Dedicated Youth Mentors Kelly and Steve Josti Invest in the BFNE Endowed Fund That Will Underwrite Salaries of Future Youth Leaders
More than 500 students, youth leaders, and staff gathered for YEC 2025
Kelly and Steve Josti of Ashland, Massachusetts, are "committed to ministry in New England" and, Steve added, "to the work that God is doing here in the lives of students, our church, and our communities."
For that reason, and because of their experiences with New England Baptists, they decided to support the Baptist Foundation of New England's (BFNE) endowed Chair of Youth Ministry fund that, when more donors choose to give, will underwrite salaries of future youth leaders.
"YEC Is a Spiritual Marker in the Life of Our Family."
The Josti family at YEC 2025. (Left to right) Kelly, Maddie, Steve, and Sophie Josti.
Their lives were transformed by God's grace and their involvement in ministries including the Baptist Churches of New England's (BCNE) annual Youth Encountering Christ winter retreat. The January weekend youth gathering, known informally as "YEC," Kelly said, "is a spiritual marker in the life of our family."
Kelly and Steve took several student leaders from their church youth group to YEC 2018, and they have been bringing a group of students every year since. Their daughters attended the BCNE's Crosswalk summer camp last year. Maddie, 17, ministered in Puerto Rico as part of Quest, the leadership development and discipleship program for high school juniors.
"Quest was an excellent experience. Maddie loved it. She still is friends with that crew. They all hang out and do stuff together," said Kelly. Maddie's younger sister, Sophie, 14, plans to apply to join a Quest team.
Jesus came and told his disciples, "I have been given all authority in heaven and on earth. Therefore, go and make disciples of all the nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit. Teach these new disciples to obey all the commands I have given you. And be sure of this: I am with you always, even to the end of the age."
Matthew 28:18-20 (NLT), called "The Great Commission"
In 1995, Steve joined the youth ministry that Allyson Clark was leading at First Baptist Church of Sudbury, Massachusetts, before she joined the BCNE staff. Kelly was a semester missionary with the North American Mission Board at Emerson College in Boston starting in 2001.
Clark has been "a spiritual mentor for both of us through the years," noted Kelly. Clark semiretired in 2023 as the BCNE's Next Generation Ministries Director and since has donated to the same youth ministry fund.
In addition to Clark's discipling relationship, "We both had many mentors and disciplers speaking into our lives through the years and we want to follow the Great Commission and do the same" for future generations, Kelly commented.
Texan Serves a Campus Ministry in Boston
After growing up in Texas as a member of First Baptist Church of Plano, Kelly graduated from Ouachita Baptist University in Arkadelphia, Arkansas. She moved to Boston in August 2001 to serve with the collegiate team in what was then called the Greater Boston Baptist Association. She served at Emerson for seven years (2001-08), helping to lead the Christian group on campus.
Kelly supplemented her North American Mission Board stipend with "tent-making" employment at the college bookstore and with philanthropist Harold Howell, an elder at Park Street Church, who founded Advancement Plus, a faith-based, youth-related, not-for-profit." During that time, she served on staff with Crosswalk and YEC and brought Emerson students to BCNE collegiate retreats.
Brothers gave their lives to Christ on the same night
After a neighbor invited him to attend a youth event in 1995 at the Sudbury church, Steve and his twin, John, who are Framingham natives, started attending the youth group and learning about how to develop a relationship with Jesus Christ. In 1996, Steve and John gave their lives to Christ on the same night at the YEC retreat.
Clark, who led the youth ministry, "played a vital role in developing and encouraging relationships between students who challenged each other in their walks with Christ," said Steve, who later received a Master of Science in Accounting from Bentley University. Today, he is an accountant in the Boston office of Vertex Pharmaceuticals.
Kelly and Steve met when they carried flags at a missionary commissioning service that Clark was coordinating. Their relationship led to marriage in 2005, and a year later they helped plant Trinity Church, a house church in Brighton, which has since folded.
The couple and their two young daughters then moved, in August 2012 for Steve's work, to Zug, Switzerland, where they were active in Lift International Church.
Kelly and Steve Josti
When they returned to Massachusetts three years later, the Josti family joined Chapel of the Cross, a congregation in Westborough that affiliates with Converge (formerly the Baptist General Conference). Steve has been an elder since 2020, and Kelly started in 2022 as the office administrator. Steve and Kelly have mentored middle- and high-school students at Chapel of the Cross since 2016.
"The work of Christ in our own lives motivates us to serve others and lead them to Christ. The merging of our stories started because of the ministries supported by this endowment," Kelly commented.
"Steve and I wanted to give to the endowment because of our passion for youth and reaching kids for Christ at a young age. The importance of teaching young students the foundational truths from the Bible is so important. There are so many things competing for their attention in this world."
The youth ministries that the BFNE endowment supports "are vital to spreading the truth of the gospel here in New England—and then globally as students and leaders go out into the world," she concluded.
Give to a Baptist Foundation of New England Chair of Ministry Endowment Fund
A donor may invest in a particular "Chair of Ministry" endowment or decide to divide the gift equally between nine chairs.
GIVE TO THE CHAIR OF YOUTH MINISTRY
The BCNE invests in the lives of teens and their leaders. Youth ministry offers churches opportunities that equip Christian teens and their unchurched friends to discover and grow in genuine faith, while also training and encouraging adults who serve in church youth ministry.
This article is part of an ongoing series. Click here to read the other "Chairs of Ministry" fund stories.