Merry Christmas!

MERRY CHRISTMAS

This funny picture is of Tate and I picking out our first Christmas tree!! I hope you all have a wonderful Christmas this year! 

Crystals Testimony! 

"I grew up in a church where community was surface level and nobody really cared to know who I was. I was also a very timid child and didn't have anyone to show me what it meant to be vulnerable with people and do life with them. That changed in the summer of 2014 before my junior year of high school, where people who had been in FOCUS began investing in me through the teen ministry at Northeast Church in Garland. A wonderful woman named Jamiann spent one-on-one time with me, and during this time God taught me the value of reading scripture with other people, how to apply what I was learning, and to have a vision for what life with Christ looks like. Jamiann went on to baptize me in March of 2015. 

Having been invested in this way, I knew I wanted to go to a college that had a FOCUS ministry on its campus, so I decided to go to UNT. Transitioning from high school to college was difficult. I continued to struggle with fully being myself; but my Corefa during my freshman year, Sam, spent one-on-one time with me and I slowly began to open myself up in ways I never knew I could. God used her to show me that I was valuable by having fun or serious conversations with me, giving me rides, and always letting me know she was just a phone call away. Through my friendships in FOCUS, God set me free from worrying about my self-worth, from feeling like I was defined by worldly standards, and from feeling alone. Now I’m a Corefa, and I am able to further invest in girls in my Core and disciple them in the ways I was discipled."

Crystal Machuca

Junior, UNT

English, Spanish major

Keep FOCUS Growing Update

We just completed our annual FOCUS Fundraiser and raised close to $70,000. We still have donations coming in! Thank you so much for giving to this fundraiser. We are blown away by what God has done for our community and so thankful for all the prayers and support.

Rock and Roll Christmas Party

This last weekend we had our student Christmas Party. We did a theme this year which was Rock and Roll Christmas. So our students dressed up in their Rock Star attire, played games, ate food and we ended with a devotional and worship. I'm so thankful for how fun and life giving our students are. They love each other well and have such encouraging and positive attitudes.

Shayla and I were the emcee's for our party. We go all out. 

Our staff Rockn' and Rolln'

Prayer Requests 

Winter camp is upcoming next month. Be praying for our students as they pray about going. We want all our students to be there. Pray that Winter Camp would be an opportunity for the community to grow in their depth of relationships with each other and learn more about our role as a disciple in the culture today.

Pray for our students over the break and that the Lord would protect them. Pray that they would continue to learn and grown in what they made progress in during the semester.