PANAMA CITY BEACH, Fla. – Thirty-nine college students from the Lighthouse Ministry at Northwest Missouri State University spent their spring break serving and sharing the gospel with spring breakers through a ministry called BeachReach. BeachReach, which has been around since the 1990s, deploys college students to spring break hot spots to reach their own generation by walking the streets and meeting physical needs such as food and van rides.
In preparation, Yarnell sent his students out in pairs at least once to have spiritual conversations on campus. These fruitful interactions helped build students’ confidence to boldly share their faith over spring break.
During the trip to Panama City Beach the second week of March, Lighthouse students had nearly 600 spiritual conversations and prayed over 406 spring breakers. “There are simply too many amazing stories to tell,” says Campus Missionary Jason Yarnell. “It was amazing to see our students step up, be bold, and share their faith with others.”
Yarnell says they saw the truth of Ephesians 2:10 play out with God clearly orchestrating their encounters. God consistently set up situations where He used exactly the right Lighthouse student to speak to the spring breaker who needed them. “Some of the stories are so perfectly aligned that I almost wouldn’t believe them if I hadn’t been there to see it!” he says. Through the shuttle ministry, one Lighthouse student led a spring breaker to Christ.
The ministry itself was an incredibly experience, but so was the way God worked through local churches to make the trip possible. In order to afford the trip, the students needed to raise over $8,000. “Our supporting churches and other individuals provided above and beyond what we needed!” says Yarnell.
Local churches provided vans for the Lighthouse to use as shuttles during the week, a key piece of the BeachReach strategy. When they got into a car accident, a local church in Panama City Beach let them borrow their 15-passenger Transit van to get everyone back to Maryville on schedule.
FBC Woodlawn, IL eagerly welcomed the Lighthouse group to stay overnight to break up the arduous trip in both directions. “Not only did they provide us breakfast and ask to hear stories from our trip before we left, but they were also the perfect provision from the Lord, as they are the local area storm shelter and were the perfect place for us to be while tornado sirens wailed all around us!” Yarnell relays.
The Lighthouse students are thankful for the many churches and individuals that rallied around them to make this trip possible, and they trust that the Lord will water and grow the many seeds that were planted that week.