Exciting Change is Here.

We are excited to share with you some new changes that are coming to our ministry throughout the next couple of months. We have seen a drastic change in our attendance over the past few years, and with that growth comes (some very good) growing pains. To accommodate this growth, we began in the fall with multiplying our Sunday morning Life Bible Studies, and currently have a total of 24 Life Bible Studies within our ministry. We believe that we are in a place to begin making changes to our Wednesday night programming. We have seen an average of close to 150 students on a Wednesday night. Our largest Wednesday night this school year reached 191 students. We want to make sure that we are able to effectively help our students grow in their faith.

Beginning after Spring Break, Wed, Mar 23, we will be multiplying our Wednesday night programming into three different locations. Middle School will continue to meet upstairs in our HUB space from 6:30-8p. 9th & 10th Grades will meet at the home of Russ and Deborah Whaley, and 11th & 12th Grades will meet at the home of Justin and Tarah Sawyer. These homes will meet from 6:30-8p as well, and we will be sure to send out addresses as the time gets closer. We will be calling these groups, “HomeGroups.” Addresses to these homes will be announced in another email soon.

We know that there are many questions that you may have regarding this exciting change. This next section will hopefully answer some of those:

FAQs

Why are you doing this?

At Houston’s First, our staff is held to the standard of being Godly, Effective and Excellent. We believe that we can be more effective in the way we prepare teachings and sermons for our students when we cater messages to the different ages we serve. This also gives us an opportunity to give our leaders more space to interact with our students in a smaller environment.

What if I have multiple students that are in different grades?

We have strategically asked people to host that are less than five minutes away from our church. We hope that this will help the drop off and pick up process for families with multiple students. Parents are still able to

Does this mean our students will never have programming in one place all together?

No! We will still have certain times throughout the semester where we all meet at one place together. In fact, our final Wednesday night of the semester will be all together to celebrate our seniors on Wed, May 4. We will be sure to notify you and tell you way ahead of time when we will be meeting together and when we will be meeting in homes.

What about dinner?

The church will still provide dinner on Wednesday nights from 5:30-6:30p in the Lobby. If desired, your student can pick up the dinner from the church and take it to their HomeGroup. They are also welcome to bring their own dinner or eat before they arrive.

Who will be at these homes to lead the students?

This answer is twofold: students and leaders. We have leaders who have been helping on Wednesday nights that will continue to help lead out on Wednesdays at all three of our locations. Our Student Leadership Team will take on a huge part of this task as well by helping in leading out on activities throughout the night and even teachings on some weeks. All of our leaders and host home families are required to be background checked and go through our intensive screening process.

Questions?

We can’t thank you enough for continuing to be a huge part of our ministry. If you have any questions, feel free to email me at Tommy.Kersten@HoustonsFirst.org.