Hello everyone,
I am the new outreach coordinator for RCA, the RPI chapter of IV. My name is Brett Mace, some of you know me, and some of you may not. I attended Baseleia this year with the intentions of encountering Jesus. (for those who weren't there, it was one of the tracks offered.) We were reading through mark in a new type of way that was very comforting to me and opened my eyes to many of the different things that Jesus did while on earth. It was amazing to see him in his journey through the land and how he commanded his people and how they didn't listen which brought him great strife along the way. Then two days before the week ended, the exec team came to me asking if I could take over Lauren Turrell's position as Outreach Coordinator because she had to step down due to personal issues. I looked at this as a wonderful opportunity because I have had some thoughts as to what I could do to better serve RPI and Sage through outreach. I prayed about it and was led to take the position. So, now for my thoughts on what outreach will look like for the fall semester of 2007.
I would like to implement many different ways to reach out to the students of RPI through ways in which they would want to build relationships. In my life, what has brought me closer to God and to know Him were the relationships that I had with older more mature members of my home church. As i was able to look at them and see what they did on a daily basis and how they showed God's love to everyone, I saw what God really was like and how gracious and wonderful He is. I would like to set up a few events that would repeat through the semester that would be exciting for the students of RPI to attend, such as LAN parties, sports days, and sewing and knitting (for the girls, unless the guys want to attend also.) This will give opportunities for you to invite your friends to what they would like, and then we could have some wholesome talk about life, God, and school. Through these events, relationships will build and people will see what the glory of God is through our actions and our speech.
If you have any other ideas as to what we could do as a chapter to reach our university, please let me know, my email address is maceb@rpi.edu. Any helpful thoughts or suggestions will not be overlooked. Also, if you'd like to head up and of the ideas put forth already, please contact me.
I cant wait for the semester so that I can better serve you and our chapter.
In Him,
Brett Mace
Outreach Coordinator
Thursday, May 31, 2007
Jon here.
It was requested that I post a paragraph to this online message board- "blog" - by midnight, May 31st, with specific instructions to "express my thoughts". It may surprise you to learn that I am not always the talkative and outgoing type, and thus publicly detailing the inner workings of my mind causes no small amount of trepidation of my part. Just so you know.
Anyways, I'm the prayer coordinator. It was mentioned that daily prayer is perceived as being boring. Those who regularly attend daily prayer say it is well worth the one or two or six hours a week that they spend in prayer and fellowship with others there for the same purpose, but that is no surprise, since they wouldn't be regular attendees if they thought it was boring. However, I understand completely how it could be viewed as boring, or a waste of time. I felt much the same way in the past, and viewed the only acceptable corporate prayer as that which took place around the dinner table and lasted no longer than fifteen seconds. However, it was only once I experienced the power of prayer (and consequently, God) working in my life and that of other people, that I realized that maybe praying with other people was a good idea. The first suggestion for changing the reputation of daily prayer was to have people tell other people about what God has done for them. As one of my friends put it: "I assume God is working enough on our campus that we can find someone once a month whose life has been impacted by prayer." I believe he is right. Has God done something with your life? Tell us.
More ideas to follow on what will be done with daily prayer itself. As always, I welcome your ideas.
-jon
P.S. I pray for you all.
It was requested that I post a paragraph to this online message board- "blog" - by midnight, May 31st, with specific instructions to "express my thoughts". It may surprise you to learn that I am not always the talkative and outgoing type, and thus publicly detailing the inner workings of my mind causes no small amount of trepidation of my part. Just so you know.
Anyways, I'm the prayer coordinator. It was mentioned that daily prayer is perceived as being boring. Those who regularly attend daily prayer say it is well worth the one or two or six hours a week that they spend in prayer and fellowship with others there for the same purpose, but that is no surprise, since they wouldn't be regular attendees if they thought it was boring. However, I understand completely how it could be viewed as boring, or a waste of time. I felt much the same way in the past, and viewed the only acceptable corporate prayer as that which took place around the dinner table and lasted no longer than fifteen seconds. However, it was only once I experienced the power of prayer (and consequently, God) working in my life and that of other people, that I realized that maybe praying with other people was a good idea. The first suggestion for changing the reputation of daily prayer was to have people tell other people about what God has done for them. As one of my friends put it: "I assume God is working enough on our campus that we can find someone once a month whose life has been impacted by prayer." I believe he is right. Has God done something with your life? Tell us.
