Sara Stadem | Editor
On Friday, December 17, Joshua’s Coffee House in Hartford hosted their first Community Youth Christmas Party for grades 7-12 for some holiday fun and reflection, according to manager Correena Spangler.
Joshua’s Coffee House, as a business, has always had a mindset of being a ministry to the community more than a business explained Spangler. “Owners Dave and Victoria Obenauer opened the coffee shop a year ago last September as a memorial to their late son. That’s always been their mindset; service at heart and to use coffee as a way into people’s hearts and have a place for people to gather,” Spangler said. So, when Spangler had the idea of the Community Youth Christmas Party, she explained it was a natural reaction for Joshua’s Coffee Shop to host the party for the students.
Spangler has been leading a youth group called Arrow Club on Monday nights at Joshua’s Coffee House for about a year and decided she wanted to do something to celebrate the holiday season. “I just wanted to do something with them (youth group) for the holiday. It’s been a crazy year so I wanted to give them a break and some fun,” Spangler said.
Depending on the night, Spangler usually has anywhere from 3-12 students attend youth group. Spangler wanted to try to get more students involved so she partnered with Ignite Life Church out of Dell Rapids and had a turnout of about 18 students at the Community Youth Christmas Party.
Spangler explained the group discussed the real reason for the Christmas season through Luke Chapter 2, The Birth of Jesus.
Spangler said, “I think it was good. The kids participated and enjoyed themselves. They were really focused and dialed in on hearing the Christmas story and scripture. They noticed things they didn’t before and had some good conversations with that.” Spangler continued, “We talked about how God made himself vulnerable for them. We are often told to trust in God and sometimes that’s hard but we forget that God had trust in us first. We wanted to remind students during this time of season the real reason for Christmas.”
The group also sang Christmas carols, had a hot cocoa bar, played games, decorated cookies and more.