So, I was leading a Breakout session at National Collegiate Week in New Mexico when a nice lady who had come to help cook for their college group raised her hand and said, "Why don't church college ministries and campus ministry work together? You could feel a lot of the air in the room go out. We just don't talk about that out loud in front of polite company.
So, here is the deal....it is complicated. Some try and some don't try....on both sides. The BCM/BSM/BSU College Ministers I know have working with churches as a key part of their job description and generally work hard at making it happen.
Here are some of the factors that complicate the situation:
1. "There are plenty of college students to go around." is one of the common things said. And, that is absolutely true. But, here is what is also true. For a college ministry to work and go well, you need good student leaders and there is often a shortage of those. So, there is often some tug and pull for them. Often churches are able to pay for some "interns" and obviously getting paid to do it and doing it for free on campus is different.
2. Church College Ministers tend to feel more pressure to produce numbers. I am not sure why that is, but I have found it to be generally true. For some, that pressure comes from the pastor and for others it is trying to demonstrate the validity of their position and their budget. A friend of mine who went from being campus based to church based at a large church got fussed at by the pastor for their student numbers being down the first weekend there was not a home football game. Students had gone home for the weekend.
3. One campus based College Minister said, "The churches hire my best graduates or upperclassmen to do their college ministry and they turn around and do exactly what they experienced on campus in my ministry." I (Arliss) believe that church based and campus based should look different. One of the keys of church based college ministry is to connect students to the church as a whole. That is harder than just having a student event. When the ministries look the same, why go to both?
4. Generally (and this is a generalization) Campus Based College Ministers and Church Based College Ministers are different. For some years I worked as a part time consultant in college ministry for Lifeway where I worked on the National Collegiate Ministers Summit, a once every 3 year meeting. What we generally found was that Church Based College Ministers wanted preaching and Campus Based wanted more "How to" Breakouts. Partly, Church College Ministers tend to be more speaker types, but I see that shifting now with more wanting campus College Ministers to be speakers.
5. Church Based College Ministry positions tend to turn over more frequently. Some years ago in my role with Lifeway, I was trying to get an accurate number of how many churches in the SBC had College Ministers. It is not nearly as many as you might think. I called the State BCM/BSM/BSU coordinator in each state and to a person, each said, it is hard to give you a number because they turn over so quickly. I think part of that goes back to Number 2. But, it has seemed that many Church College Ministers see themselves moving toward the pastorate when the opportunity comes and Campus College Ministers don't seem prone that direction as much. Because of turnover, then new Church College Ministers are scrambling to get a crowd and being "cooperative" gets lost in the shuffle.
6. Campus Based College Ministers resent that their ministry gets compared unfavorably to Church College Ministries that often tend to have much larger budgets and lots of interns or even multiple staff members. It is not apples to apples comparisons, but folks on the outside making those comparisons don't see that.
7. One "Un-cooperative" person in the mix can create an unhealthy tension or competition for all. Here are a couple of examples. One BCM Campus Minister invited all the church College Ministers to say a few words and introduce their ministry at their first BCM event. One announced and promoted his weekly meeting starting the next week that was the exact same day and time as the BCM one. Another campus based told the story of organizing a Progressive Dinner for Freshmen through all the churches. At the first stop they had all kind of fun things going on and the College Minister announced if they wanted to just stay there instead of going on, they would take them back to campus. A large number stayed and the rest of the churches only saw about half what they had planned for.
8. One Campus College Minister said, "The churches want me to give all my students and especially student leaders to them, but I have to be big and strong enough to help the churches."
Should Campus Based and Church Based College Ministries work together? Yes...without a doubt. But, it is complicated and takes extra work. Sometimes, one is willing and the other is not or they see differently what that means and how it will affect them.
"Teacher, said John, we saw a man driving out demons in your name and we told him to stop, because he was not one of us. Do not stop him, Jesus said. No one who does a miracle in my name can in the next moment say anything bad about me, for whoever is not against us is for us." Mark 9:38-40
"30 Devotionals for College Freshmen" Amazon.com/dp/B0H8K6L1QX
"Reaching MORE College Students" Amazon.com/dp/B0BMW8NPMN
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