This year, we are pleased to announce that there are twenty four colleges who are participating in the event (including one in Florence, Italy). We also have three city-wide events happening in SoCal, Seattle, and Pittsburgh.

So what is it all about? In essence, it’s an event about being hope. Over 2.4 billion people go daily without nearby access to safe, clean, drinking water. Women and girls in these communities are usually charged with the task of gathering the water for their families as a daily practice. Imagine spending three hours of your day gathering water so you and your family can have it to drink, to bathe, to do laundry, to wash dishes. Imagine if that water were contaminated and needed boiled before anyone could drink it. Imagine not being able to attend school because you had been charged with this task for the sake of your family’s survival. It doesn’t have to be this way. In fact, you can be part of the generation that stands up and says enough is enough, and chooses to make a difference.

Recently, I was reading a blog from our water and sanitation program manager, Nicole Scott, that talked about how life has changed in Kuria since the drilling of wells in the community. One of the stories told was about kids at one of the schools where the wells were drilled. The teachers said that the kids are playing now instead of running into the bush to try to find water during recess. This statement really hit me personally. I started thinking back to elementary school and recess. I can remember running, playing football, tag, and kickball, and just all around having a good time with friends. I remember running myself into a frenzy knowing that at the end of recess, everyone in my class would line up at a water fountain (I think the fountain was in my classroom too), and get a drink of water before settling back into class. What would it have been like if there were no drinking fountains in my school. What if my recess was spent looking for ANY water source near the school? What would my concentration level have been like in the classroom? It seems utterly unthinkable that anyone in the modern era would have to deal with this on a daily basis.

And that’s why we are asking you to join in Be Hope To Her this year. We believe that together we can end extreme poverty. We believe that together we can pioneer solutions for whole communities to not only have convenient access to safe, clean drinking water, but to lift themselves out of extreme poverty for good! Will you join us in this effort?

The first thing you can do is register for the event. This event is going to take place in a variety of locations across the country, so chances are you live fairly close to one of the locations (and if not, road trips are always fun—especially those with a greater purpose!).

Then, invite your friends, relatives, coworkers, and classmates to get involved. (What’s a road trip without friends?) We truly believe we can end extreme poverty, together, one community at a time, and we will work faster and more effectively as we have more people involved in this work. Imagine what it will be like to one day say that WE were the generation who said enough is enough and ended extreme poverty! This goal is within our reach, but it is going to take more than a few getting involved. Be Hope To Her is a great “first step” for folks to take as they join us in this work.

After you have registered and started recruiting your friends to get involved, you can begin raising funds for your campus. There was actually a recent blog post on the Nuru website that includes some helpful hints to some FUNdraising activities! I definitely recommend you check it out.

I can guarantee that if you participate in this event, you will NEVER look at this issue in the same way again. And your friends won’t either. Not only that, but you will be offering them a tangible first step in the journey to be the generation that ends extreme poverty!!!

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Billy Williams is the Grassroots Movement Director for Nuru International

Let me back up. One of the missions of the college at which I teach first-year writing classes is to allow intellectual formation to occur within the context of Scripture. That’s fairly straightforward when it comes to Old Testament Literature or even Introduction to Economics, but it’s surprisingly difficult to draw these things into a discussion of writing. I can say that Christians ought to learn to write well because it’s important that they communicate clearly, but frankly, that’s not terribly convincing.

McEntyre’s book restructures the conversation around the idea that we who are blessed to be literate ought to take our job as stewards of language very seriously. And not only does she invite us into that conversation, but she frames it in lovely language as well. Reading McEntyre makes you want to be able to write like her.

She proposes thirteen “stewardship strategies”:

1. Love words
2. Tell the truth
3. Don’t tolerate lies
4. Read well
5. Stay in conversation
6. Share stories
7. Love the long sentence
8. Practice poetry
9. Attend to translation
10. Play
11. Pray
12. Cherish silence

These strategies are important, McEntyre points out, because our language is weakening in so many ways. She’s not a Luddite, but she cares deeply about what our overdependence on technology-mediated communication is doing to the way we talk, write, and think:

English – American English in particular, as we have said – has already suffered sever losses in a spreading epidemic of hyperbole. Streamlined and simplified newspapers and textbooks have forced fewer and fewer words to serve the purposes of public discourse, so we sustain losses in nuance and precision whose consequences have not yet been fully recognized.

