'The Time is Now' for Emerald Youth Foundation

Written by Keith Gray and Jon Lawler | Originally published by Knox News.

Can you imagine a city where more and more young adults are becoming leaders, serving their communities, graduating from high school, going on to post-secondary education and training, getting good jobs and earning good wages? That’s what leaders at the Emerald Youth Foundation asked Knoxvillians to envision just a few years back. At that time, research showed that urban youths lagged their suburban peers by 50% academically, and the gap was widening. Only 20% were known to be engaged in organized sports and fewer than half had a mentor like a coach, tutor or youth worker in their lives.

In response, the foundation made a commitment to double down on its efforts with urban youths, and the progress since 2012 has been significant, with nearly 3,000 young people being served each year. We’ve expanded the number involved in sports and health activities from 300 to over 2,300. We’ve increased our support for high-schoolers and young adults via scholarships and post-secondary enrollment from 60 to more than 700 students. And in 2022 alone, our staff recorded over 50,000 discipleship encounters.

But so much work remains to be done to fulfill the vision we all have for our community.

The foundation recently hosted its annual Prayer Breakfast, where over 1,700 community members came out in support of our mission. At the event, CEO Steve Diggs announced the launch of our renewed and expanded commitment to urban youths through our "The Time is Now" campaign, a comprehensive initiative that will work to produce 200 godly young adult leaders each year. We know that an intense focus on developing young, impassioned leaders is key to transforming our community.

Make no mistake, our community is at a critical point where young godly leaders are needed more than ever. Imagine the impact of having an additional 200 young adult leaders serving and contributing to our city more deeply. We can’t wait on this. The mission is urgent, and the time is now.

We are convinced that if there is any city in the country that can make this happen, it’s Knoxville. Knoxville is a city that cares deeply about children and young people, especially when there is a recognition that, in doing so, the impacts will be real and lives can be changed. The Emerald Youth Foundation is doing that work, and we as a city are better for it.

So what can you do? We need your prayers, we need your time, and we need your support. Please join us in helping to transform our community so every child in every neighborhood has a full life – the kind that Jesus spoke of in John 10:10.

To learn more about the work the Emerald Youth Foundation is doing and how you can support these efforts, please visit thetimeisnowemerald.com.