First Priority is a Christian club at Bob Jones High School. Its mission is to spread the word about Jesus to students and teachers by always being kind. This club is a place where Christian students can safely express their faith. Michelle Mitchell, the sponsor of First Priority as well as a math teacher at Bob Jones said, “It gives kids who love God a chance to talk with other kids about it.” Because it is an extracurricular event, First Priority is not breaking any rules concerning the freedom of religion.

On Wednesday, there was a guest speaker from the youth program at Asbury United Methodist Church. Carl Schoenholz, the associate director of student ministries, was asked to come to our school by the leaders of First Priority. Many students were excited to have him come and speak. He told the club members a story about a time he shared his faith and overcame an obstacle. Also, he explained how he used that ordeal as a way to spread the Word of the Lord to others.

A summary of the story is this: Carl was taking a three-hour trip on a bus. He began talking to the man sitting across from him and found out that the man was also a Christian. However, the man also talked about how he went to a lot of crazy parties and drank a lot. Carl really wanted to ask him if he thought he was doing what God wanted him to do, but he was afraid it would make things awkward. It suddenly hit him that he was more afraid of making things awkward than letting that man leave without potentially turning his life around. He asked him, and guess what? It wasn’t awkward at all. It didn’t change that man’s life dramatically, but it did teach Carl about himself.

Carl told the members that talking about things like this was important because “sharing our faith is something that first: God commands us to do, and second of all: it’s a natural overflow. If we believe in God and we love God, then it comes naturally to share our faith.” He gave an analogy to help explain this by saying “Kind of like when you get a sweet present at Christmas, you’ll want to tell everyone about it.”

First Priority always enjoys having speakers come and share their testimonies to reach out to others that are listening. Sophia Almanza, one of the leaders of First Priority, already knew Carl because he was one of her youth pastors. She said that she was ecstatic that he came and that “it’s always great to meet speakers and hear about their stories.”