Tonight was wonderful! It was our All City Young Life and we had over 325 students! Way to many to count! How cool is that!? We had students from every High School in the Greater Salem Area (North, West, McKay, Central, Cascade, South, Sprague, and McNary) and it was so fun to get all our students together for one super Young Life! We played some great games, sang some great songs, the Prize Wheel had it's debut, and students got a hear about Jesus! What more could you ask for? Ronal Cruz, from Vida Joven (our Young Life ministry to hispanic students) gave the talk today and spoke from both his personal journey, and the prodigal song from Luke 15, he talked about how we all walk away to try to fill ourselves with something unfulfilling, but it's only once we come home to God that we actually find real fulfillment. He did a great job and the room of 325 students listened quietly the whole time. It is an incredible blessing to work in a ministry with so many people that are such great communicators of truth. Thank you all for making it possible through your prayers and financial gifts and willingness to help where help is needed! Special thanks to Charlie and Nancy Marshall for providing dinner tonight! You are all wonderful! -Mat

What's on YOUR Name tag?

Tonight was a good night! We had high energy, loud singing, crazy students, fun games, lots of laughter! Could you ask for anything more?! Ellie shared with us tonight (For those of you who don't yet know Ellie, you should get to know her. She's a wonderful leader who attends Corban University and she's great!) about our sin and the lengths that God went to restore our relationship with our Creator (the Cross). Ellie walked us through the Bible and helped us look at different characters. Eve (the screw up), the Thief on the Cross (Criminal) and the Jews (Messiah Killers) and helped us see that, though those are titles the world has given those people/people groups God sees us all with a different title, Loved. Ellie said that God has the name tag "Loved" for each and everyone of us who's willing to accept it. That we can throw off our old name tags, whatever they may be, and accept the ones God offers us and accept a new identity in that name. She did a great job! It was a great night! The game we played was a race to see who could get a whole straw in their mouth the fastest without using their hands. (It's WAY harder than you'd think, go ahead, give it a try!) I wish you could all join us for a Young Life some day! We, the Leaders of Sprague Young Life, are SO, SO thankful for the prayers, financial support, meals, encouraging statements, and everything else we receive from all of you! This ministry could not exist without your support. Special thanks to Rick and Teri Schaefer for hosting us for a delicious White Bean Turkey Chili dinner! And To the Butler's for hosting Young Life! And to Limeberry for being a dream come true for after Young Life hanging out! -Mat

A Night To Remember!

I want to start this post out with a quote from a students Facebook status tonight after Young Life. It read, "thank you lord for putting young life in my life." It's things like that that remind us why we do this. Tonight is a night I'm reminded of the word of Saint Paul, "If it seems that we are crazy, it is to bring glory to God." 2 Corinthians 5:13   So much of what we do is ridiculous in Young Life. Tonight we had a game where one student took off all their clothes under a blanket playing the game "Take of Something You Don't Need" (He didn't really take off all his clothes, we just played a wonderful trick on the audience!) We do thing after thing that, to the untrained eye my look to be insane, but really we are crazy to bring glory to God. Tonight, judging by the Facebook status, that glory was in fact brought into the life of at least one high school student. Caitlin Marshall brought us a message this evening that spoke to the need in our lives. Amanda and Caitlin shared brief stories in their lives where they tried to use things to fill the voids in their life only to realize that only God can meet our needs. Their stories were paralleled along with the story of the Prodigal Son in Luke 15 (easily one of my fav's!). She did a wonderful job, as was expected, and in my car on the way home when I asked three boys what their favorite part of Young Life tonight was, the answer was 'Caitlin's talk' across the board. Sprague Young Life is in an incredible place right now. Students are wrestling with Jesus at a level rarely experienced out side of a summer camp/missions trip sort of experience. In short, God is good and faithful, and the proof of that can be seen in the blessings being shown to this group of ragamuffin leaders! Special thanks tonight to Mike and Joy Fargo for hosting us for a delicious lasagna dinner! To Mark and Rebecca Butler for hosting all of us for Young Life (We were in the upper 50's tonight between students and leaders!). And as always, our deepest thanks to Limeberry for really becoming Sprague Young Life's hang out place! What an amazing community we are a part of! Thank you all for your support, through both prayer and financial gifts! None of this would be possible without you! -Mat

If April Showers Bring May Flowers...

We're going to have a lot of flowers in May! Well, tonight during our leader meeting Amanda pointed out that the Final Four (for the NCAA Men's Basketball Tournament) started tonight at 6:30, and we all thought, "shoot, maybe we should have cancelled it." Well, thank goodness we didn't! We had just over 40 students in the room tonight, and what a great bunch of students they were! Every so often a feeling of holiness seems to fill the room and that's just what happened tonight. We really asked students to go to a deeper level tonight and they really took us up on it. I shared from John 8 and the story of the woman caught in adultery, but I broke it up with a few videos. I read the first part of the story, right before Jesus bends down to write in the sand, and then showed three videos (you can find them all on youtube if you're interested), to find the first one, search for Young Life Post Secret, and it will be the first video to come up. The second video was "Hurt" by Johnny Cash, and the third was "F-ckin' Perfect" by Pink (Trust me, that song is good, and doesn't swear in the video, see for yourself!) and after that I read the second part of the story. I told our students that we hold on to our mistakes from the past and let them direct our lives and instead we need to realize that Jesus has forgiven those mistakes and wants us to, instead of hold on to our mistakes, hold on to Him. It was a great night, a number of students and leaders we moved to tears and reflected on some of the pain in their lives. The questions asked afterward were solid, super deep questions (I am always humbled by the thoughtfulness and depth put into these questions by students) and God was incredibly present.  I know I say this every week but, thank you for the opportunity to care for young people in Salem! It is SUCH a blessing!! Special thanks tonight to the Marshalls for hosting us for dinner, to the Butlers for letting us do Young Life there every week, and to Limeberry for being the perfect place to get frozen yogurt! (Here's a little plug: If you live in Salem, GO TO LIMEBERRY!!! It is so great and the owners are wonderful people and supporters of us! Help us to bless them as they are such a blessing to us!) Thank you, thank you, thank you! Goodnight! -Mat