The Debate of Cessationism v. Continuationism
By erin conner
Are the miraculous gifts for today? Dr. Michael Brown argues a compelling “yes” in his article entitled “The Reformed of the Lord Say No to Cessationism,” published on October 9 in Christianity Today.
“The cessationist debate is back, although in some ways, it’s never left,” Brown writes, in light of the recently scheduled 2024 Cessationist Conference led, in part, by Pastor John MacArthur. This conference is timed to coincide with the release of the Cessationist movie, “bringing an age-old topic back to the forefront of trending conversations, especially among Reformed believers.”
Student Spotlight: Senior Reflects on Her Faith Journey at Princeton
By erin conner
Cynthia Makachi, a public and international affairs major and a member of the executive team at Christian Union Nova, describes her faith journey at Princeton by saying, “divine intervention is evident in my life." From accepting her offer to Princeton three years ago to sitting beside a stranger three weeks ago, God has shown up in powerful ways during her academic career.
The 2023 CU Rise Campaign
By erin conner
From deeply rigorous Bible courses, intellectually engaging lecture speakers, vibrant worship and prayer events, experienced and Spirit-led faculty, powerful one-on-one discipleship, to leadership training and development, Christian Union's university ministry has much to offer Christian students at the schools where they serve. These ministry programs are deepening the faith of the students involved, but also equipping them to lead others toward life in Christ.
The 2023 CU Rise Campaign is just one example of this.
God is using your prayers to help grow the ministry at CU Lumine and develop future Christian leaders to transform culture for God’s glory!
CU Lumine’s first year campaign is producing great fruit! It was a hot day for the student activity fair, but we invited many first year students to join us. We held a powerful retreat for our freshman welcomers and have started Bible Courses and events, in which we are experiencing the growth and transformative power of God. In fact, we kicked off the term with 60+ students at our first Leadership Lecture Series event.
“For though I am absent in body, yet I am with you in spirit, rejoicing to see your good order and the firmness of your faith in Christ. Therefore, as you received Christ Jesus the Lord, so walk in Him, rooted and built up in Him and established in the faith, just as you were taught, abounding in thanksgiving.” - Colossians 2:5-7
Here at CU Libertas we are abounding in thankfulness for the extraordinary ways God answered your prayers for our freshman campaign! For the last four weeks we have welcomed new faces and shared meals with a plethora of wonderful first year students. Each student shared stories of their journey with Jesus, how he has won over their hearts and changed their lives for the better. Students shared how grateful they were to find a robust Christian community on campus. Through the many fruitful interactions and conversations, we rejoiced in knowing the Lord was answering our many petitions for an overflow of hearts seeking to know Him here at Brown.
I am so excited to give you an update regarding Christian Union Vita! We are praising God for the incredible things He has been doing during the first few weeks of classes here on the campus of Cornell University!
Our Freshman Welcoming Campaign was a tremendous success, with hundreds of meetings between our faculty, current students, and incoming first-years. We enrolled 40 freshmen in our Bible courses–20 men and 20 women! Several of our new first-years are already stepping into leadership roles and contributing greatly to the work of making Jesus the most talked about name on campus. In addition to adding a healthy number of freshmen, we have also added many other students of all years throughout this period, leading us to a total Bible Course enrollment of over 100 students! Many of these transfers and upperclassmen also feel the Lord calling them to step up and take greater responsibility in the work of the Great Commission, giving us even more to celebrate. The Lord is so faithful!
First, I must thank each and every one of you for your prayers during our campaign to welcome the '27s to campus. We truly appreciate it and felt your love continuously. And by the grace of God each student at Dartmouth will feel the effect of them as well through our ministry. Because of us, and because of you, the gospel is going forth! Our CU Vox students, even students new to the ministry, describe our group and space as a “safe haven” from the craziness and frequent Godlessness of college life. It is the rarest of students that can exist as a bold, healthy Christian without a Godly community to encourage and strengthen them. CU Vox is that community at Dartmouth.
“We always thank God, the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, when we pray for you, since we heard of your faith in Christ Jesus and of the love that you have for all the saints, because of the hope laid up for you in heaven.” - Colossians 1: 3-5
We are grateful to have had a good start to the semester for CU Gloria at Harvard. Our student leaders came back from Pre-Retreat inspired and motivated to welcome the new Freshman class of 2027, and that’s exactly what they did. Through pizza parties, hangouts, weekly Church visits, Friday night Doxas and movie nights, our students befriended the new class of freshmen and welcomed them into Christian community.
God is using your prayers to help grow the ministry at CU Nova and develop future Christian leaders. Thank you!
CU Nova held a successful freshmen welcoming campaign and pre-retreat. With the semester now underway, our freshmen men’s Bible Course groups agreed to meet for a fellowship lunch every week and an hour of confession and prayer before BC, as well as commitments to times of fasting. Our women’s Bible Courses are also thriving under Qwynn’s leadership and the student leaders. We have over 40 freshmen enrolled in Bible Course this semester! I’m so blessed to see our students earnestly desire to seek the Lord and grow in their walk with him!
