Wednesday, November 30, 2011

Many Exciting Happenings at FOCUS

November has been an exciting month for our ministry at UNT.  The semester may be wrapping up, but that doesn't mean we're slowing down.  Check out what's been going on:

Halloween Party!  (Okay, that was October, but it was fun anyway)  Here are some of our crazy students:



Our party was a lot of fun, but it was also a great chance for our students from different Cores to get to know each other and build friendships.  Oh, and my team won the pumpkin carving contest with our realistic Brad-O-Lantern, depicting our campus pastor in profile.

Pizza Theology!  On November 20th, around 200 FOCUS students from all four campus gathered at UTD to learn about relating to popular media like music and movies.  Randy Heffner, our guest speaker and the father of one of our long-time student leaders at UTD, talked about how to extract truth from movies and music that seem to have very little to do with God.  It was a thought-provoking topic and a great opportunity for students from all of our campuses to get to know each other.

In addition to being a part of these big events, I have the opportunity to meet one-on-one with a few girls to do the Focus on Jesus study.  I've been meeting with Lakai for about five weeks now.  She grew up in church, but she was never really challenged her to study the Bible on her own.  Each lesson in FOJ has homework, and the last homework Lakai was supposed to complete required her to read a few verses from Matthew and apply them to her life.  When we got together to talk about the homework, she confessed she hadn't really done it.  Instead, she had gotten so interested in reading about Jesus that she had read the first half of Matthew, and she had a ton of questions!  She even wanted to know about some of the references to teachings in the Old Testament.  It's so exciting to see people develop curiosity and hunger for the truth.  i can't wait to meet with Lakai again and see what else she's learning!

Not every one-on-one study goes that well.  One of the girls I had been meeting with consistently recently decided she didn't want to do FOJ with me anymore.  She didn't give me a clear reason, but I think she may not have been ready for the challenge of living as a disciple.  She told me she found another ministry, so please pray for her that she would find a community that exhorts her to be a true disciple of Jesus.

Even with the ups and downs of doing campus ministry, there is always something exciting to look forward to.  In mid-January, students from all four campuses will gather in Bridgeport for our Winter Camp.  This camp is a three-night retreat that gives our students the chance to build meaningful relationships and be refreshed for the upcoming spring semester.  Every year, many students say that Winter Camp is where they first felt like they were really a part of our community.  The only downside of Winter Camp is that it costs students $135; that can seem like a fortune for many of our students.  FOCUS always lets anyone attend regardless of their ability to pay, but that means we need money to sponsor those students.  Please pray for our Winter Camp, and if you would be able to sponsor one or more students, send me a quick email at kelly@anyfocus.org.

That's all for now.  Merry Christmas! (I'm already listening to Christmas music)