Christian Challenge at MSC

One of the amazing things of writing on a blog and being a campus minister is that every once in a while, I get the privilege and honor of being able to read certain bits of literature before most of the general population.  And so, I recieved a copy of the brand-spankin’ new Max Lucado book "Fearless" a couple of weeks ago. I’m not typically a Lucado fan, but I have to admit, I enjoyed it.

The fearless website - www.thefearlessbook.com - gives a good description of the book:

"Each sunrise seems to bring fresh reasons for fear.

They’re talking layoffs at work, slowdowns in the economy, flare-ups in the Middle East, turnovers at headquarters, downturns in the housing market, upswings in global warming. The plague of our day, terrorism, begins with the word terror. Fear, it seems, has taken up a hundred-year lease on the building next door and set up shop. Oversized and rude, fear herds us into a prison of unlocked doors. Wouldn’t it be great to walk out?

Imagine your life, wholly untouched by angst. What if faith, not fear, was your default reaction to threats? If you could hover a fear magnet over your heart and extract every last shaving of dread, insecurity, or doubt, what would remain? Envision a day, just one day, where you could trust more and fear less.

Can you imagine your life without fear?"

 Mr. Lucado is a fount of wonderful anecdotes that describe whatever is going on.  From the spiritual life of Woody Allen to the time he personally got to ride in a fighter jet, this book gives some great examples of common fears we all face every day.  Of course, you haven’t ridden in a fighter jet, but you have been in a situation where things seem like they’re going out of control, but in reality there is someone who knows exactly what’s going on leading the way.  Check out Matthew 14 where the disciples are on the boat and Jesus is sleeping.  

 One thing that I have noticed about the way that Mr. Lucado writes is that it is very easy to read, but it never seems to hit the same super deep spiritual notes that some other authors I’ve read have hit.  Not that this is bad – often times it’s the simple truths that change us the most.  And this book is packed full of them.  Each chapter gives some practical advice on how to deal with the different fears we may come across during our lives.  In times such as these, when the world is freaking out about everything, this book does a great job of giving some perspective on an otherwise chaotic world.

 Should you read it?  Sure.  It’s good.  My biggest gripe is the price, but that can be allayed in a multitude of ways.  More importantly, be sure to pay attention as you read it, as it would be a waste of good time to read something this good and not remember any of it, kind of like getting a t-bone steak at a McDonalds drive thru.  It’s just wouldn’t be right.

-K 

As I sat trying to quell the playful bickering between a couple of my students yesterday, I had the opportunity to talk with one young man who wanted to know exactly what we do.  "Why is college ministry different than my high school youth group?" He asked.  I tried to explain it to him, but I really felt like I’d failed a bit.  

This morning, while checking out Twitter, a tweet by @CampusMinGuy caught my eye – "Characteristics of College Ministry,"  based on an article written by @bensonhines.  I clicked the link, and just finished reading through the article.  WOW, I wish I’d had a copy of this with me yesterday.  It does one heck of a job of explaining what I couldn’t get into words.  Here is an exerpt -

The practice of college ministry is far more like Missions than like Christian Education.

So ministering to a college campus is in many ways more like Missions in Mozambique than it is even like Youth Ministry.

The more I work with college students, the more I think this is true.  Go to http://bit.ly/JfPEY for the full article.  Or just track me down on campus, I’ll have a copy with me today, just in case….

 -Kevin

(This is a guest article contributed by Remy Currier, a student with us at ChallengeMSC, that was originally published on theooze.com.  Please, check out the original article HERE, and take a look at some of the comments left by readers there.)

Last year, my college had a big
end-of-the-year party with a hypnotist, vendors, bands, food, and
games. One of the vendors was a Christian clothing company, and their
booth was set up right next to my Campus Crusade group’s table, so, at
some point during the day, a friend and I wandered over to their table.
The guy who owned the company was a young, seemingly cool guy with
tattoos and a backwards hat – the kind of guy who looks just alt rock
enough to be “Seeker friendly.”

So my friend and I started talking to the guy while we looked at some
of the tee shirts he was selling. We had been visiting with him for a
few minutes when my friend picked up one of the shirts, a black tee
with a screen print of a gas mask on the front and a logo on the back,
and asked the guy what the gas mask symbolized.

“I kind of had the idea of how, like, Jesus is like a gas mask that we
put on to filter out all of the crap that’s in the world,” he explained.

Personally, I was shocked. Not because Gas Mask guy is anyone special,
and certainly not because his view is unique or different. I was
shocked only because of the absolutely ordinary opinion he held. It’s
an opinion of Jesus that we all run into, and some of us hold, for
better or for worse.

I kind of feel sorry for the Gas Mask guy. For me, it seems as if his
Jesus is awfully small. It seems to me that if all Jesus is good for is
just to be our gas mask, then Jesus isn’t really worth very much.

