A Different College Experience

Following Christ in College

Brian Mills, Ben Trueblood

• Publisher: B&H Books
• Year: 2019
• Print ISBN: 9781462794249
• eBook ISBN: 9781462794256
• Topic: Theology & Religion
• Subtopic: Religion

For many, the college experience is defined by drinking, sex, impulsive decision-making, and a journey of self discovery. It's packaged as a consequence-free zone to have the "best time of your life." But the reality is that what happens in college doesn't stay in college. There are real, lasting consequences to your decisions. Student ministry leaders Ben Trueblood and Brian Mills have seen this firsthand. With decades of student-ministry leadership under their belts, they have seen too many lives fall apart because of the world's view of what the college experience should be. You don't have to have that kind of college experience. Fortunately, just as the gospel redeems all of life, the gospel redeems the college experience. It tells us there is another way. In this book, Ben and Brian provide a biblical and practical guide for how you can have a fun, joy-filled, and spiritually enriching college experience while avoiding the pitfalls that have captured so many before you.

Part 1

New Beginnings

Chapter 1

What Is the Gospel?

College is a challenging, yet rewarding season of life, filled with much change and uncertainty, but rich in new opportunities and growth. My first year of college I questioned the Lord’s faithfulness in my life. Had He led me to the right university? Would I ever have Christ-centered friendships? Is it really possible to live out my faith on a campus where many of the students are unchurched and haven’t even heard the name of Jesus?

I am three years into my college experience and I have seen the goodness and faithfulness of the Lord in my life particularly in those areas where doubt and uncertainty once flourished. Jesus . . . He really is good, faithful, and trustworthy in all areas of our lives. He writes a more beautiful story than anything you or I could ever write for ourselves. Amidst the Lord’s faithfulness, unfortunately there is a thief who wants to steal, kill, and destroy your life and mine. The enemy knows he can use this season of opportunity and growth to steal your hope and kill your dreams.

It is crucial to surround yourself with like-minded people who are running hard after Jesus, who can help keep you accountable in your walk with Christ. Staying spiritually healthy in college is challenging; however, by immersing yourself in godly community and staying in the Word of God, you can be victorious in this season of change. Surrounding myself with Christ-centered community is the best decision I have made during my time in college. This season of life brings much change—new city, new friends, new church, new everything, but you can hold tight to the truth that Jesus never changes, and just as He has shown Himself faithful in my life, He will show Himself faithful in yours.

—Meredith Franzke, junior, University of Arkansas studying Hospitality and Event Planning; Cross Church College small group leader; diamond doll with the University of Arkansas’s baseball team

You are in a unique moment in your life. You’ve heard that already. You can probably still hear the Dr. Seuss quotes and “one chapter is closing and an exciting new chapter is about to begin” echoing in your head from the graduation speech that already seems like so long ago. You are in a unique moment in your life because, for many of you, you’re taking responsibility for your life for the first time. Yes, you have lived with responsibility and consequences (some more than others) before, but to some extent, there has been the covering of parents, other family members, a caring teacher, or a church leader. Now, it is up to you.

The everyday decisions about when you will wake up, what you are going to eat, when you will find time for friends, if you will study, and how often you will wash your clothes now fall to you and you alone. The transition into the college years is a unique moment in your life, not just because you are transitioning schools and perhaps moving to a different place, but you are in a sense experiencing a transfer of ownership over your very own life. It is in this “transfer of ownership” that so many college students make choices that cause them and others incredible pain and baggage.

As a student pastor for many years I have seen students take ownership of their lives and live abundantly, experiencing the college years in a God-honoring, productive, and exciting way. And I have seen the opposite take place, including the life-altering consequences of what our culture would refer to as “the college experience.” Which will you choose? It’s a lot to take in, I know.

If there is one thing I want you to hear as you begin the journey through this book, it is this: There is hope. You can have an incredible college experience and close this next chapter of your life with relationships, memories, education, and a whole lot of fun, while avoiding the land mines that are in front of you. There is hope because of Jesus. There is hope because of what Jesus has done for you, what He can do in you, and what He hopes to do through you. And that is a fitting place to start our journey together here and your journey through the college years.

Dr. Jay Strack is a good friend of mine and is the president of an organization called Student Leadership University. He has spent his life pouring into teenagers and helping grow them into the leaders God has called them to be. A frequent statement I have heard him say applies directly to you at this point in your life: “In everyone’s life there is a point where the little boy or girl chooses to sit down and the man or woman chooses to stand up.” This is a statement of ownership and responsibility. We’ve mentioned a few of the everyday life kinds of things that you must now “own,” but in no way is it a complete list. Conspicuously absent from that list is the most important piece of your life to take ownership of: your spiritual life.

I know that there are people at various places in their spiritual journey who are sitting with this book right now. Some came to faith as a child, others as a teenager, some are trying to figure out what to do with Jesus, and some are still far from Him. Wherever you are in your spiritual journey, we all have the same starting point: the gospel of Jesus. Your understanding of the gospel is the single greatest influence on what your life will be like during your college years and into the future. So, in your faith, it is time for the little boy or girl to sit down and the man or woman to stand up.

Hand-Me-Down Faith

Let me shoot straight with you for a second.

If you grew up in church, in a Christian school or home, there’s a good chance that you believe what you do about the gospel because it is something your parents, teachers, youth pastor, or other church leaders taught you. It was something they passed on to you, and you believed them.