There are riches in this book, and I’m already trying to brainstorm how to use it with my students next year. But you don’t need to be in a first-year writing course to benefit. Anyone who uses words – and that’s all of us – who is frustrated by the paucity of language or the lies they feel they are hearing in public discourse, who yearns to recover a heritage that’s starting to disappear, would enjoy this little volume. I encourage you to pick it up and consider how you might care for words.

This week, though, I’m thinking about death because the mother of an old friend passed away suddenly after a short, severe battle with cancer. Her youngest son (of five) is still in high school.

And that reminds me of my father’s lost battle with cancer, very suddenly after having been in remission, less than four years ago. He died shortly before my wedding, while my own brother was still in high school. It took me many months to recover to the point where I wanted to pick back up and move into the future. There isn’t a day that goes by – still – that I don’t have that itch to call him and tell him about something that happened in my day. His presence is still so palpable. It’s uncanny.

Of course things are different now then they were then. I can watch movies with military burials (as his was) without having to turn away, and our holidays have started to grow into a new normal.

But when I found out this week, some of those things hurt more intensely than they have in a while. My mother, who lives in my hometown still, has been going to the services, and I can only imagine how much more it must hurt for her. We all know where they are now, pain free and in the presence of the Savir – and yet, and yet.

I finished reading N.T. Wright’s Surprised By Hope not long ago, and found myself desperately wishing I’d had it by my side when I was in the midst of planning my Dad’s funeral. Wright points out how nebulous and wishy-washy our conception of what actually happens after death really is. Even recently, reading the lyrics to an old hymn, I realized that our concept of life after death is often just flying away to live with Jesus in the clouds. We Christians understand death inadequately, and in many cases, just wrong.

Wright preaches the great hope of the resurrection – not some merely spiritual event, but a true, full restoration of the earth to its pre-fall glory, with the work of the church as part of the new Jerusalem – a garden city. That Christ’s resurrection was merely God folding into the already what has not yet happened – a foretaste, the firstfruits, a hope of what is to come.

But Christ has indeed been raised from the dead, the firstfruits of those who have fallen asleep. For since death came through a man, the resurrection of the dead comes also through a man. For as in Adam all die, so in Christ all will be made alive.
(I Corinthians 15:20-22)

Steeped in creation-fall-redemption-restoration theology, I know all this, and yet I’d never though of it in the context of death. I am not only holding out the hope of seeing Dad, and Cindy, and all the saints who have passed before us someday in heaven in some disembodied state. They rest with Christ now, but that is not the end. I will see them here, in a body that will be perfected, doing work that is fulfilling and glorious, rejoicing and living as we were created to rejoice and live, in a renewed creation.

And in that, we that weep may also rejoice.

But now we’re back on our campuses, in our homes, at our workplaces. As someone who attended a lot of similar events throughout college and into adulthood (though obviously, none as fine as this!), I recognize that familiar feeling of exhaustion and overwhelmed-ness that also settles in after a conference. Okay – I’m inspired. I want to do something. But where do I go from here?

Let me humbly offer a few suggestions.

Pray. I am truly but a student in the school of prayer, but I have found this week that when I know my heart is not in the right place, when I am overwhelmed by the sheer weight of what has happened, that the only thing I can do – and the hardest thing to make myself do – is pray. When I haven’t got the words, I turn to prayers that someone else has written – the Psalms, or perhaps a prayer book (I jump around but always come back to John Baillie’s A Diary of Private Prayer), asking for God to meet me where I’m at. And he always does.

So pray through your overwhelmed feelings, your desires, your fears, your needs. God wants to listen. If you ask, he won’t let the seed that was sown fall on fallow ground.

