It's Going to Be a Good Year

Today is the first day of classes for the 09-010 school year. Thousands of new freshmen have moved in to the dorms and everyone involved in InterVarsity is doing their best to meet them and invite them into what we are doing.


I will be honest with you here, I think this has been our best first week ever. There are around 20 IV students who all understand the value of outreach and invitation. I periodically check in with the leaders in the dorms to see how they are doing and find that they are making friends, playing games, and inviting people to be a part of the Bible Studies they are leading. They are meeting TONS of interested people. I think this is going to be a good year.

Mustard Seed

As I was doing some planning for this year, I realized that this group of students was something special. I had this feeling that they were the ones who were going to really going to kick this fellowship up to the next level. I wanted to make sure they had everything they needed to be as successful as possible this year.

So a few days before new students arrived, we had a retreat. The retreat was called “Mustard Seed.” It is a reminder that though we start the year kind of small, God can make us grow into something big and beautiful.

The retreat was held in beautiful, exotic Corvallis. Yep. That way we were close to campus and were able to go pray and take care of any details that needed to be done.


I thought there were two stand-out moments of the retreat: The Invitation Web and sharing our stories of transformation. The web was a way for us to reflect on how we got involved with InterVarsity. As each person shared, I wrote their name on the board with a line connecting them to the person who invited them. As we watched it grow, we began to see how important invitations are and how persistent we need to be with them. Some of the people who are now very involved did so only after being invited for a term or two. I loved watching that truth sink in.


We also had an opportunity to share the ways in which God has been transforming us. I originally intended this to be a short time, but it ended up going for over an hour and people were sharing deeply about how God was changing them. Some people continued to pray for each other long after we were done. I was struck at how powerful it was for us to share our stories with each other. I hope that this year brings us many more stories to share.


New Student Outreach

In what can only be described as one of the best last minute ideas we have ever had, we decided to set up an information table at the freshmen convocation. The school filters all the frosh through this one area of campus and we thought it would be a good idea to be there and meet them.
I have never been a huge fan of tables, so I was expecting maybe a few people to be interested. Kit thought it would be a good idea to give away free Swedish Fish. New Freshmen + Swedish fish = an explosive combination. We had over 50 people sign up who were interested in getting involved.

50 People. We have never had 50 people sign up for anything.

This table was the most successful outreach we have ever done.

And the students followed up with the people who signed up within 24 hours. It was awesome to watch.

Like I said, I think this is going to be a good year and I am excited to share with you about what happens.

Next week I will tell you how our first large, group called “Awake,” went. Just so you know, we are praying for 100 people to show up. I will be giving an invitation for people to become followers of Jesus there and I would love prayers for the Spirit to be speaking through me and for people’s hearts to be open to Jesus.

I will also be sharing some more reflections due to the large amount of positive feeback I got from the last post.

Thanks for all your prayers and support! Have a wonderful week!

Oh yeah, remember that 40-foot banana split we made last year? Well, we decided to do it again but twice as long. Here is a picture.

Personal Reflection

I was thinking the other day (trouble!) that I spend most of the space on this blog talking about how things in the fellowship are going. And that is fine because I think you all want to know those things. But I rarely share about how I am doing. So before the craziness of the new school year starts, I thought I would share a bit about my own spiritual journey.

I feel like this past year has been a big one for me. I have learned a lot from successes, failures, wonderful people who have leadership roles in my life, and books I have been reading. I think my understanding of God is growing and getting bigger. That is always a good thing. I am just trying to figure out what to do with it. It is one thing to learn something new or deeper about God, but it is another to live it. As I look at my life, I have found many places where what I believe about God internally has not quite matched up with what I believe about him externally. I believe that following Jesus is the best way to live. So why don't I invite more people into that? I believe that Jesus has made peace with the world and with me. So why do I keep looking to other things to find peace or acceptance?

These are questions that can only be answered as I try to live out what I believe. I know that Jesus is inviting me into deeper things. Oh that I would trust him and follow. He wants to give me life and that is where I will find it.

One of the ways I have decided to try to grow this year is in the area of risk. I have realized that I have a card in my back pocket. This card says "the easy way out" on it. I play that card frequently when I am not sure what to do. I will be in the dorms and I don't really know what to do, so I play the card and decide to go home. I know that I wanted to talk to a student about something in their lives, but it could get a little uncomfortable. I play the card and never move the conversation past discussing the latest U2 album.

This year, I want to rip that card up. I will choose the riskier option. As a result, I think my life might get a little more uncomfortable and awkward at times, but I also think I will see God move in ways I have never seen before. I will ask the hard question. I will stay in the dorms for another hour. I will make that one extra invitation. Pray for me as I try to do this.

It is clear to me that Jesus is inviting me into this. And I want to respond to his invitation. I have been doing a little thinking lately on the subject of invitation. Here is a little story:

I had something that really defined my experience in High School. Some people played sports. Some people took AP classes. I sang in choir. I spent every free moment I could in the choir room singing with my friends. I loved making music with other people. I loved creating something beautiful every day.

But I almost never did it.

When I was in junior high, I thought that singing in choir was only for people who had no idea how uncool they were. I heckled my friends who were in it. But I did like to sing and play guitar oddly enough. The High School choir teacher got word of that and sent me a letter inviting me to be a par of the choir. I said no. He sent me another letter. I again said no.

Then he called me to talk about it. I told him I was interested in other things and was probably not going to do choir. This was his reply: "ok, I am going on vacation for two weeks. When I come back, you can let me know your final answer." I thought I already had but whatever. Two weeks later he called me back and asked what if I wanted to join choir.

And for some crazy reason, I said, "Yes."

I really don't know why. Maybe it was just to get him to stop bothering me. So to stop someone from bothering me, I joined his class. Great Idea Ben!

But as it turned out, I loved it. I fell in love with music and learning to sing and the people I met and the places I was able to go because of it. It changed my life. It set my life in a totally different direction. I went to college to study music because of that. I am on IV staff because I responded to that invitation.

I am so thankful that he kept inviting me. He invited me four times. I said "no" three times. But the fourth time, I said "yes." And it changed my life.

If responding to an invitation from a choir teacher can do that, what can responding to an invitation from Jesus do?

May I always say "yes" to Jesus.

May you always say "yes" to Jesus.

May we always say "yes" to Jesus.