What Goes Around, Comes Around
I was just a young man in the spring of 1995 when my good friend Henriette encouraged me to apply for Mount Hermon summer staff.
She had recently served on the Conference Center Housekeeping staff and shared with me how much that experience impacted her life and her walk with Jesus. That was all it took for me, so I applied and began the most amazing journey of learning what it means to serve Jesus.
When I consider all I’ve learned over the years, I realize how many foundational pieces were missing in my teens. Where was my source of wisdom and who was I looking to for guidance in those years? If only I could have been mentored by godly leaders, and had my attention turned to serving others and not myself. That could have spared me, my family, and many others a lot of pain, grief and squandered time. Thankfully, through God’s love and mercy He has redeemed that time over the years walking with Him. Now I’m really passionate about focusing my attention on supporting ministries like our Youth Intensive Programs here at Mount Hermon. These are programs that meet teens at that key time in life and encourage them to stay strong in their faith and their journey with God through mentoring, discipleship, and through serving others.
This summer the Band of Brothers program was launched focusing on developing young guys on the path to godly manhood—becoming men after God’s own heart. At the same time the Echo program had a similar but distinct objective to come alongside teens—both guys and girls, and lead them into the resounding life of abiding in Jesus. What these two youth intensives also shared was a focus on serving others. With bright eyes and huge enthusiasm, these teens picked up buckets of cleaning supplies every day and set out to provide housekeeping services for our Family Camp guests. You would have to see if for yourself to believe it. The joy, the fun, the laughter, and the seriousness of doing a quality job—as they went about cleaning the bedrooms and bathrooms of total strangers. It was the unmistakable mark of a follower of Jesus. That community of youth campers and college–aged summer staff brought so much vibrant and positive energy to our Accommodations Department that it’s difficult to capture in words. 2015 was a turning–point summer in Accommodations as God assembled His people, both young and older, to link arms and to serve others together.
“You really learn how to be a Christian man through this program.”
—Alex, Band of Brothers
Around the time I joined staff in 1995 and Henriette had moved on into full time career work, the Housekeeping summer staff crew was fading away with the changing times.
Twenty years later we couldn’t be more excited at Mount Hermon to witness the beginning of a new era where God is not only blessing the return of an inspiring summer staff team, but adding even more depth of ministry with the introduction of high school–aged campers – all joining the seasoned year–round staff in serving His people behind the scenes, and all in the Spirit and Joy of Jesus Christ!
