The Semester is Here!

Photo: (Top) The UTD BSM staff atop the Southside Building near downtown Dallas during a staff outing), (Bottom left) Kaitlin graduating with her Master's of Arts in Global Leadership, (Bottom right) Stopping to take a picture at Chess Plaza on our first day at UT Dallas. 

Whew! Since we last posted, we have moved our furniture and boxes to storage in Dallas (as the first house didn't work out), gone through a week of Texas BSM annual training, began working with our new BSM team, and Kaitlin graduated with her master's degree. The days have been full but so good!

The house we asked you to pray about fell through (which ended up being a money pit so this was a good thing), but God has provided us with an even better house. We are thankful for our friends who are letting us live with them until we close on the new house in a little more than a week. This house is three streets from campus, in better shape than the other one and a better price! God has answered our prayers in this housing journey... to Him be the glory! 

Our new team is wonderful (top picture is of )! We are working with Brady (associate director), Jourdan (cross cultural specialist), Kasey (campus missionary) and Daniel (campus missionary). We are excited to minister alongside this crew this year!  
 
Would you pray for us as Sunday begins three very full weeks of intentional outreach on campus? These are key times to connect with students and get them plugged into small groups and other connection points. What happens these three weeks sets the tone for the rest of the semester! We believe that God has already been working in students' hearts before they arrive on campus and we are excited to engage them with spiritual conversations this semester! 

We'll send you more updates throughout Welcome Weeks! 

Thanks for your support and partnership in ministering to UTD students! 

- Mark and Kaitlin 

Prayer Requests

• On Sunday, the BSM, along with several other campus ministries and area churches, is hosting the Big Howdy, a welcome party for new international students. We are expecting about 2,000 international students, and many volunteers from local churches will be there to connect with students. Would you pray that this party will be the catalyst for deep relationships to for, ones where the gospel will be able to be shared with these new students this year?

• Sunday night through Tuesday will be our BSM student leadership retreat. Will you pray that this time is one where the students are equipped and encourage to love the Lord and love others at UTD well? Will you pray that enthusiasm for the gospel bubbles up in the students' hearts and that we staff will be led by the Spirit to shepherd them well? 

• On Thursday, Aug. 17 and Friday, Aug. 18, some of the BSM leadership team will be helping move freshmen into the dorms. Will you pray that the lead team will be able to form relationships with freshmen and that many of the new students will join the weekly freshmen small groups? 

• On Saturday, Aug. 19, we will be hosting along with a few other ministries and local churches a garage giveaway so that international students can get furniture and housewares for free. Will you pray that more volunteers will sign up to help deliver furniture to the students and that this serve will allow for relationships to form with the international students? 

• Days will be VERY full so please pray that we BSM staff and students rely on the filling of the Spirit and that we are expect of God to do a great work on our campus this fall. 

New Ministry Doors Opening for Us at UT Dallas!

Our first day at UTD, standing in Chess Plaza, one of the iconic locations on campus! 

Once we returned from England, we thought we would be settling into a normal summer, but God had other plans. As of late June, we accepted new positions with the UT Dallas BSM and moved July 16 to Richardson, TX. 

Right before we le for England, we learned that the BSM director at UT Dallas was stepping down due to her husband getting a job out of state. Before we moved to Houston, Mark was the part-time BSM associate director at UT Dallas while he was attending seminary, and this school has always had a special place in our hearts. We always said that if the BSM job became available, then we would ask the Lord if it was time to apply.

We just thought that would be about 5 more years down the road, if at all. Initially, Mark was not interested in a change as he has loved his time at HBU. But a few days later, he felt the Lord say we needed to put all options on the table and let the Lord lead and guide us. So we sent in our resumes the day before we le for England out of obedience. 

A few days before we nished our mission trip in England, the state BSM o ce emailed Mark saying they wanted him to interview for the job. We went to Dallas a couple of days a er returning from England. The state staff seemed to think Mark would be a good t, and Mark loved the vision they had for the campus and area.  

A week later, the state o ce called Mark and said they wanted to move forward with us. On June 15, we went through the final interview rounds, and at the end of the day, they offered us the job!

As we have sought the Lord in this journey, He has brought confirmation that this is the next journey for us. We are thrilled that we will get to work on the same campus. And I’m so excited as there are 8,000 international students at UTD (It’s now the Texas school with the most international students!).

We now are in the midst of a house hunt and are living with friends until we find our own place. We would love your prayers for finding a house where we can host lots of college gatherings! We are trusting that God will lead us to the place that is right for us. 

