Promises and Prison Tats

This is a cool quote from Rick James' book "A Million Ways to Die"

When God wants to produce a great man or woman of faith, he typically throws them into a jail cell without explanation and pretends to lose the key.  Nice work, Paul! Go to jail.  Great choice, Joseph! Go to jail.  Well done, Jeremiah! Go to jail.  Good work, Isaiah!  Go sit in a cistern! 

There, in the dark, isolated, confused, and apparently forgotten, faith has nothing else to do but go out to the "yard" in it's orange jumpsuit and pump iron with the other inmates: "God does have plan for me.  God hasn't forgotten me.  This isn't a punishment.  God will rescue me."

Here is where the promises and truths of God become prison tattoos, permanent and inseparable parts of us. We own God's goodness because we've had to fight every hour of every day.

Highlighted in the Huffington Post

   Last year, I wrote a post about our ministries work with Barry Segal and the the Community Faith Partners in Ithaca to end homelessness in Ithaca.  

We've continued to stay involved in a significant way throughout this year, providing an army of volunteers to work at the Second Wind Cottages.

I'll write more about that sometime soon, but I was encouraged to see this endeavor highlighted in the Huffington Post

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/mark-horvath/could-a-tiny-house-moveme_b_4361724.html?ncid=edlinkusaolp00000003

Transformation in South Africa

I want to re-iterate what I wrote in my last post; that we are passionate about being involved in God's global ministry.  

In an amazing orchestration of events, God enabled one of our interns, Kelsey Karys to travel to Pretoria, South Africa this January with a group of Boston-area Cru students.  

Our Cru staff at Harvard; Pat and Tammy McCleod have been leading groups of students to join with South African college students in an incredible mission to tutor high school students, grades 8-12.  Check out the Mamelodi Initiative website for more information: http://mamelodi.org/

Kelsey Wrote about an 11th grade student named Emmanuel who was one of the students she had the privilege of meeting.  "Emmanuel is a smart, quiet boy who loves cars and dreams to go to MIT and then work for BMW.  Like most kids from Mamelodi, his father is no longer a part of his life.  Unlike other kids, he does remember his father being a Christ-like role model who taught him to work hard and trust God.  
Part way through the week, one of the American tutors, a student from MIT, got to share the Knowing God Personally booklet with Emmanuel. On the page that talked about how our sin separates us from God, he asked if that was really true, and listened intently about how Jesus is not just a good role model, but also his savior!  When I talked to Emmanuel on the last day I learned about his church background that was, like many black South Africans, a mix of traditional ancestral beliefs and Christianity.  But I got to share with him about the work of Jesus and how the Holy Spirit will shape us more and more into the image of Christ.  Emmanuel prayed that the Holy Spirit would bear fruit in his family, and bring love back into his household."

As Kelsey and the team were leaving, Emmanuel handed her a poem about the way God carries us through all difficulty.  For Kelsey it was humbling to witness some of the students' grasp of God's sovereignty -confidently trusting in God even as they may not know where their next meal will be coming from.  

A Global Ministry....

Our hope and vision is that Cru at Cornell would be a global ministry.  Certainly, we are a local ministry, situated in Ithaca, New York, but as our God is a global God, we want to be used to make world-wide impact.  We want to zealously GO, anywhere that he would call us.

May we be a "Global ministry based in Ithaca New York" 

Over the break, I got to join a group of Cru team leaders from around New York and New England along with some regional staff and one guy from our international headquarters on a one week "vision trip" to the other side of the world.  It's a big world, I know but it's important for me not to specify exactly where we were hanging out because the world is full of countries that are not open to very much overt Christian ministry.  (Charmayne Yun was the lone woman on the trip.....props to her!) 

We visited a place where God is doing a lot of cool things, and we hung out with numerous in-country full time Christian workers talking about how we can support them best.  In the past we've sent students there over the summer, and this coming summer we've already got a group getting set to go.  

The trip was unbelievably inspiring for me personally.  For starters, it was incredibly refreshing to hang out and do some ministry with some of my friends from around the region.  I think we were all surprised at how fruitful the trip was even though we were there for such a short time.  We were able to hang out and initiate conversations about Jesus with local college students pretty much every day.  There was a lot of openness among the students and we were able to connect those who were interested with Christian students who are involved in Bible studies.  At least one student expressed an enthusiastic desire to put his faith in Jesus Christ right there, and so our friend Dan prayed with him and got him connected with a fellowship of Christians. 

