Go Ye Into All the World
A group of committed young people make the university campus their mission field.
David Park
David Park is a university student, and the president of ANEW - a network of Adventist university students that attend non-Adventist institutions. He talks to Spectrum about his organization, his goals and his convictions.
Question: ANEW is described as a retreat for Adventist college students attending non-Adventist schools - a weekend to get together, network, worship together and get inspired. How did you get the idea to start ANEW? Is this the first year the retreat has been held?
Answer: This year was the second year that ANEW has been held. ANEW isn’t just a retreat, it is an organization, and the sole organization that networks Adventist east coast secular campus ministries together. This means that we don’t operate just one weekend in a year, but we keep the east coast campus ministries constantly connected through prayer, support, and resources that will enhance the effectiveness of our individual groups.
I was only one of the founders of ANEW. The idea came to a small group of us at a CAMPUS LEADS retreat held in July of 2007. CAMPUS is the Center for Adventist Ministries to Public Universities, located in Ann Arbor, MI.
LEADS stands for Leadership Education and Development Seminar. Last summer was the first time I attended, and it was the most comprehensive and practical conference for campus ministries I had ever been to. There weren’t just powerful messages, but there were workshops and even a networking session and a planning session to equip students to be missionaries at their campuses.
After LEADS, a few of us who attended and lived on the east coast saw the need for something powerful and effective like LEADS to be implemented back home where we lived. A difference between ANEW and LEADS is that again, ANEW maintains a network throughout the year. With ANEW we want to not only motivate students to do Biblically-based campus ministries, but to equip them as well. Soulwinners are just more effective when they are trained.
Question: You held a retreat the first weekend of November at Mt Aetna Camp in Hagerstown, Maryland. How many students attended? How did you feel the weekend went?
Answer: Approximately 60 young people from secular universities attended from all over the east coast, including Maryland, Virginia, Delaware, Pennsylvania, New Jersey, New York, and even Michigan.
The weekend wasn’t just powerful and inspirational, but it was life-changing for many of the attendees, and the leadership as well. Many college students left having made decisions to serve the Lord and to start campus ministries at their schools. From the leadership perspective, it was worth going through all the work to put the conference together because we didn’t just get to witness the attendees appreciating the messages or just feeling good, but making decisions that will change their lives.
Question: Did anything surprising or unexpected happen over the weekend? Have you attended similar events in the past?
Answer: It was just very encouraging to see young people like myself catching the vision to represent God at secular universities.
I would have to say that the most surprising thing for me was when the last message on Sabbath was over, instead of people just talking and hanging out (as most people do at the retreats I’ve been to), people formed in groups and shared testimonies, convictions from the weekend, and even opened up their Bibles to study together.
But this is how it should be, when people are convicted truly so that they end up taking action.
Question: Did you plan the retreat and organize all the logistics yourself?
Answer: There is a team of three of us who put this together.
We have a VP for Programming & Logistics, Erica Dashner from the University of Delaware. She’s a PhD student in cancer research.
We also have a VP for Networking and Resources, Josephine Elia, who is a PhD student at Princeton University for Chemical Engineering.
I serve as the President.
We try to keep it simple, and while we have our individual roles, we help each other out as much as we can.
Question: How was the retreat funded? Did you have to pay to bring in speakers?
Answer: There are two local churches in Maryland who provide support for us. Through our budget, we are able to cover all the expenses to get the speakers to ANEW. We also have donors who give generous donations to further campus ministries.
Question: How did you locate Adventists students at secular colleges on the east coast to invite them?
Answer: We just try to encourage whoever we know to attend. Word of mouth works great.
Question: Tell us a little bit about yourself. Where do you go to school and what do you study? What inspires you?
Answer: I attend the University of Maryland in College Park, MD. I study electrical engineering and am a 4th year student.
