New Beginnings
This week marks our initial launch of the new school year at UNM. In the next two weeks thousands of new students will be moving into the dorms and coming back on campus, eager and somewhat nervous to experience an entirely new part of life. Whether they are freshmen or returning students, they come in motivated to find a sense of meaning and satisfaction, to develop their identity, and to gain their independence. This is an incredibly pivotal time in these men and women's lives. This is why we launch each school year with a week of prayer on campus. We spend part of each day for an entire week, walking around the campus and praying for many things. Some of the focuses are on building great new student relationships, developing contacts in the dorms, for many students to be interested in Bible studies or investigative Bible conversations, for spiritual walls to fall down at UNM, and for the gospel to advance in these student’s lives. As you read this – will you join us in praying that God will be at work in BIG ways this week and in the weeks ahead?
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As the semester draws to a close (6 weeks left until finals!) some of our students are focusing on starting Investigative Bible Conversation (IBC) groups with their friends in the dorms that are not yet believers in Christ. The idea is to spend 3-4 weeks exploring the Bible and some spiritual questions that their friends might have. We hope and pray that will lead to greater relationships of trust and friendship among these students and that some of them might be interested in coming to some Navigator events in the fall and continuing to explore the Gospel. Thank you so much for praying for our students Chris and Cameron and Andriea who will be participating in this through the month of April!
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A FULL SEMESTER!
** Over 40 students in attendance at our weekly large group meetings where our theme was Exploring the Characteristics of Christ
** 8 small group Bible studies led by staff and students going through the book of Mark together
** A great fall conference where we traveled on a chartered bus to Estes Park, CO with 40 students to spend a weekend learning about laboring in God's Kingdom
** Our National Collegiate Staff Conference in Sandestin FL where we gathered with over 500 other staff that are pouring into college students at campuses all over the USA. (this was a great time to refresh and encourage us!)
** Monthly dinner parties in our home - these continue to be the most successful events we have. They are great for outreach, for our students to fellowship with one another and for us to have the opportunity to use the amazing gift God has given us in providing this house!
** Meeting for one-to-one discipleship with students like Aaron, Chris, Kevin, Raybeau, Caitlin, Lauren and XinXin.
** Several new relationships with students that do not yet know Jesus... just recently Leigh Ann has been able to befriend a young woman from the Ukraine named Yuliya and Clint is getting to know many of workers in local restaurants and businesses near campus where he meets with students for discipleship. Please pray that these relationships will grow and lead to sharing the Gospel in 2010!
Many other things like weekly leadership training, prayer walks and other great events have made this a really great and full semester! We want to thank so many of you for giving sacrificially of your finances and others of you that support us in prayer, with encouraging emails, calls, texts, etc. This ministry is a team effort and we are grateful to partner with you in Advancing the Gospel of Jesus at UNM! May the Lord bless you abundantly as you enjoy the Christmas season with loved ones!
Our 3rd year at UNM...
Snow Mountain Ranch - Summer Training Program ended the first week in August, a bittersweet time for everyone. We hated to say goodbye to the 75 wonderful students, our amazing staff team, and the beautiful Rocky Mountains, but the LORD has put in our hearts a sense of excitement about the next two years. We learned so many things this summer that we will carry with us as we continue in collegiate ministry. Our students from UNM, Aaron and Lauren also came back this fall with a vision to reach their peers and be great leaders in the ministry. They want to make their time at college have meaning and purpose, and they want to do that God's way!!! How exciting!!!
The Fall Launch at UNM has been great! We began the semester with prayer walks around campus everyday the week before school started. We were able to survey approximatley 400 students to get the spiritual pulse among students and through those surveys, we have been able to follow up with many students who are interested in Bible studies, large group meetings, investigative conversations about God and events. We have had an average of 40 students attending our Nav nights where the theme of the semester is "Characteristics of Christ." Our small group Bible studies got kicked off last week and in those we will be reading and discussing the Gospel of Mark. We have also done a lot of events to reach out and involve new students, including our monthly FREE dinner called Friday Night Bites, a root beer float party, volleyball, a barbeque by the dorms on campus and ultimate frisbee.
