Story of God at Work in the Summers We Give Up
By Chelsy Massa
Why go spend five weeks of your summer on a summer project with Resonate Church?
Many of you may go, “If you tell me because it’s fun, I’ll scream,” Well, good news, that’s not where I am going. This isn’t going to be a long, drawn-out list of 10 biblical reasons why you should go or even a convincing story of transformation. I am simply going to say, why not go?
Honestly, I think you should go because why not? I promise you that you will work and make money for the next 40 years of your life. Why start at 19? That is a societal standard that is silly to me. Youthfulness is about learning, growing, and discovering who you are. Why not do that in a place that is designed to figure those things out while in college?
Due to the rise in influencers today, there is WAY too much pressure on young people to be successful. This is your permission slip to be imperfect. To be messy. To ask those embarrassing questions. To fail while trying. To learn what it means to bask in God’s everlasting grace. Be young, and feel free to figure it out.
Summer projects like Elevate are specifically designed for you not to figure out some real-life things but rather important spiritual things. Global projects broaden your view and make you go deeper while interacting with God’s global church and the weight of lost people. These projects are curated for YOU to be safe in failing and to wrestle and figure out our infinite God just a tiny bit more than you did at the beginning of the summer.
Now, should you always go because it's about you?
NO! Of course not; it's about God and His glory and the call to Christian people to take up their cross, wholly surrender to His Lordship, and live leveraged lives for His renown and glory.
Yet, my young reader, don’t grow up too fast. Your 20s are a time to be young. I am 32 and still figuring out who I am and what I want to be when I grow up, and am still in complete and utter awe of the depth and vastness of who God is. I kind of wish there was an Elevate for people in their 30s figuring out marriage, jobs, and how to raise kids.
Go because you can. Go because I guarantee you have not felt busy yet. You have so much time and are free of so many other responsibilities that will come for you eventually. Go because you are free to go. You can work when you're older. You can be mature when you're older. Be free to be young. Will your youth be marked by your remembrance of your Creator (Ecclesiastes 12:1)? Will you let that remembrance carry you for the rest of your days on this side of Heaven?
