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With Campus Cross Walk
Written by: CampUs4 6/18/2011 7:56 AM
The Summer Stretch By Steven Tramel Gaines “We cannot be happy if we expect to live all the time at the highest peak of intensity. Happiness is not a matter of intensity but of balance and order and rhythm and harmony.” (Thomas Merton, No Man Is an Island) The life of campus ministry is one of chaos and calm, and it seems to go in a yearly cycle. The busiest time is usually the beginning of the fall semester. New students arrive on campus. Others return. Welcome activities and outreach efforts happen one after another and sometimes simultaneously. My experiences and observations indicate that most campus ministries that receive a growth spurt in the first part of the academic year tend to plateau after a few weeks and to gradually decrease in number and stamina, beginning in the early or middle part of the spring semester. Maybe the ministry you lead has a different cycle, but I’m sure it has one. While the beginning of the fall semester is typically busy for campus ministries, the summer is often the down time. Campus ministers don’t go on vacation for three months, but our work changes. We usually have a few students who are still around. We might teach some Bible classes at the traditional “church” times. Many of us take students on mission trips, and some of us visit churches to give ministry reports and to build support. Beyond those activities, however, what’s a campus minister to do in the summer months? I titled this article “The Summer Stretch” for two reasons. First, the summer often allows us to sit back and stretch, to reflect and refresh. It’s the sabbath in the campus ministry year. In the summer, more than in the semesters, we can have time for prayer, silence, solitude, meditation, and other contemplative practices through which God nourishes our souls, equips us for leadership, sharpens our discernment, and increases our capacities for ministerial creativity. It’s a time when we can gain helpful knowledge and skills at campus ministry conferences, and we can read those books that have for so long waited patiently on our shelves. Second, the summer is a stretch as a segment of a marathon is a stretch. It’s a time when we can’t just sit back and relax. We need some relaxation, but we also keep working. We gather contact information for new students who are coming to campus in the fall. We plan for various components of the ministry in the coming year. We network and collaborate with university staff and maybe other local campus ministers. We pray diligently for new and returning students, their families, their professors, their friends, and the church that wants to be their “home away from home,” an intergenerational community of Jesus-followers who work and grow together and touch the world in the transforming and healing name of Christ. Contemplation and action combine in the summer stretch. Persevere and be blessed. Steven Gaines, Editor-in-Chief of Campus CrossWalk, is a campus minister in Spartanburg, SC.
“We cannot be happy if we expect to live all the time at the highest peak of intensity. Happiness is not a matter of intensity but of balance and order and rhythm and harmony.” (Thomas Merton, No Man Is an Island)
The life of campus ministry is one of chaos and calm, and it seems to go in a yearly cycle.
The busiest time is usually the beginning of the fall semester. New students arrive on campus. Others return. Welcome activities and outreach efforts happen one after another and sometimes simultaneously.
My experiences and observations indicate that most campus ministries that receive a growth spurt in the first part of the academic year tend to plateau after a few weeks and to gradually decrease in number and stamina, beginning in the early or middle part of the spring semester. Maybe the ministry you lead has a different cycle, but I’m sure it has one.
While the beginning of the fall semester is typically busy for campus ministries, the summer is often the down time. Campus ministers don’t go on vacation for three months, but our work changes. We usually have a few students who are still around. We might teach some Bible classes at the traditional “church” times. Many of us take students on mission trips, and some of us visit churches to give ministry reports and to build support.
Beyond those activities, however, what’s a campus minister to do in the summer months?
I titled this article “The Summer Stretch” for two reasons. First, the summer often allows us to sit back and stretch, to reflect and refresh. It’s the sabbath in the campus ministry year. In the summer, more than in the semesters, we can have time for prayer, silence, solitude, meditation, and other contemplative practices through which God nourishes our souls, equips us for leadership, sharpens our discernment, and increases our capacities for ministerial creativity. It’s a time when we can gain helpful knowledge and skills at campus ministry conferences, and we can read those books that have for so long waited patiently on our shelves.
Second, the summer is a stretch as a segment of a marathon is a stretch. It’s a time when we can’t just sit back and relax. We need some relaxation, but we also keep working. We gather contact information for new students who are coming to campus in the fall. We plan for various components of the ministry in the coming year. We network and collaborate with university staff and maybe other local campus ministers. We pray diligently for new and returning students, their families, their professors, their friends, and the church that wants to be their “home away from home,” an intergenerational community of Jesus-followers who work and grow together and touch the world in the transforming and healing name of Christ.
Contemplation and action combine in the summer stretch. Persevere and be blessed.
Steven Gaines, Editor-in-Chief of Campus CrossWalk, is a campus minister in Spartanburg, SC.
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