In the summer of 2006 I drove from Chicago to Colorado, parked my moving truck, put some stuff in storage and headed out the next day for a 3 day back-packing trip with the 9th grade boys of my new youth group.  From sea level to 14,000 feet; from no clue what I was getting myself into to bonding with the guys who continue to make all the effort worth it.  Although it was nuts to step into summer ministry with students I hadn’t met before, I can’t imagine starting any other way.  Through the unique, time-rich settings that define summer ministry I was truly able to emerge from the summer as my students’ pastor.  

Now a “veteran” I have the benefit of being able to do some longer range planning for our summer trips based on two summer’s worth of discerning the traditions that were handed to me.  One of those traditions is a houseboating trip with Sonshine Ministries in Northern California.  I can’t think of a week-long adventure with students that is more saturated with unhurried time with students.  A beautiful setting, an excellent staff; enough to do to not be bored, but enough lounging around to spawn creative fun and countless inside jokes.  I would never attempt a trip like this without the unique staff of Sonshine Ministries, but with their help the week turns into an unparalleled group-building opportunity that left us feeling like family.

Knowing that good things can always get better, I decided to enhance our Houseboats trip in two major ways: first, I invited one of my good friends and his Covenant youth group to join us on our trip; second, I decided a 24 hour charter-bus ride makes no sense when we can fly Southwest airlines into the Bay Area and add a sweet weekend of touring and serving in the cities by the bay.   

Partnering with James McMillan and the students of Pasadena Covenant has opened up new possibilities for this year’s trip.  James and I will share teaching and facilitate opportunities for our students to experience the unity in Christ that can create life-changing connections in the course of a short week.  We will also meet up in San Francisco to hang out and tour the city together before we head up to Lake Shasta (the Pasadena folks will have just completed a leisurely road-trip up the California coast!).

As for us Northern Coloradoans, flying out means that we will arrive on July 4th in time to see the fireworks in the city and then spend the next two days touring the city and engaging some service and perspective-changing experiences.  We are still working out our itinerary, but we will see as much as we can see in two days, and we will be working with three organizations: Today’s Youth Matter, a Bay Area ministry that works to transform the lives of foster care children; World Impact, a ministry that serves the urban poor; and Glide Memorial Church.  I have personal contacts with the first two organizations and look forward to reconnecting with my friends and their ministries.

Another fun part of our planning has been networking with Bay Area churches to find places to stay and even to invite their students to join us in our fun over the weekend.  We will be staying with the folks at First Covenant in Oakland and University Covenant in Davis.  We are still working on borrowing vans, but all in all the Covenant family has been a great resource in a logistics-heavy, self-planned endeavor.


Joe Thackwell
Evangelical Covenant Church
Fort Collins, CO

_______________________________________________

Meredith Peters
Cape Cod Covenant Church
Brewster, MA

What does your summer look like?
My summer looks like a great summer! I will be hopefully going to Youth Nexus with a couple of students.  I am running our 2nd annual Senior High Missions Trip and we will be going to Darby, PA. And also a few different churches on the Cape will be combining for one awesome Vacation Bible School Program this summer.  When those events are not going on I will be spending time with students and hopefully be visiting with some of them on the beach and getting ready for the fall!
 
What resources have you found helpful in preparing for summer ministries?
For resources for this summer I am using North Park Seminary, Group Workcamps, and Cokesbury VBS program.  The other resource I would suggest to people is local churches in your area.  I think I am excited about the VBS because people in the community will see that we are really one church and all have the same goals and can work together to bring glory to God.  

How can we be praying for you this summer?
Please pray that our missions trip is helpful, successful, challenging, and safe.  Please pray for all the churches involved in the VBS on Cape Cod this summer and for the goal of helping children grow in God and learn about his love to be accomplished.  Prayer for a refreshing summer and one to look at what can be changed for the following year and what is working well to continue doing.

_______________________________________________

Mike Nyman
Salem Covenant Church
Worcester, MA

What does your summer look like?
Our senior high will be doing The Secret Sojourn. This time, the theme will help us focus on love--specifically how God's love for us enables and empowers us to love in all the different ways we use the word. We will also be taking our college kids on just a fun trip for sightseeing in 
Chicago.

