Last month, Robin and I attended Epicenter, the winter conference for Cru staff and students from the Northeast region. Nikki (not her real name), a student at Sarah Lawrence College in the NYC area, also attended and recently trusted Jesus Christ as her Lord and Savior. After attending the seminars and main sessions, Nikki said, “I never knew that you could have a personal relationship with Jesus. That part is never discussed in [my church]. I am learning so much now that I found this out.”
Nikki got excited when she heard about a devotional for young artists that one of our Cru staff compiled with NYC art students. Each story is written about the universal experience of creating and connecting with the Creator. Now that Nikki is discovering more about what it means to follow Christ, her world is opening up and she wants to submit a story of her own for this devotional. Please pray that Nikki will continue to grow in her faith and for other students like Nikki to know and follow Jesus Christ.
Please pray for the Cru weekly meetings at the Fashion Institute of Technology (FIT) and Parsons School of Design, both in NYC. Pray that the students will stand strong in their faith in the face of opposition from their peers, and that more students would find out about and attend these weekly meetings. The FIT students are studying C.S. Lewis’ Mere Christianity, and the students at Parsons discuss a variety of topics relating to spirituality and the arts. Students from these two schools will one day be influential in the fashion, design, and arts industries.
Over spring break, the NYC Cru Metro team will take a group of students to Haiti to work with Nehemiah Vision Ministries (www.nvm.org), the social outreach arm of Campus Crusade for Christ in Haiti. They will minister to a community near Port au Prince. Please pray for their safety while they travel and minister in Haiti, and pray that God will work in and through them.
New York City is the spring break destination for a group of students from Cru’s MidSouth region (TN, KY, NC, SC, and WV). Over three weeks in March, students will travel to NYC to share the gospel on NYC college campuses. An important benefit of this trip is that it gives the students from the MidSouth region a vision for what it could look like for them to do ministry in NYC. Please pray for this outreach, for the students traveling to NYC, and for the NYC college students that they will talk to.
Robin and I are in Memphis, sharing about the spiritual need in NYC and how our ministry will accelerate the current Cru ministry in NYC. We continue to see God provide the monthly financial support we need to do ministry in NYC, but we still have a ways to go until we are able to move. Please pray that we will keep our eyes on the Lord as we meet with people.
Yours in Christ,
Steve & Robin