Looking ahead we are totally excited about the annual fall conference held October 23-25 in Estes Park, CO. This is a highlight every year and a time for great spiritual growth in the lives of students (and staff!!) In two weeks we have a student leader facilitating a workshop on creationism and evolution. We are also looking forward to some more events coming up soon, including a tailgate party this weekend and a hike to the top of Sandia Peak too!
As always, the transforming power of the Gospel is what we long to see in the lives of these students... as we dig into God's word, fellowship together, meet one to one with some key students and experience life together... would you pray with us for this to be evident and that we will all grow in Christlikeness?
Snow Mountain Ranch - Summer Training Program
Our final EDGE training week was a very special time. We had made some very dear friends over the course of the last two years on staff and this week was a bitter sweet time. Some are going onto other things like seminary, or jobs in the work world, and some are going to remain on staff with The Navigators so we will see them here and there. However, never again will there be such an environment of closeness and learning and growing together as we experienced during our 5 EDGE summit training weeks over the past 2 years. We had a wonderful last week together, lots of tears and laughs and prayers and long walks at beautiful Glen Eyrie!!!
Our first three weeks at the Snow Mountain Ranch Summer Training Program have really been incredible! One of the best things is we have a stellar staff team! We are so very blessed and privileged to work with such talented people that love the Lord with all their hearts.
We are also really thankful to have our own little condo in the mountains! It is such a haven after working very long days leading workshops, Bible studies, and relating to the 75 college students in our program that are here. They have a lot of energy that is for sure – and they want to experience the Lord AND the beautiful Colorado Rocky Mountains to the full this summer! That means lots of work on our part!!! We have already spent time on night hikes and in hot tubs and at game nights and campfires making s’mores and playing ultimate frisbee as well as training them in areas such as discipleship, how to have a Daily Quiet time with the Lord, and conversation skills for sharing our faith in Jesus – to name a few.
Some of you have asked about the structure of the program. There are 9 staff plus our program directors and the staff overseers. (two other couples) There are 15 student team leaders, mainly Juniors and Seniors - and then 60 student team members. The directors are over the whole program obviously and help the staff with their own skills, and the overseers (or shepherds) are here to minister to us staff in prayer and life sharing and lead our Bible study. Then the staff each has 2 team leaders to disciple and lead in Bible study and we also lead all the hands on details of the programs - things like Nav Nights and fun activities and evangelism. (Specifically Clint and my role this summer is to lead the two training times each week for the Team Leaders.) Then the Team Leaders lead a team of 3-4 students in discipleship and Bible study and life!!! It is a wonderful example and model of spiritual generations! This summer our Bible study that we will be doing is all about Jesus! Last week we looked at the “Supremacy of Christ” in Colossians 1 and this coming week we will be studying Philippians 3 on “Knowing Christ.”
For the sake of time and information overload, we will tell you more about our awesome men and women that we are discipling this summer in the next post. It has been a wonderful 3 weeks and we are so excited to see what the Lord has in store for US and these students this summer! We thank you for praying for the Lord to touch each of these student’s lives in a mighty way this summer and train them up to be laborers on their campus this fall and wherever the future takes them! Matthew 9:36-38 says that “…the harvest is plentiful but the laborers are few. Ask the LORD of the harvest, therefore to send out workers….” That is what we are trusting God for this summer – that He will be raising up laborers to do His work in this broken and hurting world! Thank you so much for joining us in this….
SPRING BREAK SPECTACULAR!