_______________________________________________

Meshia Jones
South Bay Community Church
Fremont, CA

How can we be praying for you this summer?
I'd love prayer in the area of organizing youth worship services for the summer through the fall. I'd like for our worship services to go to another level in Christ and that they would be spirit lead and filled. We are in need of a youth worship leader and musician. I'd also like prayer in the area of teachers and fellowship events for the Young Adults. Finally, please pray for me to go to another level as a leader. I need a fresh annointing. I need encouragement and support.
 

_______________________________________________

Lisa Holmlund
Montecito Covenant Church
Santa Barbara, CA

What does your summer look like?
Beyond Noah's (our VBS program at Montecito Covenant) also includes a Jr. High edition of VBS called Beyond.  We are switching it up from the normal VBS experience and going to different ministry sites around Santa Barbara each day to serve.  These service opportunities will include serving at the SB Food Bank, a beach clean up day, and serving at the Covenant Retirement Center here in town. 

Jr. High camp at Mission Springs.  Our youth pastors will be allowed to accompany our kids as counselors in their cabins, which is awesome.  No work for the youth pastor, yet we get to walk the spiritual journey with our students!

Sr. High Secret Sojourn Trip to the Pacific Northwest.  I am proud to say that I stole this idea from Mike Nyman (Thanks Mike!).  Think of an 8 day scavenger hunt that is discipleship oriented and full of awesome and surprising activities along the way.  This will include rafting, serving the homeless in a major city, sleeping on the beach, cave dwelling, and a major league baseball game.

Summer Youth groups tend to be more social times than school year youth groups.  We try to get to the beach or to family homes with pools as often as possible!  We throw in some worship and a super short devo at each youth group.

For College Ministry, we try to put together a college group that meets weekly for them with worship, sharing where God is working in their lives, and prayer.  We always include free food or dessert at this event.  The main purpose of this is to help returning college students feel like they can connect with their old high school youth group friends and also feel like there is a place for them at their home church. 

What resources have you found helpful in preparing for summer ministries?
•    For great and quick t-shirts: www.uthstuph.com
•    The CHIC 24/7 DVD curriculum to prep our students for our Sr. High Secret Sojourn Trip
•    Mike Nyman
•    Center for Student Missions for ideas of serving in San Francisco and for doing a prayer drive in the city

How can we be praying for you this summer?
Pray for Students to continue to grow in their relationships with the Lord and each other. Pray for our volunteers and staff to be excited about working together as a team as they serve and love students. Pray that I personally will have wisdom to continue to lead and love well in three ministry areas!

_______________________________________________

Phillip Beatty
Trinity Covenant Church
Manchester, CT

What does your summer look like?
The Hartford Project. On a local mission trip to Hartford CT, we will join with 7-10 other churches and work at various ministry/community organization sites throughout the week.  We will have a big community fair in the north end of Hartford, one of the poorest neighborhoods in the entire U.S.  Hartford is one of the five poorest cities in the U.S.  This trip is for both junior and senior high students.
 
Mexico missions trip.  Our high school youth group will be working with YUGO ministries and Iglesia Esperanza Viva in Tijuana Mexico from July 18-27th.  This will be our fifth year working with the same church doing VBS, sports outreach, women’s ministry, and helping the church with whatever it needs done that week.

We are also hiring two summer interns to run our junior high ministry and help with senior high.   Both are from our church and currently in college.
 
Prayers for these three items would be great! Thanks!

_______________________________________________

Dave Ahrens
First Evangelical Covenant Church
Rockford, IL

What does your summer look like?
Here are a couple of quick thoughts about our summer and some bigger ministry opportunities.
 

1. Year 5 of our at home/on-site SK8 Park Ministry (M/TH nights - w/a free supper for parents from the neighborhood on Monday nights, alongside the SK8 Park) it's been a real cool outreach.
 
2. Young Men's Outfitter Leadership Week in CO (Noah's Ark). We'll be rafting and then a 3 night/4 day adventure trip up to the top off a 14'er. I've done this before with Noah's and HS students, but this time we're reaching into our young adult male community, and experimenting a bit with some servant-leadership preparation for their days ahead. I could say a lot more - but I'll leave it at that.

3. Our HS students will be in Chicago July 6-12 w/CSM for an awesome missions week. CSM always does such a great job, so we are really stoked about our work w/them.
 
