Enter In
Creating consistent opportunities for students to share their life, faith & community with the larger student body.
The problem:
Cults & Bible thumping
So the cults on campus seem like a warm community standing around their table waiting for folks looking to connect. Then you also have more aggressive evangelistic styles ambushing folks on campus.
So we also have a branding problem. If the student body have also seen and rejected these types of invitations to faith, then what will set us apart?
Solutions?
Can we activate our whole community to demonstrate the life we find in Christ?
When students see us can we create an environment that they will come to expect with a sense of joy?
“Open your Heart”
What if, students approached the ministry groups with curiosity?
If you saw students hanging out inside a giant heart,with images of adopted children and testimonies what would you think?
What the students in the ministry need to know:
Jesus calls us salt & light Matthew 5:13, but He also says in Mathew 11:28... "My yoke is easy and my burden light."
Like my pastor used to say "we need to get out of the salt shaker every once and a while." But Jesus said His yolk is easy, so when we think about sharing, what if it looked like creating origami with friends, or writing in paint marker hopes & dreams, prayers & blessings and we just invited folks to join us.
You see we could use the art to do effective bait and switch. Make it creative and then sell them Jesus. But we do not have to do that, if we simply use these creative projects, not only to draw folks in, but also to share a life of service, community, support all wrapped in the gospel message as part of that whole, then we are not tricking anyone, or pressuring anyone. We are simply creating an environment for students to see the difference between His Yoke and that of religions. We are showing the difference between shouldering the huge burden of go into all the world and preach the gospel and a boy giving away a few fish and loaves.
We bring what God has given us and God makes it more than enough.
Amen!? -- read more
Keep reading below if you are looking for more nuts and bolts to how, why, how, and what we hope to accomplish:
This was the boring part written for the administrators, sorry students, I know you have enough homework.
Open your Heart
Partnering to Promote Adoption
Partnering with a local adoption non-profit to share about the joys, struggles and need for parents to consider adoption will benefit the students and compel them to “Enter In.” Friends Yorba Linda already has such a partnership in place.
Scalability
Creating a 3 dimensional cardboard heart large enough to envelope the viewer would be the starting point. Pinning personal testimonies, photos and quotes about adoption with statistics inside the heart would make the process of “Entering In” that much more engaging.
Handouts of the information and testimonies could be printed out with the 5 campus ministries info and a verse about being adopted into a heavenly family accompanying the resource that may be kept for years by intrigued students.
An engineering student may make a stunningly cut heart, where an art student might make a delightfully patched collage of cardboard and duct tape, which may or may not need to be painted by other students. If both types participate, half the heart could be made by two different students. Ministry participants could also plus the experience by having a polaroid available for those really interested in adoption and staple it to the info graphic testimony handout with a personal message of encouragement.
Benefit to the Student Body
Students may or may not be looking for faith or community, religion, but whether they are interested in faith or community it gives an opportunity or reason to engage around meaningful dialog of adopting children.
Some will pass by, but notice and anticipate future projects that may be more relevant to them in the future. Others will respond in one way or another to the invitation to “Enter In.” Those who enter in will respond to the creativity, community and or content inside the heart. and Iit will be a point of contact that either resources them, connects them and engages them into a larger dialog.
An obvious benefit would be sharing the Good News found in Jesus that we may be Adopted into His Heavenly Family by His shed blood and atonement for our sins. Yet the opportunity to learn about adoption, the bible dialogue study community and the opportunity to meet an inviting person should not be overlooked. Also the smiles that come from something “out of the norm” should not be dismissed.
The child likeness will be drawn out of individuals interacting with this object. The act of entering in will trigger exploration reactions as will. Adding taped foot prints on the ground toward the heart., adding the ability to close the heart on a hinge and have to enter from the bottom with a flashlight in hand can also lend towards that sense of exploration but will have to be weighed with accessibility concerns.
Art as Ministry
Ministry can be great as a team sport. Typically having 2 students sitting at a table while students walk by does not lend towards sparking conversation with the unengaged. Before a table is set up and flyers are handed out, a Builder & Designer would fabricated this object and fill it with meaningful content, Intercessory Pray-ers would have a direction to specifically pray, an Engager would invite students to enter in, while a Chatterer would be available to spark up conversation based on their engagement with the student.
Chatter: “We represent 5 different campus ministries and we support adoption because we have all been adopted.” Student: “What?”
Of course we would encourage Chatterers to move with the conversation, honoring the student and resourcing them based on their interest. But it will give an opportunity to have a conversation around faith if interested. It will also help prepare student disciples to consider the theme and what it means to be adopted by God through Christ. It will make one consider sonship, atonement, and a new family found in the people of God. It will give leadership an opportunity to highlight key scriptures that will guide participants, “blessed are the peacemakers for they will be called the Sons of God.”
Additional Helpers could photograph students with the heart, continue the art project with a paint marker on the outer painted layer with names, quotes or graphics. Drama students, Musicians could also add completely new layers to the level of engagement with the theme. Having a Quarterback with a larger team could be very beneficial in connecting new people to those with a similar testimony or shared experience.
All of this would lend towards creating an experience that will be anticipated for other meaningful points of interaction over the school year. What are you doing this week? Should be a welcomed phrase that each member should hear often.
These Artistic tools lead to Why?
If the team is consistent and patient those conversations can be meaningful.
SWOT
Strengths: Highly Engaging Projects that create opportunities to dialog.
Weakness: Heavy time commitment and preparation, that require unity participation and buy-in of 5 Campus Ministries.
Opportunity: Resource the student body with helpful information & enter into relationship.
Threats: The term University comes from Unity through diversity, Christians are often pegged as non-inclusive. Hosting an adoption awareness table will challenge students to accept people who may be interested in learning about adoption, but cold or hostile towards faith. There will be questions of acceptance and of gatekeeping. Are these Christians arbiters of who can adopt? It is a challenge and opportunity to be open handed, gracious and thankful for the opportunity to dialog with someone who Entered In.
Planning & Preparation
“Open your Heart” would have the support of a church & non-profit. The creation of a large 3 dimensional heart could be created over a weekend with cardboard and duct tape, but the gathering of testimonials, photos and handout materials would require some assistance from supporting partners to create impact. The more value offered the more likely the material would be kept and shared. This will help to create stickiness with the bible studies information & invitations.
Some of the projects could be reused at a later date. “Open your Heart” would take place in the Fall and would be perfect in February around Valentines. Other projects like “Refuge” which only requires umbrellas and a larger team could be used spontaneously or in place of another project that has fallen behind due to students' schedules.
Students can sign up for different projects and it will help to maintain consistent support throughout the school year among the 5 groups without over burdening a few individuals. That is if students are excited about the projects and they are invested in a theme, concept, partnership or just the fun of participation.
Open your Heart - 20 boxes $40 (Home Depot), 3 Duct Tape $36, paint $24, Easel $24 (hobby lobby), Hinges $12, Printing 120 Flyers $18, Color Photos & Content printing $36 Polaroid film $62 Walmart Total= $252
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