God is LOVE - Elevate Youth

Hello North Shore Church,

I pray the New Year is finding you drawing closer to God.  In this time of extreme cold we can rely on the constant love and warmth of the almighty.  Remember God is Love.  This is the primary message I am praying and hoping to convey to the youth group.  It is not a warm and fuzzy type of love or a love that is based on feelings and emotion, but an unconditional love that God has willed towards us.  Love is the most overused word in the English language.  We say we love our families and at the same time love hot dogs.  Unfortunately this leaves many especially our young ones with many misconceptions about the true nature of love.  To begin to illustrate and teach this point I taught both youth groups this week out of John 21.  This is the passage where Jesus asks Peter (three times) if he(Peter) loves Him.  As many of you know the Bible(New Testament) was not written in English.  It wasn’t even written in the King’s English.  It was written in ancient Greek.  The Ancient Greek has three words for the word we translate as love.  The type of love that God loves us with is called Agape’.  I encourage you to look up the meaning of Agape’ and look up the meaning of the words Jesus and Peter used.  Anyway please pray that our kids will begin to understand the height depth and width of His Love.

 

The Junior youth group this past week had an opportunity to put love into action.  They were taught about poor children throughout the world, and encouraged to pray for them.  After a quick lesson we all took turns praying out loud for specific children in harsh situations around the world.  I was extremely blessed to hear their hearts while they prayed.  I am reminded that as a leader/pastor my primary purpose is not to teach but to equip.  They are the ministers.  Pray that I can always keep that truth in focus.

Finally this last weekend marks the youth retreat Disciple Now.  This year we have eight Senior Youth group members who went.  It is a retreat put on by Faith Baptist with the help from a ministry team from Georgia.  I hope to get a few testimonies out to you in the next week or so.

Please continue to pray for our youth. God is really doing a work and thank you for being apart through your prayers.

Until the World Hears,

Mike Casale