Beyond that though, the trip was characterized by prayer.  We prayed often as a team, but even more, I got to pray with my room mate John Yelverton.  John is the team leader at Syracuse, and each morning we would get up, kneel on our beds and spend extended time praying for all kinds of things!  

Here we are again enjoying some delicious shish-ka-bobs.  I put a red bandana on one of our friends because he's a student who talks to lots of people about Jesus in a place where not everyone is cool with that. 

Kicking Off the Spring Semester

Of course it's easy to start the semester well, the real trick is finishing well!  I hope that we can persevere and keep this blog a bit more updated this spring than we did in the fall. 

Classes started yesterday at Cornell, so please pray for our Spring Semester.  We kicked off with a leadership meeting last night.  Some 50 students showed up to catch up and share about how God met them over the Christmas break. 

Our Epicenter conference was good.  We had 12 Cornell students along with two girls from SUNY Cortland and one guy from Ithaca College. 

One of the speakers was Doug Pollock, a man who is extremely passionate about engaging people with the good news of Jesus.   Rather than just talk about that though, he thought it would be best to actually do it.  So some of the staff arranged for a couple of guys who are atheists to come out and have a conversation with Doug right there on the stage.  Adam, one of the atheists challenged Christians who don't evangelize because they are afraid of social awkwardness to "get over it"   

Doug demonstrated well how important it is to really care about and listen to people.  He modeled how to be respectful and how to strive for productive dialog when sharing the gospel.  You can watch the session on this video.  (skip ahead to the 7 minute mark to get right to the dialog)

http://new.livestream.com/CruEpicenter/events/2665731/videos/39939110

(if the embed code doesn't work, just click on that link... The one your looking for is titled Doug Pollock on Outreach, and you'll see a picture of him sitting in a large leather chair.  

Why Chris Norman said No to the NFL

A fantastic video that I came across recently.  Chris Norman talks about coming to know Jesus Christ and taking the road less traveled for the Glory of God.

I love this story for a lot of reasons!  But one thing that is pretty cool is the way that Chris doesn't demean others who have actually chosen to go pro.  He keeps the person and power of Jesus Christ front and center.


Drafted: Why Chris Norman Said No to the NFL from Desiring God on Vimeo.

Raising Funds

Campus minister Tim Casteel hosts a fantastic blog on Leading in Ministry.  

I've benefitted from a number of his posts, especially the one titled Money To Fund the Mission.  In it Tim points out how critical finances are to the mission of moving the Gospel forward.  

During the spring of 2012, every single Cru staff member in the northeast region had to take 5 whole weeks off of campus to work on raising financial support.  The sad reality is that almost all of us are under-supported and struggling at some level.        Both our personal support accounts and our campus accounts are low. And without adequate finances to live, eat and minister staff must pull back from time on campus, meeting up with people  and spend time looking for new financial partners.   

In Tim's article, he references a Mark Driscoll video where he describes THE game changer in the history of Mars Hill (Seattle).  

He says there was " a single thing that took them from 40 people to 800. A turning point that made the difference between their church shutting down and being the global influence that it is today through the Acts29 Network and Mark Driscoll’s teaching.

It wasn’t hiring a key staff. Putting on a big outreach. Giving a great sermon. Getting a new website. Him yelling at a bunch of men (that was a different video).

It was money.

A gift from a generous couple – a $200,000 gift that was 100x greater than any gift they’d ever received."

I recommend reading Tim's article where he includes insights from both Bill Hybels and R.C. Sproul.  

He concludes: 

"As ministry leaders we spend countless hours thinking through how to reach more people with the gospel. We plan ways to raise up new leaders. Get excited about new books/ideas that could be gamechangers. Dream of new websites that will singlehandedly reach the campus with the gospel. But we rarely think of money. 

I just wonder what would change if our ministries and staff were abundantly funded. Imagine what God could do."

That's our goal!  Stephanie and I are in a place where we actually need to raise $1300 in new monthly support.  Even as we take seminary classes in Colorado this summer, we are working to raise money.  God has raised up three fantastic interns for next fall; Will Poon, Mercy Gbenjo, and Kelsey Karys.  But if we don't get adequate support, they'll be ministering on campus without us! 

We want to see the Cru ministry at Cornell truly taking the gospel to every student.  We can no longer afford to be barely making it as staff or running on financial fumes as a ministry.  

If you are reading this, and you are a financial supporter of our ministry, I want to thank You!  If you aren't, and you would like to be, please be in touch, or check out this link.