Challenge & Confession

I started the new year and a new semester at BU with a challenge from the Holy Spirit to be more radical, and with confessions to students.

Hellen and Jessica asked me at the beginning of this semester to hold them accountable to be more radical for Jesus this semester. What an incredible thing to have students ask of me! I agreed and then God begin to work in my heart and I realized that I was not being radical enough in my commitment to him and the students he had given me to disciple.

Hellen, Jessica and I had a very intense meeting yesterday morning. I was challenging them on some decisions that they had made about their commitment to the community of Christ here at BU, and I ended up having to confess to them my lack of commitment, too.

We ended our meeting with a decision to pray together every week for the rest of the year. So last night, on campus, we met and prayed for an hour. It was wonderful and all three of us were refreshed and challenged. We will be inviting others to join us, if they want, but we are committed to pray every week, even if no one else joins us.

Will you pray with us also? Every Thursday night @ 9PM Eastern Time we will be praying for an hour. If you could make a note to think about us during that time, every week, and pray a short prayer for us and for the work of God here at BU it would make all the difference.

I know that many of you have been praying for our student leaders - Jessica, Hellen and Michael. Well, as you can tell from my story here, your prayers are being answered. These two women want to know God, and they especially want to see him do something significant on campus through them. Thank you for keeping them in your prayers.

Our Task

I have not posted in a long time. I am sorry. I sat down this morning to write some thoughts to you and ended up writing a lengthy essay. I am going to share it with you in hopes that it will encourage you and give you some insights on what we do here @ BU.

The last time there was a move of God at Boston University was about 150 years ago during the Great Awakening that swept the northeast. Since then BU has stood unmoved. In fact, no one has had a successful ministry at BU since then (or, for that matter, in Boston). Not InterVarsity, Campus Crusade or Chi Alpha. None of us have built a strong, large, self-sustaining ministry on this campus. If you were to put all the evangelicals in one room at BU we would number, maybe, 200. The campus population is 32,000, larger than 30% of the towns in Massachusetts. We are trying to do something here at BU and in Boston that has never been done before. We are truly, using a religious metaphor, breaking very hard ground.  

I need to define 'hard ground'. The students here at BU are not apathetic, or angry, or aggressively against Christianity. In fact, it is very easy to be a Christian on campus right now. No one cares. Our Chi Alpha students encounter an occasional class that challenges their faith, but for the most part they can be Christians their entire four years at BU and never be hassled about it. No one cares. PreChristian students here at BU are bored and totally uninterested in God and the church. They never think about it. 

So when ever we do something on campus that everyone can see, students are surprised, sometimes shocked, that Christians even exist on a major university like BU. When we give out hot chocolate, host a cafe or a game night, set up an information table we get the most perplexed stares from students, and of course the avoidance response - walking on the far side of the sidewalk or hallway to avoid any physical or eye contact with us.

We rarely get anyone to stop. Not because they are angry, but because they are uninterested and bored. In their minds, we have nothing to offer that would add value to their lives, in any way. So when I say that we a breaking hard ground, I mean ground that has never been cultivated, weeded, watered, rock-picked, or leveled. Nothing has been done in their lives to prepare them to be interested in the Gospel.

(I still assume that God has been doing some kind of work in everyone's lives to bring them closer to him, but God uses his people to do most of that work and, to be honest, we are quickly loosing the next few generations.)   

Gene, Thomas and I work hard to get our Chi Alpha students to see the need around them, reach out to their friends and be Jesus to the campus. We are constantly examining what we do at BU. How do we represent Jesus as something vital to everyone's lives? What can we do to get students attention? How do we motivate our Chi Alpha students to see the campus as their mission field? What are the best tools to use to break up this field so that it is ready for planting, growth and harvest? 

We did not chose an easy campus. We did not chose an easy city. God called us to the most unreached area of the United States. We are not leaving and we will never give up, but that doesn't mean we do not experience discouragement. Pray for us. We get discouraged. The lack of funding, the lack of interest and responses from the preChristian students, and the difficulty of the task before us, are the three things that discourage us the most. Please pray for us. We are trying to do something at BU that no one has done before. We are looking to God to move on this campus in a way he has not moved in 150 years; in a way that will be unique to this generation; in a way that will change not just Boston, but the whole world.

Psalm 71:14-18 

But as for me, I will always have hope; I will praise you more and more. My mouth will tell of your righteousness, of your salvation all day long, though I know not its measure.  I will come and proclaim your mighty acts, O Sovereign Lord; I will proclaim your righteousness, yours alone. Since my youth, O God, you have taught me, and to this day I declare your marvelous deeds. Even when I am old and gray, do not forsake me, O God, till I declare your power to the next generation, your might to all who are to come.

Thank you, for praying for us, for standing with us and for partnering with us to reach an unreached people, here in New England. Your commitment to our ministry is one of the most important parts of what we do here.  Again, and continually, we say thanks.

Women's Core This Week

This is just a quick note that I was excited about and that I thought you would like to hear:

On Wednesday night, our Chi Alpha women's core meets (small group bible study). Hellen and Jessica lead this group and they have been doing a great job leading for the first time. This week one of the ladies in the core brought a friend with her who was not a Christian. They were thrilled. The visitor loved core, asked some good questions and she said she will come back.

They held their core in their dorm room. They live in the dorm that is the furthest away from campus and they had the most ladies attend this week, despite the distance!

They introduced their theme for their bible studies for the rest of the semester - Loving One Another. They heard back from a couple of the ladies this week that they have been putting into practice the things they discussed in core.

Hellen and Jessica are so encouraged. They are beginning to take seriously discipleship of the women that God has given them and they are seeing some results. Continue to pray for them.

Halloween Success

What a fantastic Halloween Party we had!

We started the week out with no money to do this party. By Friday, Chi Alpha Alumni had given $400 towards our Halloween party and other events for the semester. Wow! We have terrific alumni.

We stared our party at 7:00 and it looked like it would be just our students. Then in walked about 6 guys from the dorm we were holding the party in and they stayed with us all evening. They carved pumpkins, played games and ate our food. : )  They even helped clean up! We made some good contacts with these guys and we will see them again on campus for other events. 

Gene made his famous Haunted Chocolate Cupcake Mansion and we had a local garden center give us our carving pumpkins for a discount. Patrick (my son) and I cleaned out 20 pumpkins Saturday morning before the party. My hands are still hurting from digging out all the insides. But it was worth it. Thank you for praying for us.

Our next event is Thanksgiving at our house. We open our home to students who can't go home over the weekend. It is always a relaxing time with lots of food, a walk around Horn Pond and games.