On the final night of their annual summer mission trip to Minneapolis, a group of about 40 members of Big Rock’s Crossroads Christian Youth Center discovered a piano which was one of many placed around downtown Minneapolis this summer as part of an art exhibit.
Breaking out in song, the group sang together on a downtown Minneapolis street as “streetcars went by, people rushed by, people sang along, and fireworks went off at a nearby stadium.”
It was an inspiring way to end a week of giving to others, Isaac Flex, a long-time participant and now a group leader of Crossroads Christian Youth Center, said.
Flex, who grew up in the farming community of Waterman, began participating in Crossroads Christian Youth Center programs when he was only 5 years old along with his brothers and sisters.
Today, he is a student leader and volunteer youth pastor at Aurora’s Living Stone Christian Church.
The mission trip was comprised of young adults from many different area churches, Flex added.
For the last six years, Crossroads Christian Youth Center has traveled to Minneapolis to work with the Marie Sandvik Center, an inner city ministry.
Doug Pierson, the longtime director of Crossroads Christian Youth Center, said while there the group helped run their kids club, served dinner to the homeless and passed out food and clothes to needy individuals.
The group also painted part of the building, pulled weeds, and picked up garbage around the building.
However, Pierson said that the group’s main purpose was to share with others a religious message.
“Life is difficult, the Bible even says so,” he added. “We want to present the message of hope to others.”
Since 1973, after the land in Big Rock was donated to Crossroads Christian Youth Center, it has served the community through a variety of programs for children and teens.
Pierson said the youth group is comprised of about 40 kids who meet every Wednesday night.
Some are “church kids and some are not,” he said.
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Crossroads also organizes one of the largest homeschool sports programs in the nation, he said. Offering seven different sports for homeschooled kids, Pierson said, a number of kids who have participated in the Youth Center’s sports program have moved on to play at the college level.
In addition, Crossroads offers a day camp for children between the ages of 5 and 14.
Being part of the community for such a long time, Crossroads has seen many of its past youth participants move on in life to become youth ministers, missionaries, and pastors to make an impact on other peoples’ lives, Pierson said.
He said Crossroads draws children from “quite a big radius including Aurora, Batavia, Oswego, and Yorkville.”
Currently, Pierson said Crossroads is looking to expand to other locations including Aurora, if they can find the funding and the right facility.
Cathy Janek is a freelance reporter for The Beacon-News