Life at times can make you feel as if you’re drowning.  As if you’re all by yourself, alone.  Especially at the beginning of a new school semester.  You walk into your new classes with the potential of not knowing another human being there.  You’ve got the chance to get some whack professor that drives you nuts. Both human nature and society tell us that we have to fight the loneliness on our own.  It’s a dog eat dog world out there and from birth we are trained to fight to get to the top, no matter what it costs our relationships. 

            But what if I told you all of this was completely untrue.  Completely unbiblical.  The opposite of the Kingdom Mindset.

            Everything we know about fighting alone is wrong.

            Surprise, sorry to break the news to you, but c’mon someone had to.  No where ever in the Bible does it say to walk alone.  Not one place does it talk about fighting your demons by yourself. 

SO WHAT BETTER TIME TO LEARN TO LIVE IN COMMUNITY THEN THE BEGINNING OF A NEW SEMESTER?

The author of Hebrews says in chapter ten verse 24-25, “Let’s see how inventive we can be in encouraging love and helping out, not avoiding worshiping together as some do, but spurring each other on especially as we see the big Day approaching.”

HMMMM.

So we aren’t supposed to hide and do our own things.  You’re telling me we need to be creative in finding ways to love others?  We are supposed to gather and worship together?  That seems counter cultural.  I wont lie, I will be the first to tell you that a bunch of gatherings and weird get togethers seem pretty dorky.  I want no part of that. 

But here I see in the Bible that togetherness is so important for preparing for the coming of Jesus. 

In Psalm 133:1 David says, “How wonderful, how beautiful, when brothers and sisters get along!’

What if I told you that we are looking to create a space where friendship between believers comes alive?  A space where a community thrived on being creative.  A place where Christ is at the center of all friendship and community that transpires.  What if there was a place where you were accepted for who you are, but challenged to be who God created you to be.  What if there was a place so attractive that others knew there was something different about those participating?

What if that place existed now?

Welcome to Impact at IUPUI.

We exist to pursue Jesus.  Model His actions.  And teach others.

But we also exist to be a community of believers that supports one another in whatever adventures college life throws at us.  We exist to create life long friendships between believers.  We are here to change the look of the campus of IUPUI.  We exist to change the landscape of Indianapolis.  We are present to transform lives.

All we need now is you. 

Connor LaGrange, Impact at IUPUI Vice President of Fellowship

Photo cred: Taylor Sidwell

team - a group of players forming one side in a competitive game or sport; two or more people working together.

At our first night of worship this semester, we heard teaching on the importance of teams in our lives, a lesson I have struggled to learn these past three years at IUPUI. No Christian is meant to serve God in isolation. As I reflected on my own journey, I considered why it was so hard for me to identify my team. I realized that, until recently, I didn’t know what a team was meant to look like. Fortunately, the founding Christians had to learn this valuable lesson, too.

“All these with one accord were devoting themselves to prayer, together with the women and Mary the mother of Jesus, and his brothers.” Acts 1:14

After Jesus ascended, the disciples gathered in Jerusalem to pray. They had no idea what lay in store for them, so they did what preparation they could: intense prayer.

When I identify the teams in my life, they are most certainly the groups of people I pray with: my husband, my close friends, and my mentors. I have been blessed to be part of a tight-knit group of Christians for the last three years, and they have prayed me through some of the most challenging moments of college. We frequently message one another offering to pray, and for a semester we met weekly in the halls between classes to pray for our classmates.

“When the day of Pentecost arrived, they were all together in one place.” Acts 2:1

At the very moment of the coming of the Spirit of God, all of the apostles were together.

To me, this is the most obvious mark of a team. I have a few close friends left from high school, and I still get a lot of joy from keeping up with them. But as much as I enjoy their company, they are not my team. Why?

My team is the group of believers I meet with regularly. I have prioritized my life groups in my weeks. As much as I can, I try and meet with them every week. They have been with me, and I with them, in the most profound moments of God working in our lives. They have seen me laugh, and cry, and fall asleep during conversations. They have been able to tell, without my saying a word, those moments I am struggling inside. These relationships did not appear out of thin air.

By God’s grace, my team has grown together through regular, intentional gathering.

“And they devoted themselves to the apostles' teaching and the fellowship, to the breaking of bread and the prayers… And day by day, attending the temple together and breaking bread in their homes, they received their food with glad and generous hearts, praising God and having favor with all the people. And the Lord added to their number day by day those who were being saved.” Acts 2:42, 46-47

The end of Acts 2 gives a beautiful model of a church community - eating together, gathering in homes, worshiping, teaching, learning. What happened when this community gathered? They had favor with non-believers around them, and the Lord increased the number of those saved daily.

