School begins in one month. It is hard to believe that summer has gone and very soon the halls of middle and high schools will be filled with tens of thousands of students trying to find their way, make plans for their future, and for some just merely survive. I have been thinking about this coming fall and a conversation I had with about 50 students last May. I asked a simple question, “What do you think of church?” The overwhelming answer was “They hate homosexuals.” To these students church is a place of judgment. I then asked them what they thought of Jesus? Almost everyone them said he was an amazing man that tried to do a lot of good.
Reaching the largest mission field in our country
This struck me because these students have disconnected Jesus from the church. The idea that students would come to church looking for Jesus is insane to them. They don’t think He is there. The media has done a number on our churches as well as some well meaning Christians. If students will not come to hear the Gospel at church, then we must go to them. This is the heart of First Priority Central Florida. We train our Christian students to be missionaries on campus, share the Gospel, and then bring their friends to church. We have to go where they are at. They are not coming to us.
First Priority’s goal is to present the Gospel to every student and then connect students with local churches to be discipled. It is so simple and it works. We will reconnect Jesus with our churches in the minds of these students by going outside the walls of our buildings and into the halls and classrooms of our schools. Armed with God’s truth and grace our students will reach their friends and we will see a spiritual awakening that none of us could dream about. We have the churches, parents, and students ready and the harvest is ripe.
Tony Hevener - City Director of FP Orlando
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