We reconcile students to Christ, equipping them through Spirit-Filled communities of prayer, worship, fellowship, discipleship, and mission to transform the university, the marketplace, and the world. This clarion call has served as the marching orders for Chi Alpha since 1993. Taking our mission statement seriously, we had to ask how we could aid this transformation by reconciling students to Christ.
The nearly 22,000 Chi Alpha students represents a potential formidable global missionary force. To change this missionary force from potential…
On July 16 of this year, I became the father of a teenager and it hit me: in the campus lifespan of a “super senior,” my daughter will be a freshman in college! I remember so distinctly just holding her in my arms for the first time. I can recall even speaking to her while she developed in my wife’s womb. As it’s commonly said, the days are long and the years are fast! My daughter is an amazing young…
Last year was my first year on campus at the University of Iowa and I had barely given any thought or time to feedONE, Convoy of Hope’s children’s feeding program and Chi Alpha’s compassion arm. With hardly any notice at all, we launched our feedONE month in April that began with a simple dinner for all the students and watched The Waiting List documentary.
There
wasn’t a dry eye in the room of 20 students. Without even asking to receive…
One of my favorite sayings is, “Every time you say yes to something, you say no to something else.” That’s the way I used to look at feedONE. I knew feedONE was the children’s feeding program championed by Convoy of Hope, and I loved the vision and the mission. But I was so focused on our campus I thought getting would mean saying no to something else. I’ve since learned this isn’t always the case.
This year, we made a…
Chi Alpha taught me that
giving is not only tithing and giving back monetarily to the Kingdom, but it
also means truly giving your time and being a blessing to others.
What really impacted my giving in both these ways was a life-changing mission trip to Haiti with feedOne the summer after my freshman year. feedONE provides food and education to more than 200,000 children daily and also gives them an opportunity to know Jesus.
The kiddos in Haiti stole…
Can I be totally, brutally honest with you for a moment?
I grew up in church and then spent most of my college years
in Chi Alpha. Between those two things, I attended what seemed like one
thousand retreats, camps, breakaways, whatever you want to call them. At each
one, there was usually some sort of window for a compassion cause: a video of a
hungry child, pictures of young people my age living in abject poverty, and the
list…
A couple years ago, my parents decided to take my whole family on a vacation together to celebrate their 60th wedding anniversary. While family dynamics always make for an “interesting” time for anyone, life became even more complicated when my father asked each of the kids to lead a morning devotional for the family. It shouldn’t be a big deal for someone who has been a missionary for a while, but it’s amazing how inadequate you can feel when your…