However, currently I am taking a year off school to be an intern in the CAMPUS Missionary Training Program. It is an excellent program that really provides you with the training that you need to do God’s work not just on your campus, but wherever you are. Because our training ground is the secular university (one of the toughest spiritual environments), wherever we go after college - whether it’s another country, or the workplace - we are well-equipped, having dealt with such a vast variety of people.
What inspires me is just being a part of God’s movement in these last days. I want to be able to see Jesus face to face when He comes and hear “Well done, My good and faithful servant.”
The entire universe is waiting to see how the Great Controversy will be played out on earth, and it inspires me to know that one day in heaven, we will be sharing our testimonies of the amazing things God has done in these last days throughout eternity.
Question: Clearly you saw a need for something like ANEW. What do you feel Adventist students at secular colleges are missing out on? If it's something really important, why don't they just attend Adventist colleges?
Answer: I don’t think Adventists at secular colleges are missing out on anything. If anything I see it as a great opportunity.
I think that there is just a lack of infrastructure to support secular university students in doing ministries at a school where not everyone believes the same thing you do. That’s why organizations like CAMPUS began and decided to provide that support. That’s why we have local conferences like ANEW to network ministries together. The large majority of Adventist young people attend secular universities. We are just fulfilling needs that are not being met.
As public university students we have a unique role to be missionaries on our respective campuses. Most public university students only see themselves as attending school and obtaining a degree but don’t realize that the four years they have been given is one of the best opportunities to work for the Lord in a place where there can be so many blessings. Radical things can happen at a university.
Question: How do you see Adventist colleges? Do you think they are doing the job they were set up to do? Why did you decide not to attend an Adventist college?
Answer: I haven’t attended an Adventist college myself so I don’t really know. But if Adventist colleges are doing their job, then the students who graduate from those institutions should be able to do ministry not just in a comfortable Adventist circle, but in any environment, both religious and secular, in the home and in the workplace, in the church and in the community.
You can ask students from Adventist schools if they feel they are able to do that. I myself prefer an environment where there are many different ideas shared, thought out, and contested - which the secular university provides.
Question: What goals do you have for ANEW? Where do you see it going in the future?
Answer: We want ANEW to strengthen its network of east coast campus ministries, and to raise up an east coast movement of committed, hardworking young people who desire to see Jesus come soon. God requires us to sacrifice; after all He sacrificed the most for us.
One of the best sacrifices we can make is to give Him our time by using it to grow in Him and do His work.
I'd like to say to the reader: I hope that hearing about ANEW has not just been a blessing to you, but convicting as well. God is calling you to put Him first, and get actively involved wherever you are. He is raising up a generation of young people to finish the work - a movement that will be talked of throughout eternity. You don’t want to miss out. The question is, will you make the decision not later, not tomorrow, not next week, not next year, but now, to serve the Lord?
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Comments
Thank you for the great report about campus ministries on the east coast and the enthusiasm that students have for reaching their friends on today's public college campus. David Parks interview corroborates much of what many of us who have been active in reaching the public university campus have experienced for years. First off, as current trends verify - university students are very open and hungry for spiritual life and direction. Next, that the Adventist church does have a message for todays college students.
I would hasten to clarify, however that ANEW is not the only Adventist campus ministry gathering in the north east for Adventist public campus ministry. Elder Bill Wood, Youth and Young Adult Director for the Atlantic Union has been hosting a campus ministry event for the last eight years called God Encounters that specifically targets Adventist students on public college campuses throughout the north east held at camp Winnekeag every January. These weekends gather around 160 students from as many as 10 different campuses throughout New England annually. Church of the Advent Hope in downtown Manhattan also hosts a yearly campus ministry gathering in April at Columbia University with another 100 college students and young adults from many campuses around the greater New York area.
