My Students Change the World

I don’t know if everyone can say that they work with people who are changing the world.

I can.

I work with students who partner with God in bringing the truth of the gospel to their dorm communities, their apartment complexes, their classes, their intramural teams, their friends—to the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign and to campuses around the globe.

It's two weeks into a new semester and already our students have brought non-Christian friends to small group Bible studies or invited them into an investigative Bible study. They have recruited 172 of their peers to attend our Winter Retreat this weekend. They are attending weekly prayer meetings. They are staying up late, talking with roommates and people on their floors about things that matter.

Some days, these things might feel like part of their to-do lists as members of a Christian fellowship. But most days, maybe unbeknownst to them, what they’re learning about God and themselves are becoming internalized truths that are changing them from the inside out. Each encounter they have with God is beginning to leave them unrecognizably transformed. I see it happening. And as a result, they are helping God redeem and change the places where they live, the relationships they have, and the university they attend. Amen.

Wow. That’s incredible, isn’t it? But wait! There’s more! I work with students who dream. They don’t want to settle for a few non-Christian friends coming to small group or 172 of their peers attending Winter Retreat. They want more. They want more from God and the faith they are beginning to take ownership of. They want small groups where every member is bringing a non-Christian friend. They want to see hundreds of people attending Winter Retreat. They want prayer meetings where they experience the presence of the Holy Spirit. They don’t just want change—they want God-sized change.

And when you work with students who live like this, it helps you believe that not only world change, but God-sized change, is possible.

Now wait until they graduate. Look out, world.

Brittany Small is an InterVarsity Campus Staff Member at her alma mater, the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign where she graduated with a journalism and communications degree. This post first appeared on her blog InterVarsity at UIUC.