Campus Crusade to Dispatch 400 New Overseas Missionaries
The recent college graduates have postponed any post-college plans such as starting a career to participate in one year STINTs, an acrononym for Short Term International mission assignments.
For many other campus ministries, August is a month when students participate in domestic and overseas summer mission trips, but for Campus Crusade for Christ, it is a month when 400 recent college graduates will be dispatched for overseas for one year.
The recent college graduates have postponed any post-college plans, such as starting a career, to participate in one year STINTs, an acrononym for Short Term International mission assignments. They will be ministering to college students in 27 countries on 6 continents.
"I'm excited that so many students desire to spend a year of their lives investing in eternal things," said Mark Gauthier, National Director of Campus Crusade's U.S. Campus Ministry. "Our vision has always been, reach the students today, win the world tomorrow. We're trying to do all that we can to work with our partners in the world to create environments on campuses where students can learn what it means to be a follower of Christ."
Get Our Latest News for FREE
All STINT missionaries will first attend a briefing in Colorado from August 17-23 before departing to their mission destinations including Argentina, Brazil, Chile, Australia, Asia, Italy, France, Spain, United Kingdom, Japan, and Russia, among others.
“It’s such a privilege,” exclaimed Emily Aldridge, a 2005 graduate of the University of Kentucky heading to Russia. “I’ve visited Russia and I love the Russian people. I’m bringing a message of ultimate and eternal hope for the people there.”
The University of Kentucky has partnered East Carolina University to start a new ministry in Saratov, Russia. They sent their first summer project team there two years ago but this year their first STINT team will evangelize there. The STINT team includes both one-year missionary interns and leaders of the international campus staff who plan on staying there at least 5 years.
Other U.S. universities participating in the STINT program also form partnerships with each other to start a new ministry in a new location. The goals of the partnership is to send an initial team to the location, establish a residential team, set up national leaders, and then send nationals to other locations.
According to the Campus Crusade for Christ website, the stages of a partnership are International Summer Projects (1-4 years), STINT Teams (1-5) years, and International Campus Staff (a resident team for a minimum of 5 years), National Staff and eventually a ministry that is sending laborers to another location.
"We are partnering with our national ministries to help establish and grow the ministry on their campuses," said Keith Bubalo, National Director of Campus Crusade for Christ’s Worldwide Student Network (WSN). "In a few years, their graduates will be leaders influencing their own nations. Together, we are bringing the reality of Jesus to the university students of the world.”
While serving overseas, missionaries' main focus will be evangelism. Missionaries will belong to a team responsible for a specific region. They may take language classes and build relationships with nationals which will lead to opportunities for sharing Jesus Christ. The teams will live on apartments or dorms near their targeted campuses and meet often to pray and hold ministry-related events together.
“College students share many similarities the world over,” explained Bubalo, who is also responsible for sending the new missionaries. “English is often spoken helping our STINTers to quickly connect."
To ensure they can spend the most time they can on evangelistic activities, "each of the new missionaries has raised about $30,000 in donations from friends and family, as well as local churches and businesses to pay for their travel, living and ministry expenses," reported CCCI. "Altogether, the 400 STINTers have seen more than $ 12 million given or pledged."
The U.S. Campus Ministry of Campus Crusade for Christ is active on 1298 campuses around America. Since 1993 it has established partnerships with 350 international campuses through its Worldwide Student Network.
