The Next Cycle

It's the first day of October and Fall Retreat starts tomorrow, which means we're at a transition point in the semester. The first 4-6 weeks are all about gathering contacts, meeting new people, sharing the Gospel, and advertising for Cru far and wide on our campuses. For the staff, it's been all about launching and attempting to launch new ministries. Praise God, we've been able to have some point of contact on 14 Pittsburgh area campuses and been able to give out over 7,000 Cru cards!

There's a thing we talk about in Crusade called "Cycles of Momentum" - just a way of looking at the campus ministry year. It's far from biblical truth or anything, but it's a helpful tool in planning when to do what on campus. I think it can help you as student-leaders, or just involved students, too. You can check out an article on the subject here, and I'm going to take a few minutes to describe it briefly and point out what's next, so to speak, for our semester.

If you've been involved in Cru for long enough, you know by heart the adage "Win, Build, Send", or at least you should. In fact, if you don't - why not? It's three words! It's a brief and memorable way to summarize our mission and vision - we want to win students to Christ, build them in their faith, and send them to reach the world. Very Great Commission focused and biblically rooted. You can view the cycles of momentum in the campus ministry year in these broad terms too.

Phase one of the semester - roughly the first 6 weeks - are a sort of "Win" phase. We're focused on interacting with as many students as we can, sharing the Gospel with as many as will hear, following up new contacts and generally focusing on reaching out. The next month or so - October, where we're entering now - is a "Build" phase. Our focus shifts to consolidating these newly involved people and any new believers, helping them plug in by getting more involved in Cru, leading in some way, getting into a small group or discipleship setting. This begins with Fall Retreat, as it's a tremendous way to help new people, especially freshmen, get plugged in. Then the rest of the semester is a "Send" phase, particularly focusing on sending to Radiate. There people can learn about summer project opportunities, grow deeper in their walk with God, and learn more how they can get involved and minister to others on campus. And that builds momentum moving into the spring semester, which opens with another "Win" phase.

This isn't to say we never do evangelism in a Build or Send phase - in actuality October and November are great times to do a larger, more focused outreach, such as the David Williams event coming up on October 14. Part of building is helping someone learn how to share his faith, encouraging them to take a step of faith to invite a friend to an outreach-type event or Cru. Or that we never seek to be building or sending during a win phase, or vice versa. You get the picture. It's just that the general focus of our ministry is on one of those things in a stronger way than on the others.

So, in thinking about these things, I have a few questions for you to consider as you think and pray through and plan the next month of your ministry.

• What new people have we connected with, and how can we best help them get more plugged in?
• What are the things already established that are natural "building" events or activities?
• What is an outreach we can plan for the next month? How can we encourage some of the younger students to be involved in it?
• What are the greatest ministry training needs the people involved in Cru have? How can we meet those needs?
• What are some ways to help build community among the people involved?
• How can we keep the ministry, or give the ministry, outward focus, on evangelism and reaching the campus?

I encourage you as leaders on your campus together to process and pray about these things, and let them help you make some plans for the next month or so. I hope it helps! We're praying for you.

-Jason

Where we're going...

Welcome to the brand spanking new staff blog!  We hope that this will be a quick and easy way to communicate information and vision about Cru in the Pittsburgh Metro Area.

I want to take a minute to share our basic vision and leadership structure with you.  This specifically applies to Pitt students.  Other students, you're off the hook from reading this.  Enjoy the rest of your day!

First off, a huge thanks to all of you who participated in the planning meeting at the end of the Spring semester.  We were hoping that meeting would set up the events of the first 2 weeks of the Fall, and we have some great stuff on the calendar.  I think the start of this year will be quite significant in reaching students for Christ and seeing Cru continue to grow.  There seemed to be some confusion about that meeting - I think it had the impression of a general planning meeting for the whole year, when we intended it to be a time to map out the first 2 weeks.  I'm really sorry for any frustration that arose for that - we didn't mean to blow off suggestions for the ministry as a whole.  We as staff and as a servant team desperately want your input and help in leading!  Cru is a student-led ministry and we need you, the students, to step in and offer leadership.  We want to provide every opportunity we can in helping you do that.

That being said, I want to outline our general leadership structure for Pitt Cru. This was put in place as a way to expand leadership beyond servant team and give as many people as possible the opportunity to lead.  Right now, we have 3 leadership teams that will do the planning and execution of all the events in Cru.  These are the Win, Build, and Send teams.  As we grow, we'll likely expand to more teams that each have more of a specific focus.

WIN TEAM

The Win team covers evangelism and campus outreach, as well as community and social events.  Any events or plans related to those areas - survey times, everypittstudent.com stuff, evangelism training, weekend socials, after Cru events, etc. - are led by the Win Team.  There is constantly something they're planning, and it's a great team to be on if you're motivated by big tasks and compassion for people.  We decided to put community and social stuff on that team because the most effective way to reach people for Christ is through relationships and community.  The Win team is led by Alyssa and Rachele.

BUILD TEAM

The Build team covers the weekly meeting (Cru) and anything related to discipleship and growth (Bible studies, discipleship, mens/womens times).  There are LOTS of places to get involved and lead on this team - they've got a lot to cover.  If you've got a heart to see people grow and make steps in their faith, this is a good team to join.  The Build team is led by Heather and Tim.

SEND TEAM

The Send team covers prayer and "sending" - conferences and retreats, summer projects, equipping and motivating graduating seniors to minister for a lifetime.  They handle conference recruiting and registration, rides, finances - all the behind the scenes stuff that gets people to RADIATE or Big Break, etc.  If you love details and spreadsheets, this is where you want to be.  They also have the huge responsibility of mobilizing prayer for the movement.  We consider prayer part of "sending" because it's through prayer that we're sent forward as a laborer for Christ.  The Send team is led by Julia and Rob.

The team leaders make up the Servant Team, whose responsibility it is to maintain the direction and vision of who we are and where we're going as a movement, to look ahead to what will be happening in the months and semesters ahead, maintain communication between the 3 teams and map out the semester calendar, and provide a mature spiritual example for people to follow.  

So...we would LOVE for anyone who wants to help lead to join one (or more if you'd so desire) of these 3 leadership teams.  These are the places where you can make your suggestions, ideas, and heart known and help make Cru an effective and growing ministry that is making a deep impact on the campus for Christ.  Talk to the team leaders to get involved more, and please help lead!!

--Jason