As mentioned in a previous post, when I arrived at Grad School I was almost immediately invited to join a Christian group on campus, but it didn’t really work for me. As a result I decided to fill my need for a community by approaching the pastor at my church about starting a study for graduate students. The intent was to focus on reading religious books and seeing how they relate to our lives and our journeys. We started with 3 people and a book called Jewish Sprituality: A brief introduction for Christians, because I’m intrigued by other religions. We shortly added 1 more to our numbers, then 2, and now, there are 13 people that regularly attend the study! We’ve got a great group! It makes me excited to see a community of believers bounding together, learning together and sharing fellowship. Another reason I’m excited about the success of this study is a shift we have been experiencing in the Church. The student group associated with the Church has become overwhelmingly dominated by underclassmen. This is not an all together bad thing, but its a HUGE shift from previous years. As a result, several of the grad students felt they weren’t connecting with the student lead service and nearly left, myself included. I think, in some ways, were it not for the Grad Study we may have lost many of the grad students. Luckily, it seems to have had the opposite effect, drawing people in, and creating a group of older Christians that can help and challenge the younger students in the Church.
Bible study nights always make me happy. They remind of why I am still a member of my Church and I haven’t gone searching for a new one. And seeing everyone from the study meld and form a community of faith makes me happy too!
The only thing that makes me happier is when I hear from other people in the study how much it means to them. Over the past few weeks a few people have told me how much they love it.
