There is a great deal of discussion today in college ministry about the lack of direction college-age people have, even after graduating with a college degree.  I’ve said for almost 10 years now that high school graduates in no way view their graduation as a right of passage into adulthood.  Quite the opposite in fact.  Instead I’ve said that graduating high school is simply the beginning of an intentional and conscious thought process toward what they will “do with their life” from a vocational perspective.  And, we know today, even after graduating college, many still don’t know the answer to that question.

Some might think this is a recent development.  I however would suggest that our understanding is more behind the times than we’d like to admit.  Sure, more people are now in college than ever before, making this more noticeable in society.  In 1950 less than 10% of 18-24 year olds attended degree granting institutions (including high school 18 yr olds).  In 2004 this number was 65%, not including 18 year old high school students.  

Nevertheless the mindset of college grads is often the same as it was 40 years ago.  The movie, “The Graduate” hit the cinema’s in 1967 and articulates insights into the life of a college grad.  Granted, in 1967 a college degree was more likely to catapult you into a career much more so than it is today.  But the lack of direction after graduating may not have been as foreign as we might think in those days either.

The Graduate articulates the lack of direction that so often happens after college and then gives some insights into the emotional pursuits that occur during this time – often because of that lack of direction and focus.  In the drama of a love connection, The Graduate taps into the sense of longing for something deeper in life.  In another blog I may articulate how we in college ministry can help keep people focused and more importantly what we need to guide focus toward.  For now though, watch this trailer…

Our CollegeLeader Atlanta Regional is set and ready to go!  We have partnered with reThink for this event and will be hosted by them at the Orange Conference.  I am doing a pre-conference seminar at this conference, so we decided to partner up and combine them. This regional event will be held on April 29th.  The conference begins the evening of the 29th and goes through the evening of May 1st.  I recommend you checking out the conference.  It’s unique and has a strategy for church-based ministry that is holistic and insightful.  By partnering with reThink on this event, we’re able to give you a few extras!

1. A free downloadable copy of my book, “College Ministry 101: a guide to working with 18-25 year olds.”  This isn’t going to be out until July, so this is not only a sneak peak, but a free copy.  I’m very excited to get it in the hands of people…and for free.  Zondervan is extremely gracious to do this!
2. About 45 more minutes of seminar time.  This will allow us to dive even deeper into the trenches of ministry.  I’m looking forward to having a bit more time, less constraints.  We have some extra time because we’re operating under their schedule.
3. A $95 discount on Orange conference registration.  Look, if you’ve been tossing around the idea of whether or not to go…toss no more.  By registering for the Regional event you will get the discount for the entire conference.  I love partnerships like this.

In addition, I now have Tuesday the 28th free.  So, we’re planning on having a lunch for college ministry leaders from the HOTlanta area (whether or not you come to the regional).  We’re looking to gather at NorthPoints Buckhead campus and go from there.  I’ll update you on that as we get closer.  Would love for anyone to join us.

Anyway, for a full description of seminars and registration info for this Atlanta regional event, click here!

Newsweek has on their cover, “The Decline and Fall of Christian America” – in the shape of the cross.  Interesting graphics, and title.  This article (read that here) and podcast (listen here) articulates that only 62% of Americans claim that America is in fact a “Christian Nation.”  This is steadily declining and has even more so the last 5 years.  The podcast also brings up the issue of justice work from people of faith and whether or not it’s authentic to their beliefs.  It also walks through how American culture is becoming more and more secular and what this may/may not mean for Christian believers.   Lastly, and this may or many not interest you, but it discusses the influence Christian believers have on politics and in particular the Republican party – on this note and another interesting point was apparently less than 20% of Catholics today claim to be Republican (interesting in that this is declining more and more).  Anyway, worth the read, or 8 minute listen to the podcast.

