This weekend, we are taking more than 30 New Orleans students to Louisiana Chi Alpha's annual Fall Breakaway. This weekend retreat is something we look forward to every fall, as God does such amazing things there: building life-long friendships, drawing students into salvation life, filling students with the power of the Holy Spirit...
Please keep us in prayer this weekend: safe travel, and God's will.
This group is twice the size of any group we've brought in the past!
At the Leadership Advance this past weekend, the leaders made small get-to-know-you groups for fun. They made a skit or song based on 5 commonalities they shared. Enjoy.
Hello!
We've had a pretty active first weekend at Tulane and Loyola. I'll post some pictures and a bit more news tomorrow or later this week.
In the meantime, I covet your prayers. We will be taking our Leadership Team out to Pensacola, FL this coming weekend: Saturday-Monday. There we will be vision-casting, praying, training, and planning for maximum effectiveness on campus this semester. But, all the training, planning, vision-casting we can do is meaningless without the empowering presence of the Holy Spirit.
Please pray with us this week, especially Thursday, which I am making a day of fasting and prayer for the coming weekend.
thank you!
edit::the fast has been postponed until tomorrow, as I have not been feeling well.
One of the exciting opportunities involved in missional ministry on the American university campus is the presence of student from all over the globe--internationals from nearly every nation on the planet make up nearly 3/4 of a million of the 16 million college students in the nation.
Jen and I have been making friends from other nations in New Orleans since we arrived, but have had difficulty getting together a working relationship with Tulane's Center for International Students & Scholars from the get go. It's a long, weird story, but I'll spare you the whole history.
Since the hurricane, and especially this new academic year there has been a new sense of willingness, even excitement about working with us, as a new director took over the department last fall. We were helping to put back together the International Host Program, which gives internationals an opportunity to get to know an American family. We are recruiting friendship families from local churches. (check out www.onemorefriend.org)
Well, the new director, left for another state last week! So, the point of this little story: please pray that the doors God has opened will stay open, and the favor that has been granted us will continue as Tulane's transitions continue.
On a bright note, however: Our interns will be leading an Easter Retreat on the 6th-8th for international students. They will be camping, exploring some of South Louisiana's amazing culture, and learning about the Christian holiday of Easter. We're excited about what God has in store for this great weekend.
---Tulane Greenwave baseball team is having a bit of an up and down season, but has still amassed a 19-7 record heading into a series with top 25 ranked East Carolina this weekend.
A new semester is already underway at Loyola - they started classes up yesterday! The rest of our campuses here in New Orleans kick-off the spring semester next Tuesday following the Martin Luther King, Jr. holiday.
Chi Alpha New Orleans kicks of the semester in a big way on MLK day, Monday the 15th at 8pm with the Gathering. This Gathering will be special, however. This will be the 2nd annual Reconciliation Celebration!
The focus of the evening will be to remember and celebrate the reconciliation Christ purchased for us: reconciliation to God, and to one another.
2 Corinthians 5:17-21 What this means is that those who become Christians become new persons. They are not the same anymore, for the old life is gone. A new life has begun! All this newness of life is from God, who brought us back to himself through what Christ did. And God has given us the task of reconciling people to him. For God was in Christ, reconciling the world to himself, no longer counting people's sins against them. This is the wonderful message he has given us to tell others. We are Christ's ambassadors, and God is using us to speak to you. We urge you, as though Christ himself were here pleading with you, "Be reconciled to God!" For God made Christ, who never sinned, to be the offering for our sin, so that we could be made right with God through Christ.
The Uprising: 
We had a great time at The Uprising. Students were challenged to live in the freedom that the Holy Spirit brings: freedom from sin, freedom from intimidation, freedom from law and societal burdens, freedom to love...everyone!
The New Orleans students that came expressed enjoying themselves, of course - we always have fun, but also expressed greater desire for the power of God to be at work in their lives, and for greater holiness in life and thought. Some powerful seeds were planted. I'm excited to see that fruit of those seeds.
Tomorrow, the Uprising begins!
This is the annual regional conference Chi Alpha hosts as an opportunity for students to learn, grow closer to one another and form new friendships, and be challenged to draw closer to God and experience the life changing power of the Holy Spirit.
This year, the conference will be hosted in New Orleans!
I'll be getting up super early in the morning to help facilitate a team of students coming in early to work with Habitat for Humanity for the day. We'll be working on the Musician's Village project as part of rebuilding New Orleans.
The conference begins tomorrow (Friday the 29th) at 8:00pm Central Time.
I ask that you would pray that many students would encounter God in new and life changing ways. I also ask that you would pray for me as I teach a breakout session on encountering God in the books of the Minor Prophets, and properly interpreting those prophetic books.
Nearly 20 New Orleans students joined up with Chi Alpha students from around the state of Lousiana at the Assemblies of God campground in Woodworth, LA.
Mr. Curt Harlow spoke at the worship services, and challenged all of us to live a blessed life: to be meek, poor in spirit, to mourn, to be peacemakers... Everyone who came was challenged by God's word.
Fall Breakaway is not just a retreat, but a time for students to grow closer together, to rest from the demands of school for a little bit, and to encounter God, as He brings conviction and clarity to their lives.
We came home Sunday afternoon, yet we are still talking about how we might live the lessons Jesus taught to his disciples on the mountainside. We all desire to be living examples of the Jesus-life at Tulane, Loyola, and UNO. Please pray with us...
Today, Tulane students from Chi Alpha and InterVarsity Christian Fellowship are participating in a 24 hour prayer vigil. We serve a God who answers prayer!