In my life, I have seen my team grow and shrink. Some of my friends have graduated, moved away, or transitioned to a new phase in life. Others have brought new Christians into our life group, and they have quickly become as much a team member as those before. Don’t be afraid to let go of those who are leaving. They will soon get the chance to form new teams of Christians and build the body of believers wherever they end up! Don’t be afraid to welcome new people into your team. They may soon become your most trusted friend.

The church as God intended it is a collection of believers who “stir up one another to love and good works” (Heb. 10:24). How can you be stirred up if you are alone? More importantly, how can you stir others if you have not chosen to gather, pray, and grow?

A team will not happen by chance. If you look at any sports team with any amount of success you will find at least two common characteristics: first, that they all have the same goal in mind; second, that they all meet regularly to plan and perfect the methods needed to reach this goal. Our goal is laid out by the gospels: to reach everyone in the world with the good news of salvation. We must intentionally devote our time to the lives of those around us to pray, meet, and grow. I pray that you will find a team as you seek God and his goal during your college career.

“It will be great for you!” my mom said. “You’ll meet new people!”
“I like the people I already know,” I replied, with just a note of sarcasm. 

Looking back at my lack of interest in making friends when I started college, the irony is palpable. At seventeen, I could count my close friends on one hand with two fingers still folded under and, frankly, I was skeptical that IUPUI would provide anyone I cared to know.

(Let’s just establish that seventeen-year-old me was neither a very sociable nor a very wise person.)

Fortunately, that attitude changed. As I sat in classes and attended campus events because my mother wanted me to, I realized there were people I cared to know here. There were a lot with whom I didn’t share interests or values, but then there were some who loved Jesus or loved the same things I did. There were even a few that seemed like real friend material. Now the only challenge was that I didn’t live with them. Most people I met freshman year lived on campus, many of them in the same community. I lived in a house I had to go home to every night, where I shared a room with my sister and was expected to update my mom on what happened each day. I’m already an introvert, and I could easily not have built deep relationships with people on campus. 

In retrospect, this is one of many instances where I see how God is faithful to give me what I don’t even know I need. Because he did put me in contact with wonderful people who reached out to me when I wouldn’t have reached out to them. My first semester, I got involved with a Bible study that met on campus and consisted mostly of people who lived there, and who were lovely and thoughtful enough to include me. They didn’t have to do that. But they did, because they were obedient to God’s command to love, and they loved me well.

This feels oddly like product placement, and it isn’t meant that way, but people, my Bible study is awesome. It was awesome first semester when I was just meeting people, desperately trying to belong, and feeling jealous that they got to hang out after I went home. It was awesome sophomore year, when there were some new people, and I got to be part of the group that welcomed them like others had welcomed me, just because I’d kept coming. It was awesome junior year, when we decided to move it to my house, because one of the very best parts about not living with the campus crowd is that I can offer my home as a place for others to get away from campus and to remember that community is bigger and deeper than the people on your hall. Because I have a dining room table just perfect for suppers and card games, a mother with the gift of hospitality in buckets, a father who is so gracious with people singing noisy praise to Jesus at all hours of the night, and a living room that can always hold more people than I expect. 

This community is not just one of my favorite parts of college. It’s one of my favorite parts of my whole life. And it’s a part I didn’t know I needed. I didn’t ask God for kind people to welcome me and for friendships that could start on campus and overflow. I can take zero credit in making it happen. He drops grace right in front of me, and all I have to do is look up. 

Don’t get me wrong, building and maintaining school relationships as a commuter student takes work. It feels like work sometimes to go to an event at the end of the day when I’ve been carrying my backpack around for eleven hours and really only want to go home. It takes grace to know that I simply cannot be part of everything happening on campus, because when I’m there, I’m there for school. It takes patience and attention to balance school and social obligations with the fact that I still live with a family who wants to see me every once in a while. 

Sometimes all those factors are quite a load, and I’m not trying to say that community just blossoms perfectly with zero effort. What I’m trying to say is that God is faithful. God is faithful to put people in front of me who point me to him. He is faithful to give me what I need regardless of whether I know I need it. He doesn’t send people off into voids and then forget about them. Sometimes finding fellowship takes work, and sometimes it doesn’t happen the way we want. But all the “sometimes” moments put together don’t cancel out God’s always faithfulness. 

He is with us. And he gives his children good gifts. 

Krystiana Kosobucki, Student in Impact at IUPUI