Urban Youth Ministry

Both CHRIST CARES (the non profit founded by Scott Reese) and New Life Church (founded by Scott) can trace their heritage to a High School Bible cub founded in 1977 when Scott was a Senior in High School. Urban Youth Ministry has continued and has remained a strong priority these past 43 years!

1. BASKETBALL AND BIBLE PROGRAMS

In the early 1980’s Scott went to Ford Heights with a basketball in one hand and a Bible in the other… Scott was blessed to combine two of his passions – love for the Lord and love for basketball into this ministry endeavor. See the short video below to see some of the earlier basketball programs about 30 years ago and even Scott dunk a basketball : ) this would immediately open doors to connect with youth.

Recently we’ve had to take a break from the basketball ministry, first due to a Health Emergency in Scott’s Family and then due to the Covid Pandemic.

We look forward to resuming the Basketball and Bible Program as soon as the pandemic gets a little bit better. We are very blessed to have our own gymnasium to run programs jointly with New Life Church.

Christ Cares is actively looking for volunteers – please contact us if you are interested. 

We hope to have four groups (co ed both guys and girls) – grade school, junior high, high school, and young adult. 

For now it would be once a week meetings. 

• Grade school & Junior High – Thursdays, after school, around 3 p.m., 

• High school: Wednesdays, early evening, around 5:30 p.m.

• Young Adults: Saturday mornings

• Saturday afternoons – occasional games against other non profits.

We need help for supervisors (register kids as they come in building & keep the wrong age kids from coming in also helping with snacks and watching doors etc.  We also need help with coaching in the gym. (Including a girls coach). In years past when we have had an abundance of volunteers we were able to add a HOMEWORK HELP / TURORING aspect… so this is another way you can serve.

2. Urban Youth Field Trips and Activities

We are looking for volunteers who like to help take urban youth on a field trip such as the zoo or a fun day of games at a forest preserve. Also occasionally taking the youth on a service activity. If you are interested please contact us 

(& we’ll also share our list of guideline for volunteers youth workers and a volunteer application for our records.) We don’t expect to start this until the pandemic has calmed down, hopefully the summer of 2021.

3. VACATION BIBLE SCHOOL / YOUTH OUTREACH (& short term missions trips)

(Pictured above is a group helping from New Hope of Alsip several years ago. Sergio & Becca Parks did an outstanding job! If you know of any church looking to hire a youth person – please call me and let me tell you about Sergio.) 

Sometimes a group comes in for a week during the summer and help us run a week long VBS program. Other times we have had a group come in for just one day and help us do a one day outreach (or work on service projects). Let us know if you’d like to do a short term missions trip with Christ Cares.

4. Christmas Toys – 

For decades “Christ the Greatest Gift” Program has blessed hundreds of children annually – TO SEE PICTURES AND VIDEO OF THIS AS WELL AS GET MORE INFORMATION ON DONATING CHRISTMAS TOYS CLICK HERE

+ Please note, unlike most Christmas Toy Drives, our toys are given as a with the goal to demonstrate God’s love. We distribute to children we are working with and we empower awesome urban churches to be the center of hope and help in their communities. If your church is collecting toys for a secular organization – it’s nice, but I’d challenge you to remember the whole mission of your church and find an organization that also shares the real meaning of Christmas.

5. SCHOOL SUPPLIES AND BACK TO SCHOOL RALLIES

For decades we have also been providing Back To School Supplies and co sponsoring Back to School Rallies blessing hundreds of children annually. 

To see pictures, video and to learn how you can make a difference by donating school supplies click HERE

+ Please note, unlike most School Supply Drives, our school supplies are given with the goal to demonstrate God’s love. We distribute to children we are working with and we empower awesome urban churches to be the center of hope and help in their communities. If your church is collecting school supplies for a secular organization –  I’d challenge you to remember the whole mission of your church and find an organization that addresses BOTH physical and spiritual needs.

6. Hope for the Hurting 

“In a moment’s time, one’s life can be shattered and forever altered…”

(Written by Scott Reese:)

This new endeavor is really dear to my heart. 