If you are up in the Dallas area at any point, give us a call. We’d love to show you around UTD! 

83 New Christians!

The BSM Freshman Orientation Worship Team 

Yet again, the Lord decided to move in a big way at HBU's 2017 Freshmen Orientations. e gospel was presented at each of the four orientation worship sessions and a total of 83 soon-to-be freshmen decided to make Christ the Lord and Savior of their lives! Many more students rededicated their life to Christ and others indicated that they would like to learn more about Christ. Immediately, our BSM leadership team began to personally follow up with each of these students to answer questions that they might have about their new faith and to let them know about discipleship, Freshmen Bible Study, and other ministries our BSM has in the Fall. We saw over 70 students come to faith in Christ the previous year, so this is proving to be a fruitful time to share the Gospel! Please be in prayer for these new Christians! 

A Joint Effort in Leeds, England

We had the honor of leading a joint HBU/UH BSM mission team of 10 students and BSM sta to Leeds, England the last two weeks of May to work with Anna S., an American serving as the international chaplain at the University of Leeds. Since the semester doesn’t end until mid June for UK students, the BSM team spent their time hosting outreach events (henna storying, free tea and co ee handouts, world map project, prayer walking, dorm visits, etc.) on three of the ve university campuses in Leeds. Our team focused on...

• Sharing the gospel with British and International University students.
• Doing ministry alongside Christian students and university ministers
• in Leeds.
• So ening the spiritual soil through fervent, expectant prayer/ prayer
• walking.
• Encouraging the long-term university ministry leaders in Leeds.
• Learning through experiencing a post Christian culture and ministry partnership in Leeds. ( is happened through staying with British host families, observing life in Leeds, participating in worship services from di erent Christian traditions, etc.)

Ministry in England is hard as it is a very post Christian culture. It’s even hard to get into the country as the border patrol is watching to shut down any religious groups. But God allowed us to get into a country (which is a pretty cool story in and of itself so feel free to ask us about it!) and spend two weeks joining what He is doing there. We counted up that our team was able to have spiritual, gospel conversations more than 150 times! Here are a few glimpse of what those encounters looked like! 

Over the course of several days in England, our team set up a world and UK map outside of the student union and the main taxi stand. We would ask student to place a pin in their hometown and then we would ask how we could pray for them and their hometown/home country. One day, a girl from Romania stopped at the map and she seemed very stressed. She was thrilled to represent her country and was excited to hear that Mark had visited her capital city a few years back. She shared that she had an exam in a few hours and was so scared that she would fail. She shared that she was a Christian, and I got to encourage her and get her a free cup of co ee. I o ered to pray for her right then, but she seemed very nervous about that. She did say she was touched that I would o er to pray for her, and she stayed and talked for about another 10 minutes. By the time she le , she seemed much calmer. I’m so thankful that God allowed me to encourage this Christian sister in her time of stress and to remind her that God sees her, understands what she is going through and is present with her. 

During our special impact trip, Anna (the international chaplain) introduced us to one of the students from Iraq. He is a PhD student who will be graduating in July, and he has been asking questions about Jesus during the last year. We had him over to our host family dinner the rst week we were in Leeds and we had a great time chatting about life, dreams and experiences in England. The next day, Mark, Anna and the student grabbed coffee and chatted about Jesus for more than five hours. The student initiated a second coffee time later that week and again the group chatted for several hours about Scripture and Jesus. The last day in England, the student invited us over to his apartment for Arabic coffee. He shared about his life in Iraq and his hopes for his country. Before we said our goodbyes, the student said he felt that he had known us for years even though it had been less than two weeks. Please pray for this Iraqi student to see that Jesus is God and is o ering salvation to him. 

A Growing Leadership Team at HBU

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One of the beautiful aspects of BSM is that our ministry is largely student lead! at means all of outreaches, Bible studies, retreats, etc. are organized and ran by student leaders. In order to serve on our leadership team, students commit to serving a total of 5 hours a week for BSM ministry. is breaks down to one hour for personal discipleship, one hour for discipling a younger student, one hour for serving in a ministry of their choice, one hour for leadership team meetings and two hours of evangelism/ outreach. Students leaders also commit to be actively involved in a local church, in addition to living a holy life. us, when a student commits to leadership team, they are making a big decision! It was therefore a wonderful surprise when over 25 freshmen accepted the invitation to show up to Freshmen Bible Study 30 minutes early to attend Leadership Training for the Spring semester! A er successfully completing leadership training, our 25+ freshmen attended our Spring Leadership retreat where our current student leaders welcomed them to the team. Upon signing our leadership covenant, these students will o cially join our leadership team this fall, bringing our team up to 50 students strong! 

