On WHITE Sunday the youth of The Gathering took the platform. Youth Minister Leader Barbara Gomez opened with the message and returned to close the service. In between, Youth Minister Lucas González, Youth Minister Elijah Rosa, and Youth Minister Gloriahamairim Boucet each shared a personal testimony. Different stories, same truth: the enemy may attack, but he does not get the final say.

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“The thief comes only to steal and kill and destroy; I have come that they may have life, and have it to the full.”

John 10:10

Youth Minister Gomez began with a feeling many people know: going through life and feeling like you are being attacked again and again. Her answer was short: “But JESUS.” Last Sunday’s preaching, she said, was a confirmation of her message. We talked about waking up to the reality that JESUS is coming soon, and now that we have woken up, we have to take steps and take our power back. She asked everyone to look honestly at the places where something slipped without us noticing: a prayer life that quietly faded, a morning that starts with the phone instead of the LORD, a routine that includes everything except what we did when we were on fire for the LORD.

The enemy, she explained, has one purpose, and John 10:10 says it plainly. In Revelation 12:12 we see he knows his time is short, and that makes him desperate. He did not make it to heaven, so he wants to take us down with him. He has also had a long time to study us, including the generational patterns in every family, like addiction and depression, hoping that if he got our ancestors, he can get us too. That is why she said we have to take back that power and declare that it stops with us.

She also shared her own early fear as a new believer. She assumed that coming to church meant everything would be sunshine and rainbows, until a sermon about the enemy made her think, “Wait, now I have to worry about somebody else?” But as she grew in the WORD she learned something that changed it all: “He may have an agenda, but GOD gave me authority.”

“I have given you authority to trample on snakes and scorpions and to overcome all the power of the enemy; nothing will harm you.”

Luke 10:19

“The enemy can attack, but he doesn’t have the final say.”

— Youth Minister Leader Barbara Gomez

Taking back our power, Youth Minister Gomez said, does not mean fighting the enemy in our own strength. “On our own, we have nothing.” She admitted she learned that the hard way as an older sibling who finds it easy to take control and try to fix everything. Instead, we give our strength to GOD and receive it from HIM. James 4:7 gives the order: first submit to GOD, then resist the devil. He will not flee unless we resist him, and we resist with authority, telling him that our FATHER owns this house. That authority grows as we get closer to JESUS. It takes work, she said, because “you’re not going to hear HIM if you don’t know HIM.” The Bible is a life manual, she joked, and it even has recipes. “I don’t know if they’re good. I didn’t try them.”

“Submit yourselves, then, to GOD. Resist the devil, and he will flee from you.”

James 4:7

She named the lies the enemy tells and answered each one with the WORD. When he says you are powerless, remember Luke 10:19: you have authority, and it says nothing will harm you, not maybe something. When he says your past disqualifies you, 2 Corinthians 5:17 says the old is gone and the new is here, not stored in a drawer to be pulled out again. When he says you have gone too far, Romans 5:8 says CHRIST died for us while we were still sinners. We are never made to be perfect, she said, but we are made to walk like CHRIST and aim for that.

The first step is honesty with GOD: “You tell HIM your problem, and then HE’ll work on it with you.” And when the enemy trips you, you do what we tell a toddler learning to walk: get up and keep going. Today, she said, is not only about what the enemy is trying to steal. It is about what JESUS is restoring: peace, joy, faith, purpose, families, and our relationship with GOD.

“He can try to steal your peace, your joy, your faith, your confidence, your purpose, and your relationship with GOD, but he doesn’t own them.”

— Youth Minister Leader Barbara Gomez

Then she turned the service over to the youth. Their testimonies, she said, are proof that GOD can take what is broken and restore it, and proof that the enemy can try to steal, kill, and destroy, but JESUS has the last word.

Youth Minister González said he was not sharing because he is perfect or has overcome everything, but to show how GOD has been working in his life. He lost his mother when he was two or three years old and his father when he was nine, and he grew up with his grandmother, for whom he is very grateful. Growing up without his parents left wounds he did not always know how to handle. There were seasons of anger and sadness, and when people criticized or misunderstood him, the pain he carried sometimes came out as anger, even when all he wanted was to do good and help people.

“A father to the fatherless, a defender of widows, is GOD in HIS holy dwelling.”

