The River Christian Community Church and Mountain View Church – both based in Oakdale but drawing parishioners from throughout the area – have evoked community and gospel-centered fun for eight years through an end-of-July ‘Merge’ event. Designed primarily with high school students in mind, the Merge is hosted over the course of three evenings, drawing participants from some local church youth groups to compete in a variety of recreational tournaments, join in raffles, and have fun while also reaffirming their faith.

Merge takes place at the River Christian Community Church along East G Street in Oakdale and brings together 40 plus volunteers of parents and congregants to put on the event. Merge 2024 ran from July 29 through July 31 and drew nearly a hundred high schoolers from Big Valley Christian School, Oakdale Family Church, Life Point, River Oak Grace, Living Hope, Mountain View Church, and The River Christian Community Church. This year, Merge offered fun activities such as volleyball, ultimate frisbee, pickleball, ping pong, capture the flag, and many others. Donations for the event, which reached “$1,500 in total giftings,” said officials, came from congregants from the different churches that attended. These donations were utilized to purchase raffle prizes, provide food, and host other activities for the high schoolers to enjoy.

“The goal of this whole event is to bridge the gap between little isolated groups and show them before they go into school that they are all Christians,” David Barlow, the River Christian Community Church Youth Director, said.

Since Merge takes place at the end of July, “school happens a week or two afterward and invites students to meet each other on campus and encourages friendship,” added Ryan Poling, Lead Pastor of the River Christian Community Church.

The relationships formed at Merge translate into like-minded friendships that carry over into the school year, encouraging more Christian clubs, organizations and activities, such as the Fellowship of Christian Athletes (FCA), See You at the Pole, and various winter retreats.

The theme of Merge 2024 was “relatable,” said Mountain View Church Youth Director Josh Fewell, and showed that “we are created in His image, so we are supposed to relate with Him.”

On the first night of Merge 2024, Poling spoke to the roughly 100 high schoolers in attendance and introduced the theme of relatability to them and introduced the criterion of rationality, relations, and others, meaning that we relate to God because of our likeness to His image and under the experiences of being a rational being and being able to create and maintain relationships with others. The following evenings, Clifton Currys, an Associate Pastor at Mountain View Church, and Shawn Hoelsch, Lead Pastor of Valley Bible Church in Livermore, continued to carry the theme throughout the event and were guest speakers on July 30 and 31, respectively.

Ultimately, Merge is about “breaking the barriers of disunity and coming together for one purpose and one reason, to glorify Christ,” Barlow said.

What started as a small event hosting one or two youth groups has expanded exponentially, and now has celebrated its eighth year of connecting young Christians in the region.

To learn more about the stories of Mountain View Church and The River Christian Community Church and to stay updated on Merge 2025, visit mvcoakdale.com/who-weare and www.theriver-cc.com.