Spring Break International Student Trip

Students and Staff on the Spring Break to Arkansas and East Texas 

The UH BSM took 16 of us (4 American Christians and 12 international students), and we joined with the Aggie BSM to form a group of 48 of us. We had students from China, Taiwan, India, Colombia, Saudi Arabia, Belarus and France. We spent three days hiking and exploring the Hot Springs, Arkansas area and then enjoyed a couple of days at Sky Ranch in East Texas. roughout the trip, we had devotional times where an American student led a short Discovery Bible Study. is started several great conversations about who God is and how we can have a relationship with him.

One day, a er the devotional, Anna*, a lady from Belarus, asked me why we let students teach the Bible. She explained that she came from an Eastern Orthodox background where the priest is the only person who can teach the Bible. rough this, I was able to share with her that when you trust Jesus that the Spirit of God comes to live inside you to teach you and guide you and give you understanding as you study the Bible. is led to a long conversation about a personal relationship with God and why we don't have to go through a priest for confession. At the end of the conversation, Anna* said she now has many things to think about. She mentioned she might pull out the Bible a friend gave her and read it. Anna* le a few weeks a er Spring Break to go back to her country for a few months, and I'm praying she will not forget what we talked about and that she will begin digging into Scripture for herself.

*Name changed for security purposes 

The Beginning of Fall 2016 - a new year of helping college students find The Way

So much as happened with our ministries over the past two months that we thought it would be best to give you a more in-depth look at what your support has helped make possible. Simply click on the photo below and your browser will take you to a Spark page that we created. This page will have numerous photos and blurbs on what has transpired over the past two months. It is a little longer than our normal snapshots, so grab a nice cup of coffee and a comfortable seat, scroll down the page and enjoy!
 

Click on the photo to launch the photo story about what's been happening with BSM efforts at UH and HBU! 

Seventy Salvations!

Top Picture: One of the orientation worship sessions!
Bottom Pictures: Patience and Brian, two students on our leadership team, calling to follow up with some of the new believers!

During the month of June we had 4 orientation sessions spread out over two weeks where future freshmen come to HBU for 2 days to get registered for classes and make arrangements for the fall. Our BSM and the Spiritual Life Department were able to interact with these freshmen through organization fairs and worship services each night of the orientations. During the worship service of our first orientation, we decided to give a gospel presentation since we had such a large group of future freshmen attend (around 200 students or so). We were completely caught off guard when 9 students decided to make Christ the Lord of their life that night! We decided to continue this for the remaining three worship sessions and each time, more people made decisions! By the end of the two weeks, we saw over 70 students come to faith in Christ, over double that number rededicated their life to Christ, and many others indicated that they were still seeking and would like to be contacted with further information.

This past week, students on our BSM leadership team have been personally calling every one of these students to let them know that we care for them and their new faith. We are following up with each student to let them know about the next steps, which include starting one-on-one discipleship when they get to campus, finding a church home, and getting plugged in to our weekly Bible studies. The follow-up calls have been very encouraging and we are so excited to get to play a part in helping these new believers grow in their faith. 

This whole experience has been very humbling. God moved in such a big way and it is a sobering reminder to us that there are so many students, even at a Christian university, that are longing for The Savior.

-Mark

A Gateway City Learning Experience

Top Picture: The Texas team serving with Global Gates.
Bottom Picture: Henna outreach at a park in Jamaica, NY. We used Henna designs to tell Bible stories to the Muslim and Hindu ladies at the park. 

Much of the Summer at BSM is about planning and prepping for the fall. Since many students are away from campus, the days are not as full of discipleship groups, leaving us time to become better equipped ourselves. This last week, I had the opportunity to participate in a cross-cultural training and mission week hosted by Global Gates in New York City. Global Gates is a church planting group that focuses on Gateway Cities, large North American cities where people groups from the ends of the earth now reside. I joined five college students from Texas and the associate director at the Aggie BSM to be part of a Sifting Week. This means that each morning we went through training on how to share the gospel and disciple people in cross-cultural settings and then in the afternoon, we would go out and share what we had learned with others in the community. 