Psalm 68:5

That verse means so much to him, he said, because he came to understand that he was never truly alone. “GOD became the father I needed.” As he grew older he found himself around people making bad decisions, and he knew he did not want to be that kind of person. The Bible says that bad company corrupts good character (1 Corinthians 15:33), and looking back he can see GOD protecting him and giving him the strength to choose a different path. His anger was another battle. He learned from James 1:19-20 to be quick to listen, slow to speak, and slow to become angry. Where he once kept everything bottled up inside, now he gives it all to the FATHER.

He was honest that the struggle did not stop when he started following JESUS. Some people still judge him or misunderstand him, and sometimes it still hurts. When it does, he reminds himself to look how far GOD has brought him, and he refuses to let the enemy take him back to where he started. “I don’t want to give the enemy what GOD has worked so hard to restore in me.” When someone judges him, he thinks before he speaks. When someone hurts him, he takes it to GOD, who knows his heart.

“My testimony is that my struggles don’t have to be the end of my story.”

— Youth Minister Lucas González

His message to the room was simple: your past may explain your struggles, but it does not have to determine your future. Maybe you grew up without a father, or lost your mother, or carry wounds nobody knows about. You still have a choice about the person you become. Do not let anger destroy your future, do not let bad influences set your character, and do not let what people say about you decide who you are. And if we ask GOD to change our lives, we must be willing to let HIM change our hearts, as in Psalm 51:10. He closed with Philippians 1:6: “I may not be where I want to be, but thank GOD I am not where I used to be.”

Before he began, Youth Minister Elijah Rosa prayed that even if only one thing he said touched one heart in the room, it would send people home with JESUS forever. Then he told of his first encounter with CHRIST: “When HE met me, I was at my lowest.” The verse that captures it for him is the story of the son who heads home.

“So he got up and went to his father. But while he was still a long way off, his father saw him and was filled with compassion for him; he ran to his son, threw his arms around him and kissed him.”

Luke 15:20

GOD, he explained, is not going to leave you running while HE sits on the porch waiting. HE will not make you run the whole way. “HE’ll meet you halfway.” The beauty of it, he said, is that in Jewish culture a king was not expected to run, yet this father did. HE ran to rescue him and said, “Elijah, this isn’t the end, it’s just the beginning.” Elijah pointed to 2 Corinthians 5:17 as the promise behind it: the old is gone, the new is here.

Three years earlier, in Arizona, he was weighed down by problems at home, and the circumstances led to his move to Puerto Rico. He felt hurt, alone, and very quiet, and he struggled with anger and did not want to talk to anybody. He was scared of what would happen next. His dad took him to a sports school, and Elijah, who loved basketball, worried that his grades were bad and that a private school would not accept him. Before they went in to enroll him, his dad showed him a verse that became his testimony verse.

“For the SPIRIT GOD gave us does not make us timid, but gives us power, love and self-discipline.”

2 Timothy 1:7

Fear, he said, is not our identity, and it is not who we are going to be. He tried out for the basketball team and received a scholarship. “That’s when I really knew GOD was working.” Then he came to The Gathering and found a new family. It did not happen overnight. His heart was hardened, and it took a while for it to soften and let GOD in. But he realized that he had to give it all to GOD, because only HE can change things.

“Only HE can change things. And yeah, my life’s never been the same.”

— Youth Minister Elijah Rosa

He closed by thanking his family in Puerto Rico, his pastor, and his church family at The Gathering. “I really love you all.”

Youth Minister Gloriahamairim Boucet walked through her high school years one grade at a time, and she kept asking the room to turn to the person next to them and say, “But, GOD.” In ninth grade, everything changed. New school, new environment, new people, and although it all looked fine on the outside, inside she felt like she was struggling. As a pastor’s kid, she felt she had to live up to the title and prove she deserved it. Every mistake felt bigger than it was, and she was so busy trying to look like she had everything together that she was not learning to bring her struggles to GOD. Somewhere along the way she forgot something important: “Before I was a pastor’s kid, I was a child of GOD.” Even then, GOD was giving her time to grow. Her story was not over.

Tenth grade she titled “When Everything Fell Apart.” Her friends meant everything to her. She even changed her school schedule to be with them. But people she trusted turned against her, rumors spread, and she felt betrayed and alone. She questioned GOD: why am I going through this if I worship you and serve you every single day? What she found was that GOD had not abandoned her, even while she was questioning HIM.

“The LORD is close to the brokenhearted and saves those who are crushed in spirit.”

