According to research done by the Barna Group, two out of three Christians make a commitment to accept Jesus Christ as their Lord and Savior before their 18th birthday. The window of influence is small, but powerful. Children who are exposed to the Gospel during their formative years are blessed by having their minds infused with neurological pathways that entwine all of their experiences with Biblical understanding.
This early exposure has a two-part impact. First, the Gospel alters their perception of the world in comparison to their non-Christian cohorts. Research has shown that the fruits of their Christian roots affect everything from their performance at school, to drug and alcohol abuse. Secondly, if we don't reach a child before their 18th birthday, we can see that our ability to ever reach them drops dramatically.
Our Barnabas Group ("TBG") partners are passionate about spreading the Gospel, and were moved when Mission Generation shared about this very subject during quarterly meetings back in 2010. Mission Generation engages children through the public school system. Their dedicated group believes that when spiritual truth is presented, Jesus Christ is there. Once students discover their purpose in Jesus, direction and motivation to achieve their goals follows.
Mission Generation's Founder and CEO, Rocky Malloy, was recently interviewed about TBG's dramatic impact on their ministry:
"When I first met with TBG, I was asked questions that I was unprepared for. Questions to which I had no answers. Back then we were a missionary organization working exclusively in Bolivia. I thought that the only thing that our organization needed was critical funding.
During my second TBG meeting, I finally came to the painful realization that money was not our issue. The truth was that Mission Generation was not positioned for success. We were a "mom and pop" operation without the means to convey our vision. TBG came alongside our ministry and helped us to restructure Mission Generation so that TBG partners could more objectively evaluate what we did. After several meetings, and a lot of work, our ministry was invited to present to TBG in SD, OC and LA during their quarterly meetings.
I was honored to present during the same meetings as Brad Dacus of the Pacific Justice Institute ("PJI"). I became great friends with Brad. When we were ready to launch our program in the U.S., Brad's team edited our textbooks. He also signed an engagement letter stating that PJI would defend us at no cost if any public school challenged our program. His backing gave school superintendents the confidence they needed to support our program. It was a huge!
I also met TBG partner, Todd Anderson, during our TBG presentation in Orange County. I learned that Todd served on several non-profit boards, and was as in finance. We soon became friends, and I asked Todd to serve on our board. He agreed, and has served faithfully ever since. Todd added a massive element of professionalism to the ministry, and has been a great source of advice over the years.
Since that humble series of TBG presentations back in 2010, Mission Generation has grown into an international organization servicing millions of students in public, private and charter schools in Latin America, Asia and the U.S."
To learn more about the critical work that Mission Generation is doing, please visit their website at
www.missiongeneration.org.
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