A compassion and burden for the Teen Challenge Ministry was birthed in the heart of Reverend Phillip McClain in 1966 as he read a book by David Wilkerson, “The Cross and the Switchblade”.  After reading, he immediately began a street ministry.

From 1968 to 1970, he served as a pastor in Whitehall, Michigan but his burden for street ministry and the desperate constrained him to resign from his position at the church in 1970. Soon after he founded Western Michigan Teen Challenge.

He began by training street teams from area churches for evangelism. They strategically infiltrated the teen hangouts, streets, parks and beaches of Muskegon. As well as opening a coffee house ministry in 1970.

It was obvious that some of them needed a live-in program to get them out of their environment, to distance themselves from their past and to provide opportunity for the discipleship process.  In 1972, a women’s live-in facility was opened. The following year,
a men’s facility was opened. Through this method, addicts and alcoholics began responding to the gospel message of Jesus Christ.

Since 1970, the ministry of Western Michigan Teen Challenge has continued to grow. Today, it is one of the largest Teen Challenge centers in the world, housing an average of 130 students year round from all over Michigan and the United States.

Students learn that they can live free from drugs, immorality and crime. They are rooted and grounded in the Christian faith and life.

Teen Challenge has 168 centers in the United States and over 125 centers in foreign countries.