Approximately 15,000 students study here on campus throughout different portions of the summer.

Many of these students are international students here just for the summer. Others are incoming freshmen who come early to get adjusted to college life. Still others are current students just trying to get in some extra units to graduate on time.

Last week one of our students decided we should do something to reach out to these summertime students.

She went out and bought a portable camping table, lightweight enough to carry campus without our help. Then this past Monday our students started tabling again out on Sproul Plaza (pictured above). We’ve been able to be with them for most of it. So far it’s been a lot of fun starting conversations and inviting new students in our community.

And when you’re the only table on campus, you tend to stick out.

So far we’ve had close to 20 new students sign up for our e-mail list, many of whom are interested in a Christian group but don’t have much a Christian background. Although there’s no guarantee that we’ll see them again, we’re hoping God will nudge them toward coming next week to our hotpot meal or to our weekly Chi Alpha meeting.

It’s so encouraging to see God opening doors with new students this summer. We’re hoping this will build up some great momentum for our Fall welcome week events.

When you have a free moment, please say a prayer for these students.

This week students are heading into finals.

This weekend our seniors are graduating and moving on.

And at the end of May, we will begin our first ever Summer Chi Alpha meetings!

It’s a time of transition, part of the annual ritual for the high achieving and highly motivated students of UC Berkeley. Fortunately during our last Chi Alpha meeting of the Spring semester, we were able to slow things down for one evening and really reflect on everything God has done this past year before leaping ahead into the next phase of our lives

Instead of the usual message from the Bible, we had a testimony night where students could share the things God had done this past year. And as we stop and reflect on it, it really quite extraordinary:

• Our staff pastor John recently just completed his first full academic year here in Berkeley.

• We just celebrated our first full year of actually meeting on campus and not in someone’s living room!

• We completed our first semester with designated student leaders and have even chosen new leaders for next year

• Many of our students testified that this year had been a year of tremendous spiritual growth for them

It took quite an effort to get it all to squeeze into our tiny Jetta

And so far, we’ve already put our new equipment to good use. The very next day after opening our new gifts, our students went to table out on Sproul Plaza.

Not long after they had set up everything, it started to sprinkle. And then it started to rain. And then it started to pour harder then we’d ever seen!

All around us, other campus organizations were hastily trying to pack up their stuff and get out of there before they were drenched. But not us! We were safe and dry beneath our new canopy tent.

Thank you Sunset Community of Livermore!

One year ago Semra & I entered into a new phase of our life. We woke up, got dressed, and walked down the rainy streets to campus holding in our hearts the dream of seeing a new Chi Alpha ministry established at UC Berkeley.

One year later by the sovereign hand of God we have been introduced to those pioneering students who are building up this new community of Jesus. In his perfect timing, Jesus introduced to us his friends (now ours too) who share our calling to be Christ’s ambassadors to a desperate campus. And it is very good.

This afternoon we arrived home from our first ever Winter Conference with the Berkeley crew. We were absolutely blown away by the things the Lord spoke to us, by the encouragement of the Body of Christ, and by the love of God multiplied among us.

The conference speakers poured out so many timely truths and reminded us of literally our identity as Christians. Here are just a few nuggets, cherished things that need to be written down and carried close to our hearts as we walk back onto our campus:

We need the Word of God.

We need it, can’t live with out it, and have to have it. Our minds and thoughts and dreams are tiny specks compared with God’s grandiose ambitious (and sometimes offensive) plans for GLORY. The Word of God reminds us again and again what it is that we are supposed to be doing.

Without God’s preferred future as revealed to us in his word, we are powerless. But with scripture at our side, death will yield itself to life and dusty old dreams reignite once more.

It’s all about expectancy.

You get what you ask for. The reason that non-profits receive funding, politicians receive votes, and homeless guys receive spare change is because they asked.

If we don’t ask for and eagerly expect God to do something, we’re not doing our part.

If we come back from a conference, pray, fast and try hard for one week and then give up, should we receive anything?

But if we ask, ask, ask, and then ask again, and then ask some more to be involved with what God is doing on earth, something will happen. We’ve been expecting too little.

Either we’re doing this, or we’re not.

When Jesus called us into a brand new life with him, he was serious. When we sent us out into the world to tell people the good news, he was also serious. But when we only debate and blog and preach about  it, we make it into a joke.

It’s not good enough to simply repeat last semester (as good as it was) all over again. We need to take the foundation that has been laid and build higher, stronger, bigger, and fatter until people start to notice.

Either we mean it when we say when we say we’re ready and willing, or we don’t mean it at all.

