 Students accepted Christ (that we know of)!!!!
• 5 Rededicated their lives to the Lord
• 11 turned in response cards, asking to meet with a Christian club member for more information about Christianity
• 8 students want to get plugged into a local youth group
• At the rallies, the Christian club passed out to the students: 77 Bibles, 91 Gospel Tracts, 78 Gospel of John booklets, 35 More than a Carpenter Books, and 13 Jesus Films.
• After school, Christian club students partnered with 10 Jim Elliot Christian high school students and shared the Gospel with 53 students on campus

Continued Prayer Requests:

→  Pray for safe travels for our team as we drive back to Southern CA in the morning

→  Pray as the students plan another outreach week later in the Spring

→  Pray that the local Youth Pastors remain faithful to meet together and help the student impact their campuses

→  Pray for the 600 students who heard the Gospel this week, that the Lord would continue to work in their heart

→  Pray for Marcos – a student at Tokay HS who came to multiple rallies, and talked with the CSP team about the Gospel Wednesday and Thursday afternoon.  He is hungry for the Gospel and searching!  Currently he is reading the book of John.  Pray he turns to Christ.

→  Pray for Kelsea – a girl at Lodi HS, raised in a mormon home.  She is wanting to become a Christian and has questions of how to do so.  Pray she connects with the Christian club

→  Pray that the Christian students in Lodi continue to be Light and Salt on their campus in the weeks and months to come

Thank you for your faithful prayer and excitement with us this week.  We could not have done this week without you and truly give all Glory to God!

The Team

His Servants,

Emma, Kellee, Kolby, and Taylor

Tonight, we were able to present a message to Bethel High School Youth Group.  We commended the club members for all of their hard work and for heeding the call that was put on their hearts.  We encouraged the students to get involved and share the gospel with their peers using bible passages such as Matthew 5:13-16, Matthew 9:35-38, and Luke 4:18-19.  We asked them to simply present themselves as believers and be faithful when questions come up.  We also let them know that witnessing and sharing their faith will not be scary–the students in their schools are so hungry for Christ! Our prayer for them is that they continue to pray for opportunities, seek opportunities, and reach out to their peers that are like “sheep without a shepherd.”

Lodi High School:   About 400 students attended the rally today.  Reid, the speaker, asked the students to question where their lives are heading and offered them an opportunity to accept Christ for themselves.  We presented them with fliers that gave the students information about club meeting times, youth group information, and the upcoming city-wide youth rally.  After the rally,78 students turned in response cards.  7 people indicated that they accepted Christ for the first time this week and several others indicated that they rededicated their lives to Christ. There were also quite a few that said that they wanted to find out more information about Christianity from the club members.

Tokay High School: Around 125 students attended the rally at Tokay today.  Pastor Gary talked about his life of partying, drinking and smoking and how he came to accept Christ as his savior.  He explained that after deciding to accept Christ, his life has never been the same.

The Christian club students were encouraged when someone they had presented the gospel to yesterday came to the rally today.  After school, we focused on doing some John 3:16 surveys that asked high school students to explain their knowledge on the verse.

Click on this link to check out what Charas, the club president, said about this week: Excitement for Charas

Jim Elliot Christian High School:    After school, the school chaplain and 7 students came to help witness to the students on Tokay’s campus. For 2 of the girls, this was there second time witnessing at Tokay.

Prayer for tomorrow:

→  Please pray that the Lord lays it on the Bethel Youth Group students’ hearts to continue or to start doing outreach on their campuses.

→  Please pray for the city-wide youth rally this Friday and Saturday, that many people are drawn to it and that the Lord works in them through it.

→  Praise God for the hard work that the students have done and their willingness to serve!

→  Pray for the club as they respond to the oh-so-many response cards.

→  Please pray that the outreach doesn’t end here.

→  Please pray that many more get saved tomorrow.

→  Pray for Kelsea.  Yesterday, she expressed a desire to become a Christian from a Mormon background.  Pray that when she meets with us tomorrow, she will not be ostracized from her family and will find a group to welcome her.

May God bless you and keep you!

