Ministering with Young Life

Dates to Remember:
Birthday: January 14th

Contact:
audreyblomgren@gmail.com

Sending Agency:
Young Life South Peninsula
1900 Embarcadero Rd. #104
Palo Alto, CA 94306
(650) 813-5290

Area website:
www.southpeninsula.younglife.org
National website:
www.younglife.org

AUDREY'S JOURNEY
Audrey Van Elderen has been a part of the PBC body since 1997. She attended Westmont College, a liberal arts school in Santa Barbara from 1996-2000. She found PBC to be her home church when she returned from Westmont for the summers. At one point in college when she was home for a vacation she was asked by the PBC high school group to help out with a scavenger hunt activity. She loved it so much and had such a great time running all over town with a crazy group of kids. This was the first time she began to feel the Lord tugging at her heart, calling her to shine the light of Christ into the lives of kids.

The Lord continued to present her with opportunities to be involved with teenagers. Throughout her career at Westmont Audrey volunteered as a Young Life leader. Her sophomore year of college she worked with middle school kids in Carpenteria and her junior and senior year every free moment was spent with teenagers at Santa Barbara High, hanging with them at football games, having them over for dinner, bonfires at the beach, and having weekly Young Life Club meetings and discipleship groups!

During her college summers she worked with middle school kids at Mt. Hermon, a Christian Conference Center in the Santa Cruz mountains. The summers of '98 and '99 were spent working as the intern for Carol Lind in the Jr. High ministry at PBC. At this time an adult friend of hers, Gretchen Vander Plas looked her dead in the eye and said, "Audrey I think you just may be cut out for this youth ministry stuff! I think the Lord may be calling you to work with teenagers". Funny thing is sometimes other people can see things in us that we cannot. Gretchen was right, even though to Audrey the thought was somewhat terrifying!

In May of 2000 Audrey graduated from Westmont and returned home to work for two years as the full-time youth ministry assistant for PBC. And the rest is history! After receiving excellent training at PBC by way of the intern program and tons of hands on experience, Audrey launched into her career with Young Life. It was a seamless and very natural transition. She has been on staff with Young Life for the past 41/2 years working with teenagers in Mountain View and Los Altos. Now she embarks upon a new challenge... starting middle school ministry, appropriately called Wyldlife, for kids in Palo Alto. Young Life has not has a presence in Palo Alto for over twenty years. Please pray for Audrey, her committee of adults, and the staff of volunteers who will be reaching out to the youth of Palo Alto.

WHAT IS YOUNG LIFE
Founded in 1941, Young Life has earned a reputation for effectively reaching out to teenagers of all kinds in all places. The mission is a Christian non-profit organization with more than 4,000 ministries nationwide, in more than 50 foreign countries, with 27,000 volunteers, and 24 premier camps across the United States and Canada. We've got good news for kids! We give them the great news that God thinks they are great kids. We give them the great news that God believes in buried treasure and is ready to dig into their lives to help them find it for themselves. We give them the great news that God treats them like royalty and has sacrificed His only Son, Jesus Christ, just so that they can live life to the fullest. And we give them the great news that God is standing in the swift current beside them with His hand extended, ready to lead them through the waters.

Because of her history at PBC, and all the growing opportunities and encouragement that she has been presented with, Audrey deeply cherishes, and is grateful towards this church body. It gives her the strength to represent Christ to kids!

A QUOTE FROM A YOUNG LIFE KID
"This past year has not exactly been smooth sailing for me. When I first started going to Young Life the waters inside me became less and less choppy. I want to thank you for everything you have given me. Not only have you given me strength, but you have shown me the light of God, and I will carry this gift with me for eternity."