For Jason Heide, faith runs centuries deep in his family. "I've started going further back to tell my story, back to the 1600s. Someone shared my genealogy with me and I discovered that a lot of the records came from old church documents and baptism records, which was kind of neat." Now, as lead pastor of Steinbach EMC for the last few years, he sees how growing up in church has been beneficial. "I'm a benefactor of people faithfully sharing the Gospel with their children and their children and so on. I grew up in the church and my parents brought me to church faithfully and now I bring my kids to church." The moment when everything changed While being in church has always been the norm for Heide, he said something shifted when he was a teenager. "The big moment of my life came at my Grade 10 year. I was playing sports and hanging out with people who were bad influences." Heide said his youth pastor had asked him to be a part of the youth ministry team. Although he was skeptical at first, the decision changed his life. "I thought about it and I thought, 'I don't really want to. I don't really know what it's about. How will that be perceived by others?' These are the questions I was asking, but I cried out to the Holy Spirit for that moment, and I said yes. I made new Christian friends who changed my life and set my life on a whole new trajectory. And the following year, I was baptized, and I got into serving at a Bible camp." From bible camp to pastoring While working at Winkler Bible Camp and trying to see what his next step was, he knew one thing. "I love camp. That part I knew. So I worked there for a couple of years full-time and then eventually, the Lord's calling me to something else, but I didn't know what. I was volunteering in a youth ministry at the church in the town I was living, and I thought, maybe I could be a youth pastor. So I ended up applying to Steinbach EMC to be their youth pastor in 2007." Heide would go on to serve as the youth pastor for 13 years before switching roles and being the lead pastor, where he currently serves. "One thing after another. Our lead pastor had resigned at that point and it created an opportunity for me to step into a new role." .embed-container { position: relative; padding-bottom: 56.25%; height: 0; overflow: hidden; max-width: 100%; } .embed-container iframe, .embed-container object, .embed-container embed { position: absolute; top: 0; left: 0; width: 100%; height: 100%; } He can see how his own story relates to what God is doing at Steinbach EMC. "It's a very intergenerational church, we have a lot of grandparents, parents and children. A lot of them are raising up their kids to follow the Lord and I love seeing that. I also love seeing brand new Christians coming or people who are exploring faith or new Christians who are coming." When it comes to the future, Heide is excited to see where God leads Steinbach EMC. "We want to go where He leads us. One of our values is to teach the scriptures and we want to be faithful in doing that." Heide said the church is also putting extra focus on being inviting to the community. "It's a challenging thing for intergenerational churches. This is the oldest church in Steinbach, so people can get comfortable and sometimes people can be nervous about inviting new people in. We want to do this because we believe in what we do and also because people are looking for belonging." Walking into the doors on a Sunday morning at Steinbach EMC, Heide says it is a welcoming atmosphere. "We have a very busy foyer. There's this place called The Well where we get our coffee, water, or juice. People are greeted there and we try to do that part well in our services. Our people come dressed in whatever they feel comfortable wearing. Then we sing a blend of different kinds of music. One thing that I've heard a lot is that we preach the scriptures and that is our home base for what we are preaching and teaching." Steinbach EMC is at 422 Main Street in Steinbach and meets for Sunday School at 9:30 a.m., before the Sunday Service starts at 10:45. Do you want to share a story of what God is doing in your church? Email us at dj@chvnradio.com to let us know.