Strangers Today- Family Tomorrow

Every Wednesday evening I grab my purse, keys and Bible, and I make my way to my church’s university worship service. Upon arrival, I meet up with my friends, find my seat, and enjoy good fellowship with my church family. So far you may be scratching your head and wondering, “What could possibly be wrong with this picture?” This widespread problem is actually something to celebrate! There are so many members that it’s nearly impossible to meet people with common interests. The problem doesn’t lie in our numbers, but in a lack of time and opportunity. Whether it’s a lack of time before and after worship service, or “Bonding time” together throughout the week, the primary problem here is not having enough time together. How do we change something we have no control over? We certainly can’t lengthen the hours in a day, or increase our free time, but we can change what we do with our time.

I know that if we could do more together, then our student organization could become more like a family. Personally, being an out of state freshmen, the time I can spend with familiar faces makes a great difference in my week. There are students who are taking 12, 15, maybe even 18 hours at school this fall. Those students need a break from their hectic schedules sometimes. There are young adults who aren’t students, but are of college-level age who work long hours as well. Obviously someone with such a tight schedule to begin with probably doesn’t want to make any additional commitments, but what if there was something they could participate in that didn’t require much planning?

There are endless possibilities of what we can do as activities. We could meet up at the church and carpool to the movie theatre, miniature golf, bowling or ski trips. With such a large group we even have the potential to form intramural sport teams, singing groups, and drama groups. These could all go a long way toward furthering our relationships and relieving our stress this school year. In addition to extracurricular activities, we could also tutor each other and create study groups. There may be someone you don’t know in the group who is able and willing to tutor. When publicizing tutoring and study groups, we should emphasize the subject to be discussed so interested students make no mistake identifying whether or not they will need this particular study group.

Due to his work in Lubbock college ministries, I believe Jeff Smith should be consulted. Jeff serves as the Campus Minister of the Sunset church of Christ. He welcomes any suggestions and ideas that we, his students, may have. The first step to making this presentation to the campus Minister could be to poll the students concerning their needs. This should result in a more favorable response and greater effectiveness among the students. Effective planning should also take into account any possible drawbacks or downsides. One immediate concern would be to mistakenly implement too many of these ideas right away: this may prove to be another burden to an already-weary student body. Possible ways to avoid this is an idea already presented to inquire of fellow students as to which events they would most likely participate in. In doing this I can eliminate unwanted events and lower the number of events that are left out because of scheduling conflicts.

I have no doubt that there are many other productive ideas that could improve both our educational and social benefits of college life. The value of these ideas is that they could go a long way towards creating a more unified student organization. Imagine, it’s Wednesday night; 150 or more college students grab their Bibles, travel to Sunset church of Christ and strengthen themselves and those around them in a time of Bible study and praise. There’s a good chance they won’t know who is sitting beside them when they listen to the lesson that night, but there is also a good chance that someday soon, they will.