By Christine Hoover
I ventured out to the grocery store this past Sunday afternoon and found the aisles clogged, much like the streets, restaurants, and stores all over my city.
In this I rejoice because it means the college students are back in our little college town, returning to another semester of studies or perhaps their very first semester away from home. Although it means clogged thoroughfares and long lines at the stores closest to campus, I love living in a college town, interacting with students, and serving at a church that values these students. This is why: my college years were pivotal years of spiritual growth, career direction, and relationship decisions. College students, like I was, are ripe for becoming spiritually alive. When we invest in them, we are influencing future influencers.
On Sunday, they indeed appeared in herds, many of them looking scared and uncertain. I spoke to many of them, welcoming them to our city and our church, reassuring those who are new to college. But oh how I wish I could have pulled each of them aside to exhort them to use these years wisely. If I could have, this is what I would have said and what I will say to them as I get the chance:
_______________________
Christine Hoover is the author of The Church Planting Wife: Help and Hope for Her Heart. She has contributed to the Desiring God blog, The Gospel Coalition, In(courage), and Christianity Today, and blogs for ministry wives at www.GraceCoversMe.com. Christine and her husband Kyle, a church planting pastor, have three boys.
You, too, can help support the ministry of CBMW. We are a non-profit organization that is fully-funded by individual gifts and ministry partnerships. Your contribution will go directly toward the production of more gospel-centered, church-equipping resources.
This new curriculum is aimed at Christians who are facing challenging questions with the rise of LGBT ideology on topics like homosexuality, transgenderism, gender dysphoria, intersex conditions, preferred pronouns, and more. The study is broken down into eight chapters that guide readers through the Bible’s teaching on gender, sexuality, and marriage. Male & Female He Created Them gives Christians with a biblical foundation that starts in Genesis 1 and 2 with God’s good design in making mankind male and female in His image.
Male & Female He Created Them: A Study on Gender, Sexuality, & Marriage can be purchased online at Christian Book, Christian Focus, Amazon, and Barnes & Noble.