I use to keep track of how many people I knew that were murdered, I quit counting well over a decade ago when that number was well over 100. Just in the last two months (May 1, 2021) I have had three friends murdered leaving six children without a father. It’s just horrible and so devastating to all involved when a life meets a violent and sudden end. It takes a deep emotional and psychological toll on those who are involved. I myself have been professionally diagnosed as having Post Traumatic Stress by the things I’ve seen and experienced having so many friends dying violent deaths. It effects me on a daily basis and I’d appreciate prayers for complete healing.

I have pondered on of the life long impact these deaths and shootings have on the family members, not only the parents, but the siblings and children also.

Consider just one of a hundred an examples. 

Some years ago, about a dozen blocks from my house, an ex boyfriend broke into a house, stole the kitchen knifes and hid in the ceiling… in the middle of the night he dropped down a stabbed his ex girlfriend to death… while he was stabbing her, her son, only about 9 years old, came in and tried to rescue his mother but at that young age was just pushed aside… Can you imagine the pain and trauma that boy will carry? As a small measure, we invited that boy to hang out at our house for an evening a week for about a year, just hanging out, lifting weights, or basketball…

Untold hurting youth that have been scarred by violence are all around… I’m not sure exactly how to help them, but I want to at least do something… I want them to know the Christ Cares and so do we.

For starters, we have an event called Christmas in July. We gathered around 30 youth, most of whom had a family member or close loved one who was murdered. We brought them to Walmart and allowed them each to pick out a nice gift for themselves. We then had pizza and I share a lesson on God’s love and comfort. It was a great day! We had another one planned for this year, but it is delayed due to the pandemic.

We are looking for ways to move this beyond a yearly event into something more ongoing to offer support and encouragement as the youth go through their formative years. We are looking for ideas and volunteers…

We have two mothers and one father who have had children murdered and want to make a difference and will be helping us with this.

One is Carolyn Ziggler whose son was murdered many years ago… she also has close relative who was shot and killed at the age of nine. She is a wonderful lady who works with Roseland Christian Ministries and is a dear friend. 

Her life is still filled with violence. About a month ago, a few days after we delivered school supplies a gun battle broke out in front of her house – from the window she saw three different people who had been shot, including a young lady crying out for help at her doorstep, who probably died… She has a big heart to help others.

The other is Debra Dean. 

Please view Chicago Tribune’s short  video about Debra and feel her pain… Some years ago there was a series of murders that made not only Chicago’s news, but national and international news, even making the cover of Time Magazine. It all began when Debra’s beautiful 15 year old daughter, Shavon Dean was murdered allegedly by 11 year old “Yummy” Curt Sandifor who was then murdered by other young teenagers to protect their gang from being implicated. 

https://www.chicagotribune.com/0d60d26e-3152-45d5-8b30-cebea5eab252-132.html

7. VISION FOR THE FUTURE – PRAYER REQUEST – TO HIRE YOUTH STAFFING

We are blessed to have full access to a beautiful gymnasium and facility. There is great potential for youth outreach.

We would love to hire a part time or full time youth minister. Our vision would be for them to oversee our Basketball and Bible programs as well as help the church’s youth group. Another cool aspect is we would envision a regional monthly youth activity. A lot of the small urban churches in the area do not have a youth director or even a formal youth group. We could provide a monthly activity to encourage the Christian teenagers of the area.

(The pictures above and below are from a basketball tournament we had with the Monee Patriots about 6 years ago. At the time, I had grade school and junior high teams and Rev. Roosevelt Bell was running a large high school basketball program for the church.)

Please join us in prayer about this… 

We feel that there is great potential. About 20 years ago we had a full time youth minister (who was able to raise his own support, which is a very difficult thing to do) and had amazing things going on.

This picture is from about 30 years ago while I was still Senior Pastor of the Church and ran a week long VBS Program… I had the idea to have Barney the Bible Dinosaur come to have free pictures with the kids – and we had 316 kids show up! The population has shifted some since then but this does show the potential around the facility.

Please join us in prayer about this. Let us know if you know anyone or any organization that might want to help fund an urban youth minister. Also, we can set up a designated fund for this to start saving to hire a youth person if interest is shown.  So please contact us for more info.