Psalm 34:18

She did not have to hide her pain or pretend to be okay. Sometimes we think we have to fix ourselves before we go to GOD, she said, but “GOD wants you the way you are right now.” She also saw what her church family really meant. GOD surrounded her with people who checked on her, encouraged her, and loved her, and they became the aunts, uncles, and grandparents she needed. “Sometimes GOD answers our prayers through the people sitting right next to us.”

In eleventh grade the storm was not over, but she responded differently. In tenth grade she would cry and stay stuck in her questions. In eleventh grade she began to cry and pray, sometimes after wiping her tears and sometimes while they were still coming. She asked GOD for wisdom, patience, and peace, and for help loving others even when they did not like her. Philippians 4:6-7 stopped being just something she read and became something she lived. The rumors continued, but GOD was teaching her not to let them control her identity. She realized she needed to leave certain relationships and friendships behind, and she started again from zero. “Starting over doesn’t mean you’ve lost everything you’ve learned.” As Lamentations 3:22-23 says, HIS compassions are new every morning.

“Not perfection, but growth.”

— Youth Minister Gloriahamairim Boucet

Now in twelfth grade, she can say she is not the same person she was in ninth grade. She has grown in worship and is building her own relationship with GOD. She has learned to look at herself with more kindness and to see that her past does not determine her future. Being a pastor’s kid does not mean being perfect. She is still learning, still struggling, and still needs GOD every single day, but she does not have to prove her worth to anyone. She is serving in a leadership role at her school, taking advanced classes, and slowly preparing for her future, even without knowing what it holds. The promise she holds onto is Proverbs 3:5-6, together with Philippians 1:6: GOD, who began a good work in her, will carry it on to completion.

Her closing words were for anyone sitting in their own ninth, tenth, or eleventh grade season: you do not have to pretend you are okay to come to GOD, you do not have to have all the answers, and you do not have to be perfect. “People say things about you behind your back, but that does not have the final word over your life.” And then, once more: “But, GOD.”

Youth Minister Gomez came back to the platform moved by what she had heard. GOD puts each of us in each other’s lives for a purpose, she said, and we may not understand it in the moment, but over time we see it. Then she told her own story, with plenty of laughter. When she first started coming to church, she handed GOD a list of what she wanted. She would come, sit, stand for the songs, sit back down, and even clean if she had to, but she would not go to the altar and she would not interact with the public. She had hated public speaking since fifth grade. Her plan was to come, get her bread, say hello, grab a coffee, and leave.

Then she was invited to worship practice. She told GOD, “You’re the wrong person.” The one thing she remembers hearing back was that she was the one who was wrong. The first time she led worship, she thought it would also be the last. “I said, clap.” But GOD was unraveling her in a way she never envisioned. “Every time I tell GOD I’m not going to do something, somehow I end up doing it. I don’t know how, but GOD.” HE looks at us and says, “You think you’re going to plan your life? The book’s already written. Sit down.”

Just the day before, she said, they had looked at Psalm 139: GOD knew us before we were born and had a plan for us before we were ever planned. HE knew what each person in the room would become, and over time HE will reveal things about ourselves we did not know. She still learns something new about herself every single day, and she loves being here with all of them.

So she is not going to keep aligning her mind with what the enemy wants her to believe, because GOD created her to be a new creation. And she invited the whole church to do the same: resist the devil and say, “Devil, I’ve changed my mind. Today I will walk in CHRIST, and I will be new. You are not going to hold me back.” Why would anyone take advice from someone who got kicked out of heaven? The youth then came forward with a song and dance as a declaration that they will not let the enemy hold them down, and that they are taking their power back.

“At the end of the day, who has the final say is GOD.”

Youth Minister Leader Barbara Gomez

Take Back What the Enemy Stole was more than one Sunday’s theme. Four young voices, each at a different point in the story, said the same thing: the enemy may try to steal your peace, your joy, your faith, and your purpose, but he does not own them and he does not get the final say. Submit to GOD, resist the devil, and when the pressure comes, say it with us: But, GOD.

Watch the Full Service

Watch WHITE Sunday and hear all four youth ministers share Take Back What the Enemy Stole. Now you can join us on Facebook Live or, new for our church family and online community, on YouTube.

Reflect & Respond

What has the enemy tried to steal from you, and what would it look like this week to submit it to GOD and say, “But, GOD”?