It’s great that these leaders in your life are Christians, but there’s a danger here: if I described you just now, there’s a good chance that, left on your own, you will be unable to explain why you believe what you do about the gospel. There’s a good chance that you are inconsistent at best with time that you spend reading your Bible and praying. And there’s a good chance that what you believe about the gospel hasn’t translated into specific ways that it shapes who you are and how you live.

Before you angrily close the book, hold on one more second and hear me out. I know there’s a good chance for these things to be true because I’ve seen thousands of students fit this description throughout my time in student ministry. And I’ve also fit this description myself.

As a high school student in a Christian home, involved in a great church, and at a Christian school, I had a hand-me-down faith. I believed it because other people whom I loved believed. Truth be told, I struggled in my faith, at times doubting my belief, and at other times being sure of it. Once the doubting of faith was settled, my struggle moved on to wondering if I was a good enough Christian, if I was strong enough in my faith. I was a leader in the youth ministry and was at that time the only one of three children “walking with Jesus” in the eyes of my parents. The expectations I felt were like a mountain of burden that lasted through my college years and beyond as I struggled to know if my faith was strong enough, if I was “good enough.”

Because of this I often found myself simply trying harder or giving more effort to living a “good Christian life,” but at the same time, I found myself on the losing side of my personal battles with sin and temptation. It was like I was constantly running but never going anywhere. This kind of life is painful and exhausting, and is the furthest thing from the abundant life that Jesus said is available to us (John 10:10).

The “good enough” struggle is a real one that plagues many, and it begins in the minds of believers who have not yet taken the step to truly own their faith. They’re still living in a hand-me-down Christianity. I was meant for so much more than life on a spiritual treadmill, constantly running and going nowhere. You are too. It’s time for you to jump off of the treadmill and take ownership of your faith, which begins with an understanding of the gospel.

The Gospel

What comes to your mind when you hear the word gospel? Literally, it means “good news.” So, the gospel of Jesus is literally the good news of Jesus.

J. D. Greear, in his book Gospel, defines it this way: “The gospel is the announcement that God has reconciled us to Himself by sending His Son Jesus to die as a substitute for our sins, and that all who repent and believe have eternal life in Him.”1 It may be the case that you’ve heard something like this before. If so, don’t move on from here thinking there isn’t anything more to learn. You were never meant to move on from the gospel to something else. Yes, it is where your life as a Christian begins; but it’s also where you are meant to stay as a person who follows Jesus. Martin Luther, a German theologian in the 1500s and a key influencer in the beginning of the Protestant Reformation, said about this, “to progress is always to begin again.” His point is that for a Christian to continue progressing, or growing, in his or her life with Jesus, he or she must return to the beginning where it all started: the gospel.

So, let’s take a few moments to begin again.

You are an image bearer of God. It is important that you remember this truth throughout this book and, more important, throughout your life. You bear God’s image. You are valuable and treasured.

In Genesis 1:27 we see that God created people in perfection and in His image. Then, in Genesis 3 we see the first sinful act of humanity. That sinful act had immediate consequences for Adam and Eve, and it has lasting consequences for us today. From that moment forward, all those born of a man and woman inherit a sinful nature. This sinful nature brings with it some of the same consequences that Adam and Eve experienced: death and separation from God. We don’t enter life in a neutral place before God; there’s no such thing. A person is either in relationship with God or separated from Him. Contrary to popular belief, there’s no middle ground.

Romans 3:23 says, “For all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God.” Every person enters this life separated from God because of sin. The Bible explains that we are helpless (Rom. 5:6), enemies of God (Rom. 5:10), that we are alienated from Him (Col. 1:21), and deserving of His wrath because of our sin (Eph. 2:3). The post-Genesis 3 picture is pretty bleak.

Since that first act of rebellion against God, sin has brought devastation to people’s lives. It has brought devastation to my own life through the separation that exists with God upon entering this world, and it has brought devastation through my own choices to sin. Sin only brings devastation, and its offspring is more sin and more devastation.

At this moment in your life, you are about to be exposed to more opportunity to sin and more kinds of sin than at any point in your life previously. The college campus can be rampant with drunkenness, drugs, and sexual sin, and your choices in these years—whether to participate or to abstain—will have long-lasting consequences for you. You need to understand that what happens in college does not stay in college.

At this point it would be easy to wallow in our sinful state and go on and on about how sinful we are, and some people do. This would be a mistake. It is necessary for us to realize our sin because we can never understand the depth of our salvation until we understand the depth of our sin, but sin isn’t the main character of the story. Yes, sin has tainted the good picture that we saw at creation, but God is working to restore His image fully in us. He loves us so much that He provided a way for us to be with Him again rather than leave us in an alienated state before Him. He would rather have us as His children than His enemies.

We are more sinful that we will ever know, but at the same time, we are more loved than we could ever imagine.

He loves us so much, in fact, that He made a way for us to be back in a right relationship with Him. Romans 6:23 sums up this idea perfectly: “For the wages of sin is death, but the ...

Table of contents

• Preface
• Part 1: New Beginnings
• Part 2: Identity
• Part 3: The Church
• Part 4: Pitfalls and How to Avoid Them
• Part 5: Relationships
• Part 6: A Foundation for Success
• Conclusion