It’s not our job to save people.

Jesus saves, not us. All we have been asked to do is be faithful witnesses. Our job is talk about him and let people know what he has done in our life. It’s simple, but it changes everything.

He’s changed us and he can change you too. The rest is between you and God.

Our only example is his Passion.

Jesus’ passion, the sum total of his commitment and love, kept him going even when he didn’t feel like it. There will be days ahead for us when the feeling is gone. There will be spiritual opposition and spiritual oppression that resists the change that God wants to bring to our campus.

The reason we give up so easily is because we are not as passionate as Jesus was.

Heaven on Earth

Our ultimate goal is to reflect heaven on the campus. More than anything else, this conference reminded me of that powerful reality.

In heaven, Jesus Christ is worshipped by peoples from all tribes, nations, and languages. We want to find those tribes, those nations, and those languages and invite them into that future worship now.

In heaven, sin and disease have no power. We want to show students to know that there is a way to forgiveness. We want people to experience ridiculous and impossible healings.

And in heaven, the love of the Father is known to all. There are no orphans. We want to embody that heavenly love in a tangible physical way that cannot be ignored.

We pray, expect, and long for these things.

Unless the LORD builds the house,
its builders labor in vain.
– Psalm 127:1

This week we spent a good amount of time on the Berkeley campus. There are a lot of students out there. Thirty-five thousand to be exact. And they are highly motivated, extraordinarily busy, and are going places.

As best as we can tell, there are 827 registered student organizations on campus. Cal students don’t want to be in a club: they want to start one. After all, that’s how they got into Berkeley in the first place: being busy, highly motivated, and starting clubs.

We can’t just start another club. Although Chi Alpha will be a registered student organization, more importantly it will be, along with the other missional Christian groups on campus, a sending agency of the Holy Spirit.

We want our group to have an extraordinary amount of fun, enjoy fellowship and grow in our faith, but those are not our purpose. Our chief aim is to carry out the mission of Christ: to make disciples of all nations and tribes.

We don’t believe in manipulative forceful evangelism and recruitment. We believe in divine appointments, genuine compassion and friendship, and giving people a compelling reason to consider faith in Christ.

Students who join Chi Alpha are not going to come by accident. They will be called.

Starting something from scratch at Berkeley is too hard for us. If it’s by our strength, talent, and natural abilities, it will never happen. We don’t really have it in us. But if God’s hand is doing the work and moving on students’ hearts, absolutely anything is possible.

After they prayed, the place where they were meeting was shaken. And they were all filled with the Holy Spirit and spoke the word of God boldly. – Acts 4:31

Today was the beginning of Berkeley’s spring semester, and our first day on the job. We got back yesterday from an amazing Winter Conference with Chi Alpha groups from diverse places such as Los Angeles, Los Vegas, and Hawaii. During the conference, people laid hands on the Berkeley Chi Alpha team and prayed for God to move powerfully on campus this semester.

It truly felt like we were being commissioned by both the body of Christ and the Holy Spirit to reach Berkeley with the gospel.

Today was day one of that marvelous adventure. Despite the enthusiasm and sense of purpose that Winter Conference gave us, by this morning we already had began to feel under fire.

We both didn’t get enough sleep and the morning time seemed to war against our time alone with God. When we stepped on campus 80 minutes behind schedule in the pouring rain, we felt somewhat unsure of what we were to do next.

Students hustling by, faculty strutting, and clubs campaigning, we cautiously walked around campus. We sat and ate lunch at the Free Speech Movement Café, overhearing student conversation while reading the Bible. We got a few glances from students with a curious eye toward what we were reading.

On Sproul Plaza we ran into a fellow campus minister who walked around campus with us for a while, encouraging and praying with us. He was excited to see us out on first day and blessed us greatly in the Lord. Introducing some students to us, he had them tell us about what student life was like at Berkeley.

Later I met up with a graduate student friend of mine to study the Bible together and pray at the food court below the student union. We both felt the post-conference spiritual oppression and God spoke to us during prayer to go on offense.

We starting walking around Sproul Plaza in the rain, feeling called to pray for a student on campus. After aimlessly wandering for a while, a student avoiding a massive puddle came close to us and my friend started up a conversation. He was a new transfer student and it was his first day at Cal. We offered to pray for him and he said yes. I said a prayer for his time at Cal and asked God to draw him closer to him during his time at college. He seemed very grateful and we parted ways. I hope to see him again on campus sometime soon.

