I’m officially two weeks into my new role, about to head out on my 4th trip and my first InterVarsity Board meeting. I was encouraged by my initial meetings with Missions Department colleagues, who share a passion for missions and for engaging college students in missions. I also felt like a rookie staff again as I got “oriented” to my new office at our National Service Center (where I had not stepped foot into since the mid-1990s)!
I’ve also been inspired and encouraged by my leadership team, of whom I’ll share more about in a post next month. Thanks also to many of you who have shared their URBANA and IV Missions testimonies with me. In one evening alone, I received 25 Facebook responses/messages filled with testimonies! Several wrote posts such as:
- “[After decades], I still keep my laminated Urbana Decision Card in my purse.”
- “Urbana permanently changed my view of the world and myself.”
- “I don’t think I would be serving in this ministry now, if it weren’t for [Global and Urban] Projects.”
- “I still use things I learned [through IV missions training] in my relationships with both friends and strangers. And especially at work!”
*LEADING A MISSIONS MOVEMENT THAT CHANGED MY LIFE
During the summer of 1991, my perspective on God’s love for the city was transformed through an IV Urban Project in Chicago. At URBANA ’93, I committed my life to global missions, and became an IV Campus Missionary in 1994. Then in 1997 and 1998, I took my first short-term Asia trips and led a Global Project to Vietnam, which eventually led Nancy and me to serve in Mongolia (under InterVarsity “LINK”, our long-term missions arm). InterVarsity continues to impact tens of thousands of students every year in missions, just like I was impacted!
Over the next few months, I’ll be sharing different snapshots of InterVarsity Missions and the ministries which I now oversee. But in brief, they are those very same ministries that God used to change my life – URBANA, LINK, Urban Projects, Global Projects, and the Global Urban Trek.
Lastly, please pray for the sale of our home! We’ll be putting it on the market in the coming weeks, and we’re in the process of preparing it and cleaning it. (Lots to do!) Pray for Nancy, as she does significant work on the house while I’m away. And pray for a quick and fair sale!