–Emma, Kellee, Kolby, and Taylor

All week long, seven youth pastors have partnered with the local outreach. They were excited to speak at the rallies, encourage the Christian clubs, fund the Christian materials, and are strategizing how to keep the campus ministry going for months and years to come.

Lodi High School: Between 400-500 students packed into the theater to hear local worship pastor Jeff share his testimony and why it is important to commit to Christ.  The students listened intently as he gave strong intellectual evidence for his belief in God as well as his own spiritual experiences.  He challenged the students not to ponder the shallow questions in life (like how to be “cool”) but rather question the meaning for their very existence.  As the students were leaving, one student expressed an interest in becoming a Christian, wanting to know how. The Christian Club President, Alyie is meeting with her on Friday to answer her questions.

Lodi High School this week has already given out 100 Bibles, and today pastors and other donors quickly brought together money to purchase 300 more Bibles for the campus to fulfill the need of the students’ interest.

Tokay High School: Today was an answer to prayer as the classroom was quickly filled with students during the lunchtime rallies. 100 students gathered to listen to Pastor Kevin give his testimony.  Pastor Kevin explained his high school experience and told of how, after trying to fill an empty space with drugs, alcohol, and popularity, Jesus truly filled him and made him whole. One student Marcos, (a student who heard the Gospel during yesterday’s after school witnessing) came to the rally to continue learning more about having a relationship with Christ. He said through this week he is understanding Christianity in a new way.

Jim Elliot Christian High School: After Emma and Kellee spoke to the students at Jim Elliot today, 5 Jim Elliot students came after school to help witness at Tokay High School. They were very excited to share their faith and help the Christian Club promote the rally, in spite of the fact that it is not on their own campus.

Prayer for tomorrow:

→   Please pray that everyone involved gets enough rest tonight and that they are bright-eyed, bushy-tailed, and ready to go again tomorrow.

→   Pray that the students who have questions feel comfortable to approach a club-member, youth pastor, or advisor.

→   Continue to pray that the Holy Spirit speaks to the students that continue to come to the rallies.

→   Please pray that the youth pastors continue to work together and with the students to plan follow-up events

God bless!!

–Emma, Kellee, Kolby, and Taylor

Lodi High School:  Pastor Brian spoke today to the large crowd about why bad things happen.  He was able to connect to many in his audience as he spoke about losing someone in a car accident.  There have been many deaths due to car accidents at Lodi High in the past year.  The club members were encouraged by the amount of students that showed up and more Christian material was distributed.

Tokay High School:  Pastor Joe spoke at Tokay’s first rally and the club arranged to go witnessing after school.  They did a great job advertising for tomorrow and really spread the word around their campus!  One student called out to us to ask questions about the rally and about God. Two people involved in the outreach were able to spend about 20 minutes sharing the story of Jesus Christ with him and gave him some material to take home that he said he was very excited to check out!

Jim Elliot Christian High School:  A few students have become involved at the public schools, praying for them this morning and then coming to help the group go witnessing after school.  It was a great experience to see the students learning how to share their faith with other students.

Prayer for tomorrow:

→  Please pray for Kellee and Emma so that when they speak to the students at Jim Elliot tomorrow, they can mobilize and inspire more Christian students.

→  Pray for the club leaders:  Allyie, Rochelle, Charas, Izzy, and Annika.  Through all of the planning and all of the work that they have put into these rallies, they are beginning to feel the pressure weighing on them.

→  Praise the Lord for all of the students being reached and for the opportunity that the students have to do these outreach events!

→  Please keep praying that students keep coming and that God continues to soften their hearts to hear the messages.

We thank you for your on-going support.

–Emma, Kellee, Kolby, and Taylor

Check out what Pastor Joe had to say about the outreach:

Pastor Joe

Lodi High School:   The students put on their first rally yesterday during both lunches.  They put on the “Human Video” skit to the song “Everything” by Lifehouse and then Pastor Gary explained it by giving his testimony.  The students heard how a life can be turned around because of the power of Jesus Christ.  If you haven’t seen the skit before, I encourage you to do so.  It is amazingly powerful.  Throughout the whole rally, the students were SILENT!  This just shows that the students were being receptive.  A total of 222 students came to the events and 80 of those students left with Bibles!!! It was absolutely amazing.

