Pictured: Cindy, second from the left, with her YOKE team and kids at camp a few years ago.
Cindy joined YOKE’s staff as the office manager in 2004 after a friend on the board of directors let her know there was an opening. She told then-director John that she wanted the job, but that she would not agree to volunteer for YOKE. Little did she know that within a year she would be joining the volunteer ranks as the Carter Middle School Team Leader, where she served for five years!
She may not have expected how involved she would become, but she has willingly poured herself out to serve not only the staff, but also her college students and YOKE kids.
“You can’t be around all of these people who love the Lord and want to see middle school kids connect with Christ and not be impacted,” Cindy said.
Cindy has plenty of experience with college students from working on staff with Navigators and from having three children of her own. Her heart for ministry has been impacted by the many challenges that middle school kids face.
“There is so much thrown at them, and they are expected to grow up so fast,” Cindy said of the middle school years. She has been encouraged by the willingness of her YOKE Folk to “sacrifice so that middle school kids can see Jesus in them.”
In addition to volunteering her time as a YOKE leader and serving on staff as the office manager, Cindy’s roles include (and are definitely not limited to) team mom, coordinator of all delicious meals for YOKE parties, keeper of the schedules, organizer of the office, and doer of all the things the rest of us hate to do. And at the end of the day, she still enjoys her job, saying it’s a “joy for me to come in to work every day.”
“Ministry is hard work. … The years I have been around YOKE I have seen so many kids and college students changed, challenged and growing. So my advice is take the plunge, see where God would have you serve, if not with middle school kids then ask Him where you need to be.”