More ideas to follow on what will be done with daily prayer itself. As always, I welcome your ideas.
-jon
P.S. I pray for you all.
Wednesday, May 23, 2007
Eric's Thoughts
Hello all! This is a new concept for me, I've never done this 'Blog' thing before. But, I decided it would be a cool thing to start. So, first I'll give a summary of my experience at Basileia and then some thoughts about RCA , specifically for Small Groups in the fall.
Basileia....was cool. like, really cool. Now, for those of you who don't know or are too lazy to read Corey's post below, Basileia is a 5 day retreat during which everyone spends every minute with God. Naturally we're supposed to be doing this every day of our lives, but usually we suck and don't. God really convicted me of this and I set a goal this summer to have an hour long quiet time with God each morning (reading/prayer/meditation) and then be able to think about what I learned throughout the rest of the day. So far I've only have done half an hour due to my living arrangements (I'm sleeping on the floor at my friend's place because I can't move into my apartment until next weekend). But God is definetely on my mind more now, which is really cool. 2 Timothy 1:8 was also a big verse for me at Basileia. No compromise, don't be ashamed of the Gospel. This has gone well so far. My birthday was during Basileia (turned 20, woohoo!), and it turned out to be a very humbling experience, which was good. I'll let the pictures on facebook explain why it was humbling....
Anyway, so Small Groups. They're cool. You should join one. Now. We have one going on during the summer, so if you're around let me know. As I hope you've read in Corey's post, we have a new outreach-focused large group vision. We want to engage our campus in more ways and encourage spiritual discussions (Dennis will explain more about that later). Now, in order to do so, we ourselves should be used to spiritual discussions, and we should know what we believe. That's the role of Small Groups. They're a place where any question can be raised and any topic discussed. The members are like family and truly care about each other.
Some small groups dig really deep into a particular topic or book of the Bible, while others cover broader terms of what our faith is about and what it means to be a Christian. Each has its own purpose and both are awesome. If you've taken SGLAP or have led a SG before and are interested in doing so again, email me at shaffe@rpi.edu. If you're new and are interested in co-leading let me know, too. We can always use more small group leaders!
Peace,
Basileia....was cool. like, really cool. Now, for those of you who don't know or are too lazy to read Corey's post below, Basileia is a 5 day retreat during which everyone spends every minute with God. Naturally we're supposed to be doing this every day of our lives, but usually we suck and don't. God really convicted me of this and I set a goal this summer to have an hour long quiet time with God each morning (reading/prayer/meditation) and then be able to think about what I learned throughout the rest of the day. So far I've only have done half an hour due to my living arrangements (I'm sleeping on the floor at my friend's place because I can't move into my apartment until next weekend). But God is definetely on my mind more now, which is really cool. 2 Timothy 1:8 was also a big verse for me at Basileia. No compromise, don't be ashamed of the Gospel. This has gone well so far. My birthday was during Basileia (turned 20, woohoo!), and it turned out to be a very humbling experience, which was good. I'll let the pictures on facebook explain why it was humbling....
Anyway, so Small Groups. They're cool. You should join one. Now. We have one going on during the summer, so if you're around let me know. As I hope you've read in Corey's post, we have a new outreach-focused large group vision. We want to engage our campus in more ways and encourage spiritual discussions (Dennis will explain more about that later). Now, in order to do so, we ourselves should be used to spiritual discussions, and we should know what we believe. That's the role of Small Groups. They're a place where any question can be raised and any topic discussed. The members are like family and truly care about each other.
Some small groups dig really deep into a particular topic or book of the Bible, while others cover broader terms of what our faith is about and what it means to be a Christian. Each has its own purpose and both are awesome. If you've taken SGLAP or have led a SG before and are interested in doing so again, email me at shaffe@rpi.edu. If you're new and are interested in co-leading let me know, too. We can always use more small group leaders!
