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The call of community:
Find a profitable career, raise children, buy a comfortable home, and seek stability. These are just a few of the cultural demands on young adults. But for some, the call of community and simple living outweighs these societal goals. Service Adventure, one of Mennonite Mission Network’s Christian Service programs, invites young adults, ages 17 to 20, to live in a household with four to six other youth and to serve in a community for 10 months in a variety of locations across the United States. Each household has at least one unit leader who helps young adults manage new day-to-day responsibilities. A critical part of the unit is the leader. “I would say that I was a mentor, a pastor and a friend — any of those roles came into play,” said Justin Weaver, who led the South Bend, Ind., unit with his wife, Lyz, and two children for two years. After completing ministerial degrees (Justin at Hesston College and Lyz at Tabor College, both in Kansas), the Weavers found themselves searching for pastoral opportunities that would allow them to serve together. Attracted to Service Adventure’s emphasis on intentional community and the opportunities it provided to forge deep relationships, the Weavers chose to spend two years ministering to a small congregation of Service Adventure participants. “Service Adventure was our first formal ministry experience, and in a lot of ways it felt like pastoral ministry. You’re allowed into each other’s space in a sacred way,” said Lyz. A cutting-edge idea For leaders Karin and Curt Weaver, the idea of living in Christian community also was the factor that prompted them to shift gears and move their family, including Jonathan (4) and Chloe (2), from Goshen, Ind., to Albany, Ore. Curt, a former Lancaster conference youth minister, had long been aware of the Service Adventure program and often would promote it when he spoke to young adults. After studying Christian formation models at seminary, his interest in the program was renewed. “If you take a look at what people are talking about in Christian formation, Service Adventure is a cutting-edge idea,” said Curt. “There’s just this real simple idea that Christians help to shape other Christians, and I was excited that our kids could be part of that community right in their house.” Another couple, Jair and Pam Drooger, leaders serving for the third year in Philippi, W.Va., made the move from traditional careers to serving as unit leaders to focus on their relational skills. “A huge part of the appeal is the opportunity to learn about ourselves and how we work relationally — to move away from the technical world we had been working in and into the relational world we both enjoy and feel called toward,” said Pam, who, with Jair, lived in Rhode Island before moving to Philippi. Leaders are like pastors Susan Nisly, Service Adventure director, stresses that leaders are one of the most important parts of the community-based program, and that she looks for leaders like the Droogers and Weavers who are interested in ministering to young adults and also in learning more about themselves. “One of the things I look for in leaders is the willingness to lead a group of young people but also willingness to learn a lot more about themselves. Service Adventure leaders talk about the growth that happens within them as well as within the participants,” Nisly said. Karin, whose work as a social worker was primarily with geriatrics, acknowledged that the participants have taught and will teach her a lot. “They’re going to push me to be more patient, and living in close community is going to be very stretching,” Karin said. And for many leaders, what they learned and experienced during their time with the participants had an impact on their thoughts about careers and communities. When their term ends in May, the Droogers will not be moving their family back to Rhode Island, but staying on in Philippi. “We really like it here. We like the pace of life and the people in the community, and the church [Philippi Mennonite Church, which sponsors the unit] is a big factor,” said Jair. For Justin and Lyz Weaver, their Service Adventure experience helped to highlight interests and abilities. Lyz currently is serving as a part-time pastor at Fellowship of Hope (Elkhart, Ind.), a congregation with some experience as an intentional community, while Justin is the executive director at Camp Friedenswald in Cassopolis, Mich. “Service Adventure helped me realize that I gain a lot of energy from dealing with interpersonal relationships and healthy communication. It feels good to come to a camp where we have nine full-time staff, where I’m consistently meeting with camp constituents or going to congregations to speak,” said Justin. The call to live in and be part of the ministry of small communities is one that the Weavers are still attuned to and that their experience with Service Adventure helped to validate. Lyz said, “Some big moments for me were recognizing that sometimes in pastoral leadership there’s a tendency to talk about the spiritual all the time, but by living in community you realize how much spiritual there is in the daily everything.” In this issue: Features Highlights Viewpoints |
