The Power of One

By Stevi Warkentin

My husband, Loren, and I attended a ministerial conference in Pasadena March 5 to 7.

We had a wonderful, Spirit-filled experience, but I cannot stop thinking about one of the comments we heard at the conference.

During a breakout session an elder remarked about the difficulties involved with having only one or two teens in a church area. He asked for advice about how to keep the teens from leaving our church.

My mind raced back to a conversation I had with an 18-year-old girl. She told me the reason she came to church was because of an elderly man in our congregation. She knew it mattered to him if she was there.

Not long after that conversation, my husband and I started serving the teens of our congregation. We didn't start out with any official role, just a desire to connect with some of their hearts.

Six years later we find ourselves serving as youth pastors, and loving it. We were asked to coordinate the annual inter-district youth formal in February. We contacted the church areas in our district to inform them of the dance.

Time and time again we were told the church we were calling had only one or two teens, so they didn't do anything for them.

In Matthew 18:10-14 (the parable of the man leaving 99 sheep to find a lost one), Jesus teaches us what our response should be. It only takes one person allowing Christ's love to flow through them to touch the heart of a teen--to show how much that teen matters to them, to our church and most of all, to God.

Some people call this shepherding. Some call it mentoring. I call it the power of one.

Loren and Stevi Warkentin are youth pastors in Long Beach, California.