The summer is over! We are back into the full swing of things, and I got to tell you. God is good and I am so excited for what is to come in just the next few weeks of campus ministry.
This last week we got to have our staff retreat in Bridgeport, Texas. The goal of staff retreat is to collectively as a team of ministers recenter ourselves on Jesus and his work in the world, reflect on why we do what we do, and spend time together relationally. Pictured below is our UTA Campus Missionary Team for 2021-2022.
From left to right we have Jalen, Graham, Myself, Bailey, Emily, Sophie, Taylor, Emily, and Sarah. Myself, Jalen, Taylor, Emily, and Sarah are our returning campus ministers, while Sophie, Graham, Emily, and Bailey are our apprentices for this school year. If you don't know what an apprentice is, these are recent graduates from the ministry who are either interested in vocational ministry long term or just want to spend a year learning and giving back to the ministry that God used to impact them during their time in college. They will both take masters level theological courses, while still doing full time campus ministry with us at UT Arlington. We are so excited to have them join our team. Please pray for each one of these coworkers of mine, but especially our apprentices as they study, and join us in mission work on campus. I am so grateful to get to be on this team with these people. Each one of them loves God, and college students and I know God is going to use them in big ways this year. What is so exciting about this picture though is that our staff is actually 5 times this size. Across all our campuses we have 50 campus pastors headed on to campus to befriend, share jesus with, and mentor college students all across DFW. Compared to 35 last year, that is a huge jump. God has been so good to us in raising up the largest apprentice group we have ever had. That includes 19 graduated FOCUS alumni, who have decided that they want to give at least one more year to making Jesus known on the college campus. It really is incredible to witness.
Perhaps more exciting than even the growth we have experienced on our staff is that this week is the start of SICM! If you don't know what that is, SICM stands for the Student Institute of Campus Ministry. We have over 200 college students from across DFW joining us for a week long training on how to lead in college ministry, and why doing so is so important! During the week the students will take classes on biblical study, small group facilitation, evangelism, and a lot more. The goal of SICM is to cast a vision for our future student leaders why their peers need to know about Jesus, and then equip those same students to share their faith, and live out their faith on the college campus. While this years SICM will not be in Washington but in Texas. This video below captures a little bit as to why I think SICM can be such an impactful experience. Just as an aside, I still have a note that I wrote to myself on my last day of SICM my frist time going as a student and it reads. "This was the week that I went from being a passive recipient of God's grace, to an active soldier of God's Kingdom, sharing his love and grace with others."
Please join me in praying for these students as they go to SICM for the first time and catch a vision of how God wants to work through them to change the world in his name.
And lastly, in just a few weeks students will move onto campus at UT Arlington. Classes will begin again. And we will be there, campus pastors, apprentices, student leaders, and others, present on the college campus to welcome, befriend, invite, and share Jesus with the 40,000 students about to come back to UTA after an isolating pandemic year. To think about what God might do overwhelms me with excitement. How many students need to hear the good news, that God is also on the college campus, ready to give them life?
Thank you for your partnership in ministry this year. My fundraising needs were entirely met, and I can't thank you enough. Because of you I get to spend my days investing in the lives of college students and sharing with them the love of God, calling them to join God in his work by sharing that love with others. I am humbled and honored that you would believe in me and the mission enough to invest alongside me.
Dear Friends, Thank you for taking the time to read this ministry update. This winter season has been particularly encouraging and I am excited to tell you about what is coming up soon! The month of December began with a celebration. The school semester was coming to a close quickly so we threw our annual Focus Christmas party in the first week of the month. Talk about Christmas come early. The event was filled with sweet memories, worship, and funny skits put on by the various weekly core groups. Watching those skits is always a highlight of the year as everyone in the core often participates and everyone gets to see each others silly sides. A couple of guys at the UTA Focus Christmas Party. In the bottom picture, one of the roommates couldn't make the event so the rest of the guys thoughtfully chose to find a way to include him in the picture, no matter what. Once the semester was over and the students went home for the holidays, I had a lot of time to read. Over the ...
A lot has been happening this month, in the ministry, in the lives of our students, and in my own heart as I continue to learn what it means to be a missionary and a minister of the Lord. I can't wait to share all of it with you. I pray that you find it encouraging and ultimately that God is praised and exalted because of it. Ephesians 3:20-21 " Now to him who is able to do immeasurably more than all we ask or imagine, according to his power that is at work within us, to him be glory in the church and in Christ Jesus throughout all generations, for ever and ever! Amen." These are just a few of the guys in my core group that I get to lead every week! Peter, Jacob, and Saurav. I love each one of these guys dearly and I so enjoy getting to meet with them every week and hearing their heart. I meet one on one every week with Jacob, we've been reading through a book called "Experiencing God" this semester recently and it has been very helpful in aligning our ...
A student shared this at our most recent Thursday Night Fellowship and I thought it was so beautiful that I wanted to share it with you. "In Focus, Miracles are happening all the time. People are becoming saved, like I was a year ago, through this community, and equally miraculously people are becoming more like Jesus, like I'm still learning to do. But God is using this community to bring about those miracles. And I know that this all can feel common to us, especially those of us who have been around for a while, but if we are in a community where the miraculous is common , we should thank God for that community." That was shared by a student named Josh Krause who I have the pleasure of studying the bible with over the duration of this school year. I have been so encouraged by his willingness to keep learning about the grace of God and respond by living out of that reality. And I was doubly encouraged when he shared such a beautiful and praise filled sentiment with th...
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