And yet Gas Mask guy can probably back up his position with verses. And
let’s face it, Gas Mask guy isn’t all wrong, he’s just missing huge
chunks of the story. And, really, it seems to me like he’s really
missing out on what makes Jesus so great – The fact that, in
encountering the risen Christ, we begin a journey on a path of becoming
one with Jesus. It seems to me like he’s too busy worrying about heaven
and hell and the evil in the world to see the underlying beauty of the
whole thing – the fact that it’s really not about heaven or hell at
all; instead it’s about God coming into the world to reunite us to Him.

I guess I really feel sorry for Gas Mask guy because it seems to me
like he’s just trying to escape the world. Like Jesus is just there to
protect him from the world while he’s here and to be his ticket into
heaven when he needs to get there.

For me, when Jesus says in John’s gospel that he is the Way, he doesn’t
mean that he’s our ticket into heaven. For me, he’s saying that he is
so much more than just a gas mask to put on. He’s so much more than
just a bridge to walk over on my way to heaven. He’s so much more than
just a means to health and wealth. Jesus is the Way. His teachings and
his life create a Way, a path in which to walk, and a guiding companion
for that path. But even more than that, Jesus is God. Jesus is the God
who was willing to come down into a broken mess in order to restore
that mess back to the way God intended.

And so I think that’s really the problem with Gas Mask guy’s idea of
Jesus. He’s got Jesus, but it’s Jesus by the numbers. And that’s one
thing that God always has tried to keep us away from. I feel like God’s
real message for us, the message of the Gospel, is that religious pills
don’t work. That God wants something other than right theology or
religious practices or sacrifices or being moral. God wants to love us,
and for us to love him back. God wants to reunite creation with
Himself, and, ultimately, I think that’s what Gas Mask Guy is really
missing out on – God’s mission of reunifying everything to Him.

On his blog "Into the Mystic" Alex McManus (brother of Erwin, pastor of Mosaic) writes about the 4 turnings of the Spirit. These are the four major kinds of repentances that a person goes through as they become a mature follower of Christ.

 
          The four turnings are these:

1. A turning to Jesus Christ as Lord
2. A turning to some form of Christ following community
3. A turning to the Scriptures
4. A turning back to the world on mission

These turnings can happen in any order. That these can happen in any order must be emphasized. Many will belong to the community of faith for a season before ever believing in Jesus. Others will be on mission to the world before reading and centering the scripture. Some will believe in Jesus but will hesitate to identify with a Christ following community.

What do these four turnings looks like?

Do you think it’s possible to do #4 before #1? It seems like we focus on #1 so much (or #2 at ChallengeMSC) that we miss out on 50%-75% of the people out there who look to the other 2 or 3.

Jake is starting a scripture study in the dorms, and I believe Chick Church has the same plan for sometime soon too. This is a great way to lead people to #3 – a turning to the Scriptures. From here, it’s easier to lead them to another, then another.

What do you think about this? What can we do better?

It helps orphans in Venezuela or something…

The Christ Center offers free coffee and Wi-Fi to anyone who wants it.  No one will come inside for free coffee…  Today I decided that if no one will come inside, I will take the free organic, free trade coffee to the people.  So I set up a table, cups, awning, and even bought donuts.

Then I waited.

and no one came.

It’s not like I’m in an alleyway away from traffic.  I’m on a busy street where tons of people park every day.  I’m across from one of the biggest parking lots on campus.  People walk by.  It happens. There were probably 40 people who walked by in the hour and a half I was outside.

I gave away two (2) cups of coffee.

One of those was to a person who already knew about the Christ Center. She told me she liked the idea of giving it away on the street, then went away to her class.  She is a nursing student, so
she must be busy.

The other person I gave one to was a friend of mine from when I was still a student.  He asked about why I was doing this and gratefully
took a cup and a donut.

No one else did.

As I was reading Blue Like Jazz, the chapter about Grace, and came to a realization; People look at grace like they look at coffee.  Even if it is free, even if it helps orphans, even if it is taken out of the scary building and given to them freely with sweet treats on the side, they don’t want it.  BUT they will go and pay $4.37 for a Starbucks Latte in an hour anyways, even if something better was available for free all along.

People are so sceptical of “free” that they will overpay for something inferior.  This is kind of how it is with God.  People are so sceptical of His free grace that they will reject it for something lesser that requires more work.  Mormanism, Jehovah’s Witnesses, Catholics, even some of the people in my own church are so wary of God’s “free” grace that they have to create a price to pay for it.  They will pay in works or worries way more than God wants, only to get something less than God offers.

The two people I actually gave coffee to are a great example too.  One already knew that the coffee was good.  She’d had it before.  She was on the “inside.”  She didn’t need to be told it was worth it, and that free is better.

The other I had a relationship with.  I wasn’t some random person offering something for nothing.  He took my coffee because it was from me, and he trusted that I wouldn’t be giving him something that was bad.

Figure out these metaphors for yourself.  Leave a comment about it.  Be a part of the discussion.
Coffee…. God…. Hmmmm….