Merry Christmas!

Enough said!

National Collegiate Conference | The Navigators

Back in late October, Lindsay and I had the privilege of spending 6 days in Destin, Florida (on the pan handle) to attend our Navigators National Collegiate Conference (once every 4 years). We love these type of conferences, because they always remind us of the greater vision and work of God's Kingdom on the college campus. I can be easy to loose sight of this vision as we get into the day-to-day work. It was also a wonderful time of relaxation, rest, beach time (boogie boarding & body surfing), and taking in the warm weather while we could ; )

Part of my (Matt's) responsibilities while we were there was to help train the younger staff in regards to ministry with The Navigators. We had a wonderful brief time with a few different 'classes' of these young Navigators staffers who are involved the full-time short-term program called the EDGE Corps (1-2 year collegiate ministry experience). These young staff are the future generations of The Navigators, but more importantly the future laborers in the Lord's harvest! Above is a photo of all of them.

Thank you so much for praying and laboring with us to see more workers raised up in the harvest (Matthew 9:35-39)!

Here a few more photos from our time in Florida.

This guy here, and the gal below, and some good friends of ours who are also on staff with The Navigators.

The beach was beautiful!

*Special Funding Update*

*Our latest email update*

Dear Friends,

I write to you in great thanksgiving and praise, as well as in need.

When Lindsay and I think of you, we are greatly encouraged and humbled. Your partnership in ministry has been and continues to be invaluable to the advancement of the Gospel at Cornell University in Ithaca, NY. You have “helped us on our way” (Romans 15:24), and we are so grateful for that. You have labored along side of us in the Lord’s harvest fields at Cornell through your faithful prayer and financial partnership. You have fought the battle, shoulder to shoulder with us, as you interced for us and for the students to whom we minister. Thank you. The words of Paul to the Philippians resonate deeply with us whenever we think of you:

"I thank my God every time I remember you. In all my prayers for all of you, I always pray with joy because of your partnership in the gospel from the first day until now"Philippians 1:3-5

There are numerous stories that we could tell of how Christ’s Kingdom is advancing at Cornell University. I could tell you about Jessica and her Investigative Bible Discussion (IBD) among her fellow teammates, who don’t know Christ, on the crew (rowing) team. Or I could share about Mallory, who has yet to trust Christ, in Lindsay’s weekly Bible study who loves to come, dive into the Bible, ask great questions, and give great answers. Or I could tell stories of our energetic, loving, and eager new class of freshmen.

Your labor in ministry with us has been key to the advancement of the Gospel here among Cornell students. We are humbled, grateful, and hopeful as we continue to seek to live and disciple among the lost here in Ithaca, NY!

Even as I write, we are currently on “Fund-raising Assignment”. Our account is currently in deficit, and we have been required to shift our focus from ministry on the campus to primarily on fund-raising. To minimize the growth of the deficit our salary will be decreased by 25% as well. The Navigators have these guidelines in place for our long-term financial stability and health in ministry.

We have yet to reach our full budget goal, we are at 89% for this academic year. That leaves about $9,000 left to raise. Our deficit is partly due to outstanding & year-end pledges, some that are coming in. Also, November was a very lean month for donor income, only about have half of what we needed came into our account.

Our vision and desire is to be on campus at Cornell in full capacity, to see the Gospel of Jesus and His Kingdom advanced there, through spiritual generations of laborers living and discipling among the lost! We are currently unable to do that without the adequate financial partnership. We need your prayers.

Please pray with us for:

1. The Lord to move hearts to bring in a wide response from our end of the year funding letter (sent 3 weeks ago).
2. The Lord to connect us with new prayer & financial partnering churches and individuals who are excited about the advancement of Christ’s Kingdom.
3. The Lord to provide continued and increased financial partnership in ministry.
4. The Gospel of Jesus and His Kingdom to advance at Cornell University and beyond!

*If you, or someone else you know (feel free to forward them this post), would like to give right now you can do so easily and quickly online at The Navigators website (gifts of any and all sizes are welcome, one-time or recurring, via Credit Card, Debit Card, or Checking Account):

To Donate Click Here (type “kinnick” to search for us)

For other ways to partner with us financially, see the bottom of this email.

Thanks for rolling up your sleeves and wading into the harvest fields with us,

Matt & Lindsay

*Names have been changed to protect confidentiality

'Tis The Season!

We had our first snow in downtown Ithaca that stuck, today! We are feeling especially in the mood of Christmas. Christmas cookies baking, Christmas music playing, and craving some egg nog.

We hope you are all enjoying this wonderful time of year (whether you have snow or not).

Thanks for being with us!

M&L

09 Fall Campus Photos

Here are some fun photos I snapped with my phone over the last few weeks. Enjoy. This is a beautiful time of year. Click here to view the rest.

First 2 Weeks Over

The dust has settled. Orientation week is now behind us. The freshmen are begin to settle into their schedules & routines. They have just finished their first full week of classes.

Thank you all so much for your thoughts & prayers during this busy & crucial time for us. Our fall launch went efficiently and smoothly. Some unpleasant details & red tape got worked out, and we connected with several eager first year students!

A quick recap ...

√ Orientation Week ("O Week") - August 21-30

√ Sunday, August 23 - Freshmen "Block Party"

Our sophomores came out strong for this one! We did a bunch of spiritual interest surveys (gauging the freshmen interest in reading the Bible). We gave out freezie-pops and gave out cards with info of our events during "O Week".

√ Tuesday, August 25 - Noon-3pm, Cornell Christian Fellowship Fair

We hung out in the beautiful, sunny, blue-skied day handing out more spiritual interest surveys and connecting with those that we had already seen that previous Sunday at the Block Party. Great weather; great turn out! Lots more surveys taken, and freezie-pops given out. An excellent turn out from our returning sophomores & juniors.

