Each student we meet on campus has a different story to tell and each one finds our ministry in a different way.  Some seek out a group on their own and find us. Others attend a supporting church. Some come and get a hot dog on Fridays and others just happen to be walking through the union when they hear us and decide to join.  However, it is rare that I have come across a student who comes to CC because of a parent.  But that is where Shawntell’s story begins, but I’ll let her tell it in her own words.

“I first came to CC because I had been looking for Christian group that I could feel comfortable with. One day my Mom called me and said she had been looking for me and she had found the CC website, so I decided to go to one of the times they met, little did I know that these people would become like my second family a away from home. Even though I have gone to church for quite a while I had not taken that next step and getting baptized at the time I guess I wasn’t fully ready to. Before going on our spring break mission trip I had been thinking about being baptized, but I did not take that final step till our spring retreat. I decided I was ready to take that huge step and fully die to my sins and self and live a holy life through the power of Jesus.”

Her decision couldn’t have been more unexpected, since we had never talked about baptism prior to our annual Spring Retreat, but the joy of it all is something beyond words. Saturday night of the retreat Shawntell just said, “I’ve never been baptized” so nonchalantly that it took me aback. I followed her statement with numerous questions and it didn’t take long to realize that we were both going to enter the chilly Lake of the Ozarks water in the morning. It was a privilege and a blessing to baptize Shawntell and her story is truly just beginning.

Shawntell was a freshman this year, and she will continue to be a part of this ministry and its core of leaders. She has already agreed to live in the Campus House next year and will most likely be leading a bible study. Her testimony will impact the lives of others and will hopefully encourage them to take huge steps in their spiritual growth.

I rejoice that Shawntell views CC as a family because we are all brothers and sisters in Christ. It is a great compliment to our students and their love of each other. I hope this is something that becomes a legacy at KUCC and know that students like Shawntell will strive to be that family for those arriving in August.

Personally I look forward to being able to continue to invest in Shawntell’s life over the next few years and look forward to the positive impact she will have on her peers here at KU.

Joplin, Missouri was the destination for our trip. Our objective was to serve God and our neighbors by helping to rebuild homes damaged or destroyed by the devastating EF5 tornado of May, 22, 2011. We had 11 people involved including Heather, Lanny, and me, three Chinese men (one KU student and two KU visiting scholars), 4 active CC members, and even one CC dad! God must have known just who we needed to have on this trip, because the mix of wisdom, youth, experience, energy, and heart seemed to be just perfect! As often happens in life, we planned ahead as best we could and then had to adjust our plans as necessary, at times needing to trust in God for what was coming next.

We worked through College Heights Christian Church in Joplin to find people who needed help. This church has taken a huge leadership role in the clean-up and rebuilding of Joplin, organizing and placing more than 15,000 volunteers so far! CHCC also helped us find lodging for our team at First Christian Church in Webb City, Missouri, just north of the area devastated by the massive twister. Pastor Mike Geisert, his wife Tammy, and the men and women of FCC provided us with cots, towels, and showers at the church as well as food for breakfast each morning. In addition, they came and cooked dinner for us each evening and enjoyed it with us! It was clear that we were not the first team that the church had hosted since the tornado. Providing hospitality for teams of volunteers week after week had truly become a ministry for these dear people. They loved doing it and we could tell. Before we left, we all signed their guest book for volunteer teams which showed that they had housed hundreds of people before us. We came to serve others, but here these people were being blessed by God as they served us! Their ministry to us helped to make our service to Joplin possible.

Initially College Heights assigned us two families to help, but most of the work was outdoors and the weather was not cooperating. We were dry for Monday morning, but it rained steadily the rest of the week. In spite of the uncertainties we faced, our group became a team that first day and we grew together as friends and worked well together all week. In the end, we helped three families, thankfully one of them needed help finishing drywall work inside their rebuilt house! Their original house and almost all of their possessions were lost in the tornado. The rain turned out to be a great blessing for them, the very thing that brought our team to their doorstep!

Every evening of our trip we had a gathering of our team for worship, sharing, and prayer related to our day’s experience. These times were a very important part of the trip for all of us, especially for our Chinese friends. All three of them came mostly to improve their English language skills. They were all greatly surprised by how close we grew as friends and by how much fun it was to serve other people together. It was great for all of us to see how God had orchestrated a truly amazing recovery effort among the churches of the Joplin area and many Christians from all across America.  We all saw God’s people in action and we were God’s people in action. We experienced the power of putting our love for God into action by serving Him and serving people. The light of God’s love is shining brightly in Joplin, Missouri!

