Our students at the Beach in San Diego

So we had our annual Winter Conference in San Diego and ended up taking 8 of our NAU students with us. They road tripped out there together and bonded over adventures such as a flat tire, etc. The conference was a great experience for them though, and it was exciting to see the ways God worked in them.  The theme of the conference was “Undone,” and there were some amazing speakers who challenged the students to focus on God instead of themselves, to really see Him in all his power and glory, and yet his role as loving, personal, Father as well.  They were encouraged to rely on the power of the Holy Spirit to live daily life, and experience the joy of God’s presence that we can experience because of the work of Christ and the Holy Spirit in our lives.  Then the last speaker, Michael Oh, challenged them to live as a “normal” radical Christian, because it should be what is natural for us if we are truly following Christ!

Mikayla, one of our students, decided she did not want to wait any longer to get baptized, so we went down to the COLD beach one evening and she and Jeremiah went into the ocean and she took that step of obedience in being baptized. She was so excited, and it was great to pray together as a group for her, huddled on the sand.

God is so good, and I love to see His love and His purposes transform people right in front of us.

It has been really fun to see our students growing lately.  It is encouraging to see them enjoying one another while they grow in their walk with God and are beginning to live with a common purpose in mind. We desire to be a safe, authentic, fun community where people can laugh together while learning about God and what it means to follow Christ. But we also want to be more than that – we want to be about what God is about. We are seeing our community move in this direction and we praise God!

We had 6 Juniors and Seniors come with us to the Crossroads conference for that age group. They heard talks on keeping an eternal perspective and remembering Jesus is king as they look to their future and make life choices. The main speaker talked specifically about things like Surrender and Decision making, and it was fun to see our students soak it in and struggle with what implications those thoughts have for their lives.

The week before that conference, we did an outreach on campus here at NAU. We called it “Think: What’s Your Perspective” and, as a community, we sought to respectfully ask students about their perspectives on spiritual things and, if they were willing to hear, share the Biblical perspective. The most exciting thing about it was seeing almost all of our students participate. Our student leaders did a great job training the other students in how to engage with their fellow students. We all wore T-shirts, responded to questions from friends and classmates about the shirts, and came out to the tables in the Union to invite students to stop and share their views with us there. I saw our students praying for each other and encouraging one another, as well as taking steps of faith to share their perspective after listening and dialoguing with students about those students’ views.

The week before that, my Small Group of girls went to a local Rescue Mission to help out during a meal. It was fun to see some of them step out of their comfort zone and serve. Many of us enjoyed talking to the guests there (people from the community facing hard times and from around the country passing through Flagstaff). I heard a few crazy stories and interesting spiritual perspectives. One man, from the East Coast, shared about some of his religious experiences as he has explored various religions, but said only recently he was open to hearing about Jesus again because he met a deep-thinking, authentic Christian who made him re-think some of the reasons he had rejected the Christian faith before. I will continue to pray for him.

Overall, we are encouraged. God is at work within Cru here at NAU. We look forward to what He will continue to do, and we are praying that our community continues to become more authentic and vulnerable while staying welcoming and outward focused. We know that keeping our eyes on Christ is what will help!

We just returned from our Fall Retreat camping trip up in Southern Utah. It was a fun time of connecting with several of our new students.  We had about 20 there, and we enjoyed some great devotionals and relaxing times around the campfire. The environment is great for laughing together and also having some deep conversations on hikes as well as in camp.  We wore everyone out with a hike into the famous Buckskin Gulch, and even waded through some deep pools of mud. I will try to link some pictures later this week.

The theme for the weekend was “All Things New,” which enabled us to focus on our new life in Christ and how walking with God means our perspective and our mission and our hope are all new. It was great to see some of the students open their eyes to see new things about God even from the beautiful creation surrounding us. It was also super encouraging to hear some of the students engaging with one another about faith. I heard one student ask another one how they came to know the Lord, and overheard other conversations about how they are so glad they decided to dive into caring about their faith more up here at College. God is on the move, and we are thankful! Thank you for your prayers. Please pray that community continues to go deeper in our small groups and other activities, so that those students who were unable to come on the retreat experience that depth as well.

We are excited about what God is doing already this fall. It has been a bit of a whirlwind for the past three weeks, with all kinds of events and get-togethers with students, but we can tell God is moving here at NAU and we are praising Him!

