My friends!
This past month amazing! So many of the seeds we put our energy toward sowing in August have begun to sprout into amazing friendships, spiritual relationships, and lives being pushed to encounter Christ! I've been so encouraged by our Richland College FOCUS ministry. This is my fourth year as campus pastor of Richland FOCUS and each year I get more and more excited with the students that God is sending to our group. One student specifically, Garrison, has really been an encouragement to me. He walked up to me after one of our Friday Night Fellowship times and thanked me for meeting him during welcome week. He told me that he is so grateful for the friendships in his life and the way we have made his time in college an enjoyment! He even said that he wakes up in the morning excited to come to campus!
He is just one of the many different people that are being touched by your support and partnership. Meeting students like Garrison give me energy and remind me what this is all about: impacting students. He is just one story but I can tell you that many other students are experiencing the same kind of love and community that God is providing them with through our community.
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| One of our Richland FOCUS gatherings! Our students come every Wednesday @ 11:00am to fellowship, share in God's word, and pray for each other. |
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| Our Richland FOCUS ministry @ Fall Camp! I'm so grateful for this group of students! They love each other so well and are very engaging with new students! |
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| Peter & Emily (our UT Dallas FOCUS Staff) leading us in "You In Action" during Friday Night FOCUS. So grateful to work with these people! |
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| This year we have split our UTD Friday Night Fellowship times into 2 services. We now have a Tuesday Night FOCUS and a Friday Night FOCUS. The shifting has been a bit of a challenge and has caused us to work extra hard in figuring out how to divide our staff, student leaders, and time - but God has been so faithful & good throughout this! This is a picture of our Tuesday Night FOCUS gatherings! |
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| One of our Friday Night Fellowship time(s)! |
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| Casey & Joey, two student leaders that I spend weekly time with, decided to make an announcement and wish one of the guys in their core a happy birthday! |
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| I had the privilege of teaching our FOCUS Worship Class, "So, You Think You Can Worship?". It was a great class and we had an amazing discussion with the students there. We talked through the way of worship, the why of worship, worship in the corporate setting, and the worship pastor. The discussion was so lively and we all grew in our knowledge and understanding of worship. |
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| Evan, one of our student leaders, sharing during Richland FOCUS about how God is working in his life! |
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| Our UTD Fall Camp students worshiping with each other! |
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| This was what the inside of our Richland FOCUS cabin looked like throughout fall camp. This was the first year that we did our fall camp separately from UT Dallas. We were a bit nervous, but I think that it was very intimate and our students grew so close with each other! |
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| Thank you so much for your support! Our Richland FOCUS ministry has been blessed richly through your prayer and financial support! Your partnership is helping build God's kingdom here & now! |
I'm honored to have you all on my team :) Thank you for believing in me all of these years and for pushing us to not give up on our calling - to make and mature disciples on God's college campus.
Please don't hesitate to contact me if you ever need prayer for anything in your life. I will be in touch with you all soon!
Your brother & campus missionary,
Sirak
