A record 2,200 students will gain real-world experience in Southern Baptist church planting and evangelism this summer through the North American Mission Board’s 2008 edition of PowerPlant.
The middle-school to college-aged students represent a 29 percent increase in the number of PowerPlant participants over the previous summer, reported Jonathan Wilson, a NAMB student volunteer mobilization consultant in Alpharetta, Ga.
“This year, PowerPlant is emphasizing how students can use their God-given gifts and abilities in their own spheres of influence to infiltrate the world for God,” Wilson said. “They don’t have to be called to ministry; they can go to their jobs in the marketplace and serve, realizing God has wired them for a particular profession for this very reason.”
Twenty PowerPlant projects – all connected to newly started churches – are scheduled for 20 U.S. cities, including Greenville/Spartanburg, July 5-11. A project may require from 60 to 200 volunteer student workers.
PowerPlant is based on a Saturday-Friday schedule. On Sunday, the students attend a worship service at a local church plant and then prayer walks, go door-to-door and start preparing for the week.
Monday through Thursday mornings, students will be taught church planting and evangelism techniques by area church-planting strategists.
Teaching turns into action during the afternoons, when PowerPlant volunteers conduct sports camps (soccer, basketball and cheerleading), Vacation Bible Schools, backyard Bible clubs and block parties. Others will undertake servant evangelism such as bottled-water distribution, free oil changes and car window-washing. Nights will be spent in worship and sharing sessions called “The Gathering.”
“Our sports camps, for example, will be excellent because students will be taught by experts for those sports,” Wilson said. “But it just won’t be a time to play. Integrated into the camps will be Bible study and testimony-sharing.”
PowerPlant’s overarching goal, he said, is for students to share their faith in Christ at least once during the week.