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I used to sell litigation support technology to law firms. I would boldly walk into corner offices and conference rooms alike attempting to convince powerful people to consider a different way of doing things. For over 12 years now, I've been walking into churches, schools and institutions, and sometimes even living rooms attempting to convince Christians to consider a different way of doing things.

Sometimes, Christians are harder to convince than attorneys.

I never attempted to convince an attorney that the laws should change. I only suggested that we should reconsider the ways we practice. Similarly, I would never attempt to convince a pastor, parent, or educator that the timeless truths of historic Christianity should change. Never. I only suggest that, in light of cultural shifts and generational differences, we should consider changing some of the ways we define and practice apologetics, evangelism, discipleship, and outreach. Especially in terms of how we are reaching, teaching, training, and retaining our young people.

Unfortunately, this suggestion isn't always well received.

What I believe to be my personal calling, as it relates to ReThink315's mission, is very rewarding most of the time. Other times, it can be very discouraging. Some days it seems like it would be easier and certainly more prosperous (in a worldly sense) to go back to consultative sales. Some days I just want to quit.

Today, my friends, is NOT one of those days.

We just wrapped up our second annual ReThink315 student retreat. Below are just a few of the powerful student testimonies we recorded. These are, quite literally, the fruits of our efforts and I couldn't be happier with these results. We're making a measurable difference in the lives of students! That said, don't let the attention grabbing subject line fool you. I really love and feel personally called to this work. I do.

God willing, I'm not going anywhere.

If you haven't already, please consider making a donation to this impactful mission and ministry. This has been a tough year for a lot of our churches, families, and supporters. Many of our students applied for and were given scholarships and discounts. You can help us offset these additional costs by making a generous donation today.

In Grace,

Jeremy R. Smith
Founder, Executive Director
www.ReThink315.com

Email: jsmith@rethink315.com
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I always heard my older siblings talk about apologetics… I didn’t know what apologetics was, but it seemed to be such a big part of their lives. Now that I’m here and seeing it, it’s amazing. The discussions and so many people thinking through why they believe what they believe.

I think now I’m much more confident in talking about my faith with people who don’t believe the same things I do. Not necessarily trying to win them over, but I can help them along if they are open to learning more about the Christian faith. Being here increased my understanding of people’s different gifts and how every gift can be used to the glory of God. Whatever your gift is it can be used to glorify God and bring others closer to Him.

Apologetics has a reputation for talking about stuff that nobody else understands. But that’s not the case. There’s so much more to it. There’s also a depth and a spiritual aspect to it.

-Dayton

I’ve been hanging out with this group since I was a kid. I’ve participated in and even helped create so many different components of this ministry. It’s nice to be a young adult coming back, and continuing to come back, to grow with people and to grow in my faith. What I love the most is all the returning speakers and panelists. It’s not just this history I have with the volunteers and staff, it’s the speakers themselves.

When I first started coming it was a little intimidating... I felt like the new kid on the block. I didn’t grow up talking about apologetics. But the more that I listened and participated, the more it all stuck with me. I’m not the kind of person who is going to get a Ph.D. in philosophy. Not many people are. This kind of training and these sorts of conversations are good for not just the super smart people out there, but for ordinary people like me... It was so nice to find out that there were people here, even leaders, coming from the same place as me. Your education or level of knowledge just doesn’t matter here. You come as you are…

I think the most helpful thing I’ve picked up over the years is my growing ability to have positive conversations with Christians and non-Christians and my ability to have compassion for their different points of view. Knowing that I don’t know everything and learning how to listen better is one of the most important things I’ve learned here. I’ve learned that it’s almost always better to listen to understand than to listen to respond. But the beauty of this approach is the better I understand where people are coming from, the more opportunities I will have to respond.

-Kari
Prayer Coordinator, Volunteer

I’ve been to a lot of different youth events. What makes ReThink315 different is the panel discussions and Q&A sessions… Even though all of the panelists here agree on the fundamentals, there are other topics Christians have different views on. That concept of “mere Christianity” that C.S. Lewis talks about, in terms of all the things all Christians should agree on, is a great start. But I feel like it is very important to hear different views.

As we’re learning together, we can compare different views and it’s like that “iron sharpens iron” scripture. Seeing these different perspectives helps us to decide for ourselves. We can even look at different views and agree to disagree. Instead of giving us one answer and saying we should believe it, I feel like being able to listen to different views helps us to sharpen our thinking... I like being presented with different views and I like learning why Christians have different views. It helps to reinforce the beliefs I chose and makes me more confident when defending my view.

I was just telling my brother, when we first came here on Friday, there was such a strong sense of family. We’re just now joining in, but you can feel it every time we meet together as a group. All of our mealtimes, our panel discussions, the hang outs, it’s just great! I feel like having that sense of community and family really makes an impact.

-Samuel “Uncle Sam”

I was expecting to come here and be preached at. But instead, it was an interactive experience. This is a really inviting community and everyone seems to want to grow and learn together. I got to hang out with students with the same mindset as me and were asking all the same questions that I ask.

The panel format really brought a different perspective and answered questions that I never even thought of. To be able to get answers from people who are literally professionals, people who have studied this stuff for 30+ years, it’s just such great information. Usually, the only place I can find this information is online, but I don’t always know where to look or even what to look for.

Being here, it’s like all this good information is being spoon fed to me. That’s important because now I feel like I can spoon feed it to other people in an easy to digest way. People in my close friend group are always asking me these deep questions about Christianity and I have no idea how to answer them. I feel like this event has really given me what I need… now I have better answers for my non-Christian friends.