I’ll issue some thoughts on this possibly later this week.  But would love to hear some of your thoughts/comments about it first…

Well, yesterday was a lot of fun and a good time sitting around tables with people in college ministry.  After the first 4 sessions (each about 1/2 hr. long – see post below) we all hung out and had lunch together.  After that we had 3 more sessions.  We covered the following topics:

1. College-age Pursuits: Truth
2. Teaching/Discipleship Philosophies
3. Ingraining College Ministry Into the Fabric of Your Church

It was a lot of fun.  Here are some pictures from the day of great conversation, round table discussion, and an intimate time with others from the Southern California region – although we did have one person from Washington, one from Phoenix, and one all the way from Atlanta.  Fun stuff.

This was about 20 minutes prior to us starting.  You may notice the cameras and lighting equipment in the background.  Yes, we recorded it.  And, yes, it will be available.  Oh, and check this out….downloadable resources.  Easy, immediate, and hopefully helpful to you and your ministry.

One of our CollegeLeader mentors, Abbie Smith, talking with someone who came (She didn’t know I was taking this).  You may know of her through CollegeLeader, or through Passion, or because you read her book, “Can You Have Faith In College?”

People connecting with others in college-age ministry over lunch – Subway.

This was during one of the seminars.  I loved the small format.  Bigger is not necessarily better.  With about 45 people in the room we had some great discussion and you get a chance to meet and connect with more like minded people…great day.

“Halftime” at the regional.  Wanted to post a quick blog – don’t want to take too long though because I want to hang out with people.  But, four sessions down, three to go.  We just did:

1. College Ministry as an Age-Stage Ministry
2. College-age Pursuits: Identity
3. College-age Pursuits: Intimacy
4. College-age Pursuits: Meaning/Pleasure

We dove deep into these pursuits, going through how and why college-age people pursue these things.  Then we discussed how to guide their thoughts and heart pursuits toward biblically mature conclusions.  Fun stuff.

FYI, these will be downloadable resources!  coming soon…

I’ll post more and give pics in later post…off to hang with college ministry folks.  I’m being socially distant right now and there are 40 or so others that I’m not connecting with…enough.

I’m at my favorite coffee shop in Portland, looking out the window and doing some last minute preparations for tomorrow’s CollegeLeader regional training.  Tonight I’ll hop on a quick 2hr flight down to Orange County, and then crash in a hotel near Saddleback (not telling in case you want to come interrupt a night of sleep without kids!).  I always think I’m going to sleep well when I’m away, but the truth is it never actually happens.  I sleep much better at home.

Anyway, last minute prep stuff going on today.  People are still registering, so if you’d like to join in with the conversation tomorrow, click here.  I’ll try to give updates throughout the day.  Not sure how that will go, but I can try.

I will conclude my entries on this subject here.  We can however continue the discussion through the comments section.  That would be fun.  Here are 4 final thoughts I want to throw out on this topic (well, who knows, maybe there will be more in the future…we’ll see):

1. Pursuing unity.  Students are only on a campus for 4-6 years, so there is limited time.  So, there is a sense of urgency we ought to have with bringing the gospel message to them.  But first of all, this does not automatically excuse us from “being diligent to preserve the unity of the body” (Ephesians 4), including those members of the body of Christ that are on faculty or the administration side of the “system.”  It’s one thing to say we’re not living in disunity, it’s another to say we’re being diligent to preserve unity!  
2. Dig deep into our hearts.  We have to be very careful and dig really deep into our heart motivations!  Too often our ministry becomes about getting people to come to our ministry – but of course we would rarely say this.  But we can see our heart motivations in one thing: what we do when they graduate?  Do we put as much energy into making sure they connect with a church body when they leave as we did trying to get them to come to our ministry?  If not, we’re missing the whole point and we have wrongly placed our ministry above their spiritual health. 
   