We started off by getting together with our Core leadership team and sharing the vision for the year, praying and planning together. The 5 Core students and Jeremiah and I were all excited to step into our various roles and trust God together for what He might do through us and the group.

Then we dove into Welcome Week, with students moving in on campus. We had a little come-back get together for our returning students and then tabled for several days to get the word out about our group and get the info of people who were interested in our activities, our small groups, or how to have a relationship with God. We also had an ice-cream social, a hike and a scavenger hunt the first weekend.

The first week of classes we had a Freshmen meeting on Tuesday to introduce our small groups and let students know more about what we are all about. It was followed by Free pizza and our first weekly meeting on Wednesday. We had about 45 students attend and many responded positively to the time. We truly felt that God was glorified in the focus and content, and praise Him for being at work there.

In addition, we and the Core team have been pursuing meeting one on one with many of the interested students, to hear their stories, find out their spiritual backgrounds, and share the good news as the opportunity arose. Jeremiah had some exciting conversations (you can see your latest newsletter for one fun story of a student responding to the Gospel! – not quite posted here yet) and several of our Core women had great conversations too. One girl in particular is excited to have a follow up conversation with a girl who really wants to know how to have a relationship with God!

The second weekend, we had some “spikeball” on the lawn Friday afternoon, an evening hanging out downtown, and a hike to the Lava Tube on Saturday. It was lots of fun, with about 30 people on the hike with us, and some great bonding and hanging out. The kids did well in the Lava Tube too. Isaiah went all the way to the end, and Bethany made it most of the way and was a trooper walking with her headlamp next to Daddy the whole way.

This week has been reason to praise God too. We are seeing a number of the freshmen really get involved in our group. Several have volunteered to help with worship for the weekly meeting, I had a great turnout for the womens’ small group, and Jeremiah saw another student receive Christ and get more involved. Praise God! We have another hike this weekend, and will have mens/womens’ overnighters the following weekend, so that will be fun. Please do continue to pray for us and for God to move, drawing more NAU students to Himself day by day!

July was a good month, though very busy for us.  With help from my parents (who we stayed with during the whole month), Jeremiah and I were able to work well on our various projects.

Jeremiah was coaching several interns and STINTers all summer as they walked through support raising for their year-long commitment either in the US or overseas, working with Cru. He was able to encourage them from God’s Word to keep going and to remember why they are doing what they are doing; he was also able to challenge them to work harder in little ways, remembering that there is joy in inviting people to partner with you in reaching people for Christ.  One of the coolest things that happened is that one of the girls has had the opportunity to share the gospel with many of her family members that had never heard the truth of God’s Word.  Several of them have seen the hope she has in Christ, asked many questions, and some have turned to Him as well.  God is good, and we never know what he is going to use for His purposes.

At the same time, we were also re-connecting with many of our ministry partners in the Bay Area (what a joy to have so many wonderful people partnering with us in ministry), and also inviting others to consider partnering with us. God graciously provided some new partners, and we praise God for them, and the encouragement the individual conversations Jeremiah had with them brought.  When we share about what God has done and look forward to what we are trusting Him to do in reaching the hard soil of Flagstaff, it reinvigorates our passion for what He has called us to.

Jeremiah and I have had many a conversation and have both laughed and shed many tears as we have thought about what God has done and the desires we have for seeing the Gospel further transform students’ lives and driving them to boldly live for Him wherever they go.  We are so thankful that several of our students are gaining a heart for the lost and for the world, and we long to see God send many more from here to reach this culture and other cultures with the healing, powerful, hope-filled message that is found ONLY in CHRIST!  We are excited to see more transformation like we have seen, and we are trusting that spiritual multiplication will continue to grow as we enter this third year of the Cru ministry here–students and community members pouring into more students.  Please join us in praying for this!

Finally, I was also working on a big legal project in July that has slowly been in the works for a few years. I have been working with a staff member from the faculty ministry of Cru (Faculty Commons) to develop a resource website for Faculty that encourages them to live out their faith in the academy and shares about many of the legal parameters and rights they have as employees of colleges and universities.  I flew to Orlando (to Cru headquarters) for a few days at the end of July to meet up and pull together the final details. We have the content complete and are now working on getting it up online. I am excited about seeing it up and running, and pray that God uses it to encourage faculty members around the country to continue to live for Christ in all they do.