Afterwards, we went to another coffee shop across the street from campus where I noticed a young man staring at me. I started a conversation with him and listened to him explain his pantheistic beliefs about life and religion. We talked for a while about who Jesus was and I was able to share my faith with him. Although I’m not sure if mentally he was entirely there, it was an interesting conversation.

Next, my friend and I chatted with one of his friends. He talked for a long time about the definition of human freedom and complicated moral philosophies. I questioned him on his views about moral relativity and that all religions were the same. I presented my view of Jesus as God and savior, but mostly I listened.

What started out as sluggish day, an uphill battle really, turned into a God-honoring and exciting challenge. Despite being a missionary, sharing my faith is still really hard for me! But I know God has sent us to Berkeley to start Chi Alpha and partner with other students in sharing Jesus Christ with the campus. Although we are weak, the Holy Spirit is more than able to use us for his purposes if we humble ourselves to pray and be obedient.

Tomorrow is another day, ripe with opportunities to pray and share with students. We look forward to tomorrow, but there will never again be a day like today: Day One.

We see these two values as our spiritual core, guiding both our identity and our mission on campus. Without experiencing a living faith in our daily lives, we are missing out on the very kingdom Jesus desires to build in and through us. Without engaging scripture on a deeper level and giving persuasive reasons for the hope that we have, we will not develop a solid faith or engage the intellectual climate of our campus. So what is Chi Alpha @ Berkeley?

• If there are already twenty-five groups on campus, why did God call us here?
• How are these groups going to react to the presence of yet another campus ministry in town?

I remember the story someone told me about being the new campus minister into town. This new campus minister had the chance to meet with the leader of another fellowship. Essentially that leader told him was that they already had the campus covered and there was no need for another campus group. Today the ministry that the new campus minister is leading is alive and thriving, ministering to many students each year. Without that extra help, many more students would not be actively living out a life of faith on campus or be a part of a healthy community following Christ.

By coincidence, we got in touch with a staff member from Campus Crusade at Cal through the internet. He told us that the campus pastors at Cal meet every month for fellowship and prayer, and he invited us. Along with our team member Jeff, we went to the meeting yesterday morning. The campus pastors who were there greeted us very warmly and treated us as equals, despite the fact that we showed up quite at random, had no official status on campus, and were still interns. They encouraged us in our ministry and reminded us that God can use us to minister to students that no other group can. Being the new campus ministers in town, we had genuinely worried about how the established ministries might respond. But instead of being told that the campus was already covered by the existing groups and pointing out our inadequacies, the campus pastors in the room brought encouragement and peace to our hearts. We were powerfully blessed and relieved at the same.

As the different pastors shared where they were at personally and how their ministry was doing, we sensed some common themes. These were seasoned veterans, most of which at had been at Cal for a while. Here are some of their insights we picked up:

• Ministering to Cal students is very hard
• There are only 24 hours and 7 days in a week, and Cal students are already using most of those!
• Student leaders are hard pressed to give you more than 2 or 3 hours a week of their time
• Once a year Cal campus pastors consider quitting campus ministry altogether
• A supermajority of the students being reached by all the different ministries are Asian, including the non-Asian specific groups like Crusade and Intervarsity
• Graduate students are much more like young working professional than undergraduate students. It’s extremely difficult to find time in their schedule for more than 3 or 4 to meet at the same time!

We feel so blessed to be living in Berkeley and are so excited for what God has in store for us. There’s no place we would rather be then relying on God for provision and direction in ministry. We know that even though there are many Christian groups here, there are tens of thousands of college students who need the message of Jesus Christ and encouragement in their studies. We are glad for the other campus ministries and churches who have been doing great kingdom work, but we also know that there is plenty of room for a healthy multi-ethnic spirit-led Chi Alpha ministry at this dynamic and influential university. Pray with us that the Lord continues to bring spiritual healing and reconciliation to Cal students in search of their purpose and ultimately their creator.

You can expect to see the follow people there!

Winston Bui, veteran minister to college students and twentysomethings, founded and leads the Chi Alpha ministry at UCLA. Winston’s intensity will spill over into your soul and set you on fire.

Char Blair is a witty communicator willing to speak truth from God’s Word into real-life situations. She is the founder of Unspoken, a ministry that encourages those struggling with life-altering problems.

You might have seen Dennis Gaxiola on Comedy Central or BET. The man is funny. He’s also a brother in Christ and is coming to prove to us that laughter is a gift from God.

Morning worship will be led by Vi Tribe from Tongan Community Christian Center in Sacramento. Check out their MySpace.

Evening worship will be led by the Promised Band, the worship team of Chi Alpha @ Stanford.