Read. If you were wise, you spent some time browsing the (truly extensive) selection provided by Byron at Hearts & Minds. Did you make a purchase? Now’s the time to start reading it. Learn. Understand. Exercise your mind and move beyond simply what’s required of you. Expand your humanity, and read more about whatever captured you – issues of justice, workshops you attended, ideas that filtered into your mind through talks or conversations.

Watch. Look around you. God desires for you to see your world with new eyes, to understand what he has planned for you, to fill your vocation as a student or professional and seek your future with an open heart. So keep your eyes and heart open. Write down what you see and ponder it. Don’t let the work of this weekend fade away.

Here’s a top ten list of things to do to prepare. Most of these points are adapted directly from my co-worker, Steve Lutz’, blog (the SENTinel)…with a few add-ons. Thanks, Steve!

1. Come with an open mind. Assess and deal with your preconceived notions, particularly of what Christian conferences (and a bunch of gathered Christians) are like. Question your skepticism. In large part, the conference will be what you make of it. People have had amazing, wild, utterly mind-blowing, life-transforming experiences. People have also had “Meh” experiences. So, in your mental, spiritual, and physical posture, be Active (engaged), not Passive (entertain me).

2. Seek Humility. Seek humility (I don’t know everything), not arrogance (no one can teach me). Ask what you can contribute (prosumer), not “what’s in it for me” (consumer). One thing about Jubilee–you won’t agree with everyone. Jubilee is not “safe,” as many conferences are. You will be exposed to things you don’t comprehend, things you dislike, things that make you uncomfortable, things you’ve never heard before. This is good. So listen, process, dialogue. It means to think critically, but not to put yourself “above” the conference as a hyper-critic. You’ll rob yourself–and others–of your experience.

2. Work ahead. This point isn’t just for students! Trust me, you won’t want to come home on Sunday afternoon with 6 hours of work to do. If possible, you don’t want to have to do O-Chem on Saturday afternoon. You’ll want time on Saturday to process Jubilee.You’ll want to rest. Do yourself a favor, and do everything you can to leave your work behind from Friday thru Sunday. Your future self thanks me for telling you this.

3. Meet new people. You are gathering with 2500 students, and leading authorities in their field. So get out there and meet them! Meet students. Meet speakers. Connect with some ministries and organizations. Start conversations. Make connections. Network. Line up an internship for the summer. The people you meet at Jubilee may serve as a critical juncture in your life-path.

4. Get some new books! Jubilee is not about telling you what to think. It is about helping you know how to think. It is about equipping you to join the conversation. It is about connecting you to the best dialogue partners. One thing about Jubilee–it puts to death the common assumption that Christians are anti-intellectual, uncultured, & brain-dead. Well, not all of us are. You will encounter a unique and fantastic book “table” at Jubilee. I say “table” in quotes because what Byron Borger and the Hearts & Minds team pull off is extraordinary. You will find books with a Christian perspective on nearly every field of study. You will want to spend a good deal of time perusing this mobile bookstore, which is unlike any other bookstore you’ve been to. So bring some money, and plan on coming home with a couple books!

5. Pace yourself, and 6. Process as you go. We hope–and expect–that you go to most or all of the main sessions. We hope you go to most of the breakout sessions. We expect you to be fully present when you are there. Take notes–you won’t remember everything you hear, and you’ll want to. But at some point–particularly if this is your first Jubilee–you may get overwhelmed or worn out. Take the time to process and refresh yourself. This isn’t a carte blanche to skip out, but to pull someone else aside and talk through something you have heard, to work things down deeper so they stick.

7. Pray. Before, during, after. You may or may not know that there’s a prayer room at Jubilee, located in Armstrong room. Come for a respite to pray with CCO staff people who are there to serve you, or come and pray on your own. Breathe. Pause. Pray.

8. Pay attention. And I don’t say that in the way the school teacher does, chiding the pupil. Pay attention to where God is moving, to what He may be teaching you. Pay attention to the needs of people around you. Look for confused folks and help them. Look for ways to be Jesus to others. Look for Jesus.

