Between classes, school work, and holding down a job, it can seem impossible to carve out time to attend a weekend retreat — especially if you’ve never been on before.

Retreats are an essential part of developing your faith, and a time when you can encounter God in a new and fresh way.

A God-Encounter

Below are just 9 ways God will encounter and change you during a retreat:

1. Reduce Stress

Retreats are a calm time away and can often help you breathe and unwind. They say that time outside in nature is good for your soul and can remedy stress — especially the stress of homework, projects, and exams.

2. Slow Down and Reflect

We’re always so caught up in work, school, and the circumstances around us, and often, we’re going 100mph through the week. Going on a retreat is a special time to get away from the norm and the routine and slow down. It’s a time of reflection and refreshment.

3. Strengthen Your Confidence in Him

You can encounter God no matter where you are, but you truly encounter Him in a personal and special way during a retreat. Here you’ll learn to trust in the Lord in new ways, and ultimately build a foundation of love and confidence and that will help you along your journey for years to come.

4. Enrich and Grow Your Relationships

Similar to the first point, spending quality time with friends and others you may not know as well, will enlighten your world. God loves making use of moments such as these. He brings people together for a stronger support system and a lot of fun memories.

5. Discover More of Who You Were Made to Be

We are usually asking the question of who we’re becoming — what gifts we have, how can we use them, what we should do with our lives. Trips like these are a great opportunities to discover who you are, whether through the time of teaching, time with your peers, or time with God.

6. Discover God’s Love for You

There are a number of ways God can reveal His love to you, and one important way is simply just time spent in prayer and communication with Him. During a retreat, you’ll have the opportunity to get away and spend time communicating with Him and hearing Him tell you just how much He loves you.

7. Answer Tough Questions

There are moments at retreats where you will have opportunities to ask questions that you’ve always wondered about. Whether it’s a general question, or something more personal, these are safe places to ask anything.

8. Grow Your Understanding of the Bible

It can be difficult to find time to read your bible during the week, but during a retreat, you have dedicated time just for it. During the teaching you’ll have a chance to know it more and know God more. A time to take notes, highlight, ask questions, and dive deeper.

9. Find life long friends

God loves bring people together, as we’ve said above. It can always feel new or different meeting people or knowing them deeper. But can work in special ways. And years from now as you look back, it will be so worth it.

Sign Up for Your Encounter

Retreats are just about that — encounters. Encounters with God, encounters with others, and encounter with yourself.

Don’t miss your opportunity to encounter God, grow in your faith, and develop deeper relationships with other students — sign up for an Ignite Retreat today!

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Resolutions are made.
Goals are set.
Gym memberships are purchased.
Life plans are written down.

The promise of a clean slate is a powerful motivator.

But how do you set the right goals? How do you make the right resolutions? What life plans should you pursue in the new year? How do you get ready to tackle a new year and do so in a way that you can stick to your new goals?

Practical Ways to Prepare

Here are 5 practical ways you can be ready for the new year:

Evaluate the Past

Socrates stated that “the unexamined life is not worth living,” and I tend to agree with him.

When we fail to hit pause in our busy lives and evaluate where we’ve been, we’re more likely to repeat our same 0ld behavior patterns. Evaluating your past year is a necessary step to making the next year successful.

[bctt tweet=”When we fail to evaluate our past, we’re more likely to repeat our same old behavior patterns.”]

Take an hour this next week and ask yourself these questions:

• What goals did I accomplish in 2015?
• What led me to achieve those goals?
• What habits should I keep practicing in 2016?
• What goals did I fail to accomplish in 2015?
• Why did I fail to accomplish those goals in 2015?
• What could I have done differently?
• What was my biggest struggle in 2015? Why?
• What habits do I need to break in 2016?

Answering these questions will help you to see the patterns and habits in your life that you need to break in order to be successful in bringing change in 2016.

Answer the Question: Who Do You Want to Be?

The start of any new year often raises the question: what do I want to do this next year — focusing on behavioral changes we want to instill in our lives. Exercising, eating better, rebuilding relationships, finding a new job or choosing a major, getting better grades in school.

Those are great goals, but the desire to make behavioral changes won’t be enough to motivate you to follow through when change gets hard.

A better question to ask yourself is: who do I want to be this next year.

Focusing on the character qualities you want to embody in the new year is a much better way to stay committed when the required changes get difficult.

[bctt tweet=”Focusing on who you want to be in the new year is a better way to stay committed when changes get difficult.”]

