On Friday, October 18th over 600 campus students from all over the Northeast gathered in Stamford, CT for fellowship, a rockin’ dance party, but most importantly to worship God. It started off on Friday night with an amazing worship service led by Jacob Tacher, a brother on the One-Year Challenge at the Shore Points Mission Team. The meeting space was so full that a second room had to be opened up for overflow seating where the message was live! Now that is a good problem to have…
Nilson Ramirez opened up the weekend with a powerful lesson about getting deep. In Luke 5, when Jesus calls Peter to throw his nets to the other side of the boat and trust him, Peter says, “because you say so I WILL” (emphasis added). Nilson challenged everyone all to step off the shore, go past the shallows, get past the sharks, all the way into the deep. Saturday morning started bright and early with the split men’s and women’s portion titled “I Will Wage War.” Four individuals from NY and New England taught and shared about what the spiritual battle is and how to personally wage war against it.
The rest of the day was followed by two sessions of seven breakout classes where the students could choose which topic they most needed to hear, anywhere from humility, to friendships, to holiness, to Christian apologetics. The students were filled to the brim with scriptures and with direction for where to go next in order to get deeper in their relationship with God. Finishing off on Sunday morning, Steve Schnell from New England preached a powerful message titled “I Will Get Saved” and focusing on what we must do to receive true salvation.
It was incredibly inspiring to see the campus ministries unite in heart and soul — even to see the camaraderie among the NY and New England staff brought such great hope for further future unity. We may not route for the same baseball or football teams, but we definitely route for the same God! And that is all that matters in order for us to have “everything in common” (Acts 2:44). For the remainder of the weekend, campus students from across the Northeast were deciding their “I will” statements. Will you change your life? Will you step up in your ministries? Will you surrender your pride? Will you confess your sin and get into the light? There were tears. There was repentance. There were hours of deep fellowship up until the early hours of the morning. And, by the grace of God, there were four souls added to God’s wonderful kingdom! They made their “I will” decision. Will you?
