As we went through September, the main thing going through my head was being diligent with all the guys God put in my path so far. My mindset shifted more to diving headfirst into ministering to the guys that have been showing up to our small group (Core) and our large group meetings (TNF), which has presented many challenges I am grateful for! Learning to love and follow God is a lifelong journey that requires committed time learning more about who he is and looking to live as his light to the world. God wants us to be a part of his solution to making the world new. And we believe this happens really well through investing deeply in consistent relationships with people who are on that journey too, which is costly but helps build something that lasts. So, we seek to have the leaders in our cores meet consistently with everyone in our cores who desires it. But it has felt overwhelming with the amount of new guys who have been coming to our core!
What does the routine of ministry look like now?
As I said above, now that our core is in full swing and personal discipleship relationships are getting going, the average week is very full! Let met tell you about some of the different things going on:
Core
My small group meets every week at 5pm! We meet on campus at one of the dorms at 4:30pm and then carpool over to my house to start by 5pm. We have a very diverse group, which excites me because where else would a group like this come together except for God? We have people from all sorts of backgrounds, upbringings, ethnicities, and spiritual beliefs. This makes us need to have wisdom as we approach what we do that make everything accessible for non-Christians, since our groups by nature are so “outward-facing.” But it is fun in some ways because we get a lot of creative liberties to discern what God wants us to do.
Our vision for core is something we tell the guys each week to help them internalize what we are trying to do and why. Our vision is to grow in our love for God and our love for others, and we achieve this in a lot of ways. To grow in our love for God we seek to learn about God, worship God, talk to God, and pursue him with hunger. To grow in our love for others we pursue each other in relationship, sacrifice for one another, listen and learn from one another, encourage one another, welcome each other’s doubts and questions, and strive for unity. This allows us to structure core differently in ways each week to be able to hit on these different aspects!
So far, we spent three weeks on the three building blocks of our ministry (devotion to Jesus, real relationships, and raising up leaders) in addition to going over the themes of “God wants relationship with you” and “God is a forgiving God.” We have been aiming to help the guys see and think about some of the core characteristics of who God is as a person. We use a lot of questions and open discussion to help the guys internalize who God is and put themselves into the situations we read about in Scripture. And we want them to share about their own lives to begin building trust and depth with the other guys. I get really passionate about core and how we lead our guys and desperately want to see them learn to love God more and love each other :)
This was last week’s core. We had 6 new guys come and 17 total!
An after core hangout at Sonic. See all of the guys trying to look cool and not smile………
Another after core hangout at a playground playing sharks and minnows
Personal Discipleship Relationships
I get to meet with 8 or 9 guys a week typically for more focused, intentional times of learning about God. One of our major principles in Focus is to “think pastorally,” which is to cater what you do based on thinking with God about what you think that guy(s) needs! We use a shared curriculum called “Focus on Jesus” to go through with guys, but we have all the flexibility to respond to the Spirit as to what you may need to discuss with a particular guy. So it keeps me on my toes! I go through this FOJ booklet with 5 guys, and then I meet with 2 of our student leaders for leadership development. Then I have some flex time available for other guys in my core who I want to catch up with or other guys in the ministry who may need some attention! I will cover some highlights with specific guys later down below.
These are the two student leaders I get to meet with each week. Their names are Josh and Francisco. I love them so much! They have such strong hearts for God, beautiful gifts, and complement each other really well.
Thursday Night Fellowship
I mentioned this before, but this is our large group meeting each week. It is when the whole ministry comes together and we worship Jesus together, hear a sermon from someone on staff, and then see what is happening in the community! Last week was our largest turnout yet where we had many new people come. The excitement during worship was palpable! We also have after TNF events, and my house got on the docket to host the first large one off campus for the year. We had almost 100 people cram into our house….it was hard to move around. My favorite part about TNF is that it gives men and women who come into our ministry through outreach or core a larger vision for what the entire community is all about. It can make the kingdom of Heaven feel more real since they get a greater vision into a multitude of different people devoted to God!
The after event at our house! Pt. 1
The after event at our house! Pt.2
The after event at our house! Pt. 3
Apprentice Classes
I haven’t mentioned this much yet, but a large part of our week is also taking classes. we have them most of the day every Monday and Thursday. We have 7 of them going on right now, with varying regularity. We study topics like the Old Testament, Body Stewardship, Spiritual Leadership, Spiritual Disciplines, Evangelism, and more. I am learning so much; it is almost impossible to put it down on paper (or digital paper in this case). The Old Testament class is a highlight, and I feel much more confident engaging with the themes of the OT and being able to use it to minister to people. We have read from Genesis to the minor prophets now (skipping some books in the middle to come back to later). Feel free to ask me individually more of what I have been learning if you want to! But another highlight has been the other apprentices. We have eight of us split across four campuses, and I think everyone is so amazing. I think the thing that makes our group unique is that everyone really is sold on ministry. No one is really on the fence or just doing the apprenticeship because they didn’t know what else to do. We all really want to be here and want to see people’s lives transformed by knowing Jesus, which unites us together in a strong bond! I look up to each one of them in different ways!