Take an hour this week and ask yourself:

• What kind of person do you want to be this next year?
• What character qualities do you need to develop?
• What gifts and talents do you need to develop?
• What weaknesses do you need to work on?
• At the end of 2016, what do you hope other people will say about you?

Set Some Goals

After you’ve written out who you want to be in 2016, now it’s time to set some goals to help you become that person.

This step can be tricky. Set too many or too lofty goals, and you’ll crash and burn before you even begin. Don’t make the goals measurable, and you’ll never know if you are on track to achieve them.

Follow these tips to set realistic and reachable goals:

• Create a few (read: 2 or 3) short-term goals that will give you a quick “win.”
• Stagger goals throughout the year. It’s best to only focus on 2-3 goals at a time. Staggering your goals allows you to focus for a season, and then add new goals as you finish old ones.
• Set a time frame for accomplishing your goals.
• Include small change goals (i.e. – rather than a goal being eat better this year, make a goal to substitute fruit in place of sweets 4 times a week)
• Allow for wiggle room. You don’t know what 2016 will bring in way of major lifestyle change (new job, moving). Give yourself some wiggle room on achieving your goals to accommodate any big changes.
• Build in rewards. Seriously. It will keep you motivated.
• Make your goals measurable. Rather than setting a goal to lose weight, consider including how much weight. It will help you track your progress and make changes as you go.

Define Success

Success looks different for every person, every goal, and every year.

What does success look like for you? Is it achieving all your goals? Being a better person? Finishing with better grades or a new job?

Create that image of a successful 2016 in your head and write it down. It will become a gauge to determine how 2016 is going for you.

Understand, though, that life happens and the unexpected is right around the corner. Three months into 2016, you may experience a big life change that voids out your image of success. If and when that happens, simply take time to redefine success — otherwise, you’ll be holding yourself up to an image you can’t possibly achieve.

Expect the Unexpected

Life is good at throwing us unexpected curveballs.

You may be doing well at accomplishing your goals in 2016 when the unexpected happens. You lose your job. Fail a class. Get transferred. Transfer to a different college. Have a kid. Get sick. Get promoted. Lose a loved one. Choose a new major. Choose a new career. Send a kid off to college.

There is no way to know what the new year will bring, but that doesn’t mean it should catch you off guard.

[bctt tweet=”You won’t know what the new year will bring, but unexpected changes shouldn’t catch you off guard.”]

Follow these tips to expect the unexpected:

• Re-evaluate your goals. Are they still achievable with the new life change?
• Set new goals. You should expect to need some new goals after a curveball.
• Redefine success. Success will likely look different after a major life change. Don’t be afraid to scrap your previous view of success and replace it with a new one.
• Embrace the change — whether it’s good or bad. Wishing that life hadn’t thrown you a curveball isn’t doing to do much good. Take time to grieve, but the sooner you embrace the change, the better equipped you will be to turn it into something good.

Get Ready

Following the steps above will help you not only prepare for the new year, but also give you a clear plan on how to be successful in 2016.

Carve out a few hours over the remaining days in 2015 to go through the exercises outlined above. It will be beneficial to have some kind of notebook or journal to write all your answers done so you can refer back to them as you set goals and define success.

(Image via Susanne Nilsson cc)

The post 5 Practical Ways to be Ready for the New Year appeared first on Ignite Student Ministries.

We design each retreat with one main goal: for students to have a genuine encounter with God. Retreats are powerful and a necessary practice for building your faith, growing closer to God and to other Christians. We believe in the power of retreats so much that we put a lot of time, energy, and resources into our retreats.

But why are retreats so important and, better yet, why should you attend a retreat? Here are our top 5 reasons:

1. You Encounter God

If you take an entire weekend to focus yourself on seeking God, you will have some kind of encounter with Him – be it an overwhelming sense of His presence, clarity on an issue in your life, receiving a life call, encouragement or challenge to reach out more, even healing for the wounds in your life. And as we say in Ignite – one encounter with God can change your life.

2. You Grow Closer to Others

Lock yourself away at a retreat center for a few days with other Christians and you will come back with some new and deeper friendships. In the midst of meals together, sharing a bathroom, playing games, worshipping, praying, discussing, and eating snacks you get to know more about the people on the retreat – in a way you never could just at school.

3. Your Priorities are Straightened Out

Our priorities often get out of whack. We tend to place more importance on grades, work, organizations we’re involved in and forget our main priority – growing closer to God. When you put aside everything else to focus on God, your life suddenly comes back into alignment and the amazing happens – God gives you everything you need. After all, when you seek Him first, everything else will be given to you (Matthew 6).

