In a rented upstairs room at Founder's Mercantile and Coffee, I am installed at a small desk that looks over Main Street in April. Anthony Munoz, Battle Ground Young Life's volunteer area director, sits in front of me with his wife Amy on a soft, dark green couch. To my right, Tania Scruggs, of Founder's Mercantile, and our publisher, Markus, take up the two leather armchairs. The mood in the room is jocular and open. Anthony and Tania have known each other for several years, and Markus and Tania have been "partners of a sort" since Founder's opened and Greet launched together in the same month.

            Anthony is a down-to-earth-looking guy; he wears a pair of jeans, a Battle Ground Young Life t-shirt, and sports a tattoo of orange flames around his right forearm. It would be unimaginative to say he doesn't look like the typical youth minister. His manner is casual when talking about his early life, which he describes as 'dark'. "I remember thinking," he says, "that this couldn't be all there was. This can't be my life." His mother struggled with substance abuse, and his youth was populated with men who abused her. He was born in Southern California, and moved with his stepfather and stepbrother to Coos Bay, Oregon for his freshman year of high school. There, they lived in a basement they dug out together, which his stepfather framed. It had previously been a freezer. The place had no windows, and Anthony says his stepfather spent much of his time smoking in the house until it stunk. "I was kind of embarrassed," Anthony said. "I didn't have many friends over."  

            But one day after school, there was a knock on his door. Anthony opened it. On the other side was Todd, a local Young Life leader. He carried a pair of shoes and new socks. "I noticed you need some shoes," Anthony remembers him saying. "Can I come in?" Anthony tried to refuse. He thought Todd must be aware of the smell. Anthony's stepfather was standing in the living room, smoking. Todd didn't seem to mind any of it. "He kind of just strolled into this dark place in my life," Anthony says.

Todd and Anthony saw each other during youth club and Bible study, and outside of official Young Life hours. Todd made real time for Anthony, and as a result they built an authentic friendship. Once, Anthony asked if Todd was going to attend his upcoming high school reunion on a night they had planned to spend time together. "No, man," said Todd easily. "We're hanging out." "I didn't know then," says Anthony, "but Todd was setting an example for me, how to give these kids the best of me, not just my scraps of life. Not just, 'I can fit you in on a Thursday night'...No, [he] can have my mornings, my whole Mondays, my Friday nights, my Saturdays. And Todd never had to argue with me about what was real. He was just loving on me. He would invite me to their house for dinner, and I saw the way he interacted with his family, with his wife. I had never seen anything like that." The fact that Todd had a family of his own wasn't lost on Anthony. "Can you imagine spending that much time with a kid you don't know?" It's sacrificial love, but now that Anthony is in Todd's position, he feels it just as strongly as Todd evidently did.

            A few years later, Anthony was in an emo-adjacent 2000's rock band ("good guys making good music"), touring the Portland and Seattle areas. He met Amy at a show in Pendleton and also got to know her brother, another music enthusiast, who passed along her phone number. Anthony called Amy. "I think I asked her, 'Do you like short guys?' and she said yes, so I was like, 'Okay!'" Anthony recalls. "Actually," Amy says, "you called me a liar." The room erupts in laughter. I ask if he and Todd remained in contact during the band years. "He officiated our wedding," Anthony says, smiling. By this point, Anthony and Todd had cultivated a deep, faith-based relationship. It didn't start out that way. Anthony says that Todd "earned the right" to share his faith, and his opinions about Anthony's life, by putting in the work to get to know Anthony deeply.

This concept is still central to Anthony's ministry. Before he and Amy began Battle Ground Young Life in 2023, they found themselves driving along Main Street with their own children, looking at the kids and teenagers going by, heads down, fixed to their phones. "I thought they looked…sad," Anthony says, "and we would pray 'Hey God, please send someone that can reach these kids, that will love them'. And eventually I started to feel like God was saying, 'That's you.'" He has written in a testimony, "When I shared that with my wife and family, I didn't have to convince them. We knew it would be a big commitment…but we said yes." They knew it would mean sacrificing time with their own children, time to themselves. But they also knew what they wanted to do: build authentic, healing relationships with middle schoolers and high schoolers in Battle Ground, acting on Christian values in an ecumenical, non-judgmental way. And they knew that mission was critical. "That's all it's about," Anthony declares. "I have no tolerance for people who just want to put numbers on a board. When I talk to our volunteers, and they are so excited to get out and share the gospel, I tell them, 'That's great, do that if you're at that place with [the kids], but I want you to make sure you are their real friend first.'"

            BGYL volunteers go where the kids are, whether it's getting permission from BGHS to do weekly events, as they've done in the past, or showing up at skateparks and other local hangouts. Some of these kids go on to develop their own faith, and some never do. Anthony says both are a success, as long as they've made a positive impact on someone's life. A friend of Anthony's, a former YL leader himself, who we'll call Dave, recently attended the wedding of a young man, Emory, he'd become friends with via Young Life. Introducing Dave to the wedding party, Emory said, "This is the guy who tried to convert me!" "But isn't that beautiful?" Anthony asked, leaning forward. "Even if he never 'buys it', isn't it still good that there was someone there who cared about him? You don't have to buy it—you can still say, 'That guy is my friend and I want him at my wedding.'"

Battle Ground Young Life infuses the community with spontaneous opportunities for connection between youth and volunteers. They put on Young Life Club, which welcomes participants from various backgrounds into a relaxed setting filled with games, music, and home-cooked meals. They host Bible studies for those curious about following Jesus, and organize resort-style camps that offer unforgettable adventures, from zip lines to go-karting. They are in need of dedicated volunteers who share the spirit for showing up for kids in our community. Tania Scruggs, rapidly becoming a local fixture herself, and a long-time YL supporter, has experienced the BGYL camp environment for herself. She and her family were invited by friends a couple of years ago, and Tania says it's an experience she will never forget. "This whole shop is a place for people to connect and grow…and Young Life is so about that. I have such a heart for kids being influenced positively, especially at that formative age. That's where we can make the biggest change."

 

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