Thank you for your prayers for CU Caritas at Stanford! We are seeing much fruit from our freshman welcoming campaign! In addition to supporting our student leaders in distributing over 500 welcome bags to freshmen, Susan, our women’s ministry fellow, and I have been holding many one-on-one meetings with students to get to know them, to pray for them, and to invite them to join Bible Courses and ministry events.
Greetings from CU Martus! I pray this finds you well.
We are well into the fall semester, and there are two main updates: 1) we now have a Women’s Ministry Fellow, and 2) current update on the Freshman Welcoming Campaign.
I am very pleased to welcome Maima Badio to our team at CU Martus. Maima was born in Liberia, West Africa. Her experience living as a refugee in Ghana, before immigrating to the United States, fuels her passion for working with students and families. She earned her BA in Economics and International Affairs at The George Washington University. She later earned her MA in School Psychology from the University of Delaware.
I trust this email finds you well and filled with the joy of the Lord. As we step into the vibrant colors of October, thank you for your unwavering support, which continues to fuel the transformative work of our ministry. Your intercession and collaborative spirit remain the bedrock of our life-changing work, and it is with great excitement that we share some recent milestones along with specific prayer requests for the upcoming month.
By chuck hetzler
The brothers immediately sent Paul and Silas away by night to Berea, and when they arrived they went into the Jewish synagogue. Now these Jews were more noble than those in Thessalonica; they received the word with all eagerness, examining the Scriptures daily to see if these things were so. – Acts 17:10-11
The Bible says that the Bereans were “more noble” than the Thessalonians because they were eager to hear what Paul and Silas had to say. They did not quickly take offense to the concept of a suffering Savior, crucified as a criminal, and raised from death to life as the victorious Son of God. They did not consider it inconceivable that God could fulfill thousands of years of prophecies in this God-Man, Jesus of Nazareth. Some people today can be quickly triggered when hearing unfamiliar messages, but such a reaction is ignoble and immature. We should be able to hear different views and then patiently weigh and test them through the Scriptures, just as the Bereans did.
Christian Union America's Mentoring Program Launches Alumni Well
By christine foster
Two are better than one, because they have a good return for their labor: If either of them falls down, one can help the other up. But pity anyone who falls and has no one to help them up. - Ecclesiastes 4:9-10
For many Christians, the most challenging phase of life begins the moment they graduate from college. Robust discipleship, through which many students grew strong in college, suddenly disappears. The members of their Bible Course group scatter across the country and around the world. Young graduates suddenly find themselves in a new city, with a demanding job, and no home church. Christian Union’s Alumni Mentoring Program aims to smooth this time, by equipping these graduates with some support. The intention is to see these new alumni continue to network with other faithful people and grow into the full Christian leaders God intends for them to be.
A Devotional
By qwynn gross
If you abide in Me, and My words abide in you, you will ask what you desire, and it shall be done for you. - John 15:7, NKJV
The Word of God is the bedrock, basis, and fabric of Christianity; spoken in the beginning and framing the world in which creation lives, the Word is the manna from heaven that became flesh and dwelled amongst man, written on tablets of stone and transferred to man’s heart so that all would be warned and find great reward, the Word was given to one, Adam, and defied by two, Adam and Eve; a covenant to be kept by a nation astray in heart but upheld by the Savior who would be faithful and true. Established as the one thing that will never pass away, neither return to God void, the Word of God is the Truth that endures forever, and that must abide in every believer, as imitators of Christ, that prayers may be answered, faith can be seen, and fruit is produced.
FCA v San Jose Unified School District
By erin conner
In an article on the FIRE (The Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression) website, Robert Shibley reports that in 2019, at a high school in California, Fellowship of Christian Athletes' (FCA) recognition as a student group was revoked for requiring that student leaders comply with their statements of belief. These statements align with the basic tenets of Christian theology.
On September 13, 2023, belief-based student groups won an important victory in the lawsuit that followed, Fellowship of Christian Athletes v. San Jose Unified School District, which restored the ability of many such groups to meet on public campuses and schools in the many western states covered by the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit.
Christian Union New York
By erin conner
Many people know Christian Union as a student leadership ministry serving at some of our nation’s most influential educational institutions. However, Christian Union also serves Christian professionals in one of our nation’s most influential cities: New York.
CU New York is working to bring revival to America, by developing, connecting, healing, empowering, and equipping bold Christian leaders in the city.
Christian Union Bible Courses Challenge Students
By erin conner
Intellectual engagement, one of the six core values of Christian Union, embraces God’s command for us to love God with all our mind. (Mark 12:30) As a result of the desire to intellectually engage university students to build faithful leaders, Christian Union offers rigorous Bible Courses.
Students involved in Christian Union ministries in the fall semester of 2023 have an opportunity to join a 10-lesson study on the Apostle Paul’s letter to the Colossians, which is often referred to as a “prison letter,” as Paul wrote it while “in chains.” (Colossians 4:3, 10, 18.)
Ministry Snapshot: Christian Union Vita at Cornell University
By erin conner
“Let us not love with words or tongue, but with actions and in truth.” - 1 John 3:10
In February of 2023, Marcus Buckley and his wife, Lea Ann, packed up their life in Florida as church leaders to move to Ithaca, New York to answer God’s call to serve Cornell students.
This call did not come without sacrifice.
