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The Third Degree

92 missions this academic year

In 1919 a student called Norman Grubb began the Cambridge Inter-Collegiate Christian Union in response to a theologically-weakened Student Christian Movement. Within the space of a few years, new Christian Unions sprang up around the UK and, in 1928, Grubb established Inter-Varsity Fellowship with a vision to see ‘an evangelical witnessing community on every university campus’.

79 years later, nothing has changed except the name. UCCF: The Christian Unions is still focused on making disciples of Jesus Christ in the student world and, just as Grubb had hoped, the gospel is proclaimed by witnessing communities on more than 300 university campuses across the country. This original vision is being powerfully worked out in 2007 as 92 Christian Unions (CUs) have held missions: weeks of intensive evangelism and gospel proclamation on their campuses.

Bishop Grosseteste College

BGC CU are a small group of students (15-20) who were recently thrown out of their Students Union (SU), derecognised as a Student Society and had their bank account frozen. The SU sent along a ‘spy’ to the CU meeting, which happened to be one of the PURE course sessions which teaches about the biblical view of sex and relationships. The girl enjoyed it so much that she went back the following night and took her boyfriend with her.

After much prayer and some discussion, the SU decided to reinstate the CU one week before the mission. During the mission, three students became Christians that week, including the girl who had come as an SU spy.

Nottingham University

Nottingham CU’s ‘Who?’ week was designed to get every student at Nottingham University asking ‘Who is Jesus really?’ The week contained a lot of high profile evangelism, which is possible for this massive CU. Lunch bars were held at several venues across the campus, a cafˇ in the SU building proved to be a great base for the week, Will Stileman spoke at the evening meetings, and it was great to see after one of these talks various members of the Islamic society chatting things through with Christians afterwards. The CU mobilised their 300+ members during the week and held events in almost every pub, hall of residence, faculty and house on campus.

Bradford University

Mark Stone, Staff Worker in Bradford, told us: ‘One day during the mission week I was sat on the CU stall, looking after the publicity while some students were doing questionnaires, and a Pakistani girl walked up to the table and asked what was going on. I told her about the events planned and invited her to come. We started to do a questionnaire, but after the first question she asked, “What is the Trinity and what is a Christian?” Her hunger for truth and her openness to the gospel was staggering. She read the Bible with me as we sat for half an hour talking about who Jesus is and what he had done to save us. She went away with all the tracts, gospels and literature she could get her hands on saying she would read them all!’

Bournemouth University

The CU at Bournemouth University had some great press coverage in their local newspaper this month. The CU is made up of around 60 students and they held a mission week towards the end of last term. The reporter from the Bournemouth Echo came along to a CU meeting, was obviously impressed with what she saw there, and her positivity was reflected in the article. There has recently been a ‘Be thinking group’ started by the CU where students can meet together to discuss apologetics issues. At the first meeting, five students met together to discuss the validity and purpose of apologetics.

Aberystwyth University

A group of atheists got quite worked up by the CU’s publicity and decided, under the cover of darkness, to put up anti-religion posters all over the campus. Jonathan Thomas, the Missioner for the week, happened to be returning to his car around 3.00 am after talking to some students and he stopped to talk to them about the posters they had put up. He then asked if they were planning to attend any of the events, as he was the main speaker for the week. As a result, two of the atheists came to lunch bars and an evening event. They also met Jonathan for coffee and were willing to read some books he offered.

It used to be traditional for CUs to hold a mission every three years. Now, many are planning to run these weeks every year. In a constantly secularising and pluralising society, one could be forgiven for expecting Christian students to retreat to safety. They are not: they are taking the battle to unbelief on their campuses, living radically and speaking openly for Jesus Christ. 79 years have passed since Norman Grubb’s idea, but the vision remains exactly the same.

Daniel Hames,
UCCF