Merry Christmas, Blessed Urbana, and Happy New Year!

At twentyonehundred we're anticipating not only the anniversary of the birth of our Lord, but the continuance of his mission here on earth. So along with baking cookies, trimming trees, giving gifts to each other and singing the wonderful old carols, we're organizing schedules, reviewing videos, outputting final files and packing trucks---We're anticipating Urbana. This Urbana's recruitment call is "It starts with 12" and our onsite theme is "The Great Invitation." So, as much as it's hard that Urbana takes me away from my family during the holidays, it's appropriate it falls in the season of new beginnings, the beginning of our redemption and the beginning of a new year. Urbana is the start and the invitation to many, many people's beginnings of a career path, of a mission, of a new vision. Here are a few stories of Urbana alumni, and here's a few photos of our preparations:

My rehearsal and show schedule at Urbana.

Loading our cameras, computers, signage, lights and a whole lot more on the truck.

The truss for our stage goes up in the dome.

The stage, already almost in it's final form!

Would Jesus Eat Frybread?

Once again I've updated the Native Ministries fundraising case (they have new potential major donors!), and in the meantime they've had their first national conference, called "Would Jesus Eat Frybread?"

What kind of a name is that? Well, it's one that gets at the heart of questions Native students are asking. Frybread is a traditional dish for almost every Native American nation--it's a part of native culture--but that's because it was made from the rations distributed by the US government as tribes were forced on long journeys leaving their lands and homes. So in asking about frybread, we ask simultaneously: would Jesus accept native culture as it really is, and is Jesus willing to dwell even in consequences of oppression?

The questions and the answers don't just relate to native students, they relate to us too. A Chinese American alumn working in the Navajo Nation was invited, too, and her reflections from the conference might strike a cord with many of you.

You can read her whole blog entry here, but I've included an excerpt below:

"...somewhere between learning a haka, cooking frybread, absorbing stories, and learning at the feet of elders, God chose to speak directly to me – a first-generation Chinese American with napa cabbage and a jar of chili paste snuggled in the fridge between some jicama and hummus.

God told me that it was time to reclaim my culture. Like every culture, mine reflects a part of His character: He created us all in His image, and while we can’t encapsulate His entirety, we each have the honor of reflecting one facet. In the end, we will all worship Him in our own languages, dance our own dances, and sing our own songs. I don’t know what He wants me to do with this: maybe someday I’ll help build His kingdom in China. Maybe He just wants me to honor my family and honor Him by fully inhabiting my identity.

Reclaiming my heritage won’t be easy. Where is my history located, now? Where did I discard it? I need forgiveness from my family. I want to learn what I can about my lineage. I need to reacquire my language. I want to learn the dialects particular to my family. I want to love the things about myself and my people that I once despised. I have to repent for thinking that how God made me didn’t matter. After all, if I reject myself, I do not fully accept my Creator. I need prayer support, brothers and sisters. And to those in my faith family who are first-generation Chinese Americans, I need guidance and mentorship. If I’m to reflect one small pearl in the vast ocean of God’s glory, then I want to do it well."

Please pray that God would raise up native Christians from every nation! 

Red Cup: University of Chicago

Staff Barney Lin shares a story one of his students told:

We started off the year again with a push to engage the campus in spiritual conversations, asking students who didn't mind stopping by, "What are you thirsty for?" and proceeding to ask them if they're interested in what Jesus says about the satisfaction of ultimate thirsts. I was SO ENCOURAGED by how open students were to truly hearing, and dialoguing about Jesus and faith. Here is a short story from a student in InterVarsity who spoke to a militant atheist:

"I honestly believe God's Spirit was there with me, in particular when speaking with a 'militant atheist'. How did I know that? Well, for one, if you know me, you'd know that I'm quite shy, reserved, and absolutely hate conflict. Indeed I felt that the strength to keep the conversation going, though at times I did feel like a punching bag, was not my own. And more so the patience and the absence of hate. 'Cause I know that on my own, I would have been totally infuriated and personally offended, but God really enabled me to speak boldly but respectfully with love. And finally, I know that God was with me during the span of the conversation because I felt absolutely no stress while speaking with  him. It was only after he left that I realized that I was emotionally drained. I'll be honest - I kinda burst into tears. BUT I was confused 'cause I didn't know why I was crying, 'cause it wasn't because I felt personally offended/attacked (which is still mindboggling to me). I do believe it was the Spirit weeping for him. That he was so blind and hardened. I must say I've never so acutely experienced God's heart for His creation before. But yeah - what a truly blessed experience. And I think about how Jesus taught us to love our enemies (what a crazy teaching), and how He himself was scorned and shunned and CRUCIFIED by His own CREATION. It makes me marvel at our Savior that much more."

Who Will You Be: University of California, Davis

 A short dispatch from University of California, Davis: Seven students stood up during the call to faith at the very first large group [after the Who Will You Be outreach]! We were blown away and thankful for the response. Also, Lillie, who is starting an international ministry this year, has 85 contacts [from the WWYB booth]!

Who Will You Be: University of Montana

Here are the stories of 2 freshmen this year, as told by the staff at University of Montana:

Callie’s Story

To say Callie’s home life has been rough would be a drastic understatement. Tough medical issues, alcoholism, homelessness, debt, extreme bullying and teasing; the list goes on and on. Her dream was always to go to college. No one in her family has even graduated from high school, so her dream of college was a lofty one. But after a lot of hard work, she made it; her dream was fulfilled, but somehow it wasn’t what she has dreamed of. Instead of starting over, finding friends, and exploring the possibilities that lie ahead of her, she was met with extreme loneliness, girls in her dorm who drank all weekend, and even more hard times. Coming from a family who has dealt with alcoholism, she knows how destructive it is, so she didn’t want to go party with these new “friends” and would often sit in her dorm alone, crying, and wondering if all her hard work getting to college was wasted on one bad decision in coming to school at UM.