Last week we took a group of students to Glen Eyrie for UNMs spring break and what an awesome week it was! We had great devotions and workshops each morning, free time in the afternoon for hiking etc. and fun planned activities in the night like campfires and game nights. There was even a day where a few of our students and Clint got to go skiing and the rest of us stayed at Glen Eyrie and did a service project on the grounds. It was just the right mix of spiritual input and planned activities and rest/retreat time. I also have an amazing story to share with you from the week! You probably remember reading about the young lady that I have been meeting with for a year and a half now, my Chinese friend XinXin? We have been exploring the Bible together on a weekly basis and she has been very involved in coming to our events and even many of our large group meetings. She has understood the story of Christ for awhile, but had some hard questions and barriers that she didn't know how to overcome, which were things we talked about a lot during our times together. Xin Xin agreed to come to our spring break trip wanting a changed heart, and God is so faithful. On the second night of our trip, she and I had a 2 hour conversation that led to her accepting Jesus!!!! Can you believe it!!?!? What a privilege to walk alongside her for the past year and a half and to watch God work in her life and slowly change her heart. What a joy to be able to pray with her as she asked Christ to come into her heart! And NOW, we will be at UNM for two more years and so I will be able to help her grow with Christ and become established in her faith walk! So exciting!!! That night praying with her, I thought "Wow, this is what this is all about!!!" Seeing the Gospel truly CHANGE someone's life is so amazing - and makes the harder things worth it! It also was yet another confirmation of our decision to stay here in Albuquerque for a couple more years. The picture to the left is of XinXin and I in front of the Glen Eyrie Castle the morning after she accepting Christ.
We really want to thank you for your part in this story! Without the prayers, the friendship, the financial support of our dear friends and family – our team – YOU… stories like this would not be possible! We are so grateful to the Lord for His provision, and thankful to those of you who support us in so many ways!!!!
BIG NEWS!
We have some fun news to share! After several months considering our next steps in collegiate work with The Navigators, we have made the decision to stay here in Albuquerque, NM and continue on at The University of New Mexico!!!! Now that the difficult decision making process is over, we are really excited to stay and do Staff In Training here for 2 more school years! During the past months of prayer and conversations and seeking God’s word, Clint spent time reading Isaiah 37:30-32 which basically says "This year you will eat what grows by itself, and the second year what springs from that. But in the third year sow and reap - plant vineyards and eat their fruit....a remnant will take root below and bear fruit above... The zeal of the Lord Almighty will accomplish this..." We really feel this is an interesting parallel to our journey here. The first year – we were just learning and working from what was already in place, and this year, we have been blessed to see some growth coming from the work we put in last year. BUT the third year and beyond - this is when we will really start to see fruit! And that is exciting! There will be a strong group of students here, and it will be done by the Lord's hand, and He wants to use us!!!
Thank you so much for journeying with us as we serve the Lord in this way. You have been so faithful to offer your prayers, your financial support, your friendship, during our EDGE Corps experience and we know you will continue to walk this road alongside us as we make the transition into Staff In Training. There will be lots of new things like our different responsibilities, fundraising needs, living arrangements, etc. that we will continue to keep you up to date with over the next month or so. Just to let you know what our “big picture plans” are from now till next August – we will be taking a trip to SC in April to work on some fundraising and visit dear friends and family and then we will be here in Albuquerque until May when we will travel to Colorado. We will have our final EDGE Corps training summit and do some fundraising for a few weeks and then we will spend 12 weeks leading the Navigators Summer Training Program with 6 other staff at the YMCA Camp, Snow Mountain Ranch in Winter Park, CO. In August we will return to Albuquerque to start a new school year at UNM! If you have any questions about all of this, please don’t hesitate to call us or email us. We would love to talk more about it – it’s just a lot to write! We appreciate each of you and your care and concern for us – we are blessed beyond belief by our friends and family! While it is so hard to be far away from so many of you, we trust where the Lord has us right now and we are grateful for your support!!!
We begin again!
