It's my responsibility to think about the big picture of GFM and our mission within InterVarsity’s purpose on campus. With the GFM Leadership Team, I am seeking to lead in hopeful vision, dependent prayer, strategic planning, faithful execution, and attention to our thriving as staff. But I am always mindful of each of you who carries out the ministry: going to campus for a student appointment or setting up a chapter event or coaching a student leader or praying with an administrator or enlisting a volunteer or asking a ministry partner for support or praying for the campus with an undergrad colleague or writing a blog post.
I have in mind, for examples of late, the:
- conference in N. Dakota where faculty learned to give Passion Talks about their faith and their fields;
- Veritas Forum at U Tennessee-Knoxville this week on “Hope and Resilience in a Nation Marked by Slavery’
- TELOS retreat for NY/NJ at Princeton that offered healing and refreshment to grad students facing anxiety and pressure
- simple conversation that affirmed the good work of a community college professor who joined the GFM West leadership team for dinner last night here in L.A.
Thank you for being faithful witnesses and hard-working leaders in such ways.
I am eager for our upcoming Mundelein meetings when most of us will gather for encouragement and equipping. We’ll have a chance to absorb together the spirit and content of the new GFM Strategic Plan for 2018-2022 that focuses our priorities in keeping with InterVarsity’s 2030 Calling. Here is a succinct reminder of the five major goals for GFM:
- To accelerate planting of new witnessing communities for grad students and faculty
- To mobilize more partners, staff and volunteers, to join us in the mission
- To strengthen partnership with our undergrad colleagues and with Faculty Ministry
- To develop staff as flourishing leaders on flourishing, inclusive teams
- To fully resource staff financially
At Mundelein, we will work on aspects of goals 4 and 5 above, which pertain to our thriving as GFM staff within a healthy GFM organization; we’ll focus on growing in dependence on God in prayer and cultivation of ministry partners. The spiritual rubric will be partnership. Several InterVarsity leaders from outside GFM will partner together to teach and encourage us: Jason Jensen (VP for Spiritual Foundations), Shannon Marion (VP for Development), Connie Anderson (Director of Prayer Ministry), and Sophia Gaboury (Assoc. RD for undergrad NY/NJ). Each is an exemplary colleague with wisdom to share.
Let’s pray for open hearts to learn and to bless one another at Mundelein.
PS: Grants available to Campus Staff
Campus Staff: Please take a look at the opportunity to pilot Public Reading of Scripture, a fresh mode of scripture engagement that your fellowship might find valuable. We have up to 15 spots, with incentive grants, available for this 2019 program. This program fits within our spiritual formation core commitment.
