Why We Want Our Youth to Sign Up for Passion Youth Camp 2025

Several decades ago, our church “was involved in a lay renewal that called people to faith in Jesus Christ and inspired members to commit to prayer, to witness to others about  Jesus Christ, and to transform our community through outreach.” That is what we want for our church today. That is what we want for our youth. And that is why we are emphasizing Passion Youth Camp this summer. (sign up here.)

There is nothing magical about any camp or conference experience. Camps and conferences don’t change lives; only the Holy Spirit can do that. But the Holy Spirit often uses the ordinary to accomplish his supernatural works. We see this in the Bible:

1. Did you ever notice that Zacchaeus is interested in seeing Jesus AFTER the Lord had already called Levi/Matthew? Seeing another tax collector give up his hold ways to join the disciples likely had an impact on Zacchaeus. He could know for sure, “The life of discipleship and repentance is for people like me.” I want our kids to be able to know that a life of worship is for students like them.
2. In Acts 16, a girl is following Paul and Silas around, saying, “These men are servants of the Most High God, who proclaim to you the way of salvation.” Sounds great, right? No. “Paul, having become greatly annoyed, turned and said to the spirit, ‘I command you in the name of Jesus Christ to come out of her.’” Even good things can be distractions. I want our students to have a time outside of their normal routines and away from their usual habits to make space for something new.

Much more could be said here and this list could be long, but I simply want to say: we can’t make the Holy Spirit work in the lives of our youth, but we can follow the patterns laid out for us in the Bible.

At Passion Camp, students see other middle and high school students worshipping, repenting, asking questions, and being attentive to the sermons. One review of Passion Camp said, “it was AMAZING how many kids there are out there who actually want to be close to Christ!” One of our own students described Passion Camp as “amazing, and life-changing, and really really fun.”

Sign up your youth today. Why? Because we are praying that God will use this camp to show them that teens aren’t junior-varsity believers. They can worship. They can read. They can pray. They serve. They can repent. They can evangelize. They can do it today.

That is my prayer for this camp: a week away from distraction with a focus on God in the presence of many young people who want the same thing. We can’t generate a new lay renewal. But we know that the Spirit of God renews through his Word and his people.

Sign up today. And pray. The Renewer is still at work.