It's our time...

For all of its issues, York ( see earlier blog ) is one of the most influential and far reaching institutions to be found anywhere. Add to its nearly 55,000 students over sixty thousand students at the University of Toronto, twenty thousand plus at Ryerson University and many tens of thousands in other university and college campuses dotted throughout the GTA the opportunity and challenge afforded is almost overwhelming…

As I think and pray about the campus, the words reverbrate through my soul. I am NOT OK with this! I am not ok with the way things are. I AM NOT OK!  I can't be.

The reason I dove into coordinating this work is not only due to my experience but because I honestly believe that it is time for our Fellowship to weigh in.. big time.

So, let's make it clear. I am talking about the PAOC. Many are those who are shocked to find that we do campus ministry. They are even more shocked that we often do it really well. More shocked still to find that we are doing it all over the country.

Allow me to be bold enough to say the words that have been alive in my heart for several years.


It’s our time. The time is now.


This could sound like arrogance. I pray not. It is an emerging sense  of responsibility and role. It is the recognition of an opportunity - a word often used to translate a meaningful greek NT word 'kairos'.  The ancients recognized 'kairoi' as key hinge moments that determined 'fate'. It corresponds to the English sense of 'timing' or 'season', which is an opportune time which demands a response.

Yet, here is an honest assessment. We don’t do it well enough.


We can do more and/or better. We must. When I walk through the huge institutions that swallow our young like Molech of old, I am physically affected. I am not being overly dramatic, here. I feel the weight of the challenge.  


 Institutions like York rise like Goliath and loudly taunt God’s people to do something. Anything.....

The assumption is that the parachurch organizations which  continue to serve us so well have it all taken care of. Yet, on almost all campuses across the nation there are less than three percent of the student population involved in a Christian group of any kind whatsoever. In many places it is much less. Much, much less.....

Add in all of the other worthy groups and organizations involved in campus ministry in our nation to our own efforts and the truth be told... all of our combined efforts fall stunningly short of what is needed.

We have a challenge and an opportunity before us. Engage the campus. Do it with the experience and resources we have as a movement. Whether it is planting churches, providing chaplains, starting student clubs, developing church ministries that actually reach out onto campus and/or developing commercial projects that reach the campus , we can leverage the experience of those who have done it well and who are still growing.

I believe we can have it all. Intellectual integrity. Biblical and theological soundness. And the power of the Holy Spirit. We can do it in a way that is contextually aware, creative and that reveals the servant heart of Jesus. To my mind this is 'normative' Christianity.

What we cannot do is be OK with the way things are...