The 8 of us: Shree, Hannah, Hannah, Josh, Asa, Juli, Leo, and Me.
Just a guys photo: Asa, Leo, Me, Josh
Weekly Prayer “Room”
Another fun experiment I have been pioneering here is a weekly prayer “room” for our students. It is every Wednesday at 4:30pm. So far I have just opened it up to our student leaders as I get the hang of leading it and receive feedback on how it is going. I am able to lead us in a prayer set based on what I learned while in Greece (s/o to my Antioch people reading this). I come with a theme of something that I feel like God has laid on my heart and we spend the first section just worshipping and being with God. Then we open a Scripture and use that as fuel to pray out what God is stirring in us over our cores, ministry, and campus. My goal for it is to be a place of rest, rejuvenation, and God’s presence for people, and intercession. I have gotten a surprising amount of positive feedback from people who have come, so I am excited to keep it going!
So that wraps up a normal week for me. Those are a lot of the major elements and what keeps me busy; sometimes too busy! :)
What has God been doing in the lives of guys this month?
Just like last month, a crucial thing I want to always share about is what God is doing in the lives of these guys. We do all this ministry stuff, but how are people actually seeing God? Again, I changed their names for privacy’s sake.
One guy who I meet with regularly to disciple, Mark*, found Jesus a couple years ago, but has had no real community or anyone to help him grow since he found Jesus. He has had a checkered past with people in the past, and has been burned a lot. So he simultaneously finds it very hard to trust people, but also God has been stirring in him that he needs people. I am have been so encouraged by his steps to be consistent with our small group and meet with me each week. And I can tell he really enjoys it! He has lots of questions that he loves to ask because he has never really had someone to ask them before. Which just makes it fun and interesting. I met with him today, and was just smiling with God that ministry is all worth it if this one guy learns to open up and love other people. Even though he can get discouraged by where he is at, I always remind him that the Spirit is stirring in him a desire to live with others and learn how to trust more.
Another guy, Tristan*, is a guy who just got involved last week with our core. He grew up with his parents teaching him a lot about God, but when his mom developed stage four cancer, his faith really started to be shaken. He is at a point where he wouldn’t call himself a Christian anymore, but he is still choosing to remain open to God. He knows his foundation is shaken, but I can tell that he wants to rebuild it. I am so pumped up by this! I have gotten to talk with him a couple times, and he has a depth and maturity in perspective that is rare in 18 year olds. I can see God being very compassionate and patient with him as Tristan works these things out, and so I view my role as the same thing.
The last guy I will mention is Nikhil*. He is an Indian international student who I have been studying through FOJ with. I also get to study with his roommate at the same time! He grew up as a Catholic, but had his faith shaken during high school through various circumstances. He is not sure what he believes now, but I can tell that he is being really moved by our time together. He told me last time that his views about God are being challenged, and it is making him rethink a lot. He listens very intently, asks good questions, and is committed to learning. I am so excited to see what God continues to do in him through our discussions. I am very hopeful for the Gospel to take root in him and his very heart to be transformed! :)
Prayer Requests
I would love prayer over everything I have shared so far in the blog plus the specific guys mentioned above. I also have another prayer request about college students based on some conversations I have had. In light of Charlie Kirk’s assassination and other violent events in that same week, could you be praying for college students at UNT that they:
Would be filled with peace from God
Would be led to the Good News of Jesus and His hopes for redemption in the midst of what they are experiencing
Would fight against division and hate
Thank you!
I want to end again with a thank you for your support, prayers, and reading this. Often when something amazing happens in these guys’ lives I think of how you guys are just as much of a part of this as me, and I hope these blogs can help make you excited about what God is doing here in Denton and what you help make possible! None of this could happen without you. We are a team. God’s team.
Signal Group
If you would like to get more realtime updates like videos, photos from our events as well as more frequent prayer requests, then please feel free to join my Signal group. Here are some instructions on how to do this!
Download the Signal app on your computer (Windows link: https://signal.org/download/windows/ and Mac link:https://signal.org/download/) or phone(find on App Store), and then join my group using this link: https://signal.group/#CjQKIIujklEZvNmG_EOmTctAzpNzojYf52Hv05-Cgv2Gd7VmEhCyxnKnaP0J84IBhccEcGXO
With love,
Casey