9. Reach out. In a very practical sense, if you have a question about where to find a certain room or speaker or any pragmatic question for that matter, head to the Jubilee Solutions room. On another level, if you’re struggling, confused, overwhelmed or need something, don’t be afraid to ask for help. Reaching out is an incredibly important part of our spiritual lives. It’s okay and necessary to admit we need help.

Last, and very important….

10. As you come off the mountaintop, bring the message to the people. In the book of Exodus, Moses has a powerful encounter with God on the mountain, and he returns to bring the message to the people. Don’t leave your Jubilee experience in Pittsburgh. In our “instant” culture, it’s so easy to be on to the next best thing, but let’s not do that. Let’s share with others when we come home. What a privilege it is to attend a conference like this. Let’s be faithful to unpack it and share it with others. Let’s make a commitment to live jubilee!

See you there!

This fabulous, thoughtful book would make for great listening material as you drive or fly or walk or even take the bus to Jubilee 2010. Don’t miss out!

I don’t actually  mean Jubilee (though I’m so excited for Friday!). I mean Lent.

For Western Christians, the Lenten season begins this Wednesday – Ash Wednesday. (Our Eastern Orthodox brethren begin celebrating the Great Lent today, though this year we celebrate Easter – Pascha for them – on the same day.)

I could describe Lent for you, but Wikipedia does a pretty good job:

The traditional purpose of Lent is the preparation of the believer — through prayer, penitence, almsgiving and self-denial — for the annual commemoration during Holy Week of the Death and Resurrection of Jesus, which recalls the events linked to the Passion of Christ and culminates in Easter, the celebration of the Resurrection of Jesus Christ. Lent was also traditionally the term used to describe the period leading up to Christmas before the term of advent was officially recognized.

Conventionally it is described as being forty days long, though different denominations calculate the forty days differently. The forty days represent the time that, according to the Bible, Jesus spent in the wilderness before the beginning of his public ministry, where he endured temptation by Satan.^[1]

As Wikipedia goes on to point out, quite a few Protestant denominations do not formally practice the observance of the church calendar, and with that, they don’t observe Lent. (My own Presbyterian denomination, I’m told, traditionally does not even formally observe Easter or Christmas, though I don’t know of many churches over the broader Presbyterian world which don’t do so.)

But over the past few years, I’ve observed that more and more Christians of all stripes are recognizing the value of the church calendar and the differences between feast days and fast seasons. Observing a fast of some kind is not a means to salvation. But it can be a means to holiness, a discipline that helps us to focus on the glory of Christ’s resurrection.

Christians traditionally observe a fast during Lent. (The concept is the same as that fast during Advent.) I was contemplating – still am contemplating – what I’ll choose to fast from during this Lenten season. I’m on a restricted diet right now for some minor health reasons, which has already removed most of the things I enjoy eating from my diet. (Yay?) Some people give up Facebook or other favorite social networking tools, but I’m somewhat tied to them for work. So I’m being forced to think outside the box a bit.

Some people have told me that they often add a habit during Lent instead of removing one. While I admire the good intentions behind their effort, I think this kind of practice misses the point a little. The idea behind the Lenten fast is to remove something good that nonetheless can Christ’s place in our life as the true source of comfort and joy. We add it back on celebratory days (the Sabbath, and then Easter), with the goal of finding comfort in Christ while being able to put his blessings in the proper place in our lives.

Adding a practice during Lent is good. But if we take up a practice in place of giving up something good, do we then give up the practice when Easter comes?

Of course, since Lent is generally considered to be an optional practice for spiritual development, then it’s really between the individual believer and God whether to practice Lent, and how. But I’d encourage you to keep the concept behind Lent in mind as you contemplate whether God is showing you something in your life that is taking His place.

Happy Lent. And I’ll see you in Pittsburgh.

He simply couldn’t get back to the play. An experienced quarterback, however, can. Even under pressure, a veteran sees more than the immediate threats and pressures, and can quickly regain his focus after avoiding a sack. Pardon my fatherly, Kipling-esque attempt, but a lesson emerges from this story.

College is like practice, or maybe pre-season for your career. It will help you get ready, but only when that first big job begins will you realize how many “pass rushers” exist. You’ll be tempted to accept unfitting salary offers, to surrender to unhealthy co-worker distractions, to compromise on projects and budgets, and to lose balance of work and family and faith.