Read what South Korean CC member Daniel Kim said about our trip:

“Ready 2 back on studies?? How was your spring break? Mine was totally awesome! It was very meaningful and thankful spring break ever. I was recharged by happiness and thankfulness during Joplin mission trip. So glad to learn what serving and helping my neighbors in real life are. Moreover,it was a great time to remember what living sacrifice is. Now is time to do my best on REAL life. I am ready for living sacrifice. Hold me and keep me on Your way LORD!!!!”

“Special Thanks to my Joplin crew who really worked hard and enjoyed a lot in Christ. Love you all. Also thanks to people who prayed for mission trip and me. Love you all so much!!! — with Heather Jackson, Neal Hodgkin, Scott Pixler, Richard McWherter,  Shawny Graham, Kaleb Weaver, Beau Zhao, Kaitlin Stiltz Hodgkin, Jianguo Zhang, Anding Wang, and Lanny Maddux.”

After losing track of each other for a number of years, in January we re-connected… Imagine my wonder as I read the beginning of his email:

“Dear Scott, What a pleasant surprise.  After so many years you are still thinking of us.  I praise God, our Lord Jesus Christ. How are you and your family doing? … Yanrong and I are very well right now.  A few things happened to us in the past seven years.  We got green card in April, 2005 and became American citizen in September, 2010…

(He gave an update of their lives over the last seven years, then he continued)

…The most important thing is that God saved both of us. I gave my life to Jesus in January 2006, and got baptized in an American Church at Omaha.  Yanrong believed and got baptized in February, 2008 in our Chinese church in Denver.

I thank our Lord Jesus sending you and your family into our life.  When you left Lincoln, I still did not understand God’s salvation, but you planted a seed in our heart. When God’s timing came, it grew and convicted us to know that we are sinners and need God’s salvation.

We often think of you, Diana, and your Children. We hope we can see you and your family again.

Yours sincerely,

Jianjun Liu

I cannot even begin to describe all of the things that I was feeling as I read his words! Amazement, gratitude, humility, joy, and satisfaction would be a good start! In a later email he told me more wonderful news:

“I am attending a small Chinese church in Denver which only have five-year history.  Our church is trying to reach the college students from China studying in Denver University and University of Colorado at Denver.  Thank God that we have many brothers and sisters who love lord very much serving the students.”

Not only has his life been changed but he and his Chinese brothers and sisters are now eagerly working to show Christ’s love to even more Chinese students!

“Still other seeds fell on fertile soil, and they sprouted, grew, and produced a crop that was thirty, sixty, and even a hundred times as much as had been planted!” ⁹Then he said, “Anyone with ears to hear should listen and understand.”
Mark 4.8-9closeMark 4:8-9 8 “And other seeds fell into good soil and produced grain, growing up and increasing and yielding thirtyfold and sixtyfold and a hundredfold.” 9 And he said, “He who has ears to hear, let him hear.” (ESV) NLT

Behold… the Power of God’s Word!

Scott

Why 18-22 year olds drop out of church

When Bedford Falls Becomes Pottersville

Under Heather Jackson’s leadership, CC students have been helping International Students improve their English by working at the KU Applied English Center. This work has led to many relationships being built and to several “International Pot Luck Dinners” being celebrated at the Campus House. On November 19th we held an “International Thanksgiving” attended by a mixed group of 30+ International and American Students. Friends inviting International friends to join in a meal… it was really cool! Many of us had to sit on the floor because there were not enough seats for everyone!

Recently my old friend and campus ministry colleague Greg Swinney contacted me about being a part of his nationwide effort to connect International Students with American Christians. It is called Crossroads International Student Ministry. Here is a bit I grabbed from the Crossroads website to let you get a taste of what they are about:

By Aaron Couch

It’s a Friday night, and you see a young man dressed as a bottle of mustard. He’s dancing on a front porch at 13th and Ohio, shouting something about hot dogs.

You’re not sure what he wants, but he has your attention.

“My shtick is to be a little nuts. I like to be a little goofy,” says Jordan Leroy Hanson. “On hot dog nights, when I wear the suit, I can be as goofy as possible.”

If you are one of the hundreds of college students who will wander past 1320 Ohio tonight, you will probably see Hanson.

Hanson is a member of Campus Christians. On most Fridays the group of Kansas University students gather at the ministry’s front porch and grill about 400 hot dogs. They hand them out for free to whoever wants one.

This particular Friday starts off slow. By 11 p.m., only a few college-age guys have heeded Hanson’s call. They’re sitting on the front porch, clutching beers and smoking cigarettes.

It’s not exactly the cover shot of a campus ministry brochure, and that’s kind of the point. Members of Campus Christians say they follow the traditional tenants of Christianity but strive to be open and inclusive.

“We’re not here to be judgmental,” says Scott Pixler, director of ministries for Campus Christians. “We just want to have a place where people can come.”

The guys on the porch talk for a few minutes before moving on. No one has mentioned religion.

