Bursting At The Seams

When we started our Friday night youth meeting last October, we averaged around 15 teens each week. By December the numbers had dropped to 10-12 each week, and I was a little concerned.
When we went to the youth conference in Bucharest in December, we took the Friday night kids, the Sunday morning kids (some of whom never came on Friday nights), and a couple of teens who had been to camp with our teens before.
Over the last couple of months, these different groups have started to integrate a little bit more. We still have a sizable group that comes on Sunday morning but not Friday night (most of them orphans from either group homes or mentor apartments...they have their own "youth meeting" on Thursday evenings). But we don't really have a "Friday only" group or a "camp" group any more; they've all started coming on Sunday mornings. And another new group of boys has started to come as well. Last week we had 27 teens and 7 adults stuffed into a little basement room. Last night we had 24 teens and 8 adults. We're bursting at the seams!
Even more exciting than experiencing growth in numbers is watching spiritual curiosity and growth in the teens. It's fun for me to hear their questions and see their excitement for learning things from Scripture that they have never heard before. Two weeks ago, our pastor ended his sermon with a very direct salvation invitation, which is pretty rare here. Four of those teenagers (3 of them "camp only" kids and one a sibling of a "camp only" kid) responded and made decisions to repent of their sin and make Jesus Christ Lord of their lives! That makes giving up my Friday night "veg out" time not just a sacrifice, but a true joy and blessing to me, too!