Welcome back to UNM! After a great break, students are back on campus and we are so excited about the eagerness we have seen the past couple of weeks. We kicked off the semester with a staff and student leader retreat. For two days, the staff gathered together and prayed/planned/prepared for this next semester, and then on the third night our student leaders joined us as well. It was a truly refreshing as well as a productive time. We were able to spend 4 hours "Time Alone With God" (refreshing!) and in our meetings (productive!) some of the things we talked about were our training for the freshman and sophomore students who would like to lead in the ministry this upcoming fall of 2009 and we also discussed outcomes of our ministry (ie: as a freshman enters the ministry how do we want to equip them throughout their time up until they graduate college)
This Spring is exciting because we will be bringing our weekly large group meeting back. This semester’s theme is Collision: When Faith and Life Collide
We will be studying the book of James in our Bible studies, and going over specific topics regarding faith and life during Nav Nights. Last week Clint gave a talk on “Being Confident in God,” and this coming week Kim and Leigh Ann will speak on “Total Commitment to Christ.” Some other messages will include titles such as, “When faith and our finances collide”, "When faith and future collide" etc. The students (as well as us as staff!) are excited to dig deeper into how to put our FAITH in action!
The verse that we, as a Nav group, hope to exemplify this semester is Romans 15:5 which reads
May the God who gives endurance and encouragement give you a spirit of unity among yourselves as you follow Christ Jesus so that with one heart and mouth you may glorify the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ.
Would you pray this along with us, along with some other specific requests you can find on our prayer/praise page??? We are so grateful for you and as always, thank you so much for being on this journey with us!!!
A LOT GOING ON...
Hello friends and family! Wow, so much has been going on the past month – it has been hard to find time to update everyone. Please forgive us!
A huge praise is for our fall conference this year! We had 47 students from UNM, a challenging speaker and an overall awesome time! Clint did a great job as the conference Emcee and Leigh Ann served the conference well in her roles as snack and guest coordinators! Thank you so much for your prayers for that weekend!
We have been so blessed the past month with great bonding times with students! Just this past weekend, Clint was able to take 3 younger guys from our ministry on an overnight camping trip. They had a great time “adventuring” outside and Clint was super excited to introduce two of these guys to backpacking! This is a huge praise because he has really longed to connect with some guys that share the same interests and passions as him – and this seems to be an answered prayer this semester. Please pray for Aaron and Chris, as Clint grows in brotherhood with them! They are pictured here (in that order right next to Clint) along with Merk – a student from the Netherlands.
Leigh Ann has been having some really rich times with girls that she meets with one-on-one. Times with Becca, Caitlin, Jessy and XinXin continue to be really bright spots in her week. Please pray that she will have wisdom in leading them through many challenges they each face in their own personal lives and walks with the Lord. And recently Leigh Ann was able to share a night of fun with one of her girls Bible studies. They got dressed up and did each others hair and had a great dinner at a Japanese restaurant and later watched a classic chick-flick! How special it is to spend 7 hours on a Friday night with these lovely ladies! Check out her group picture from that night on the photos page!
We have also added a new page to our blog to be able to fill you in on some personal things going on in our lives apart from the ministry – like our marriage, our own thoughts about the Lord, etc. Be sure to check out “Personally Speaking!”
We want to say THANK YOU to all of you for your care and your support and prayers for us. We could not do this without you guys behind us!
ALL THE LATEST...
A little update on two very successful activities that are in full swing at UNM!
The first is Friday Night Bites that we host a couple times a month in our home. Students from all the different Bible studies are able to come have a free meal and get to know one another and it has proven to be a BIG HIT! This is a great way for students from our 14 small group Bible studies to connect. Last week I overheard a group of girls talking to another group and they were making plans to hang out later that weekend. They had just met over the dinner table in our home! That is what we love about these nights - watching the students build community! The challenge is definatley space - our little house will not be able to hold many more students. (there were 44 people here last friday night!) Be sure to check out the picture on our photos page!
Another thing that is really exciting is our new large group meeting that began last week. Clint is heading up a 5 week series called "The God Series" and we are exploring such questions as:
"Who is God?" - "What does He want from me?" - "How can I see Him in my life?" - "When will I hear from Him?" and "WHY would I want to follow Him?"