Mr Parks in his zeal to share the good news of ANEW's accomplishments fails to take into account an even bigger picture of Adventist campus ministry not only on the east coast but around the North American Division with Adventist campus ministry fellowships on over 100 campuses. These campus ministries as well as ANEW and CAMPUS, the program he mentions in Ann Arbor, Michigan are all a part of a greater network of Adventist public campus ministries - Adventist Christian Fellowship (ACF/NAD). For more information about the growing Adventist presence on public college campuses please visit www.acflink.org where Adventist campus ministry groups are encouraged to register their groups and share ideas and ministry strategy for reaching todays university campus.
Ronald Pickell,
ACF/NAD Coordinator
I lived about a 1/4 mile from Mt Aetna Camp during my adolescent years, 12-18. Just hearing about it in this article brought me back to those happiest years of my life. During 7th grade our school was being renovated, and we met for classes in the camp. My Dad was both teacher and camp staff in summer, and remembering those happy times I miss him so much!
Ron,
Thanks for adding the information about groups gathering throughout the US. I was encouraged to see the group of graduate students at the Adventist Society for Religious Studies meeting in Boston in November that you helped to facilitate with Julius Nam.
And thanks for this interview, Alita. Mr. Park's enthusiasm is engaging.
Campus ministry indeed holds great potential to advance the spreading of the Everlasting Gospel in this generation, fulfilling Jesus’ charge in Matthew 28:18-19, “Go ye therefore, and teach all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost: Teaching them to observe all things whatsoever I have commanded you…” The Adventist message is what students at secular universities need to be ready for Jesus’ soon coming.
What ANEW wants to do is simply to provide tangible support for Adventist students on secular campuses to minister to their friends. At the retreat, this support includes training and workshops for the students to be able to present and defend Biblical truths. The focus is the individual, that when the love of Christ takes over a student, there is no limit to what God can do through that person on his/her campus. As students in the east coast who comprise the leadership of ANEW, we saw this need because many have never heard of any campus ministry networks, but have carried a burden in their hearts to do something for God. The majority of campuses that are represented in this year’s ANEW retreat did not have campus ministries, so ANEW wants to empower people to start doing ministries through Biblically grounded training, equipping students in a very real way to be missionaries wherever they are.
The need for God’s people to move on secular campuses is great. As the programs mentioned by Mr. Pickell are done in the Atlantic Union regions, students may have limited access geographically to attend those meetings, since a large proportion of campuses represented at ANEW are located in the Columbia Union region where similar arrangements have not been done. But when it comes to numbers, what we have so far is but a fraction in the statistics of secular colleges and universities. The city of Boston alone and its neighboring towns host more than 100 campuses! Not to mention the entire United States of America. While grateful for what God has done, we cannot be satisfied by our current standing. (Thanks to Mr. Pickell for pointing out the larger network of campus ministries. As of the date of this interview, ANEW was not aware of the ACF directory. We now look forward to network with other regions as well.)
ANEW’s vision for networking is to create an on-going support system where students on different campuses can pray and encourage each other to spread the Gospel mission and vision. Many students who are by themselves on their campuses need spiritual backings, which call for more than a list of student groups. My personal example at Princeton University illustrates this point. I found out that Princeton’s Seventh-day Adventist Fellowship is listed on the ACF directory on Friday, November 28, 2008, but the ministry has been non-existent for years because the previous leadership graduated and left. Faced with a real problem like this, what Adventist students need is a tangible support to empower them to take action, which ANEW aims to provide.
The plain message of Adventist campus ministry especially in the United States is that not enough has been done. And if we want to see Jesus comes in our generation, we need radical commitments to spread the Adventist message, the message of this time, in the concrete jungles of America, namely secular college and university campuses.
Josephine Elia
ANEW VP for Networking and Resources
How can a faculty member working at a secular institution be included in this kind of networking?
"I myself prefer an environment where there are many different ideas shared, thought out, and contested - which the secular university provides."
