Week One Done!

It has been a good, though incredibly busy week!

Classes started, first CSF, activities fair, got introduced to the church, planning, writing, school, meetings, it's been hard to find time to breathe!

Since last Monday classes had started. Much of Monday was spent making plans for the year, having discussions with our president and figuring out how we want to do things and what we want to do during the year. I ended up making a list of things that I need to do, and even when I knock off a lot of different items there are always more that need my attention. This new ministry is really pushing me to have some good time management.

Tuesday rolled in and we had our first CSF meeting. Talking with our president we decided to go the easy route and just have some food and drink and have students stop by to hang out and play video games. Of course ol' reliable came out, the Nintendo 64, and we had some intense Mario Kart go down. We ended up having 4 different students stop by, and the Catholic group came by and shared some pizza with us. Afterwards there was a period of about an hour or two were a couple of us guys just sat and talked, getting to know each other. That was honestly probably the best part of the entire night.



Wednesday started and this time we got to prep for the activities fair which was on Thursday. We talked about what we were going to do, hand out, and how we were going to stand out from the other campus ministries. We decided our goal was to offer a different environment than the other ministries as to give others a chance to find a place where they feel comfortable.

Thursday started up bright and clear, and kinda chilly. I seriously love the weather here by the way. Except for this week. This week is supposed to be in the mid to upper 80's all week. I hate it. But I digress. I ended up meeting Buzz in a town just north of here to grab some supplies for the activities fair, a banner and some bags to hand out. I got back to campus and set up started. Around 11 we started getting the table put together, got our flyers we were handing out, and waited. Then the students came. Over the course of 2 hours we had 74 students give us their information! That's a lot more than what our Altoona campus had last year from what I hear, and even more than what we got at Pitt last year (I just checked to make sure). We also had 400 flyers to hand out, and gave out a good number of them with all of our information and who we are as a campus ministry. Overall we have no idea how many contacts with students we had, but I was really encouraged by it. I feel that God is going to do great things this year. For those of your praying for this ministry, from the bottom of my heart thank you! I ask that you keep praying that God does something huge on this campus this year, even if it's just a single baptism, or one life changed.

The rest of the week was pretty uneventful except for the fact that I had two smart phones die on me. And since I'm not an authorized user on the account I have no way to fix it. So I'm looking into getting a new cell phone service. Now, why I'm writing about this mundane detail that you probably don't care about. As a campus minister we are on call 24/7. We must always be available for students to get a hold of us. And with how technology is advancing, students use more than just texting or calling to get a hold of us. They use facebook, email, twitter, snapchat, instagram, vine, all to get information from them to others, either in a personal way, or to just get information out there. This makes having technology in the palm of my hand incredibly necessary. I remember I had a friend that had his car break down in the middle of no where and only had enough service to get the information out on facebook through a text. Things like that actually do happen. So the point of all of this is that funding is needed to support this aspect of the ministry. How my funding is at the moment, I may be able to swing a cellphone bill with rent and everything else, but it's not certain at this moment. So if you could please pray for funding for communication to come in, or even if you feel compelled to help with that I would be grateful beyond words.

Sunday started off amazingly. I woke up and ran to the store to get some cat good and the sun was just rising over the mountain in the distance (Don't worry I was sitting at a stop light when I got the picture). After I got back to my house and got ready I headed to the church to be introduced. At 8:30 in the morning. I wasn't all about that. But it was necessary. For three services I got to sit in front of the congregation and tell them about myself and CSF. I told them of my hopes and plans, how we want to create a new identity for the ministry, and how we want to impact not just the campus, but also the community of Altoona. One of the final things that I got to speak about was how the church can help, which is good information for you as well dear reader! First, prayer is always needed. I love knowing that I have people praying over me and the ministry. Second of course is funding. As I said, campus ministry is a 24/7 job and unlike churches, we don't bring in an offering. We don't have an established church that has constant funding from within, and we're not a church plant where in 3-5 years we should be self sufficient. In 3-5 years we'll have an entirely new group of students. And third, able bodies and resources. Gift cards for gas, food, drinks, other supplies. Cooked meals, drivers, whatever. Campus ministry is always in need of just more!

Well that's been my week! Hope you've had a good week as well! Keep an eye out for a News Letter today in your email or in the coming days in your mailbox! Thanks for all you do!