The meeting takes place on Thursday nights at 8pm in our Student Union Building so we would appreciate prayers for that key time. Last week Clint spoke and did an awesome job exploring WHO God really is. We had about 25 students there, and we are hoping to see it grow over the next month!
ONE-TO-ONE
So much of our ministry includes amazing time that we spend "one-to-one" with students. Each week we meet with maybe 4-5 different students one-to-one in coffee shops, dorm rooms, at the duck pond (UNM's own little oasis) the Student Union Building and anywhere else we can think of! During these times we talk about what God is teaching us, help students develop life and ministry skills, pray with eachother and also have a lot of fun. It is really awesome meeting with a student each week and watching their growing relationship with Christ transform their life! Here to the left you see Clint and Chris, a new student at UNM and one of the guys in Clint's Tuesday night Bible study on a recent hike we took in the Sandia Mountains. The students that we meet with on a regular basis are XinXin, Jessy, Annie, Becca, Caitlin, Sarah, Raybeau, Kevin, Chris and Aaron. Please pray for these students as they seek to honor God and be lights for Jesus at UNM!
EVENTS HAPPENING ON CAMPUS!
Our Bible study leaders training (BsLT) happens every Monday afternoon. This has been a wonderful time to get together with our 8 student leaders to encourage them in their own lives, plan outreach events for our group to do, and to help them lead an effective Bible study. This semester each Bible study on campus is studying the book of Romans! Pictured to the left are some key leaders in our ministry.
We are also leading several Bible studies each week. Clint has a Bible study on Tuesday evenings in the Student Union Building on campus with 5-6 guys and Leigh Ann has a study in our home on those evenings. There are 9-11 girls involved in that. Clint also has another study going on campus on Friday afternoons with 5-6 guys. This is so encouraging, as many of you know there were not a lot of guys in the ministry last year. In addition to this, we continue to attend and help lead the Sunday night discussion group and this semester's theme is "Learning to love others well."
Each week, we will be doing an hour of evangelism outreach on campus. Please pray for boldness in sharing the gospel! We will also be doing an hour prayer walk each week with our student leaders
Each Thursday we have Pizza & God night. This is an investigative Bible conversation where students can come and ask any spiritual question in exchange for a piece of pizza! We are really encouraged by the number of students in attendance and the questions they have been asking.
We also have our sports outreach kicked off! We have men's flag football on Thursday afternoons, and co-ed sports like ultimate frisbee and volleyball going on on Saturdays.
August 18-24 Joshua Walks
Hello faithful friends! Thank you for your support and prayers as we begin this semester! We wanted to let you know about what we are doing this week on campus.
With classes beginning in one week we have some big plans for how were going to get this year kicked off. The biggest of these is to do prayer walks, or "Joshua Walks" on campus throughout this next week. What it comes down to is that we want to continue to build the foundation and the future of our Nav group on seeking and following God's lead. After all Jesus did say, "apart from me you can do nothing." (John 15:5) This year we're trusting in Him for BIG things.
Here is what we are doing:
When God told Joshua to get ready to lead the Israelites into the promised land he said, "I will give you every place where you set your foot." (Joshua 1:3) What an incredible promise! God then told Joshua, "I will be with you; I will never leave you nor forsake you. Be strong and courageous..." (Joshua 1:5-6) In boldness with God leading the way, the Israelites came to Jericho. When they arrived it was tightly shut up with a mighty wall around it. The Bible says, "No one went out and no one came in." (Josh. 6:1) However, God had already delivered this city into the hands of his people. All they needed to do was march around the city for seven days in the way the Lord instructed them. Upon obediently following the Lord's command, the city walls collapsed and the people went straight in. It was God's power that did this.
In the same way, only God can bring down the spiritual walls on campus. This week we will march (really walk) in prayer around main campus from Monday the 18th through Sunday the 24th. We are asking and trusting in Him to bring down the walls around the students. These prayer walks will be times of worshipping God, believing God, and calling on God to open people's hearts to receiving His good news.
Will you pray for us and with us as we devote this week to prayer for the campus at UNM????