Our team focused on reaching out to Jamaica, a neighborhood in Queens that is predominantly comprised of people from Bangladesh and Guyana. Global Gates has a list of apartments with Hindu and Muslim residents, and our goal was to break into small teams of 2 or 3 and knock on these doors to host a survey to learn how Global Gates could better serve the community. In the process, we were able to share the gospel with many people. Some politely turned us down, but others listened and engaged in spiritual conversations about Jesus. Our hope was to find people of peace interested in the gospel and then connect them back to Global Gates church planters. 

You can engage the world by traveling the New York City area and engaging other gateway cities like Houston, San Francisco, LA, Chicago, and Toronto! I learned so much this past week and am excited to take many of the teachings back to the BSM students. Now I just have to be patient since I won't get to share this with the students until they are back on campus in early August! 

- Kaitlin 

Spring 2016 in Review!

I can't believe the Spring semester finished up last week! Where did the months go? Mark and I are so thankful for the time we have had with the students in the UH and HBU BSMs this school year. God has done so much and we are filled with joy because He provided us the opportunity to walk with students seeking Him and also to share His love with so many others on our campuses. 

To give you a glimpse of all that's happened this semester, we wanted to share a few photos with you. Enjoy! 

BSM at Houston Baptist University 

Summit 2015

Summit is our state-wide leadership training for the campus missionary interns and students serving on the state leadership team. Top Photo- Mark got to lead and help train a small group of students who served on the 2015 state leadership team.

Bottom Photo- These are all of the state lead team students and campus missionary interns for 2015!

2015-2016 HBU BSM Staff

This is our HBU BSM Staff for 2015-2016. From left to right: Selena, my campus missionary, myself (Mark), then Sebastian, my volunteer intern, and then Jeru, our student intern/state lead team student.

Fuego

Fuego is our monthly night of worship, led by Refuge, our student worship band. On this particular night, a student made the decision to follow Christ! 

Free Lunch!

One of the best way to minister to college students is with free food! Free Lunch (aka Commuter Lunch) is our weekly luncheon held every Tuesday at the commuter lounge. We have local area churches provide the food and share about their church with around 250 students each week.

Coffee Outreach

Coffee outreach is one of three outreach options we challenge our students to commit to each week. At Coffee Outreach, we set up a table in the middle of campus, offer free coffee and start conversations with people about their thoughts on Christ.

A fun surprise!

One of my awesome students surprised me with an authentic high tea! Jasmine (middle right) is originally from England and knew that I loved English Tea time!

Fun at Beach Reach

During our Spring Break, I (Mark) led a team of HBU and UH students to South Padre Island for our Beach Reach mission trip. In this photo I am enjoying lunch with a few of the crazy kids on my team.

Beach Reach 2016

During our Spring Break, I (Mark) led a team of HBU and UH students to South Padre Island for our Beach Reach mission trip. This is our entire team!

Freshmen Bible Study Fun

One of the most important weekly gatherings we have is our Freshmen Bible Study. At Freshmen Bible Study we have about 30 freshmen gather together for a goofy ice-breaker game, I introduce the week's lesson, and then we break into 3 small groups led by upperclassmen. In this photo, our game of the week is a paper airplane battle!

Our Leadership Team!

This is our leadership team for the upcoming 2016-2017 school year. In this photo, we had just finished up an afternoon planning meeting where our new freshmen leadership team students joined our existing leadership team to plan for the Fall semester.

Covenant Fellows

One of the neat things I get to lead at HBU is a special program for future, vocational ministers, called Covenant Fellows. In this program, I get to disciple, minister to, and equip future ministers! These are my 2015-2016 Freshmen Covenant Fellows students.

BSM at the University of Houston

Chinese New Year celebration

At our weekly BSM/Bridges International Hangout, we often have cultural celebrations, allowing students to share their special holidays with the group. In February, the Chinese students hosted a Chinese New Year celebration complete with Chinese food, and activities like making dumplings, drawing calligraphy and learning Chinese etiquette. 

Girls' Retreat

At the end of February, many of the girls in the BSM traveled to Canyon Lakes, TX for a weekend of rest, relaxing, Bible study, community and lots of laughter! 

International Girls' Night

In March, we BSM staff sent the boys bowling during one of the International Hangout Nights, and we girls stayed at the BSM for a night of girliness! One of the volunteers is a professional photographer and she taught us how to pose so that we look good in any picture. We also enjoyed manicures, henna and lots of chocolate treats. 

