Thanks Josh!

Thanks Josh!

This Sunday we are going to take a moment to express our thanks to Josh Hayward who will finish as our Youth Minister in early 2024. 

You can write a personal note and join in a gift for Josh here: Celebration of Ministry for Josh Hayward.

Josh joined the team in 2018 to assist in the youth ministry but due to staff changes quickly found himself in charge of a bustling and significant work reaching more than 200 young people each week. From that moment on he has demonstrated a capacity to learn and grow with humility and grace. When I joined the team in 2020 Josh had a confidence and ability that belied his age and an ability to execute a plan and exegete God's word that many people twice his age lack. 

Josh’s talks on the Holy Spirit from Summer Camp and the recent Defined series are excellent and are well worth recapping via the Spotify playlist. 

Josh would be the first to tell you that he’s not perfect and not everything went to plan every time but his creativity and dynamic ability to have ten things on the go at once has served him well. I am often amazed at how much happens in the youth space and this is also testimony to the teams Josh chooses and the way he works with and empowers people.

It is Jesus’ loving willing service of us that motivates our loving willing service of him and his people. Josh embodies this every week and it has been a great blessing and joy to serve with him. To see young lives changed, to see the gospel go forward and to see people served. Josh, thanks for serving us as you serve Jesus. 

Thankfully this is not yet a final farewell. Josh begins 2nd year at Moore College in February and will be working with us as a Student Minister in 2024 focusing on Mission at Night Church. 

Josh, thanks for your partnership in the gospel. As Paul prays, so do we:

“I thank my God every time I remember you. In all my prayers for all of you, I always pray with joy because of your partnership in the gospel from the first day until now, being confident of this, that he who began a good work in you will carry it on to completion until the day of Christ Jesus.”  (‭‭Philippians‬ ‭1‬:‭3‬-‭6‬)