SaturateColorado.com

By Al Barrera

Colorado Springs -- Anyone who knows of Colorado College (CC) will tell you that it is an extremely unique campus.  Having worked there for the last year, I have sought out any opportunity to involve students in spiritual conversations.

One of the most open forums for spiritual dialogue comes in the form of a weekly meeting called "Shove Council" a discussion group organized by the chaplain's office.  This meeting involves two critical elements to student life at CC: lunch and intense conversation.

Recently, in this setting, I had the opportunity to share my faith with several self-described searchers.

On a Wednesday in mid-October, after devouring a sandwich and several hundred pretzels, a conversation about the idea of "conversion" began to formulate.

Listening to the students speak, I began to have a clearer understanding of what their ides of conversion might mean.

The context of the dialogue was the help sent for natural disasters -- such as Hurricane Katrina and the Southeast Asian tsunami -- should be purely humanitarian, or for the good of mankind and that help should arrive without any agenda or expectations of religious conversion.

I listened as one of the students, an Assyrian Catholic/Hindu, told of "conversion tactics" she had seen used in her home country of India after the 2004 tsunami.

I listened to the opinion of a Mormon girls who was very critical of how even her own faith tradition uses movements of terrible devastation to spread their doctrine.

I listened as a young Muslim woman criticized American missionaries for their manipulation of difficult situations in order to more effectively spread their version of the truth.

After listneing for quite a while, I chimed in.  This moment allowed me not only to share my opinion, but it oopened the door for the gospel of Christ to be shared in this group of seven people.

I love how God orchestrates situations.  Two years ago, I had the opportunity to go on a tsunami relief mission to Southeast Asia with the Southern Baptist International Mission Board.  I spent most hours of the day pumping wells in villages.  It seemed, at least on a spiritual level, to be fairly insignificant.

On the day fo "Shove Council" however, my time in Southeast Asia was far from inconsequential.  My time pumping wells allowed me to speak from a position of authority, and the students were an audience I had never predicted.

I spoke of the love and appreciation from the people we met while helping repair their broken homes and villages.

I told of Southern Baptist relief and the tremendous resources available through that organization.

I recalled a conversation I had with a man who wondered how Allah could have abandoned his people in such a way.

I spoke of my faith and the call of Jesus Christ to help the needy and to help the poor.

I spoke of Galatians 5:6 where Paul states: "Neither circumcision nor uncircumcision has any worth: the only thing that matters is faith expressing itself through love."

I said, as a follower of Christ, I am called to share my fiath, but I also said that sharing my faith is sometimes done without saying any words.

I talked for about 30 minutes asking many questions and getting many different responses.

At the end of that time, as people began to leave, the young woman who was an Assyrian Catholic/Hindu came up to me and asked if it would be appropriate for her to come to our Monday night meeting on campus.

As she thanked me for my time and quickly left, I thanked God for His sovereignty and His amazing ways.  I felt assured that He was the only one glorified through the day's intriguing events.

Al Barrera is director of Christian Challenge at Colorado College in Colorado Springs.