Fall in Valley Forge

2013 Cru Stint/Intern Conference Attendees

  As one of my teammates said, it was, "awesome ministry collaboration with awesome colleagues!"

I have been incredibly privileged to be a part of the Cru Campus Ministry's Stint/Intern Coordinator team for the last several years.  Each fall, we meet in Valley Forge, Pennsylvania, to discuss strategy, recruiting, policies, and all sorts of leadership development pieces related to our Cru intern program.

Jim Rhodes, the leader of our team, calls me at "at-large" member of the Campus Ministry, and my role on our team is partly to speak as a representative of the non-Campus ministries within Cru.  I love this team, and I continue to be grateful to get to be a part of moving our intern program forward, specifically in Cru Inner City.

This year, Jim hired a babysitter so that Bart could join me at the conference!  As you can see from the photo above, two babies joined in the fun this year...what a great example of valuing moms in our ministry!

Intern Explosion--again!

Last year, I put up pictures of our new HLIC interns and titled it "Intern Explosion".  Here I am again, overjoyed at the fact that the Lord has raised up 13 interns who are assigned to 5 different Cru Inner City city teams....Milwaukee, Minneapolis/St. Paul, Chicago, Los Angeles, and Seattle.  Pictured with me above are all of our interns for next year (7 new and 6 returners) and our 3 intern coaches as well as Janet and Debby, the ladies I get to work with on administration of our intern program.  It was such fun to get to spend this last weekend with them at their kickoff weekend, as they were trained and sent out.  They will report to their respective cities, Lord willing, in September.  Thank you, Father, for raising up these laborers for your harvest in the city!

Interns to Staff

This summer, a lot of our HLIC staff are out here in Colorado taking classes; one of those includes Bethany, a former intern who is now on staff in Chicago.  Here I am in 2009 with that year's HLIC intern class:

What a joy it was tonight to join Bethany for her birthday dinner and realize that now, with Sam and Teresa joining staff this summer, that brings to 75% the number of interns from that year who have joined full-time with our ministry.  Praise God for raising up laborers for the harvest!  I have loved my years working with our interns, and as I think about turning the reigns over to someone else, it's great to be able to see these woman making longer-term commitments to full-time ministry.  When the above picture was taken, none of them had yet begun their internships.  Now, 3 of them are on staff and the other (Lauren) is teaching in the inner city.  And besides the statistics, the reality is that God has moved, growing, maturing, and changing these precious ladies into women who more readily reflect His image.  He has used them to disciple kids, empower ministry partners, and share Christ with women in prison.  He gets the glory, and we praise Him!

And here they are today.  Sam will be serving full-time with the Campus Ministry in Maryland; Bethany is on staff in Chicago; Teresa will be reporting to Jacksonville, where she will work in the prisons with the HLIC team there.  (p.s.  Our family hasn't seen Teresa--who lived with us during her intern year-for almost a year, so we are loving being out here together with her this summer!  We miss her so much!)