4. You Come Back Recharged

School can be exhausting, especially with papers to write, books to read, math problems to solve, not to mention roommate issues and finding ways to make cafeteria food taste good. Taking a weekend off campus away from the homework and stresses of school is relaxing – and often what you need to be recharged and energized for the rest of the semester.

5. You are Energized to Reach Your Campus

Let’s face it – school has a way of overwhelming you, stealing your time, attention, and desire to reach others for Christ. Attending a retreat will help energize you again for reaching the lost – and put a fire in you to see it happen.

These are just five of the many reasons why attending a retreat is important for your spiritual growth. Getting away, disconnecting from life, and reconnecting to God is necessary to becoming the person God has called you to be.

Take the step today – register for our next Encounter Retreat. You won’t regret it. We promise.

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Steven has taken the position of Marketing Intern, where he will handling Ignite’s social media presence as well as helping to develop a marketing plan for the organization as a whole.

We launched this internship as a way to not only help students come to Christ, but also to help develop their gifts and talents to advance God’s kingdom in the workplace.

Steven is a perfect fit for this role.

Even from a young age, Steven has had a heart for people and connecting with them. God has given him a passion for reaching them, hearing their stories, and showing people how valuable they are-no matter who they are, where they come from, or what situation they are in. This all really began with God showing him how valuable he was, and in turn, wanted show people their worth.

Steven also has a passion for writing and using words as a form of art, as well as branding, typography, and photography. Combing all of these made social media /communication/ marketing the right career path for Steven.

Travel, and learning about different cultures is something that has always encompassed him. The fact that he is Puerto Rican, Lithuanian, German, French, and Native American has only driving his intrigue.

Steven is almost finished studying at UW Parkside in Wisconsin. After Graduation he hopes to aid a non-profit, church, or business in their marketing campaign and raise awareness for who they are. He also aspires to create a project that even in a small way, creates social change.

In the past, Steven had the privilege of walking alongside and teaching teens as a youth leader for 3 years. Soon after, he helped develop the beginning visions of a unique college ministry at his church, at helped co-lead it after.

In his spare time, Steven loves, hiking, rock climbing, reading, documenting the day with photos, travel, and loves all things (nerd alert) Star Wars, Harry Potter, and Lord of the Rings.

Currently he has had the cool opportunity to work at Barnes and Noble where he gets to be sell stories to people to better their own story.

He loves God, and strongly believes in the awe-inspiring and beautiful unconditional grace of God. It’s the thing he most desires to reflect to others in hopes they would see a better picture of who God is.

Also, he thinks Jason Vana is a pretty cool dude!

The post Ignite Welcomes Marketing Intern Steven Soto appeared first on Ignite Student Ministries.

It’s always an amazing experience getting to interact with and pour into youth at a nation-wide level. This year was our third time helping with Kristfest and it was, by far, the best event yet.

It’s not easy to put into words what God did during our time at Kristfest. I mean, how do you sum up an entire week of sessions, prayer, worship, having lunch and dinner with youth, pouring into their lives, engaging in conversations throughout the day, laughing and crying with them?

Luckily, we don’t have to. The awesome people at Kristfest put together a video portraying what God did that week. You can also flip through pictures of our week at Kristfest on Facebook.

Most of the video is in Czech, but keep watching — a few of us are featured in the video speaking English.

I was honored to be one of the main speakers at Kristfest this year — getting to close up the camp with the final message reminding students that they are called, and need to live out that calling every day.

To everyone who donated and prayed and supported us on this trip — Thank You! God did an amazing work in the lives of young people throughout the Czech Republic because of your help.

I’m still receiving Facebook messages, emails, and texts from youth about what God did during our time there.

God is about to do something big in that nation and, for some reason, we get to be a part of it.

The post Making a Nation Wide Impact at Kristfest appeared first on Ignite Student Ministries.

Most churches probably aren’t advertising on campus, you might not find an active Christian group at your school or, if you do, you might not be able to attend right away, and finding other students willing to get up on a Sunday morning to go to church can often be near impossible.

It’s important for your faith and your walk with Christ to get involved in a local church, but how do you find the right one?

The Church Finding Checklist

Here at 8 steps you can take when trying to find a local church when you’re away at college:

1. Know what you’re looking for.

It may seem pretty elementary, but knowing what you’re looking for in a church is the best place to start.

Make a list of non-negiotables you want in a church — those qualities, attributes, or opportunities that a church must have and that you won’t compromises on — and a list of what you desire in a church, but could live without if need be.