How can we be praying for you this summer?
I'd appreciate your prayers for these awesome God shaping encounters as well as our interim begins July 1 w/our Pastor retiring. This always creates an interesting transition time for our church community.

_______________________________________________

Justin Craig
Elim Covenant Church 
Moline, Illinois

What does your summer look like?
Our summer plans do not include a regular meeting time for our youth group but instead of that we are meeting several times away from the church that will give us the opportunity to build community and relationships, which I believe to be very important to the students at our church.  Our youth group has met before throughout the summer and I feel like that is a giant mistake.  The summer is about getting away from your everyday routine for students and youth group should be the same.  We are going to several sporting events here in Moline.  We are headed to Six Flags Great America in Gurnee and our big trip for the summer is to Cornerstone Music Festival in Bushnell, Illinois for a week.  I think that our students will benefit from not having group every week and this will in turn bring an excitement back to the group when we start regular meetings back up in the fall. 
 
How can we be praying for you this summer?
Please be praying for our students. They are in battle with the “world” every day at school.  Pray for their choices, pray for their actions, and pray for their spiritual lives and that everything that they do glorifies God.

_______________________________________________

Melissa Wall
Deergrove Covenant Church
Palatine, IL

What does your summer look like?
We are doing "Impact without Boundaries" this year. It is an experience where we take students into God's creation and allow them to experience living without the luxuries they are used to, push them to their limits physically, and help them encounter time with God through Spiritual Disciplines.

_______________________________________________

James McMillan 
Pasadena Covenant Church
Pasadena, CA 

What does your summer look like?
This summer our biggest adventure will be a house boating trip in northern California. This trip will be a partnership with Fort Collins Covenant Church, who we will be meeting up with and house boating with together. In our three year summer sequence of CHIC - mission trip - ???, this is our summer to experiment with something new, and this time we are working on creating some connections with another Covenant church in a "summer camp on water".

_______________________________________________

Erik Cave
First Covenant Church
Portland, OR 

What does your summer look like?
This summer will look different than past summers.  For the past eight years or so a family in our church has let us use their cabin on the Umpqua river in Southern Oregon near the coast.  We would wake board, tube, hike and have a great time.  The last few years our group has had a growing desire to serve.  On this retreat we were able to dedicate one morning to helping out a local church with various projects.  This desire to serve has me excited about what we are doing this summer instead of our River Retreat.  The North Pacific Conference is launching a new event called Feet to Faith in Seattle Washington.  It will be five days focusing on issues of social justice and compassion.  When I proposed this event to our group I didn’t know what kind of response to expect.  All the students want to go.  They really want to learn and serve in these areas.  It is cool to see how this event came at just the right time for our group.

We will also be returning to Mexico this summer.  Last summer we built a house in Tijuana through a group called Northwest Outreaches.  It is a small “mom and pop” organization let by a couple from Oregon.  They have established a compound in the city where groups can stay while working.  This year they have asked us to build a classroom at a junior high school in a very poor part of the city.  Our church is very excited about this opportunity.

Summer can be a difficult time for mid week youth group meetings.  We have events and camps, families are on vacation, and I tend to get super busy.  So instead of putting an elaborate program together, for the summer I do a very simple mid week program I call “Summer in the Son”.  I put together a series of scripture passages that we will discuss each week.  Each one focuses on the life, ministry, or person of Jesus Christ.  I list them all out on a handout

For our mid week program we go lean and simple.  “Summers in the Son” is a laid back time where we play ultimate Frisbee, have a “choose your own adventure” time of worship, and a simple bible study.  The passages for study are laid out at the beginning of the summer focusing on some aspect of Jesus’ ministry and life so students can follow along on their own.  We also do an off campus activity each month such as a Portland Beaver’s baseball game, swimming at the river or a BBQ.

How can we be praying for you this summer?
Please pray for my time management skills this summer.  My track record shows that I get so wrapped up organizing events that I don’t spend the time with students that I would like to.  Too often I come to the end of August feeling like I didn’t take advantage of this time when students are most available.  I did better last year at this, but would like to really thrive this summer.

_______________________________________________

Brittany Borgeson
Glen Ellyn Covenant Church
Glen Ellyn, IL

What does your summer look like?
Czech Trip (June 6-17).    For the last three years Dave Sveen has organized a mission trip specifically for our high school seniors to the Czech Republic to serve an organization called Josiah Venture. The main focus of this trip is to prepare our high school seniors for the next stage of their life; college, being away from home and making their own decisions. Dave has intentionally designed this trip to be a trip built around the question, “who are you going to serve, love and ultimately choose--- god or yourself?”