This is my personal opinion, also. What better place to be confronted with new ideas and varieties of teachers and students. For students who wish to make friends and acquaintances apart from the former SDA school and church environment, "going away to an SDA college" is not completely "cutting the cord" and limits the introduction to a completely new and invigorating academic atmosphere. If more college bound students felt this way it would mean a much larger area in which to witness, in addition to likely being less expensive. If I had college bound children today, this would certainly be my preference.
Is this organization in any way associated with GYC which, I believe, had its inception on the Ann Arbor campus?
MMR,
Faculty members interested in campus ministries are an INVALUABLE resource.
Student-run campus ministries are cropping up all over the world. (You can find most on the ACF directory, through contacting local churches, or on the student groups page for your university.) Most universities require these groups to have a faculty advisor. Even if this is not the case, faculty members can play a crucial role in encouraging Adventist students and witnessing to their colleagues (evangelism to faculty is an area of campus ministry that has not received adequate attention). You can host dinners or Bible studies for the students at your home as well; as college students, it's a luxury to take a break from dorm life.
The dynamics of each campus are different, so above all commit your role in campus ministries to sincere prayer.
Your openness and willingness is an encouragement to me!
Missionary means a person with a mission. What is the student's mission. Is it some distant land and its people?
There is a little children's song that goes" Brighten the corner where you are!
The training ground for world-wide mission is home, neighborhood, city, county, country--maybe a nursing home or a prison. One of my first mission fields was at the Moody Bible Institute in Chicago. Frankly, armed with the Third Angels Messages, I was a great failure.
It took 40 more years for me to be adequately prepared for mssions. Thanks God for the inter-net or I would have missed a great opportunity.
I rejoice, at student missionary efforts. I wish them success, but I also urge proper preparation--and a secure knowledge of the Love of God and the Passion Play it created.
Tom
Thats right Tom.
The biblical model Christ gave shows the order.
Acts 1:8 you will receive power when the Holy Spirit comes on you; and you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem, and in all Judea and Samaria, and to the ends of the earth.
To "Your Friend"
No. We are not affiliated with GYC. We are focused on the area of Biblically-based secular campus ministries. For more information please visit www.anew-web.org.
To Tom Zwerner,
Yes, proper preparation is important. This is why we have year-long training programs like CAMPUS to equip us, whose very philosophy is that we don't need to go to some far away land to be a missionary, but we need to start first in our schools and homes, like the Bible says.
Thanks David--Very good approach.
Always a story:
My church, Reid Memorial Presbyterian Church of Augusta, GA always has a summer project to send senior youth to Central or South American to "build" churches. The church membership represents the power elite of Augusta.
The young people always come around asking for sponsors. I always turn them down. They seem very puzzled because, I a usually a very soft touch. They either asK why, or the puzzle on the face does it for them. I believe, I owe them an explanation. So, I simply ask. What is so important about three weeks in Ecuador? That isn't just as important in Augusta? Now if the senior youth has spend 10 months, repairing the fences and proches of widows of Augusta, or cleaning up the yard, or painting the clapboards, I would be a lot more interested in you helping put the roof on a church in Ecuador!
If you see and need here and lend a hand, I'll be first in line to see you get to Ecuador! They just shrug about a craze
old man and go look for another softy. They all seem to get to Ecuador and return with great stories and pictures of sweat, and mud, and bugs, and smiling "natives". Tom
I hope ANEW, CAMPUS and ACF will view each other as cooperative ministry partners, not competing organizations. May collaboration make each more effective. Here's a video on ACF for those not familiar with their work -- http://www.facebook.com/home.php#/video/video.php?v=101057000507 .
MORE ONLINE INFO:
ACF -- http://acflink.org/
ANEW -- http://www.anew-web.org/
CAMPUS -- http://www.campushope.com/
The Word on Campus (book + dvd) -- http://www.adventsource.org/book.aspx?ID=35683
Peace,
Jeff
This conversation is also missing:
AMiCUS -- http://education.gc.adventist.org/amicus/
DIALOGUE -- http://dialogue.adventist.org/index.htm
From your experience, is the org or publication helpful?
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