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Hi everyone! I hope you’re having a wonderful week! I’m certainly enjoying the warmer spring sunshine that we’ve had lately.

This morning, I’ve been working on some announcement information pertaining to our church’s youth program, and it occurred to me that it might be useful to include it here. In part I share it in this format because some of you have young people in your households and this is information you’ll want to know. But I know all of us at WVBC are eager to see things move forward with our youth ministry, so everyone will be interested to hear a bit about what’s happening. Please do continue to uphold this important part of our church’s ministry in prayer. Pray for our youth, their parents, and those who have stepped forward to help with leadership. Pray that God will tap others on the shoulder with an invitation to join the leadership team, investing in the lives of our young people. Pray that we will all have wisdom, energy, unity, and clear leading as we seek to follow the Spirit’s guidance in this area. And pray that our youth ministry will grow and bear good fruit in days to come. 

Thanks for your support. We’re really just beginning with a new phase of youth ministry. There are plenty of things to work out and develop. But I’m excited to see it moving, thankful to those who’ve stepped up to lead, and looking forward to what God has in store for us.

An update on WVBC Youth Ministry, April, 2026
West Vancouver Baptist Church has come through a number of transitions in recent years, including what has been a very transitional time for our youth ministry. We’re happy to announce that we’re now ready to do a youth-program-refresh this month. Here’s a little more information on what’s going to be happening.

  • We are shifting our core youth activities to the Sunday after-church slot (11:45-1:00).
    Parents have told us that Sunday is the best day to begin regular events, and after-church meshes with other community activities. This means there will no longer be youth activities during the morning service—we encourage our youth to connect and sit together, and we hope to involve them more in services as we go.
  • We will build youth programming around 2 target age groups: Senior Youth (grades 8-12) and Junior Youth (grades 6-8).
    The age brackets aren’t completely rigid, especially while numbers are small. But needs and interests are different at different stages, so we’re trying to match our youth activities roughly with the structure of our local school system.
  • We’re just starting out and numbers are still small, so we’ll begin with Senior and Junior Youth on alternating Sundays. (Senior Youth in weeks 1 and 3 of each month, Junior Youth in weeks 2 and 4.)
    In months with 5 weeks, we’ll have an open activity for all. Meeting every other week isn’t ideal, but it’s a start. As more youth attend, and as our leadership team builds, we hope to increase the frequency of key activities.
  • Marlani Engelbrecht will be anchoring our youth leadership team.
    *** We’re still looking to add core team members; please talk to Marlani or Pastor Ken if you feel that you might be interested. ***

Two “Youth Sunday Launch” events
We will kick off the updated youth program with two “Sunday Launch” events, both featuring ice cream Sundays.

  • Sunday, April 19, for the Senior Youth (high school age)
  • Sunday, April 26, for the Junior Youth (grades 6-8; middle-school age)

There will be ice cream (obviously!) with time to share, grow, and have fun together.

I’m excited, and not just because I like ice cream!

On other fronts, this week we begin a new sermon series that will run through the rest of spring. It goes hand-in-hand with my announcement about youth ministry, because our series is going to look at family life, with lessons on what God does (and doesn’t) want for our families, drawn from the narratives in the book of Genesis. I’m excited about this series as well. God’s Word is full of practical insights for us as we live together in families, and as a church family. I’m hoping we’ll all be encouraged and motivated as we probe Genesis for some of those insights.

This week, we’ll begin at the beginning. Genesis 1, 2, and 3 lay some foundations for everything else that Genesis (and the whole Bible) offers on the family. So we’ll explore some highlight verses and key ideas, especially from Genesis 1 and 2.  If you want to read ahead, I recommend reading both of those chapters in full. They’re familiar, so it won’t be hard reading. By all means, add chapter 3 as well if you wish, though we won’t spend as much time there.

As always, have a wonderful week. May God richly bless you, and your family, this week. See you soon!

—Pastor Ken