L.O.V.E. Stories: Youth Extreme’s team
Youth Extreme is a ministry that travels to central Vancouver every Friday evening to spend time with kids and teenagers. Led by Andrew Gundy and Jacob Schellenberg, they take their teams to play games, sing worship songs, and have devotionals with kids ranging from 10 to 18 years old. The ministry is “very different from most youth groups as most of the kids are from at-risk backgrounds,” said Gundy.
Photo: Tim Andries
Many of the children in Youth Extreme come from broken homes with parents who aren’t there for the kids through most of the day. Both leaders joined the ministry because they knew the importance of working with young kids. “It’s always a good idea to get involved,” said Gundy. “I saw [Youth Extreme] reaching out to people in need of grace, just like me.” For Shellenberg, who got to know some of the kids through his involvement at Camp Qwanoes on Vancouver Island, working with the kids was “like being involved in mission trips; where you intend to be a blessing, and you end up being blessed yourself.”
The most important part of Youth Extreme is “building relationships with the kids,” said Shellenberg. “Trust is a big thing,” Gundy explained. “Kids often put barriers between you and them because they are afraid you won’t stay in their lives.” Some of the contention that exists between the kids and the leaders is because many of the kids that attend Youth Extreme come from families that once attended the Canadian residence schools in the 1950s and 60s. In this way, Youth Extreme represents a “reconnecting between two groups,” said Shellenberg. The redemption of the ministry is not based on race or ethnicity, but on “the redemption of people with each other,” Gundy added.
Working with the kids can be challenging, as sometimes the kids will act out just to test the leaders. But “it’s in the small things that you can see progress with the kids” said Shellenberg. “A kid’s mom asked me to take him to Playland,” said Shellenberg, “which I saw as God working in building that relationship up.”
“If you’re patient,” said Gundy, “they will open up to you. One minute they’ll be flipping you the bird, and the next they’ll be coming up to you and telling you about their struggles.”
It’s not too late to get involved, as the team is always in need of people willing to give their time and love to the kids at Youth Extreme.
Clayton Andres
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