Cru Weekly Ministry Tip, Spring 2012, #6
In his recent book “You Lost Me” by David Kinnaman, he describes a group of people he calls the “Nomads”. The Nomands “faith is nomadic, seasonal, or may appear to be optional or peripheral par of life…nomads disengage from attending church or significantly distance themselves from the Christian community. They demonstrate an up-and-down, hit-or-miss faith.”
This comment by Kinnaman, describes what has happened to some people during the teen or young adult years. To me this puts an extra sense of urgency into our ministry during these critical college years. Many college students may be deciding whether they are going to follow Christ the rest of their life or whether they will just walk away. Let us do what we can to keep students from walking away from God.
Israel went through a very difficult time keeping their hearts focused on God as seen in the book of Judges. In Judges 3:1, 4, and 7 we read, “Now these are the nations which the LORD left, to test Israel by them…They were for testing Israel, to find out if they would obey the commandments of the LORD, which He had commanded their fathers through Moses…The sons of Israel did what was evil in the sight of the LORD, and forgot the LORD their God and served the Baals and the Asheroth.” Baal was the male fertility god and Asheroth is the Canaanite goddess called Asherah.
What was one contributing factor for Israel having such a difficult time staying focused on God? Look carefully at Judges 2:7 and 2:10, “The people served the LORD all the days of Joshua, and all the days of the elders who survived Joshua, who had seen all the great work of the LORD which He had done for Israel…All that generation also were gathered to their fathers; and there arose another generation after them who did not know the LORD, nor yet the work which He had done for Israel.”
Apathy in the book of Judges generation may have been the greatest contributor to why Israel did not continue walking with God after the previous generation had died. Judges does not place the blame here, but perhaps passing on a reverence for the law and obedience to God by the previous leaders, did not transfer to the next generation. Helping to encourage, train and developing a heart for God and for the Great Commission (Matthew 28:19-20), is what we are hoping to build into the lives of our students.
Good News About Summer Projects
Two weeks ago we highlighted summer projects. Community, relevance, and training are important to our students. Many of you may have thought about summer projects as something that you cannot attend because of time, work or classes. There is good news! Summer projects now run 1 week, 2 weeks, 3 weeks, or 8-12 weeks. Summer projects historically have played a huge role in preparing students for a lifetime of training and walking with God. Students coming off summer projects are often prepared and motivated to help provide leadership for your campus ministry. So many good things happen on summer projects. It could be the best summer of your life.
How about applying for a 1 to 12 weeks project, depending on how much time you have? Take a second look at the summer project web site and carefully weigh the location, length, and dates of the projects being held in over 200 project locations in 51 countries around the world. Be sure to click through all the topics on the top tool bar. Take a second look: http://gosummerproject.com/ – stories
Help your students work through the apathy and stand strong.
Talk to you next week,
Ben Rivera/GodSquad and CruPressGreen Team