This will help you to weed out the churches that don’t fit your criteria and help you focus only on those that do.

2. Ask a friend where they go.

Did you come across a friend who already attends a local church? Ask where they go!

Your friend probably already dwindled out the churches he or she doesn’t like, and likely found a church that will help you grow as well.

3. Search for local churches online.

Most churches have at least a minimal web presence, so do a quick Google search for churches in your area.

Check out their websites, see what they have to offer, and make a list of churches you want to visit.

4. Read their doctrine / beliefs.

Let’s be honest, reading a church’s list of doctrine or beliefs doesn’t make for a fun time — but it’s incredibly important if you want to find a church you can easily fit into.

Most churches will have similar list of beliefs, with minor differences (like how they baptize people, what they believe on the Holy Spirit, if they allow women in leadership), while others will be completely different.

Even a quick scan through a church’s list of beliefs will help you get a feel for the kind of church they are and what they teach every week.

You can see Ignite’s List of Beliefs for a reference.

5. Look at ministries they offer.

When on a church’s website, see what ministries they offer. This will be a quick way to tell if it’s a church geared toward helping college students, like yourself, grow in their faith.

You’ll likely find that most churches don’t have a full-fledged college ministry. It’s why ministries like Ignite exist. But if all they offer is for families with kids, or for retirees, chances are you might be the only young adult in the building — and the messages might not be geared towards you.

6. Visit service a few times.

Websites can only show you show much about a church. At some point, you need to get out of bed and start visiting local churches to get a better feel for who they are.

Understand, it usually takes more than one visit to get a feel for a church. You may have picked a weekend when the main pastor was away, or they were doing a special service, or maybe all their technology broke down and they frantically threw together what they could.

Best practice is to visit a church a few times before making a judgment call.

7. Give it time.

No church is going to be like your home church.

You won’t know anyone there the first few times you visit. The preaching and worship will be different. You won’t know where the bathrooms are, how service normally goes, or what to expect when you walk in.

Give it time. Eventually you’ll find the feel of this new church and may even begin to like it more than your church at home.

8. Get involved!

You don’t truly know a church until you get involved — so find a way to get involved! Help with the worship team, be a door greeter, see if you can help with the youth group.

Remember though, your college campus is your mission field. God sent you there not just for an education, but to share your faith with those you would never come in contact with anywhere else.

Get involved in the local church, but make sure you aren’t so involved that you stop reaching out and being involved with a college ministry at school.

Take the Next Step

The tips above will help you take the next step in finding a local church to attend while you’re away at college.

If you’re already involved in an Ignite group at your school, talk to your leaders or post in the Facebook group and ask for recommendations of churches to attend. They may even be able to arrange car pooling so you don’t have to go alone.

[Image via Groman123 cc]

The post 8 Steps to Find a Local Church When in College appeared first on Ignite Student Ministries.

I think it’s safe to say everyone has strayed from God at some point, particularly during or after a hardship in their lives. It’s a pretty natural response. Something bad happens that’s out of anyone’s control, we look at God who’s supposed to always want the best for us and can do literally anything, and yet the bad thing still happened. We get mad, we get confused, we have no way of understanding and all we want is answers. When we don’t get answers, we get madder. At this point, usually our fight or flight instinct kicks in, and since we can’t fight God, we usually walk away.

I just want to clarify, I think this is a normal and natural response. Taking a step back from the thing or person that’s making you angry is almost certainly better than fighting.

The danger comes in when you step back and don’t start stepping towards God again.

This is what I was wrestling with right up until leaving for the Czech Republic. God let my world get flipped upside down and devastate my entire family and everyone that’s close to us. The same God had told me to leave my family when we were hurting to go do His will.

This is not a God who is easy to say yes to.

At that time, I felt like I had every right to say no. I was in more pain than I had ever known before, my family needed to stick together, and I had been in turmoil for so long that I just wanted to rest.

God knew all of this; and yet He still called me.

He called me not just for the benefit of those in the Czech Republic, but for my own. Because as much as He is their Heavenly Father, He is mine as well. He loves me just as much. He wanted to use people in Czech to help heal me probably much more than I was able to help them. In Czech, they started planting in me seeds of healing. This doesn’t mean I’m not still in pain.

This doesn’t mean I’m not still confused or have anger in my heart. It means that I’m asking God every day to help me through that turmoil. And when you pursue Christ in the midst of pain, He makes the pain bearable. He guides us on how to move forward. And that will be enough.

Because I am His, and He is mine.

