New staff role means new events for the summer
Young adults at OneWay and in the Chicagoland area are in for a fun-filled, engaging summer with the addition of Carl Fisher to the OneWay young adult staff. Carl brings nearly ten years of youth ministry and pastoring experience to the team — as well as a passion to draw young people into relationships and challenge them to grow in their faith.
As the part-time Community Director, Carl will lead events such as bonfires, game nights, worship and open mic nights to build community among young adults in the area.
“That’s my favorite way of doing discipleship and making connections and building rapport,” Fisher says, “Just the grassroots way.”
Carl started volunteering in youth ministry in his early 20s. He later became the youth director at a church, and today he pastors at 168 Community Church in Downers Grove, IL, where he serves with youth, hospitality, preaching, teaching and more.
“As I’ve gotten older and really just gotten into the work, one of the things I recognized is that my calling was to be a tool that God used to shape the future — and that the youth and young adults of America are the future,” Carl says. “And if that was what God was calling me to do, I wanted to go into it 100 percent, full force with no hesitations.”
Part of Fisher’s passion comes from a time in his own young adulthood when he lacked a strong community with other youth. He wants youth and young adults to know they aren’t alone. There is strength in being together and accountable to each other. It’s easier to pursue the Lord with one another, especially when they are going through the same things at the same time, Fisher explains.
Fisher first learned about OneWay through a friend who is on staff. He and his wife, Liz, felt that the community director role lined up with God’s calling for their family, to build community and activate people in the western suburbs of Chicago.
“When I think of the word activate, I think about the word igniting. Like finding somebody’s passion or their fire — what God has created them to do — igniting that fire in them and then directing that flame in the direction God is calling them,” he says. To him, that process involves understanding where a person is at in their belief in God and the gospel, what their major life hurdles are and then walking with them through those things one by one.
“One of my biggest hopes is that the interns would grow in their relationship with the Lord,” Fisher says. “Two, that they would feel more confident and assured in their calling for the Lord.”
Carl is excited to see how God is going to use his past for His future and to be a part of that process while continuing to look at his own story through God’s eyes.
Carl is married to Liz, and they have two daughters and a son. They met in high school, so although they’ll be celebrating their 12-year anniversary in 2022, they are going on almost 20 years of being together.
Adding a community director to the team is one of the ways we are working to expand our program to activate even more young adults into Kingdom-advancing work. Would you consider investing in this program so we can engage even more young people into a ministry experience?