– Joshua

My sister came a year before I did. She told me how much she learned and how much fun it was. I didn’t think I would enjoy this at first. I couldn’t really get through my college lectures without being bored out of my mind. But here I’m listening sometimes for two hours and I just want more of it. I went to a few different youth camps. The balance between fun and learning was different there than it is here. There it was more than half fun and games with just a few talks or sermons. Here there’s still plenty of time for fun but there are more talks, deeper talks, and you get a lot more out of it.

A lot of time growing up we’re never told why the Bible is true or how we even got these books. Here you’re getting to know why you believe what you believe. Even though you already believed it and accepted it your whole life, it’s good to have historical proof and even proof outside of Christianity. Here I learned why we have different books in the Bible, how they were chosen, and why they were put into the Bible. I learned how they were copied and translated, and now I know that what’s in there is accurate.

The thing that makes ReThink315 different is the wide array of talks and even different opinions on different subjects. You can hear different opinions. So, while there are different opinions from different people here, everyone is a Bible believing Christian. Even when our pastors have good answers, they won’t have all the answers for everything. Here there’s a really diverse group of people to learn from with the experience and the qualifications to talk about these things. Sometimes this helps me to understand a topic better and helps me figure out what I think for myself.

-Larissa
Volunteer

I was at this retreat last year but I've also attended apologetics events in the past. What I found here isn’t something you experience in other places. It’s not just the concrete, evidenced based apologetics. It’s also all about the more emotional and relational… In terms of other camps or even church events, there aren’t a lot of other experiences I’ve had that compare to what I experienced here at ReThink315.

One thing that was really cool... there are different perspectives here. It’s not about hearing different perspectives and agreeing or disagreeing or even changing my mind. It’s about hearing something new. That’s important because if you’re constantly hearing the same thing, even the right thing, over and over and you’re not being challenged. You’re just being affirmed. That’s fine and even appropriate to an extent, but when everything you already believe is just echoing back to you there’s no real development in your faith. There’s no challenge and without challenge there’s no growth.

Regarding my non-Christian friends, I think the biggest takeaway for me from this event is that I think I’m now able to be more gracious. I can accept the fact that people have different views. Even Christians. And that’s ok. I think that going forward I’ll be able to articulate the things that I believe better and if my friends want to learn more we can have a good conversation, even if they don’t agree with me.

-Ethan

More Quotes...

One of the things I love most about ReThink315 is the atmosphere. When I first walked through the door people were making friends right off the bat. Which is great for people like me who are new. You don’t have to be an intellectual to come to this camp. I don’t think I’m an intellectual. You don’t have to be super smart like all the panelists here. This was my first time here and not one person was sitting by themselves and everyone was talking to everyone, which I love. I love a community, especially after COVID, where everyone talks to everybody. - 2022 Retreat Student

I feel like a lot of Christians in my age group just have blind faith. They’re just following their parents or their friends because they don’t know anything else. For someone like me, I want to understand why I should trust this. Because if there’s no reason to trust this then what’s the point? Mostly what I’m taking away from this event is the ability to defend my faith. I’m all about preaching it but I want to defend it too. I think reThink315 really helped me with this because they’re answering the questions that nobody else is answering. - 2022 Retreat Student

I’ve been working closely with Jeremy attending these kinds of events since 2013. Almost 10 years ago I did my first student interview as a high school freshman. I’m now here as a volunteer and I still sit in on lectures and learn so much. I think that’s one of the cool things about ReThink315 is that when it comes to the people on the panel, you don’t just learn from their degrees and expertise. You learn from the way they talk to students. The way that they take time afterwards to answer questions and just engage students. They look you in the eye, they have conversations with you, and they just radiate kindness and Christ’s love. They are a living example of everything they’re telling you. - 2022 Retreat Volunteer

ReThink315 is different in that they have so many speakers and panelists who are experts and, as smart as they are, they’re not judgmental of different ideas. I like that they all share the same principals and the main doctrines of Christianity, but they leave space for disagreement on the small things. They keep the main ideas the main ideas and don’t divide over the small stuff. They help us to grasp the idea that the small things don’t really change the fact that Christianity and Jesus are true. - 2022 Retreat Student

My parents didn’t have to force me to come. I really wanted to come! I’m really glad I attended because at other Christian events or camps you really don’t get the same responses to your questions. At other places it seems like all you get is a halfhearted, “Just trust Jesus.” I want to trust Jesus but to do that I want to know what the answers are. I can’t blindly trust Jesus. I don’t think that’s faith. I think that’s just following directions. - 2022 Retreat Student

There are experts here. The answers they’re giving are backed by Biblical evidence and that’s really helpful when defending your faith. You should come here! Especially if you’re struggling to figure out what’s true. It’s a small group here. I like this because of the student teacher ratio. It’s like a family feeling. You can talk about anything and no student leaves with a question unanswered. - 2022 Retreat Student

More interviews, including videos, are coming soon.

"The panel format is really effective because not only are you getting experienced Christians to give their opinions on deep subjects of the Bible but you get a wide variety of opinions on a single topic."

“To be able to see the people that I love and care about join in this tradition of asking the deep questions and getting deep answers, in a community like this, is something remarkable.”

"After the talk about Jesus being the center of the Christian faith, and that Jesus is the gospel, I was really pondering that... I think that while it’s very elementary a lot of us forget it.”

"There wasn't a focus on telling us what thoughts we should have, but rather there was a focus on the thoughts that we do have and how to analyze them in a way that’s both logically sound and scripturally sound."

“You have so many people here that are gathered together from different kinds of Churches and denominations, and it just doesn’t really matter, it doesn’t even come up. You make friends...”

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