√ 4:30-5:30pm, Survey Follow-Up

We had a great group of motivated & excited sophomores come out with us to call up the freshmen we surveyed who recorded an interest in reading the Bible, etc! Unfortunately, the university had some freshmen events scheduled that we did not anticipate, but we still were able to connect with a few & give them our Nav backpacks with free stuff in them (i.e. playing card, new testament, candy, etc).

√ Wednesday, August 26 - 4pm, Ultimate Frisbee Game

We didn't have as many surveyed students show up as we had hoped. But it was a great opportunity to meet random freshmen interested in playing! We also had a good turn out from sophomore and junior students.

√ 7:30-Midnight, Survey Follow-up & Movie Night

Jeff (not his real name), whom I have been discipling for the last year, and I got together on Tuesday and planned a movie night with root beer floats for Wednesday night. We followed up surveys with another good crew and were able to connect with several freshmen men & women! And later that night we had 9 freshmen come to our movie night! Very encouraging.

√ Friday, August 28 - First Nav-Night

We had about 15 freshmen show up! Doug (campus director) spoke on The Navigator's calling statement, "To advance the gospel of Jesus and His kingdom into the nations through spiritual generations of laborers, living and discipling among the lost". Afterwards, we ate desserts provided by other Nav students, hung out and talked, and most students went down to an upperclassmen's apartment and we played the game Scene-it!. At this point we were a little shocked at how much these same freshmen have continued to show up at!

√ Saturday, August 29 - Ultimate Frisbee & Malts

Pretty simple, we played frisbee, and then got malts & milkshakes from a local joint. Not a lot of surveyed freshmen, but lots of random freshmen and a good turnout from upperclassmen.

√ Fast forward to Friday, September 6 - 2nd Nav-Night

I (Matt) spoke on the topic of "Lordship" from Luke 6:46-49. Our theme verse for the semester is from Colossians, the epistle that we will be studying all semester in our Bible studies:

(Sorry about the awkward photo; but you get the idea.)

Colossians 2:6-7 "So then, just as you received Christ Jesus as Lord, continue to live in him, rooted and built up in him, strengthened in the faith as you were taught, and overflowing with thankfulness." NIV We have our Nav-Night topics all extracted from this verse to guide our semester.

Thank you all, again, so much for laboring with us in prayer for Cornell, and specifically this incoming freshmen class! We are so encouraged to have a team of co-laborers wading into the harvest fields with us. We certainly have felt your prayers and the Lord's hand with us in these last few weeks.

M&L

P.S. Remember the raffle we were doing for the $100 gift card to Target, by guessing how many pieces of candy were in the jar? Well, the winner was only off by 1! There were 1,275 pieces of candy in the jar.

Freshmen Block Party

We just had our first official event in regards to Orientation Week ("O" Week) last night. From 5-7pm we had our Cornell Navigators table setup where we handed out "30 second spiritual interest surveys". These consist of a few questions about their views/interest concerning God, Jesus, and a Bible discussion/study.

To encourage the students in these surveys, we are raffling off a $100 gift card to Target. The winner will be chosen sometime next week probably. They enter the raffle by taking the survey and guessing how much candy is in a jar. The person closest to the correct number of pieces wins the gift card. Oh yeah, and we give each person an ice-pop for free too!

I'm not sure how many surveys we filled out last night, but it was a lot! It was wonderful & exciting to see our sophomore students (who were freshmen last year) jump right into the middle of things and ask people to fill out our surveys. They have a great energy and motivation that we are encouraged by and thank God for!

Here is our schedule for this week; please pray with us and for us over these!

Monday, August 24 (Today)
3:45pm-5:30pm - We will be visiting surveyed students at their dorms, inviting them to events this week and giving them a bag of free stuff

7pm-10pm - Our student leadership team will meet together to plan and pray, as well as have some ice cream

Tuesday, August 25
Noon-3pm - The Cornell Christian Fellowship Fair will be held; this is where all the Christian fellowships at Cornell have a BBQ to encourage the incoming freshmen to plug into a community of believers (this is a huge time for surveys for us)
7 pm-8pm - We will be following up freshmen surveys again

Wednesday, August 26
2pm-4pm - We will try to get some freshmen together to play ultimate or football with us, to further connect with those surveyed and build friendships
6pm - Dinner at campus dining hall to reconnect with other returning Nav students
7pm-8pm - We will continue to follow up more surveys

Thursday, August 27 - First Day of Classes
7pm-8pm - We will continue to follow up more surveys

Friday, August 28
7:30pm - Our first Nav-Night of the year

Saturday, August 29
Do some fun activity to further connect with surveyed freshmen and build deeper friendships

All these points of contact with the freshmen, and other students, are great opportunities to have impromptu discussions about faith, Jesus, religion, etc; and to build relationships of trust and understanding! Please pray with us and for us, that the Lord would make us keen observers (attentive to His Spirit), attentive listeners, loving and serving boldly, and speaking clearly the good news of Jesus and His beautiful gospel; letting our speech "always be gracious, seasoned with salt" (Colossians 4:2-6).

Here are some photos from the Block Party last night (Sunday, Aug. 23):

Some of our sophomores and juniors helping out with surveys. I (Matt) am holding the candy jar over my head so those around being surveyed can see it to make a guess.

Some of our sophomore and junior women helping out.

Junior guys.

Our Navigator campus director on the left, Doug, behind our table at the Block Party. Our other staff woman is to Doug's left, handing out surveys and ice-pops.