Winter Retreat
Every year, one of our biggest events is Winter Retreat. All of our campuses get together for four days to worship together, learn about God, and love one another well. As it gets bigger and bigger and the students who come are from all different walks of life, we're tasked with being faithful to the charge that God has given us; we are to make and mature disciples of all nations. So we incorporate students from all our campuses into the service, we integrate different musical styles, languages, and traditions, and we seek to make sure that our students are both welcomed and stretched to grow in our community. Because our God is not a God of uniformity but of unity, that all
tribes, nations, and tongues would bow before him laying down our crowns. We nearly maxed out the entire camp this year with over 800 people coming to the weekend. Marty Solomon of the BEMA podcast came and spoke to our students about Genesis, pulling in a lot of his learning of the Jewish tradition, culture, and viewpoint. Pray that the growth and inspiration that our students received from the weekend would be stoked into full fire for the Lord!Spring Semester
While spring semester does not generally have as much going on as the fall, the beginning of each semester is a special season of new beginnings for the students at college campuses. New schedules, new resolutions, new opportunities. This year we started off the semester in ice. The entire city shut down for a week because of the ice. Schools were canceled and many businesses were shut down because of inaccessibility and risk. While many of us were given much-needed rest, we trust that God is working in reaching the people that the week disrupted from being able to encounter an opportunity to join our ministry. We've continued to reach out and make efforts to evangelize, and our numbers continue to be much larger than they were two years ago averaging well over 200 every week regardless of test schedules; but we trust that God will bring those he has called to meet him at UTD, and we'll remain faithful to telling them of the good news. FOCUS Asian Fellowship
One of the major initiatives we've taken this year is to give our FOCUS Asian Fellowship some momentum. It's been a small trickle over the years as I've been working through what needs we want to address at this campus. Between Intervarsity, ACTS, and Epic, Asian Americans have multiple campus ministries dedicated to them at UTD. So, what are we trying to do with FOCUS Asian Fellowship? The strength and the weakness of these other ministries is that they often end up being mono-ethnic. While it's great to be around thos ewho understand you, to have your particular cultural needs and struggles address as the norm, there's not as much reflection and wrestling with how to view ourselves and our culture in the midst of a diverse kingdom of God. How do we live in deep, intimate community with people who are vastly different from each other? What is God calling me to bring to his tapestry of humanity in worship, service, and teaching? So in FOCUS Asian Fellowship, we've been diving deep into a book I read in seminary called Doing Asian American Theology by Dr. Daniel Lee. Hopefully, it levels up our understanding of God and how he sees us and how we are a part of his vision for the earth. It's been so encouraging to see our students engaging in material that even I struggle to understand as a graduate of seminary. They are eager to bless and be blessed by a continual pursuit of God!30 Year Celebration!
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If you’re an alum, please take a moment to complete our contact update form here to ensure you don’t miss any updates. We can’t wait to celebrate with everyone in October. Our big celebration will take place at CityBridge Community Church in Plano.