Some of these may get the best of you. In time, however, if you are diligent in your pursuit of and submission to God’s leading, you will gain a feel for the game and how to manage it wisely.

It may take all of your 20s or your entire working career for such a thing to develop. In the meantime, gather around you a community of helpers – both teammates and coaches. Keep them in your game as peers and guides, and someday, by the grace and mercy of Jesus Christ, you’ll be a veteran, too.

Kirk Ream is one of those Jubilee people. He owns a fitness center in Carlisle, PA. But it’s not like most gyms you may have joined. You won’t find mirrors or muscle magazines. Kirk is motivated by a Jubilee vision for running a workout facility. In a culture obsessed with working out to be more sexually attractive, Kirk keeps his clients focused on a better goal: to be fit for the service of others. Talk about having your imagination liberated! Now that’s a Jubilee vision if I’ve ever heard one.

Intrigued? Kirk will be joining us at Jubilee this year! And he won’t just be talking about his business or giving you health tips. He will be inviting you to participate. That’s right. Bring your sneakers! You will have three opportunities to work out with Kirk at Jubilee: Saturday at 7:45am and 3:30pm and Sunday at 7:45am. There will be something for every skill-level and you will also have an opportunity to ask Kirk questions about developing healthier ways of living.

The Jubilee Conference is not just about exercising your mind, you know. It is about the whole-person, following Jesus in whole-life discipleship. Kirk will not only help us to liberate our imaginations about the fitness industry, but he will also give us the tools we need to care for our bodies the way God desires. We need this reminder too: the healthier we are the more fully we are able to serve our neighbors.

Be sure to stop by Kirk’s “Fit4Service” table at the exhibit hall and become a fan of Fit4Service on Facebook today!

I’m not even sure I know how to define what it means to be part of the scholarly community, let alone to be a Christian in that community (as opposed to being a scholar in the Christian community, which has real value but is quite a different activity).

But I’ve found a few resources to help me in those questions, and I wanted to pass them along to you.

The first comes from a professor in the program from which I just graduated at NYU. A student posed the question to him: “What is good scholarship?” After consulting with other members of the department, he wrote a two-part reply on the department’s blog. While it doesn’t address the “Christian” side of our question, it’s quite useful for understanding what it means to a productive, responsible member of the scholarly community.  You can read both Part 1 and Part 2. Here’s an excerpt:

To find your way, you’ll need a sense of balance between an openness to the world and a suspicion of its honesty, between faith in the reality of knowledge and skepticism that anything can be truly known, between construction and deconstruction. At the same time, you’ll want to rely on your ability to be creative. That doesn’t always mean coming up with a dramatically new argument or composing a revolutionary piece of literature. Most enduring knowledge builds by increments on what’s come before and the majority of scholarship—even some of the best—is more methodical than grandiose. There is creativity in finding (and recognizing) a new and valuable source of information, in saying things in subtly new ways that open up novel routes of thought and research, and in combining existing ideas in unexpected constellations.

To address the “Christian” side of this, the always-thoughtful Nicolas Wolterstorff delivered a talk at the Veritas Forum last fall that InterVarsity’s Emerging Scholars Network posted on their website.

I think of the various academic disciplines very differently. I think of them as social practices, some, like philosophy, with a long ancestry, some, like molecular biology, of recent origin. And I think of these practices as constantly changing due to all sorts of developments both inside and outside the discipline. I hold, thus, that natural science does not have an essence, nor does philosophy. What they have instead is traditions that are constantly changing, sometimes slowly, sometimes abruptly.

The application relevant to our topic is this: the Christian scholar participates as Christian in those social practices that are the disciplines. Those practices are not a project of the Christian community, nor are they the project of some anti-Christian community. They are human; they belong to all of us together – just as the state is not for Christians nor for non-Christians but for all of us together.

And now to make my opening point again: the mode of the Christian’s participation in these on-going, ever-changing, social practices is to think with a Christian mind and to speak with a Christian voice.

So, what do you think?