BRENTWOOD, Tenn. — This summer, as thousands of kids and students attended Lifeway camps across the country, camp staff challenged them to think more broadly about their role in God’s mission to make disciples of all nations, and campers responded by giving generously to Southern Baptist missions endeavors.

Because of the faithful giving of kids, students and leaders this summer, Ben Mandrell, president and CEO of Lifeway Christian Resources, presented checks totaling $678,283.32 to International Mission Board (IMB) President Paul Chitwood and North American Mission Board (NAMB) President Kevin Ezell on Tuesday (Sept. 17) during the Southern Baptist Convention (SBC) Executive Committee (EC) trustee meeting. This was the highest amount given to missions through Lifeway camps since 2017.

“The missions education that takes place at Lifeway camps each summer allows campers to learn about a church planter who serves through NAMB and a people group we are praying for and trying to reach with the gospel through the work of IMB missionaries,” Mandrell said. “At Lifeway camps, students are discipled to become Great Commission people.”

Through its Southern Baptist missions partners — the IMB and NAMB — Lifeway has the ability to extend its reach across state borders and beyond oceans. This summer, as Lifeway hosted more than 114,000 campers representing over 4,200 churches, it continued its partnership with the IMB and NAMB, providing missions education and promoting missional giving among kids and students at Lifeway camps. Over the past 40 years of partnership, Lifeway campers have given more than $17 million to missions.

“It’s an honor to be able to present checks each year to the IMB and NAMB on behalf of the thousands of campers from across the country who came together to support Southern Baptist missions,” Mandrell said. “Our team at Lifeway is grateful for this ongoing partnership with the IMB and NAMB.”

In 2024, campers, camp staff and adult chaperones at FUGE Camps, CentriKid, Student Life Camp and Student Life Kids Camp across the country gave $207,241.16 to NAMB and $471,042.15 to the IMB.

“Even more important than these one-time gifts is the way these offerings elevate missions as a priority before students,” Ezell said. “It is a reminder to them about the everyday importance of reaching the lost, and we pray many of these students will someday answer the call to enter the mission field themselves.”

Chitwood is grateful that Lifeway camps maximize the unique opportunity to let children and youth know how they can be part of the Great Pursuit of the lost. “Keeping students’ eyes on the Revelation 7:9 vision is a responsibility Lifeway takes seriously, and we thank the Lord that we see students embracing the opportunity to make an eternal impact on their world,” Chitwood said.

New Orleans Baptist Theological Seminary President Jamie Dew addressed EC members before the check presentation to tell his own journey of coming to faith in Christ, which began with his attending a Lifeway student camp.

A new international emphasis

Each summer, FUGE Camps, CentriKid, Student Life Camp and Student Life Kids Camp emphasize international missions through the IMB. This year, Lifeway and the IMB began a new international emphasis, focusing on the unreached people groups located in Northern Africa and the Middle East (NAME). Around 8 in 10 individuals in NAME are Muslim, and 93% of the 794 people groups in the area are unreached.

As kids and students gave to the IMB through Lifeway camps this summer, they knew their gifts would help fund efforts to reach the unreached NAME people groups. The primary focus this summer was on Ethiopia, a country marked by war, famine and trauma. Many Ethiopian children are not in school because they must stay home to work or enter the local military. Many of these kids have never heard the gospel and have little or no access to the Bible or other believers.

Through missions emphasis videos, teaching and prayer, Lifeway camps challenged kids and students to recognize the plight of unreached people in the NAME region. By giving to the weekly missions offering, campers had the opportunity to join God in the work He is doing in that part of the world, changing lives for eternity.

Supporting North American missions

Alongside the international missions emphasis, FUGE Camps and CentriKid campers also learned about NAMB church planters Noelson and Edna Chery serving in Philadelphia.

The Cherys are Haitian immigrants who unexpectedly began a church from their own living room. The couple was having a hard time finding a Haitian church in the area that worshiped in English, discovering that many Haitian churchgoers still worshiped in Creole. The Cherys were burdened to worship in a different way because they wanted their kids to have continuity with the English language, including their Sunday worship.

This burden prompted them to start a family Bible study in their living room, and to their surprise, neighbors were constantly popping in as they passed by, wanting to be a part of what God was doing. Many who attended encouraged the Cherys to transform their living room Bible study into a church — one where kids and adults alike could serve and be discipled. The couple responded by giving God their yes, so the First Haitian Metanoia Baptist Church was born in 2020.

As Lifeway campers heard the Cherys’ story of obedience through daily missions videos, they got to know a family that would be specifically impacted by the offerings they would give at camp that week.

Increasing gospel impact

At the end of each week of camp, kids and students had the opportunity to give to the missions offering. This week, the IMB and NAMB reaped the financial fruit of the summer’s weekly offering, after Lifeway camps participants gave the highest per person average offering in nearly a decade.

“IMB wants campers to understand they can be part of what God is doing around the world now, no matter how old they are or where they live,” said Sarah Farley-Beall, senior NextGen strategist and camps specialist at the IMB. “They can learn, advocate, pray and give to be part of the work now. The IMB wants our younger generations to know they are needed and that there are opportunities to be part of God’s great pursuit of lost people.”

Working with NAMB and the IMB, Lifeway camps give students the opportunity to hear stories of faithful missionaries and God’s work around the globe. Not only do these stories give campers a vision for giving to missions but also for living on mission themselves — locally or globally.

“I can’t imagine how many seeds are planted of future church planters, missionaries and church leaders who will one day start a brand-new gospel work because they saw it demonstrated at camp,” Mandrell said.

(EDITOR’S NOTE — Marissa Postell is a writer for Lifeway Christian Resources.)