College Ministry Link, and Where the Content Is

First, a quick link:
Exploring College Ministry is a blog by a former college minister (I think?) who's now visiting different campuses and churches and learning about the field of college ministry and blogging as he goes. It's great just to see someone thinking actively about what the field really needs.

Second, most of the content I've been generating online is at our Facebook Page, where I regularly post Scriptures and links and articles I think will be helpful for students. I'm working on embedding it into this site, so hopefully it'll be on the right here soon. But for now, You can now see a "Fan Box" for the page embedded on the right where you can see the latest content I've added. Please, become a fan of the page so we can spread it to more people and so you can see the content I'm putting up there for students.

What if no one comes?

I am struggling to figure out how to respond to students' lack of interest (when it happens). There are two ways I can think of to respond:

1. Beg and scrape for their attendance. This is my default posture: to consider a meeting/event a failure if even some of my InterVarsity students don't attend. I make apologies, add incentives, call people personally to figure out why they didn't come.
2. Make a group/event that follows Jesus, and let people who are interested come. This is the default posture of certain sectors of the church, saying "We're following Jesus. People can join us if they don't want to burn in eternal hellfire."
   

I just don't think either of these postures are adequate. There's somewhere in the middle, some tension that has us following Christ and allowing that to attract people... and yet desiring all to come to Christ, and not just doing our thing and expecting them to come to us. I'm trying to figure out how to walk that tension.

April 2009 Prayer Letter

April 2009 Prayer Letter (pdf)

Chapter Camp in a week!

This year I have a variety of teaching and other assignments at Chapter Camp.

First, I'll be playing bass for the entirety of camp. I love getting to be a part of the worship team, helping facilitate the musical section of the worship aspect of camp. I love music, and I'm completely aware that my musical ability is God-given–so turning it back to him, and helping others enter into his presence, is one of my greatest privileges in life.

Second, I'll be walking through the Leadership Track Week 2 with members of the UF Chapter's Leadership team as they're trained and as we plan and pray for the fall.

Finally, I'll be helping teach the Old Testament Track for Week 3. I'll be leading a manuscript Bible Study and helping the students experience a cross-cultural simulation to help them understand the Jonah story.

I'm looking forward to two weeks with my fellow staff, my students, and students from around the Southeast. Pray for students' hearts to be ready for what God plans to do this spring, and pray for us the staff to teach, lead, and facilitate well and in a manner glorifying to God.

Student Ministry Not in Recession

InterVarsity.org posted this article entitled "Student Ministry Not in Recession" about God's work in students' lives through InterVarsity despite the current financial recession.

Culture Making

Every week I meet with the leaders of UF's InterVarsity chapter at a meeting we call SaLT (Student Leadership Training.) It's here that the chapter and its events are envisioned, managed, and planned, but I also use the time to build into the leaders–it's like a small group for all of the leaders of the chapter.

This week we watched and discussed a video from Andy Crouch, the author of Culture Making and a former InterVarsity Staff Member, as he spoke to San Diego InterVarsity. You can view the video here.

Andy speaks on the posture of Christians in relation to mainstream culture, and we had some great discussions on our postures (and gestures) and those of other campus Christians, and how we can seek to have the correct postures God prescribes for us.

November 2008 Prayer Letter

November 2008 Prayer Letter (pdf link)