Today’s university campus is one of the greatest mission fields. It is a place of transition and questioning. It is a place where major life decisions are made as students learn to become adults. And it is a place where each year there is a continuous influx of new students. You never stop meeting new people.
The college or university campus is also a place where a diversity of cultures gather. In fact, when you walk on today’s college campus, you encounter the world. Some have called it the Great Commission in reverse. Instead of us going to the nations, they are coming to us!
Philosophers J.P. Moreland and William Lane Craig reiterate the fact of the importance of today’s college campuses. They believe they are “the single most important institution shaping Western culture.” They write:
It is at the university that our future political leaders, our journalists, our teachers, our business executives, our lawyers, our artists, will be trained. It is at the university that they will formulate or, more likely, simply absorb the worldview that will shape their lives. And since these are the opinion-makers and leaders who shape our culture, the worldview that they imbibe at the university will be the one that shapes our culture. If we change the university, we change our culture through those who shape culture.[1]
Reaching a college campus, therefore, is exponential. To impact a student on a college campus is to impact his/her family and home, his/her future home and family, and every city and community he/she will reside throughout his/her life.
Reaching today’s campus however, is bigger than just impacting Western culture. As mentioned above, since the world is coming to today’s college campus, then to reach the campus is also to reach the world. To reach an International student is to make an impact on his/her family and his/her country. We must open our eyes to realize that the world is coming to us via the college and university campus. And the majority of those who are coming from around the world are un-evangelized.
Just imagine the impact that could be had upon the world by reaching today’s college campus. If we go about making disciples who make disciples on today’s universities, then as students graduate and spread throughout the world, so does the gospel.
I hope you pray for college and university campuses. And if you live near one, I hope you invest in that campus. The ripple effects of doing so could usher in a tidal wave.
[1] J.P. Moreland & William Lane Craig, Philosophical Foundations for A Christian Worldview (Downers Grove: InterVarsity Press, 2003), 2.
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