3. Overturning the system.  The university system, in general, is not a God-honoring system.  In this regard, I would say I would love to see God overturn the system.  But how do we do it?  I don’t have all the answers, but what I can say is that in all the years of our “march in and do our own thing” without bringing any of the “core” members of the university system into the mix, certainly hasn’t worked.   The reality is campus ministries more often than not compete with one another in an unhealthy and unnecessary ways with who God is already working through on a particular campus.  There are some ministries that are in unity with others which is phenomenal.  We ought to pursue these partnerships much more .  Unfortunately I don’t think being unified with what God is already doing is our first objective.  More often than not, our sinful desire takes over and we rationalize building our own empire.
4. Urgency to our mission.  There ought to be a sense of urgency as believers…but with a condition: that our urgency isn’t about us getting another “notch” on our belt of someone else that has seemingly accepted Christ.  Frankly, too often evangelism is about our pride rather than about the salvation of souls.  We might say our heart is for the person we’re trying to reach, but then too often we issue a count of the people that were “saved,” or the amount of baptism’s we were a part of.  To me, this is more of a “notch” thing, than a Christ thing.  There was a time in which a long time friend did his best at articulating the gospel to me and I confessed my sin before God, excepted His forgiveness through Christ’s sacrifice and I also, at that time, told the Lord I wanted to honor Him in everything.  But fully embracing the gospel message in my life takes time and is much messier than that prayer or when I was baptized.  I’m thankful to one commenter that talked about walking with people after their initial decision to follow Christ is made.  Simply counting the amount of prayers or baptisms is simply an American way of measuring success, not necessarily Christ’s way of measurement.  You can easily see in the gospels that Christ did not judge success by the number of people that “confessed” to believe!

The reality is I think there is a difference between our mouth and heart.  I think if we opened up our hearts we scream a different story than our mouth articulates.  The university is a mission field and we ought to view it that way.  Mission is not about us, it’s about the people we’re trying to reach.  Its not about making ourselves look good, it’s about doing what’s BEST for those we’re trying to reach.  It’s not about avoiding disunity, it’s about diligently preserving it.  We cannot do this without bringing the other believers on a campus into the mix.  Just some thoughts…

If you’re planning on coming to next week’s regional training at Saddleback church, make sure to register here!

Ok, now that we got some juices flowing with this topic, let me add to what I said in the previous post.  I can tell, from some comments as well as a few emails I received, that this post got some of you pretty fired up.  Frankly, some people might be irritated or frustrated with me.  To that I say, “good.”  

The good part of frustration is that we think more deeply.  And, that was part of my point in the last post.

Now, let me list out some of the balances to part one.  I will issue 3 here, get some of your thoughts, and then post at least 3 more tomorrow.  I didn’t want to balance it out in part one for the purpose of discussion.  So, there are a few things I’ll add here that may balance some things out for you (or possibly further your frustration/thought process!):

1. I know I worded things as an either-or issue in part one.  I did that on purpose.  However I don’t think this is an either-or issue at all.  My point is to get those of us who don’t even think about connecting with what God is already doing on the campus before just marching in with our own agenda’s.  The reality is that there are Christian’s in the “core” part of the “system” that God is already using.  I think we need begin to think more about connecting with what He is ALREADY doing and come alongside of that instead of just charging in.
2. We cannot ultimately undermine God, but we can undermine some things He’s done in the past through others.  Let me explain.  Lets say you’ve been spending a ton of time with a co-worker.  You’ve learned this person, their thoughts and experiences, and because of the time you’ve spent with them have a really good understanding as to why their perspective of Christ is off.  You’ve been walking with this person for a year or so now, seeking to help them understand the gospel.  Then, someone comes in and “preaches” to them – totally turning them off to any further discussion with you.  Would you not be upset…at least a little?  Sure, maybe you help them understand that the message that was preached is still the message they need to receive.  But surely there could be some damage done to the process you’ve been in with that person.  At the end of the day we embrace the sovereignty of God, but that does not mean that the process God had you in with that person wasn’t thwarted to some degree.  This is what I’m trying to get us to think more about.  Not that it’s wrong to begin a brand new ministry on a campus.  But we ought to think much more about joining in with what God is already doing on a particular campus.  This, my friends, is not a waste of time – but it does take some time to understand.  Maybe 3-5 years is a bit of a stretch (again, I used those #’s on purpose to initiate thought), but taking a certain amount of time to understand what God is already doing and joining in that with unity is not a waste of time – or being unfaithful.  I think it’s quite the contrary.  It’s simply trying to tune in to what God is doing, being sensitive to the Spirit, and working in unity with the body of Christ.
3. James 4 speaks about the arrogance of going into a town with a plan of our own.  I think we need to be very careful of our arrogant attitude and approach.  Some college campuses are much larger than towns or cities.  I think this certainly applies to this context.  In addition I am also issuing the thought here that maybe it’s not the Lords will for you or I to begin a new ministry on a particular campus, but instead join in with what He’s already doing there.  This, unfortunately, is typically not something we even give the time of day.