We have just returned home and are now looking forward to the Fall, getting back to planning and seeking God’s wisdom. We excitedly await the NAU students as they return and come for the first time to this university. Please join us in prayer.

It was a crazy June, and an even crazier July. We were up in the Bay Area mainly working on our financial support for our ministry at Northern Arizona University, but we had some time for some fun with family as well. We posted a photo album on Facebook here. Sorry it’s so little editing of pictures. Sometimes it’s either get them up as is, or never get to it.

A highlight for Jeremiah and Lori as definitely an overnight backback ALONE! Yes, it can happen. We went to the Trinity Alps, where Lori grew up vacationing and to a beautiful area called the Canyon Creek lakes. It was breathtaking to see God’s beauty and a great time to reconnect with one another doing something we love.

We just finished up the San Diego Express Summer Project. It was a quick few weeks with the 28 students from all over the country, but a powerful few weeks. We saw students grow in ways that will change the spiritual trajectory of their lives, helping them to live for eternal things instead of things of this world. And we saw those very students help people they met and shared the gospel with to think differently about Jesus and those who follow him, changing their faith-journeys as well. A small shift in degrees at one point in time makes a big difference when that line is extended out over a lifetime. It is God who makes people change and grow, but it is a joy to be part of it when He moves.

It was so much fun to hear the students share on the last night some of the memories and things they would take back home to their campuses with them.

• Under the category of first time experiences, some shared that it was their: first time sharing their faith; first time seeing someone receive Christ, first time on the West Coast, first time seeing the Ocean, first time not being afraid to share the Gospel.
• When asked about some things they learned, some shared that they enjoyed: learning how to listen to the Holy Spirit; learning what role God’s Word and The Spirit play in conjunction with one another in our spiritual growth and life; learning how to use tools that lead to spiritual conversations with strangers or friends (such as Soularium–photography-based discussion; and the Perspective cards–leading to a fun world-view discussion).
• When asked what they would remember, many shared how special the deep relational connectedness had been; many also mentioned some specific Evangelism experiences with interesting people they had met; one girl said getting baptized in Mission Bay (we had 4 students on project get baptized); a few also shared some of the analogies that our main speaker had used that really connected with them.

Jeremiah and I particularly enjoyed working with students who were hungry to learn and eager to do evangelism. They understood the Gospel enough to know that they really wanted to internalize it and make sharing it with others to be a more normal and consistent part of their lives.  It was exciting to see them more deeply grasp God’s heart for the nations and for broken people during our small group Bible studies, and wonderful to see them set aside fears and cultural barriers and speak the Gospel in love to strangers as they asked questions and listened to the perspectives and backgrounds of individuals in different parts of San Diego that we went to.

We will continue to pray for these special young people as they return to the many states they came from, several going back to movements that are entirely student led, where they will bring a renewed focus for reaching out to the lost with the Hope we have in Christ and through the Power of the Holy Spirit.

The students all arrived a couple days ago here in San Diego for the intensive 2 week summer project. We staff arrived several days earlier and began to pray for and prepare for their arrival. It is a fun group of staff, and an exciting group of students. We have students from all over the country (including MO, WI, WV, TX, CA, and AZ, among others).  It has been wonderful to see the students’ hunger to learn and grow and their willingness to be stretched by sharing their faith in many different ways and places around San Diego in the next two weeks.  It is also fun to see them bond with one another quickly–shared experience is powerful, especially when the group is wanting to function well together and speak into one anothers’ lives.  Two major focuses of this project are (1) learning about the person of the Holy Spirit and how we as followers of Christ can learn to walk in the Spirit on a day to day basis and (2) gaining confidence and skills in Evangelism, an essential part of living a joyful and fruitful Christian life. We are doing devotionals related to these things in the large group, in small groups, and in personal quiet times.  We are also doing training and learning by doing.  Jeremiah and I are thankful to be part of this project, and we pray that God moves in and through those here in powerful ways to build and expand His kingdom.

The kids are doing well, and enjoying playing with some of the other staff kids in the childcare times. Please pray for the students, staff, and staff kids that are here. Thanks!