The post A Step Towards God appeared first on Ignite Student Ministries.

I’ve danced to N’Sync’s Bye, Bye, Bye in front of 70+ people.
I’ve been egged so many times that the mere sight of an egg makes me anxious.
I’ve donned a pink wig and shook my booty in front of an entire camp.
I’ve played basketball, soccer, and baseball.
I’ve been thrown into a pool with my clothes on. Multiple times.
I’ve ran uphill in grass up to my waist at 10:30 at night.
I’ve eaten the nastiest, smelliest, most gut wrenching cheese available.
I’ve prayed for people until my voice gave out.

This year was no different.

During one of my sessions at Kristfest, my translator and I came up with a great translator-bonding time activity.

We’d dunk ourselves in the freezing cold river at the edge of the camp.
I mean, why wouldn’t we?!

But we didn’t stop there. Our goal was to get more people involved.

So a few days later, we did it again.

Dunking ourselves, in cold water, just for fun.

It may seem trivial. It may seem like a waste. It may seem like a missed opportunity to have deep, life-changing conversations.

But in reality, it was an opportunity to show these young people that I care — even about the trivial, crazy, silly fun stuff.

I don’t know what next year’s trip will bring — what crazy activity I’ll find myself thrown into. But I know this, if it helps build a relationship with just one young person, I’ll do it.

No questions asked.

The post Freezing to Make an Impact appeared first on Ignite Student Ministries.

Where do you start? How much should you read? How long should you read? What if it doesn’t make sense? All questions that hinder us from getting into the Bible every day.

Enter the YouVersion Bible App.

This free app (available on iPhone and Android) makes getting into the Bible easy. Not only can you take the Bible with you every where you go, but YouVersion also has a library of hundreds of Bible reading plans to help you get into the Bible every day.

Pick a Plan

In order to help you get started, we chose our top 5 favorite YouVersion Bible reading plans that are designed to grow your faith.

Jesus Culture: Faith for Your City
21 day plan
God wants cities and nations to be saturated in His presence. Compiled by Jesus Culture, this plan will strengthen your vision for your campus and your city. It includes a short bible reading, devotion, and prayer each day.

Elisha: A Tale of Ridiculous Faith
13 day plan
Elisha was one of the most powerful and faith-filled prophets in the Old Testament — seeing God perform some crazy miracles. This plan will walk you through the life and ministry of Elisha, and give you a glimpse of what it’s like to live out a ridiculous faith.

My Utmost for His Highest
30 day plan
For over eighty years Oswald Chambers’ My Utmost for His Highest has been one of the most widely read books in the Christian world, helping believers encounter God in a new way. This plan will take you to a short bible reading each day, and include a devotion from My Utmost for His Highest. These selections also include Oswald Chambers’ personal prayers with each devotional.

New Thru 30
30 day plan
The New Thru 30 reading plan from Elevation Church takes you through the entire New Testament in 30 days. This plan will stretch your mind, heart, and will to continue with an intense pace of Bible reading over the course of 30 days. Warning: not for those who give up easily!

Chronological
1 year plan
The Chronological plan takes the recorded events in the Bible and places them in the order that recent historical research believes they occurred. This is a great plan if you want to discover the historical context of your favorite passages of scripture.

Get Started Today

Download the YouVersion Bible App to your phone or tablet by clicking the button below, and start one of these plans today!

[Image via Ryk Neethling cc]

The post 5 YouVersion Bible Reading Plans to Grow Your Faith appeared first on Ignite Student Ministries.

The trip to the Czech Republic with Ignite this year is something I’ll never forget. Not only did I get to meet so many amazing people, I made friendships that I know I’ll cherish forever.

After only 1 week I felt very close to them. I had some of the best conversations with them and got to play a lot of games. I am even keeping in touch through Skype with some of them.

I went on this trip expecting to do a lot of Gods work to help other people. It was actually the opposite that happened. People seemed to be helping me more than I was helping them. I felt closer to God than I ever have before.

God really changed a lot for me in just two weeks. The team I went with lead a leadership conference in Cesky Tesin. I personally got a lot from that. Especially after the session “Walking in Great Faith.” I really learned that great faith comes with a price.

I finally started to believe God has something great in store for me if I’m willing to pay the price.

I’ve never been a leader, nor did I ever want to be one. After that conference though, I really had a desire to become more active in a leadership role.

God did a lot in my life on this trip, and I am so thankful I got the opportunity to go and experience God in a new way.

The post God has Something Great for Me appeared first on Ignite Student Ministries.