“They’re here for a hot dog tonight, but maybe they’ll be back tomorrow for something more,” Pixler says. “And if not, that’s OK too.”

Though Christianity is still the dominate religion in the United States, it is on the decline. From 1990 to 2008, the number of adults who called themselves Christians fell from 87 percent to 76 percent, according to the 2009 American Religious Identification Survey.

Although a majority of young people still consider themselves religious, a 2010 study by the Pew Forum on Religion & Public Life found more than a quarter of 18- to 29-year-olds claimed no faith.

For KU students who aren’t Christian, the face of the religion might be Topeka’s Westboro Baptist Church or Jed Smock, a fire and brimstone preacher from Columbia, Mo., better known as “Brother Jed.” Smock has been derided by KU students during his campus visits for saying things such as God created women to make babies and do housework.

Members of Campus Christians say hot dog night is about breaking down those stereotypes about Christians being intolerant.

“As Christians, we think that Jesus has called us to love our neighbor,” said Heather Jackson, a minister with the group. “We’re not handing out a tract, and we’re not making them listen to a message. We’re really just giving them something for free, and that’s how we interpret grace — that it’s absolutely free.”

There are signs younger Christians tend to be more tolerant of other faiths than their peers. Researchers at the University of Warwick in the U.K. found that 13- to 15-year-old Christians were more likely than their nonreligious peers to support the right of Muslim classmates to wear religious garb in school.

At hot dog nights, some people can’t believe the hot dogs are really no-strings-attached.

“They’re just in complete shock that we’re doing this out of the kindness of our hearts,” said Richard McWherter, a KU student who helps out on Friday nights. “It’s just really interesting to see people’s reactions.”

Just after 1:30 a.m., some of the Campus Christians start belting out Aerosmith’s “I Don’t Want to Miss a Thing,” and Emily Freeman doesn’t quite know why. She’s never heard the song.

Back home, Freeman practices a religion indigenous to the mountainous region of Peru where she is from. She doesn’t know much about Christianity but started hanging out with the Campus Christians a few weeks ago.

Freeman might not know the same songs or the same religious texts, but she knows she likes her new friends. They are people she needs right now; just a few weeks after moving to Kansas, she was diagnosed with leukemia.

Freeman picks up Fae, a small dog dressed in a ketchup costume. She’s hot dog night’s unofficial mascot.

“Fae’s owner said if I lose my hair from my treatment, that she’ll shave Fae and make me a wig,” Freeman says, laughing. “I would have the coolest hair ever.”

Things get busy after The Wagon Wheel Cafe, at 14th and Ohio streets, closes for the evening. Dozens of people come by for hot dogs. People who probably wouldn’t hang out normally are talking and laughing. One young man uses his phone to show off pictures of his artwork. Another starts freestyle rapping to entertain the crowd.

Hanson, the Campus Christians member in the mustard suit, continues yelling “free hot dogs.”

The last hot dog is given away just after 2 a.m. The lucky guys who snagged the last of them are appreciative, and start spinning puns in honor of the hot dog.

“Man, I’m going to have such a dog-over tomorrow,” one says.

Lanny after dinner out with his former student Simon Zhou and his daughter Hope on August 22nd, 2011 in Lawrence. Simon brought his wife and two daughters to Lawrence from the East Coast on a family vacation.

intelligent animal won out competition against other species.  This materialistic world view caused a lot of confusion and made me a pessimistic person with a dark outlook of life.  To survive and prevail, one will have to win against the competition.  This is a cruel game with no meaning or purpose, where winning is everything.  Consequently, love and compassion are not virtues but weakness that will hamper one’s effort to win.  But in my heart I knew there is something seriously wrong with this proposition, I want to win and I want to love and be loved.  But I don’t know what love is.  The loves I witness around me are fickle and fleeting, tainted with selfishness, broken and twisted.  There is anguish beyond description in my heart.  I know something is missing, but I don’t know what it is.

After graduation from college in China, I applied and was admitted to graduate study in US.  I came to a small college town, Lawrence, KS expecting to expand my knowledge and build toward personal success.  Once I was on the ground in Lawrence, a group of Christians serving the local community reached out to me. Among them, a Campus Christian minister-Lanny Maddux- stood tall and had been my spiritual awakener.  The un-reserving love and help I got especially through Lanny, together with his life style of honesty, freedom and joy draw me close to these so called “Christians”.  Their faith was entirely foreign to me, and although I dismissed it as a well-intentioned superstition, I marveled at the unselfish love and virtues demonstrated by these men and women who confessed a faith in Jesus.  And to my great surprise, many of the great scientists I was taught to respect to the point of worship since I was a little boy, were confessed Christians who described their work as discovery of God’s created order and attributed their success to God’s providence.