Ok, so I’ll post at least 3 more thoughts about this tomorrow, but before I do I’d like to hear your thoughts again….

A past student of mine, Tim Shontere, is now a missionary in a tribe out in Papua New Guinea.  I was recently chatting with him about the process it takes to actually reach the core of the tribe he’s in.  There is a minimum 3-5 year process of getting to know the tribe’s culture before they even mention the name Jesus.  The reason is because he has to understand how their social system works, how they function (and don’t)…he has to understand their worldview.  Why?  Well, first of all they need to understand the connotations their worldview places on words.  By getting to know the core group of this tribal system they have a much great chance of being a part of transforming the entire tribe.

For instance, if they talk about Christ being a sacrifice these people can think of all kinds of different things.   In other words the word “sacrifice” could carry all kinds of connotations for these people that could actually distract from/distort the biblical meaning.  As missionaries they need to understand ALL of these things if they’re going to accurately portray the gospel message.  They have to understand the system of thought.  If not, they could actually undermine the entire mission.

Why is it that we as college ministry leaders feel like we’re an exception?  Why is it we feel like we can just walk on a university campus, throw an event or something, and think that’s all we need to do?  Is it possible that without even realizing it we’re actually undermining the core group of that system – and possibly our mission?  Shouldn’t we know the core of that system before we just jump in?

If you truly want to reach a campus, here are some thoughts:

1. Get to know the people at the core of the system: administrators and professors.  Maybe you ought to spend 3-5 years building relationships with the right people in the core of the system before you ever mention the name of Christ.  The truth is that every campus has some Christian professors that are trying to reach the campus in some way.  Not seeking the advice of these types of people could actually undermine everything God has been doing on that campus through them before we marched on with our immediate results mentality.  Maybe they had a long-term objective of reaching that campus.  It would be like you or I going into that tribe in Papua New Guinea to put on an event – without even knowing it we could undermine the life long commitment of the missionaries.
2. Have a long-term perspective.  We too often want immediate results and thus create events designed to attract a certain number of people.  This is a short-term mindset.  We have to build relationships with the right people if we’re going to truly penetrate things.
3. Check ourselves.  Do we really think we can reach an entire campus without at least some of the core of that system being on board?  To me that just seems arrogant.  It just doesn’t seem right to not work alongside some of these professors – who frankly are much smarter than we are.  I have a Master of Divinity degree.  That means I have some education in regards to theology.  I also have somewhat of a grasp of philosophy and some other subjects.  However, there are Christian professors that have spent their life thinking about how the gospel message plays out in higher education – and most in a specific area of higher Ed.  The reality is they’ve probably thought about some things we haven’t.  We can’t be so arrogant to think we could do a better job than them.  Granted, some campuses have fewer believing Christian professors than others, but I don’t think that changes my point.

I have more to say, but I think I’ll stop there for now and see what you think…