Called Collective Brings Together Ministry-Minded Students
“Everybody’s called to something, but Paul says there’s a special calling into full-time ministry, so we’re going back to emphasizing that,” says Matt Harder, 38, network ministry youth director. “It sounds so simple but now that we’re doing it, we have kids saying, ‘I’m ready to go wherever God sends me.’”
The network’s initiative, Called Collective, implements and adapts ideas generated by the national Called office which identifies and equips people called to vocational ministry. In recent years, Harder and team have prioritized giving students a chance to consider and respond to God’s call to full-time ministry, especially at the network’s ten summer camps which have “exploded” in numbers and spiritual response, he says.
In the last few months, more than 420 high school students have filled out cards saying they believe they are called to full-time ministry, and more than 100 of these say they are called to be missionaries. Some aim to be youth pastors, worship leaders, kids’ pastors, and military chaplains.
“We haven’t been giving those kinds of altar calls as much in the past decade, so we’re getting back to that, and students are being called to ministry at the altars,” Harder says.
Students declare their call by filling out cards and giving them to their youth pastors who then shepherd them locally on the journey toward what God may have for them. They also plug into the network’s Called Collective movement which is anchored by monthly live and live-streamed “Calledcast” rallies on YouTube and Twitch. These regional events held at AG churches bring Called Collective high-school students together to worship, share a meal, and hear from missionaries and pastors in an interview and question-and-answer format. The monthly rallies are hosted by Harder and Yoyo Garcia, 28, the network’s Youth Alive director. Called Collective students who don’t attend in person can watch in small groups with other participants in their youth groups.
“The response has really surpassed what I thought,” Harder says, noting that 128 students attended the January event in person at Faith Tri-Cities AG in Pasco, Washington. “They are hungry, sharp kids that just get it. They’re ready, they’re focused and excited to be there. It’s great energy that sparks our youth pastors and creates good partnership with our network.”
Northwest University in Kirkland, Washington, partners with the events to offer a Bible quiz segment called “Are you smarter than a professor?” This helps to acquaint students with the training offered by the university which can become part of their development. Harder also promotes missions-affiliated ministries such as Speed the Light which are natural beneficiaries of a greater enthusiasm for world missions.
“This is the greatest opportunity we have to teach kids to give,” Harder says. “We tie the call to ministry into Speed the Light and say, ‘Others of you will be supporting these people at the altars with vehicles and so on.’ We connect it all and help them understand that God can birth something in them we can’t yet put into words, but that they can give their lives for ministry.”
Gracie Duchemin, 20, grew up at Stone Church AG in Yakima, Washington, where her father, Jeff Duchemin, is pastor. She joined a Called Collective cohort in 2022.
“I loved the vision for a community of people who are devoted and felt a call to ministry and to living that call out,” she says. “I wanted to make those lifelong friendships I was really excited about.”
Zoom meetings helped her connect with students throughout the district, and, “There were times on those meetings when the Lord used them to speak into my life and encourage me in my personal walk with God and also in ministry. I learned from awesome people, authors, and pastors.”
Now a senior at Northwest University (NWU), Duchemin keeps in touch with her fellow Called Collective members and is pursuing the call on her life to be a worship pastor — a call which has been affirmed and re-affirmed at summer camp and conference altar times over the years.
“Called Collective brought such life and helped me have a foundation,” she says. “The AG has been such a gift and provided such strong roots for me as I’ve started out in ministry and prepare to live it out.”
She serves as student worship coordinator at NWU this year and last summer traveled for five weeks with NWU’s worship team to minister at AG summer camps.
The Called Collective community can stay connected 24/7 on the Discord app where students hear from leaders and participate in sub-groups focused on the Bible, discipleship and topics such as how to evangelize their peers. Community connections also are forged in person at summer camps where Called Collective students spend time together at special lunches to “build community among future missionaries and pastors,” Harder says.
His passion for the movement is personal: he was called and discipled into ministry at Moses Lake AG at the age of 14, and the broader fellowship of AG churches played a strong role in raising him up, he says.
“What kept me going was our network, the ministry, the culture and the family dynamic it supplied,” he says. “The network has been family for me. In times when I needed somebody outside my local church, I had brothers, sisters and youth pastors at other churches.”
Today, Harder and others are building a culture in which students can seriously consider becoming missionaries or pastors and take that journey with others. For some, the process of discovery means they realize they are called to something else.
“What I love is that after hearing missionaries talk, some say, ‘This isn’t going to be a full-time thing for me,’” Harder says. “As much as we’re excited when kids are called, I’m also excited when God confirms it’s not that and says it’s something else.”
The network expects the renewed interest to bear fruit for years as they open the altars and invite students to hear God’s specific call for each of their lives.