Michigan Trip (July 27-Aug 1). Last summer we went to Mexico to serve in a cross cultural context and this summer we are going to Grand Rapids, Mi to serve in a local context. We will be  working with an organization called GRASP. We will be  staying in a local church and doing odd jobs for low income housing in the area. Two of the nights we will be serving at other local
ministries with a fun day at the Grand Haven beach on Wednesday.

How can we be praying for you this summer?
Pray that God would continue healing our church and the complex conflicts and brokenness we are experiencing. Pray that our hearts would be soft to the spirit and obedient to Him. Pray that students would mature and grow in their relationship and understanding of Christ. Finally, pray that community would be discovered.

_______________________________________________

Frank Alioto
Hope Center Covenant Church
Pleasant Hill, CA

What does your summer look like?
Our summer is full of connecting students to Christ and each other.  The majority of our mid-week meetings will take place at a local park where we can have some outdoor activities and worship God in creation.  Our teaching times seek to share appropriate Scriptures connnected to nature as we gather next a small lake or sing praises on a hilltop. An annual savory activity is “You Can’t BBQ That!”  We barbeque foods like Twinkies, peppers, anchovies, pig’s feet, and even a cow’s tongue!   Our Sunday morning focus will explore “Temptations” based on Doug Fields curriculum called “Hooked.” 

An outreach trip for the summer is a week Houseboat trip in July with Sonshine Ministries.  In early August we will travel to Ensenada, Mexico for a week long mission trip.  This is an all-church mission trip where we reside outside of town at a camp named Rancho Agua Viva.  We then visit our sister church daily where we have ministries opportunities like VBS, youth outreach, soccer, sewing, men’s prayer, women’s care and share, and some work projects.  We will also have some activities for certain groups of students like incoming freshmen, and a graduating seniors-only trip.   Service opportunities will include sorting rice and beans for a local crisis center and handing out lunches.

We also offer individual weekly girl’s and guy’s Bible studies.   We are planning to use a Renovare’ resource called “A Spiritual Formation Workbook.”  It is a great exploration of the movement of God throughout history and the church.  Each week offers a chance to focus on different spiritual disciplines.  

How can we be praying for you this summer?
Areas for prayer:
•    The transition of our students into new grades in mid-June.
•    Encouraging our students to reach out to their friends with the love of Christ. 
•    Volunteers to come alongside and point students to Christ. 

_______________________________________________

Hefti Brunold III
Heartland Community Church
Ripon, CA

What does your summer look like?
This summer is a time for connecting for our youth.  And not just with each other.  Something that we started last summer is what we call a “summer of testimonies”.  I basically set up several adults from our church to share their life story with our students.  Something I’m sure that every church encounters is the gap that divides generations in our congregations.  My hopes for this “summer of testimonies” are on many levels.  First, it gives some adults in our congregation the opportunity to share their faith, to articulate what God has done and what God is doing in their lives.  Second, our youth can see how God has worked in the lives of others, and possibly begin to see how God has already been working in their own lives.  And third, it provides the opportunity for our youth and adults to connect with one another in a relaxed environment.  All of this will take place in a backyard with a pool of course. 

This isn’t all that’s going on this summer, but I think it’s the core of what we’re doing.  I see the lives and experiences of the people at Heartland Community as a rich resource that hasn’t been tapped into.  I really believe that unless we can learn to be a family that demonstrates its love for one another, our testimony as a church will fall on deaf ears.  So we are pursuing unity as a body in the hope that God will be glorified through the life that comes from living into God’s will.

_______________________________________________

Matt Mills
Ocean Hills Covenant Church
Santa Barbara, CA

What does your summer look like?
One of our highlights for our High Students is putting on a surf camp for 60 kids grades 3-6.  It’s almost a one on one relationship for surf instruction.  The kids get community service and get to be in the water.  Each year it has grown so now there are about 125 people involved each year.  It’s called Unleashed Surf Camp and this year will run from the 4th-8th of August. 

I will also take the seniors away on a retreat during Memorial Day to talk about what life will be like outside of the home and in college.