My journey toward faith has been gradual and took a lengthy path and progressed on multiple fronts of intellectual quests, personal friendships, emotional and relational struggle with an ex-girlfriend and close family members.  Two years into my study in US, I was still dubious about but willing to give this “silly” faith a try.  I was baptized quietly during a week day by Lanny with only a small group of Christians witnessing, and did not want more people to find out.  Never did I ever in my wildest imagination could I have predicted what followed.  Jesus took whatever little faith I had in Him and multiplied it with his marvelous and unfathomable love and mercy.  He gradually tore away my doubts and confusion, guided me through ups and downs with His steady and tender hands via miracles, sound teachings and edifications by pastors and fellow brothers.  I shed my dark outlook on life and came to understand what love is and what its ultimate source is.  The amazing truth of love is that my savior came, died for my sin and is resurrected and offers the living hope for me to join Him in this earthly journey now and in a more glorious heavenly journey later.  Bit-by-bit, the Lord is mending my brokenness, the pains and confusions in my hearts are lifting and the longings are met and thirsts are quenched.  Now 17 years later, Jesus is ever clearer and dearer to me.  It is not that I fully grasp the infinite wisdom and unfathomable depth of love of my Savior; rather, I become more aware of His wisdom and love, and my dire need to depend on Him for providence and guidance.  Prior to knowing Christ, I had been searching futilely in oriental philosophy, science and false religion to find love and lift my burden, but to no avail.  In Jesus I found all I was look for.  As Jesus called to all of us in Matthews 11:28 “Come to me, all who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest”.

Jesus is true to His word, may the name of Jesus be lifted up!

Simon Zhou

BY EILEEN RODDY

A late-night bathroom stop after a wild student party changed the course of Ali Edwards’

Ali Edwards, Heartland Community Health Center's development director, has found a life full of purpose and meaning working for the center and assisting people in holistic health care.

life. It led her to abandon Hollywood plans to take instead an AmeriCorps position at Heartland Community Health Center, then become the center’s development director.

Born in Meade, where her father farmed and her mother directed Minneola District Hospital’s obstetrics department, Edwards was known as a tomboy.

“I played outside all the time, made forts in trees, looked for action and was a huge KU sports fan,” she says. “My dad used to joke I was the son he always wanted because I was so into sports, whereas my three brothers weren’t.”

Edwards played basketball, was active in track and cheerleading, and by seventh grade she’d decided she’d become an athletic trainer.

She graduated from Meade High School in 2007, enrolled in KU’s School of Education athletic program and spent her first few weeks partying. After one party she stumbled into Campus Christian house, 1320 Ohio, searching for amenities.

“People were friendly, serving free hot dogs but no alcohol, and I wondered what it was all about,” Edwards says. “Someone handed me a card and invited me back.”

She returned to the house several weeks in a row but arrived late for services and left early to avoid getting involved.

“My family are regular churchgoers, and I’d say I was a Christian, but it was mostly words I didn’t fully understand, and it wasn’t really service-oriented,” she says. “I continued attending Campus Christians, and something of deeper significance starting happening to me.”

The athletics world lost its luster. Edwards stopped partying at the end of the first semester, transferred to the journalism school to study strategic communication, then decided to become a celebrity event planner in Hollywood. She became more involved in Campus Christian’s worship and Friday night service projects, and volunteered at Jubilee Café.

“I learned the importance of serving and loving others, and loving my neighbor as myself,” she says. “I was never consciously seeking God. It seemed God sought me and led me in a different direction to the one I’d planned.”

When (then) Campus Christian chaplain Rev. Tony Bedora encouraged her to apply for an AmeriCorps outreach position at HCHC, she resisted.

“I was determined to move to L.A. but decided to give the center one try,” she says.

Edwards met HCHC’s director Jon Stewart, learned about the center’s mission to provide quality holistic health care for those living below the poverty line, then applied for the AmeriCorps position. It was the perfect fit.

She gradated from KU this year, completed her AmeriCorps term and is now HCHC’s full-time development director.

“My work can be challenging because many deny poverty exists in Lawrence because they don’t see it. Many poor and suffering people look like us, they just don’t have good support systems,” Edwards says. “HCHC supports people to make healthy lifestyle changes and discover meaning and hope in their lives. I’ve changed, too. I’ll never be a Hollywood party planner. My life now has purpose, significance and meaning.”

Tagged: Heartland Community Health Center

When? – October 7th, 8th, and 9th.
Where? – Maranatha Bible Camp & Retreat Center (in Everton, MO)
How Much? – $36

Come with us on our annual fall retreat with other campus ministries from the midwest.  This will be a great way to grow together as a group and get to know each other better.  The speaker for this year is Bryce Hansen.