Peace,
Monday, May 21, 2007
Basileia and the New Face of RCA (InterVarsity)
Basileia.
So much to say about Basileia! Basically it was just awesome and there's no great way to communicate how great it was so I'll do my best.
What it was: an InterVarsity retreat for the NY/NJ region. There were 270 people there representing about 15-20 different schools. There were several tracks in which you could chose from and of which your week was focused around: Engaging God's World, Encountering Jesus, Transforming Prayer, Small Group Leaders, and Servant Leaders.
Since the exec team members are the only ones to participate in the Servant Leader's Track, I would like to let you know what exactly goes on. This is biggest planning time for Exec so that we can plan everything that happens for the coming semester. Everything from Small Groups to Prayer, to Large Group and Outreach. So we sat down and prayed for a long time about what was missing from our chapter and what was the purpose/vision of each of those areas listed above. And we decided that we were not focused on reaching out to the community half as much, no, a tenth as much as we should be. So we decided that a bunch of things needed to be changed in order to see that happen. [i will let each of the respective exec members tell you exactly what these details will entail relating to their positions]
Oh and we got to do so many fun things!: high ropes course, parasailing, wake boarding, hot tub, large viking canoe, sports of all kinds, pool and foosball, surprise birthday fun, eat, worship, talk to other chapters, learn things we never knew, etc.!
The New Face.
So first off, Exec officially has a new member! Who is it you say? Well, drum roll please . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Brett Mace! Brett will be taking over as Outreach Coordinator for the semester since the previous one had to step down. So please let Brett know all about your Outreach ideas for the semester so we can begin really fulfill our theme for the semester.
And what is that theme?? Well, the theme for this coming semester is going to be: Expand Your Bubble.
I think that all too often we live in our own separate worlds and are afraid to reach out into our community and make an impact. We are too worried about ourselves and our own needs that we ignore the needs of people around us. So we all need to learn how to Expand Our Bubbles and be a little more community minded. Prepare yourselves over the summer for an RCA/InterVarsity that will make you rethink what your purpose is on this campus and in this chapter. Keep an open heart. Trust.
~ President - CD
So much to say about Basileia! Basically it was just awesome and there's no great way to communicate how great it was so I'll do my best.
What it was: an InterVarsity retreat for the NY/NJ region. There were 270 people there representing about 15-20 different schools. There were several tracks in which you could chose from and of which your week was focused around: Engaging God's World, Encountering Jesus, Transforming Prayer, Small Group Leaders, and Servant Leaders.
Since the exec team members are the only ones to participate in the Servant Leader's Track, I would like to let you know what exactly goes on. This is biggest planning time for Exec so that we can plan everything that happens for the coming semester. Everything from Small Groups to Prayer, to Large Group and Outreach. So we sat down and prayed for a long time about what was missing from our chapter and what was the purpose/vision of each of those areas listed above. And we decided that we were not focused on reaching out to the community half as much, no, a tenth as much as we should be. So we decided that a bunch of things needed to be changed in order to see that happen. [i will let each of the respective exec members tell you exactly what these details will entail relating to their positions]
Oh and we got to do so many fun things!: high ropes course, parasailing, wake boarding, hot tub, large viking canoe, sports of all kinds, pool and foosball, surprise birthday fun, eat, worship, talk to other chapters, learn things we never knew, etc.!
The New Face.
So first off, Exec officially has a new member! Who is it you say? Well, drum roll please . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Brett Mace! Brett will be taking over as Outreach Coordinator for the semester since the previous one had to step down. So please let Brett know all about your Outreach ideas for the semester so we can begin really fulfill our theme for the semester.
And what is that theme?? Well, the theme for this coming semester is going to be: Expand Your Bubble.
I think that all too often we live in our own separate worlds and are afraid to reach out into our community and make an impact. We are too worried about ourselves and our own needs that we ignore the needs of people around us. So we all need to learn how to Expand Our Bubbles and be a little more community minded. Prepare yourselves over the summer for an RCA/InterVarsity that will make you rethink what your purpose is on this campus and in this chapter. Keep an open heart. Trust.
~ President - CD
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