Houston Rodeo

One of the ways we serve international students is to guide them through American culture. One of the fun ways we do this is to take students to the Houston Rodeo and Livestock show where they can experience Western culture first hand. Here, I introduced a student from India to a longhorn cow! 

Spring Break International Trip to Big Bend

During Spring Break, the UH BSM partnered with the Aggie BSM to take a group of 33 students and staff on a trip to West Texas. There we enjoyed star gazing, horseback riding, hiking, and much more for several days. It was a special experience as we shared many deep heart conversations during these days.

Campfire

During Spring Break, we stayed at a dude ranch in West Texas. One of the special experiences was a night of cowboy poetry complete with s'more making around the campfire. 

Easter Party

My favorite celebration we get to host for international students in Easter Party. Because Jesus is my life, I get so excited to introduce students to this holiday that is so connected to this. A lovely family offered their home for an Easter egg hunt and potluck dinner. During the evening, we then get to share the meaning of the holiday. The ladies in the picture are just a few friends who enjoyed the celebration.

Nowruz - Persian New Year Celebration

In April, several Iranian students hosted a Nowruz celebration, introducing us to Persian food, traditions and dancing!

English Club

Each week we host two Conversational English Clubs to help international students with questions they have about American culture and American idioms. This picture shows a few of the students and scholars who attend the Wednesday morning English Club. 

Hangout Celebration

At the last BSM/Bridges Hangout of the year, we introduced a new international student lead team that will plan and carry out the efforts of hangout in the next school year. This group of 10 students did a great job of decorating, planning and hosting the year-end party! We're looking forward to working with this group next year! 

Lovely ladies

At the BSM student banquet, we had a Hawaiian celebration. The evening was so special as we celebrated what God had done in our lives throughout the year and then honored the graduates and those serving on summer missions. 

2016 BSM Seniors

This year, we had a wonderful group of seniors. Pictured here are those who made it to the BSM banquet! I'm so thankful for the ways these students have invested in the the BSM efforts, and they will be greatly missed as they move on to the next season. 

Incredible Joy

Discipleship is at the core of BSM life. Each year, I get to walk with a handful of young women who serve on our leadership team or who are part of the BSM in discipleship relationships. This is one of my absolute favorite aspects of my week. This year, I got to walk with these five incredible BSM ladies - Rebekah, Bethany, Reggie, Paige and Jiwoo. We met with each one of them each week, sharing our lives, taling about what God is teaching us, praying for each other and our campus and laughing so much! I was here to shepherd these ladies through the ups and downs of college life, but in reality, I think these ladies gave just as much back to me, caring for my heart and walk with Jesus as well! These ladies are God's gift to me and they bring me such incredible joy.

At our BSM Hawaiian party at the end of April, these ladies completely surprised me with a special gift. They made me my very own cookbook filled with their favorite recipes and lots of special notes. On this day, I was supposed to be honoring them as three were graduating just a few days later. But again, they cared for me, encouraging me in such a special way! If you are a follower of Jesus and have never been discipled or discipled someone else, I encourage you to do this. It will be one of the best choices you will make in your life! There is nothing like learning from others and then in return pouring our your life to help shepherd others as they pursue a life of following Jesus!

A Wonderful Gift

So April 9th was my birthday. I (Mark) will usually not make a big to-do about it, but leave it to the college students to not miss a beat! They lured me up to my office that week for a surprise, albeit eclectic birthday party! It was truly a special day!

I wanted to give you a glimpse of some of the wonderful students that we have the pleasure of working with every week. Each of these students that you see here are plugged into a local church, meet weekly with someone for discipleship, share the gospel through one of our weekly outreaches, attended one of our spring break mission trips, and will be serving on the leadership team next semester. These are just some of the students that your financial support and prayer have impacted. Kaitlin and I get a front row view of your support and prayer being brought into action by the Lord, and that is a wonderful gift.

Thanks for all you do!

Prayer requests:

1. As you have likely heard, there are many in and around Houston that have been affected by flooding. Kaitlin and I are fine and the universities in Houston have been closed the past two days to keep the students, faculty and staff safe. Nevertheless, please keep Houston in your prayers as the city recovers from all the damage.

2. There will be a banquet on Thursday night to benefit the Houston Area BSMs. Pray for the Lord to draw more people into partnership with the BSMs in Houston!

3. We are about 3 weeks away from the end of the semester. Pray for Kaitlin and I to finish up the school year well.

-Mark and Kaitlin