the following are a couple of newsletter articles about our Summer activities:

The Hot, humid summer days at our campus in downtown Houston are a rollercoaster ride of fun and service. What goes on at Impact during the Summer is credited to God, but we also are thankful for and indebted to the many volunteers and servants who come to combine their efforts in making our Summer Youth Program fantastic! About 15 college students arrived from various universities to spend the summer as interns. Many are from Christian universities, like ACU, Harding, LCU, and OC, while some others came in from OSU and even from so far away as Canada. But the collaboration does not stop there. Helpers came in June to take kids on trips, assist in this Summer’s Reading Camp, and provide extra hands for special activities as various church groups are there to bear the load of activity. 20-30 High school interns from Impact join the other interns to man the myriad of activities that is VBS 1 and VBS 2. Groups also came to camp out on campus as they lent their groups and various talents to us. Churches and ministries descended upon us from Oklahoma to Kentucky and from Kansas to Alabama, each bringing their own special blend of blessing and talent. Some of these groups have been coming down for years. Others are new supporters, like one group who just happened across our webpage this year, became interested in us, and organized a large group of kids to drive in from Missouri to serve in this area. We received so much help from these efforts (close to 400 volunteers in all), but we have also learned that they take something with them when they leave. They grow in their passion for ministry to others, they dream of more ways to care for their cities, and new works and servants of the Lord develop from what was experienced during a hot sweaty summer. Please pray that what happens at Impact does NOT stay at Impact. Pray that the effects of this summer extend to many more people in many more places. God is faithful and He will do it. Our schedule is crowded and so will be our building and facilities, but don’t let that keep you from stopping by. There is always room for YOU at Impact!

..........As we think of Summer, things like baseball, camps, cook-outs, and fun in the sun come to mind. Here at Impact, we wrapped all that up in God’s love.
Monday, June 4, was in many ways our first official day of summer, and as first days usually are it was pretty hectic. The youth group from Conroe Church of Christ arrived in the morning to pick up thirty of our elementary children and take them to Gulf Coast Christian Camp to spend a week at camp together. Impact’s middle school youth group, led by our middle school minister Wes Fikes and several of his interns, loaded up an Impact bus to head to Galveston for their summer kick-off. And later in the afternoon our VBS directors and I, along with a visiting youth group from – in Amarillo, went to the Irvington Village apartments, where many of our kids come from, and picked up a busload of kids (and I do mean busload) and took them to play at the park, an event we used to help finish signing kids up for our upcoming VBS and Reading Camps. And all of this was happening while our high school youth group was hiking in the mountains of Colorado on Wilderness Trek.
All of this activity (and the God-breathed impact this activity has on the hearts of His children) takes lots of resources, including financial ones. Many of you been great supporters and partners of God’s work in Houston in the past, and we hope and pray that partnership can continue.