Tokay High School:   Tokay got everything approved and they are very excited to start their rallies today.  After school, they put up all of their posters and made last minute arrangements for today’s rally.

Jim Elliot Christian High School: In addition to the awesome things that are happening at the public schools, we have also had the amazing opportunity to make announcements at the local Christian high school to try to get them involved in witnessing and praying with the students in the public high schools!

Prayer for today:

→ Please pray that the students have the opportunity to share with their classmates.

→  A few of us as well as the students have been getting sick recently.  Pray that God protects our bodies as well as our minds.

→  Pray for the speakers, that they may speak truth to the students.

→  Please pray that the students come back to the rally and that their hearts are open to receiving the messages.

→  Pray that more students catch the vision to pray over their schools in the morning.

→  Please pray that when Emma speaks during Chapel at Jim Elliot Christian High School tomorrow, the students feel the call to join with the Christian clubs at the public schools.

Today, we were able to make a LOT of posters and talk to a bunch of the students that are in the Christian clubs on the campuses.  It was very encouraging that 25 students came, much more than we had anticipated.The students immediately got to work, using their artistic abilities to advertise their rallies and spent time together as students of faith.

Next, we discussed what the themes would be for each day and discussed that our goal is to reach the non-believers and be a light to them.  We wanted to make sure that no opportunities were missed. so our theme for our training was “Don’t miss it!”  We know that witnessing and answering students’ questions can be scary and intimidating, so we introduced the kinds of questions they would be subjected to and practiced answering questions in different scenarios.  We reflected on Matthew 5:13-16 (which talks about being the salt of the world and the light of the world) for encouragement and ensured them that according to statistics, 900 out of the 2,500 students at their school would be opened to discussing the gospel! We also spoke about the importance of starting conversations with others in order to open the door to talking to non-believers.

One student expressed her excitement for the upcoming outreach by saying that she had been waiting for an opportunity to share the gospel to her classmates but didn’t know how to start the conversation.  After today, she said that she was going to take full advantage of the outreach week.

Lodi High School:   60 posters were made to be put up around campus this week and many students challenged themselves to be intentional about giving Bibles and tracts to their friends and peers that were provided by some of the churches that they partnered with.

Tokay High School:   30 posters were made to be put up around campus and students also took materials to distribute to their peers.  One student named Chris took a rather large stack of Bibles, tracts, Jesus films, and Gospels of John with the intention of passing them out to his friends from school.

Prayer for tomorrow:

→   Pray that administrations gives final approval on the location of the rallies at Tokay High School.

→   Please pray that we can wake up early, refreshed, and ready to start tomorrow.

→   Please pray that the students find opportunities to talk to other students and see the fruits of their labor.

→   Continue to pray that hearts are opened to the message this week!

So here we are!  Lodi, California.  We’re preparing for an exciting week of high school outreach.  Today is a lot of last-minute planning and organizing to start our exciting journey.  We will be working with the Christian clubs at Lodi High School and Tokay High School, two public schools in the area.  Their theme is “Why?”  They want to challenge the students at their schools to consider Christianity by asking a lot of important and thought-provoking questions.

Lodi High School- In addition to passing out pizza, ice-cream and cookies, the club has speakers who will talk about subjects such as why do bad things happen?  Why believe?  Why choose?  And why me?

Tokay High School- With pizza, rootbeer floats, and hot chocolate, the students have arranged for speakers to address the following topics:  Why care?  Why choose?  Why change?  Why commit?

We are very excited to get started!

Prayer for tomorrow:

→ Please pray for the students as they speak with their congregations and that the congregations get behind the clubs in prayer.

→ Please pray for the poster party that we will be having tomorrow.  Pray that a lot of students come so that we can do training with them, and that our time together will be effective.

→ Pray that the students would become excited and encouraged to share their faith with their peers.

Thanks for your support through prayer!

–Emma, Kellee, Kolby, and Taylor