“Even with so many fish, the nets did not break.”  (John 21:11)

After a busy August, the Columbus Campus staff used September to get down to business running weekly Bible discussion groups and meeting with students one-on-one.  We have 20 Bible discussion groups that have started, with over 120 students attending and 40 volunteers helping.  Since the school year started, we have heard of at least four International students putting their faith in Christ: two from China, one from the Middle East and one from India.  Praise God!

So far this school year, we have connected with 948 International students, with the help of 336 volunteers.  These images show where the students come from (the grayscale background helps identify where the students are from).  It is always exciting to see so many areas of the world connecting with IFI.  

Wen Cao, our OSU Campus Ministry Director, recently completed a review of the student demographic data we receive from OSU and determined that 89% of the international students at OSU come from unreached or hard to reach countries.  This fall, we have had fewer Chinese students engaging with IFI, which has made the diversity much more apparent at our activities and events and confirms the direction God had given me over the summer to launch some ethnic focused teams.

IFI held its first African Night Party on September 12.  We had about 20 students participate. It was fun for me to meet students from so many countries and to try African foods and dances.  We laughed a lot and made some great new friends.

Through the years, our Columbus location has had periods where there were more African students engaging in our activities.  It appears that time has come again. Over the summer, several former students from Africa that work in Columbus approached us and asked if they could get involved in serving students again.  We also have two interns in our ISEED program who are helping us reach out to African students, along with two of the IFI National team staff who are from Africa. I was also excited to help launch a Hispanic Team with a kickoff barbeque hosted by Columbus Team minister, Fabiola Jara!

The hands of Jesus are being extended to students from a wide range of backgrounds. And though I'm excited and grateful for the progress we've made and maintained in establishing these focus teams, there is more work to be done. That means more hands are needed.

I ask you to consider taking the opportunity to get involved with what God is doing through these teams, especially if He is leading you to pray. Here the a few needs to focus your prayers:

• Chinese Friendship Team
  • This is the most fully functioning ethnic team.  We have 6+ Chinese staff on the Columbus team who have been helping us serve this large population at OSU.
  • Pray for the wisdom and favor that are needed for this team to engage with the Chinese students.  New pressure from the Chinese government has many students concerned and fearful about participating in religious activities.
• Loving Indians Friendship Team
  • The Indian Friendship team has had one part-time staff person facilitating for two years.  We just hired a second part-time staff person from a Hindu background to begin raising funds to start her position.  We are looking for six more staff members and dozens of volunteers for this team.
  • This team has a growing impact and very positive reputation with the Indian community at OSU. Read about a powerful experience had by Danny Walker, staff leader for the Loving Indians Team in Columbus.
• Muslim Friendship Team
  • The Muslim Friendship team has been around a while but we have had challenges with changes in the volunteer leadership team.
  • Pray for God to bring several staff people to this team so that we can see more consistency in serving this vitally important community.
• African Friendship Team
  • This is one of the newest teams.  It has been 10 years since we have had a functioning team.  We thank God for the two ISEED interns helping this year.  Please pray and ask God to provide some staff and key volunteers to keep this team engaged.
• Hispanic Friendship Team
  • We have had dreams for about 15 years to have a Spanish speaking outreach team and Bible discussion groups.   Please pray and ask God to provide some staff and key volunteers to keep this team engaged.
• European Friendship Team 
  • As I was praying about various teams, I remembered that we have had students from Europe engage with IFI through the years. But because so many Americans are immigrants from Europe, those students can get lost.  I believe God wants us to have a team that would focus on identifying and engaging these European students.

Get more information about joining one of these Ethnic friendship teams here!