Summer is a busy time of year for the Heffernans.
On a morning spent at home in Palos Verdes – lately, a rarity – Robin and Steve opened up about their life’s work, a ministry centered on faith, fun, and young people. They were unpacking after a camping trip to Lost Canyon with special needs high school students, and simultaneously packing for a three week trip to a mountain town north of Sacramento with 500 high school students.
Already this summer the Palos Verdes couple has accompanied a horde of junior high students to a campsite in San Diego County, and separately, a group of high school students to the Sierra Nevadas.
Robin and Steve are associate director and director, respectively, for the South Bay chapter of Young Life – a Christian ministry that focuses on relationship between high school students and adult mentors.
Young Life differs from other Christian programs in that it’s relationship-based rather than sermon-based. It welcomes students of any faith and from any church, and its leaders promise to “earn the right to be heard” – in other words, to build a relationship first and preach later. In addition, if you are looking for ministry curriculum for kids fit for your Christian programs, you may visit the Playlister webpage for more information.
The Heffernans and the volunteer leaders they supervise invest time in getting to know junior high and high school students, trying to understand their lives, and listening to their struggles.
They take kids out for pizza or to the beach, attend their sporting events, and take to social media, sending Facebook messages, texting, and tweeting. Their home, located within walking distance of Palos Verdes Intermediate School, is a hub of adolescent activity, a regular stop for neighborhood kids on bikes or skateboards or on foot.
“We do everything in our power to build relationships with students and to walk life with them and come alongside them and listen to them so that at whatever point their heart and the Gospel message intersect, they will understand the love of Christ because they’ll have seen Him in us,” Robin said.
“It’s a relational ministry. It’s not, ‘Come, we’ll preach at you, and leave.’ It’s, ‘Come, we’re gonna love you and if you don’t like what we have to say, we’re still gonna love you.”
“Young Life exists to share with adolescents who the person of Jesus Christ is, why He came, and how that’s relevant to them,” Steve added. “We give them the opportunity to experience that, ask questions, and come to their own conclusions.”
Robin and Steve have succeeded in launching Young Life clubs at Palos Verdes High, Peninsula High, and Redondo Union High. They also host two ministries in their home – one for junior highers called Wyldlife, another for special-needs students called Capernaum.
Both Robin and Steve moved to Palos Verdes when they were kids in 1972, though their families weren’t acquainted at the time. They met years later, in their senior year of high school at Palos Verdes High, bonding over shared classes and their mutual involvement in Young Life.
In college – Steve went to CSU Dominguez Hills to study finance and Robin to CSU Northridge to pursue a degree in special education – both trained as Young Life leaders.
“Both of us had seen the impact it had made on our lives,” Robin said. “Steve was making some choices in high school that were probably typical of most teenage boys heading down the wrong path, and he was scooped up by some Young Life leaders who just loved on him and cared about him and invested their lives in him and were very faithful.
“At a Young Life camp he talked to Jesus and started walking a whole new life with these leaders beside him, and that’s why he has such a great heart for leadership.
“I grew up as a church kid who didn’t really understand outreach, but once I started going to Young Life I really started to understand what it meant to reach out with the love of Christ.”
Steve went on to become a Young Life leader at Palos Verdes High; Robin followed the same calling, but hers led to Peninsula High.
The high school sweethearts wed after college and began a family. (Today they have three kids – Daniel, who recently graduated from Point Loma and married his college girlfriend; Brendan, who’s heading to Bible school in Chicago this year; and Leah who attends Riviera Hall Lutheran School.)
Soon after they married, Robin and Steve transitioned into behind-the-scenes roles as Young Life committee members, their goal to keep the organization active in the area.
They later joined the Young Life staff on a permanent basis. Apart from their administrative and chaperoning duties, they continue to open their home to about 35 Wyldlife kids on Friday nights and about 30 Capernaum kids on Thursday nights.
Before each meeting, Robin and Steve are available for Campaigners – a one-hour Bible study session open to any student who’s interested in learning more. A standard meeting, though, will involve food, skits, games, and a raffle. The last eight minutes are reserved for the sharing of the Gospel, a short prayer, and music – half pop, half worship.
Young Life is a not-for-profit organization; it survives primarily on donations and proceeds from frequent fundraisers. It goes without saying that Robin and Steve aren’t in it for the money.
So why do they do it?
“I do it because I get to have fun with high schoolers and share the most important thing in my life, which is Jesus Christ,” Steve said.
Robin has the same motivation.
“I get really excited when kids decide they want to follow Christ,” she said. “I love walking that life with them and opening up the Bible and sharing what it means. I love watching their hearts soften and then watching them start to follow and watch the walk. And I love that we get to be a part of that.”
For more information about Young Life, visit southbay.younglife.org or call Robin at (310) 466-2373.