Then last Thursday, she ventured off to the school cafeteria to eat dinner alone. She saw her RA sitting at a table and went to eat with her. After dinner, her RA (not a Christian come to find out) said she was headed to check out this thing called InterVarsity and asked Callie if she wanted to go too. So they came together to Breakaway last week where I spoke about the Prodigal Son and the love of the Father for us. It moved Callie to tears. Not only did she hear about a personal relationship with God that night, but she found a community of people who wanted to be her friends, who accepted her for who she is. She also joined us for all the events we had going on last weekend (including the no hands spaghetti dinner in the picture). She told me today, “I was never the girl that got invited to do anything,” and that all changed after coming to Breakaway. She has been invited non-stop to everything we do!!

She sat telling me her story at a coffee shop today and she cried about how grateful she is to find friends, real friends. She said she feels hopeful that she didn’t make the wrong decision in coming to UM after all. I told her I think God has something big in store for her, and she smiled at me and said she was beginning to think so too.

 

Peter’s Story

Peter is from the Helena area and grew up in the Church. He came to college looking for a Christian group and found us the very first day of classes during our free BBQ outside the dorms, and he’s been with us ever since.

Last week on campus we did an evangelistic outreach through a tent called a “proxe.” The whole goal of the proxe is to get into spiritual conversations with people in a very non-threatening way. (The theme was “Who Will You Be?” and we were talking about how identity and spiritual combine.) Peter came and signed up for an hour slot to stand at the tent and talk to people about God. He was scared out of his mind, but he stuck with it, took a risk, and did a great job—and even got to share the Gospel with several people during the hour. (That’s him in the picture talking about the Prodigal Son story and the love of God the Father with a complete stranger!) He said, “I hope I was able to make an impact,” and he told me as he was leaving that he hoped to stop by the tent the next day even though he hadn’t signed up because he loved doing it so much.

Freshman doing evangelism and sharing their faith within their first 4 weeks on campus, freshman finding real community and friends for the first time, and finding God along the way—WOW!

Calling Students Out of the Trap

Liz, staff at Chico State, championed the Red Cup outreach campaign and wrote a Bible study series for it. She wrote a post back in the early fall that I want to share with you (though I'll abbreviate it here). It made me understand why she's so passionate about Red Cup...and why we should be too:

"Chico State is a well-known party school, and the typical Christian response to the party scene here is some combination of hiding, and misunderstanding/judgment. Despite the reasons to keep our distance, our chapter has felt led to pursue the party scene as a place of ministry. We have prayer walked weekly around the main downtown house parties for five years, and IV students intentionally go to parties and bars to build evangelistic friendships w/their partying peers (of course, modeling not drinking or responsible drinking). Four years ago we began handing out water and offering rides during the annual Labor Day float down the Sacramento River next to campus, which draws 15,000-20,000+ drunken students from all around.

I graduated from Chico State in 05 and came straight on staff, making this my 12th year in Chico, and I've mourned an alcohol/drug-related student death almost every year. I am heart broken to say that another student died this week. Brett was a 20-year-old Cal Poly student who came up with his friends to have a fun weekend, and was last seen at Beer Can Beach (yes it's really called that, because of the massive trashing that happens during the float) Sunday. By Tuesday his parents were on campus and around town handing out flyers, by Wednesday strangers were joining the cause. Then at 11:30 this morning [the next Sunday, Sept. 9th], it was confirmed that police had finally found his body in the river. His parents wept as they made a positive ID.

Days ago, while we were all still searching, our IV students prayed and we got a clear sense of spiritual warfare, it felt like Brett was somehow trapped. And for years as we have prayed about the party scene, we have known that the party scene is indeed a trap, or a slaughterhouse. Students go hoping to find deep friendships and have a good time, and it is fun enough to a point. But there is a line that gets crossed after a while, and suddenly it isn't just fun. People begin treating one another poorly, relationships are strained and abused and broken, hearts get hard. Then, if the partier keeps going, there is another line which is far easier to cross than the first and things go one of two ways: violence-- assaults, riots, rape; or isolation and death. It is a trap. The enemy lures students in with hopes of community, but I've yet to hear of a student to die in Chico with people around them, no matter how well-intentioned and loving their friends actually were. He/she is always alone.

We have students in our community who, like myself, have survived the party scene here. Who felt the emptiness after that first line was crossed, or survived the violence if we went past the second line, and decided to get out. Please pray for us as we live out our party scene ministry in this season of mourning. Please pray for the families of all the deceased students, because I'm sure the news of every student death reopens their wounds.

Please pray that we will be able to get more students out of the trap.

Who Will You Be: Milwaukee, San Francisco, Columbus

From Brittany, Staff in Milwaukee: 

"We did our who will you be large group last night and had 5 students made first time commitments! Praise God!"

And from this summer's design intern, Justin (pictured right), and his staff Carrie (left) at San Francicso State:

"... Since we're an urban commuter campus, we've experienced a lot of difficulty getting students who come through the proxe to come to our Thursday night Large Group. Many have to commute so far that they can't stay on campus late.

BUT this last Thursday we saw tons of new students come to our event! Many hands flew up for recommitment and 2 students made a first time decision to follow Jesus! Praise God for what He is doing on all our campuses."

Carrie and Justin are great Vanna Whites.

 From Erik, Staff Ohio State: 

"I did Who Will You Be pocket proxes with 3 students this past week. Each time, we ended up going through the proxe with the VERY FIRST person we approached.

After a total of 3 conversations, we had shared the Gospel with 8 people because people kept joining in during the conversation. My prayer beforehand was that God would prepare conversations in advance, and He certainly did!"