June 15, 2011

Tapping the Power of Service

When the Black Adventist Youth Directors Association (BAYDA) staged the United Youth Congress (Iserve) this past April in Orlando, Florida, they did more than just hold an impressive convocation with 12,000 attending the closing Sabbath services.
 
The most profound part of the Iserve congress was when 2,200 young people and chaperones fanned out across the city, participating in a variety of community service projects. The youth cleaned up public parks, distributed food to disadvantaged families, assisted senior citizens, helped teachers in local schools, and a host of other projects. The youth also supported several charitable causes, collecting $10,000 for earthquake victims in Japan, 504 pairs of shoes for Haiti, and 410 Bibles for Africa.
 
I commend BAYDA for giving service a high priority in the program. BAYDA has tapped into a powerful key that communicates values to an emerging generation. According to the Corporation for National and Community Service, the “spirit of service” pervades the Millennial generation. North American youth and young adults between the ages of 8 and 27 gave more than 1 billion hours of uncompensated service to nonprofit organizations in 2008.
 
USA Today (Apr. 14, 2009) dubbed Millennials as the “civic generation,” and surveys show that they are more civic-minded than any other generation since the 1930s and 1940s. Millennials are activists who want to fix things, to make the world a better place.
 
BAYDA leaders want to establish a culture of service in Adventist youth groups across North America. They see this as a powerful way to help young people build a closer relationship with Jesus Christ. To bring the Iserve experience into local churches, BAYDA members encouraged local church youth leaders to plan initiatives that will make a difference in their home communities and share their stories.
 
                                                For more information on the Iserve movement, visit www.iservemovement.org.
 
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Carlos Medley is the online editor for the Adventist Review. This article was published June 16, 2011.
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