FORWARD!! Serving God With Energy and Synergy

by Larry Salyer

"Oh Lord, you fill my life with wonder...my spirit soars with Your wondrous gift of grace...with a heart forever grateful I will sing Your glory and Your praise."

So rings out line after line of uplifting, inspiring words, sung in harmony and joy by the Ambassador Bible Center choir. The atmosphere is electrified. The voices and enthusiasm of youth praising God seem to provoke a special response from the congregation.

This is a Sabbath service special music presentation in Lafayette, Indiana, but it could be anywhere that godly young people are serving God. By the time I begin the sermon, I am inspired and anxious to add to the message their music has already conveyed.

The Church of God is abundantly blessed with young people of all ages. Our traditions rightly emphasize their value to God—from the blessing of little children ceremony through summer and winter camps, winter family weekends, local teen development programs, ABC education opportunities, Youth Corps and a host of other youth-oriented activities.

In his Pentecost sermon at the founding of the New Testament Church 1,977 years ago, the apostle Peter was inspired to say, "For the promise is to you and to your children, and to all who are afar off, as many as the Lord our God will call" (Acts 2:39).

The numbers of second, third and even fourth-generation children who are now adult members of God's Church show that He has indeed called many. As long as God allows the human experience to continue, children and youth will be valued servants in His Church. They are bright spots in a dismal world that desperately needs their example and the message their dedication to God's truth carries.

It is the time of year when we congratulate and honor our high school graduates. The time when our children pack up and head off to summer camp. It's the time when several Youth Corps projects are launched and ABC enters its final rush to completion. It's when many of our young people are making decisions about further education, a new career, marriage—perhaps even baptism. You will notice references to all of these in this very issue of United News.

Just as the Church needs the energy and enthusiasm of youth, so the young people need the experience and wisdom of those older than they. We are all one Body "joined and knit together by what every joint supplies, according to the effective working by which every part does its share" (Ephesians 4:16).

I encourage those of us who are older to take to heart both the present and future of these young people. Add them to your prayer list. Share your Christian experiences with them. Let them see your example of faith and trust in God and how He has worked in your life. They indeed live in the midst of an increasingly "crooked and perverse generation." Help them fully learn to "shine as lights in the world" (Philippians 2:15). God is working His miracles in their lives.

I can still hear the voices of vibrant young people as the choir's refrain rings in my memory, "He reigns from heaven above with wisdom, pow'r and love, our God is an awesome God." UN

Larry Salyer is Media and Communications Services operation manager.