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The following is taken from Appendix B, in College Ministry 101
Doing ministry in a context where a major university is nearby brings lots of wonderful opportunities, but it also brings some serious challenges. The biggest challenge is the sense of competition between the local church and the campus-ministry organizations. To me, this false competition boils down to both parties having a program-driven philosophy of ministry. When everyone’s out to build his own program, there’s bound to be competition. If we stay focused on discipleship and assimilation, however, there’s no reason why our churches can’t complement the work of all those campus ministries.
The best way to put an end to the sense of competition is by serving in those campus ministries. Rather than duplicating efforts, it makes much more sense to join forces, come alongside each other, and support each other with our resources. Here are eight ways you can help bridge the chasm between local churches and campus ministries, so both of you can do more to reach out to college-age people:
For all 8 ideas, click here.
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Chuck, I’m glad you deal with this in your book. My own context is that I’m a college minister through a local church in a university town. We take our collaborations with campus ministries seriously, and continue to find ways to be a blessing to each other. I view the relationships I have with campus ministry workers as being a pastor to them. I think they appreciate this, and it seems to work well.
By the way, I just finished reading your book and found myself saying “amen!” a lot. It was, for me, not so much new information as it was a big affirmation of what I have been doing in focusing on relationships and not trying to build programs or a lot of structure in the ministry. So, thank you, it was an encouragement to me to read the book.
Timotheos, glad to hear the book was a help to you!